ANNA KARENINA (Collector's Edition). Leo TolstoyЧитать онлайн книгу.
of activity in accord with its degree of development. There used to be slaves everywhere, then villeins; and we have labour paid in kind, and leaseholders, and hired labour: so what are you looking for?’
At these words Levin suddenly grew warm, for at the bottom of his heart he felt that it was true — true that he wished to balance between communism and the existing forms of life, and that this was hardly possible.
‘I am seeking for a way of making labour profitable for me and for the labourers,’ he answered hotly. ‘I want to establish …’
‘You do not want to establish anything. You simply want to be original, as you always have done, and to show that you are not just exploiting the peasants, but have ideas!’
‘You think so? Well, then, leave me alone!’ said Levin, and he felt that a muscle was uncontrollably quivering in his left cheek.
‘You have no convictions and never had any; you only want to flatter your self-esteem.’
‘Well, all right! But leave me alone.’
‘I will, and high time too! You can go to the devil! And I am sorry I came!’
However much Levin tried afterwards to pacify his brother, Nicholas would not listen to it, but said that it was much better for them to part. And Levin saw that life had become simply intolerable for his brother.
Nicholas had quite made up his mind to go. Constantine came to him again and in an unnatural manner asked his forgiveness if he had offended him in any way.
‘Ah, this is magnanimity!’ said Nicholas, and smiled. ‘If you wish to be in the right, I can let you have that pleasure. You are in the right: but all the same I shall go away.’
Only just before he left Nicholas kissed Constantine, and suddenly said with a strange and serious look at his brother, ‘Do not think too badly of me, Kostya!’ and his voice trembled.
These were the only sincere words that had passed between them. Levin understood that they were meant to say, ‘You see that I am in a bad way, and perhaps we shall not meet again.’ He understood this, and tears trembled in his eyes. He again kissed his brother, but he did not know what to answer.
Three days after his brother’s departure Levin left for abroad. He surprised young Shcherbatsky, Kitty’s cousin, whom he happened to meet at a railway station, by his moroseness.
‘What is the matter with you?’ asked Shcherbatsky.
‘Nothing much, but there is little to be happy about in this world.’
‘Little? You’d better come to Paris with me instead of going to some Mulhausen or other. You’ll see how jolly it will be!’
‘No, I have done with that; it is time for me to die.’
‘That is a fine thing!’ said Shcherbatsky, laughing. ‘I am only preparing to begin to live.’
‘Yes, I thought so too till lately; but now I know that I shall soon die.’
Levin was saying what of late he had really been thinking. He saw death and the approach of death in everything; but the work he had begun interested him all the more. After all, he had to live his life somehow, till death came. Everything for him was wrapped in darkness; but just because, of the darkness, feeling his work to be the only thread to guide him through that darkness, he seized upon it and clung to it with all his might.
PART FOUR
Chapter 1
THE Karenins, husband and wife, continued to live in the same house and to meet daily, but they were wholly estranged, Karenin made it a rule to see his wife every day, so as not to give the servants any grounds for making conjectures, but he avoided dining at home. Vronsky never came to the Karenins’ house, but Anna met him elsewhere and her husband knew it.
The situation was a torment to all three, and not one of them could have stood it for a single day but for the hope that it would change and that the whole matter was only a temporary, though painful, trial. Karenin expected the passion to pass, as everything passes; all would be forgotten and his name not dishonoured. Anna, who was responsible for the situation, and for whom among the three it was most painful bore it because she not only expected, but felt sure, that very soon everything would be settled and cleared up. She had not the least idea what would settle it, but was quite certain that it would now come very soon. Involuntarily submitting to her judgment, Vronsky too expected something, not dependent on him, to clear up all these difficulties.
In the middle of the winter he spent a very dull week. He had been chosen to act as guide to a foreign Prince, and was obliged