第134章

`But you must understand that I want nothing,' said Vronsky, `except to leave things just as they were.'

Serpukhovskoy got up and stood facing him.

`You said, leave things just as they were. I understand what that means. But listen: we're the same age, you've known a greater number of women perhaps than I have.' Serpukhovskoy's smile and gestures told Vronsky that he mustn't be afraid, that he would be tender and careful in touching the sore place. `But I'm married, and believe me, in getting to know one's wife thoroughly, if one loves her, as someone has said, one gets to know all women better than if one knew thousands of them.'

`We're coming directly!' Vronsky shouted to an officer, who looked into the room and called them to the colonel.

Vronsky was longing now to hear Serpukhovskoy to the end, and know what he would say to him.

`And here's my opinion for you. Women are the chief stumbling block in a man's career. It's hard to love a woman and do anything. There's only one way of having love conveniently without its being a hindrance - that's marriage. Now, how am I to tell you what I mean?' said Serpukhovskoy, who liked similes. `Wait, wait a minute! Yes, just as you can only carry a fardeau yet do something with your hands when the fardeau is tied on your back - and that's marriage. And that's what I felt when I was married.

My hands were suddenly set free. But if you drag that fardeau about with you without marriage, your hands will always be so full that you can do nothing. Look at Mazankov, at Krupov. They've ruined their careers for the sake of women.'

`What women!' said Vronsky, recalling the Frenchwoman and the actress with whom the two men he had mentioned were connected.

`The firmer the woman's footing in society, the worse it is. That's much the same as not merely carrying the fardeau in your arms, but tearing it away from someone else.'

`You have never loved,' Vronsky said softly, looking straight before him and thinking of Anna.

`Perhaps. But you remember what I've said to you. And another thing - women are all more materialistic than men. We make something immense out of love, but they are always terre-èa-terre. '

`Directly, directly!' he cried to a footman who came in. But the footman had not come to call them again, as he supposed. The footman brought Vronsky a note.

`A man brought it from Princess Tverskaia.'

Vronsky opened the letter, and flushed crimson.

`My head's begun to ache; I'm going home,' he said to Serpukhovskoy.

`Oh, good-by then. You give me carte blanche !'

`We'll talk about it later on; I'll look you up in Peterburg.'

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TOLSTOY: Anna Karenina Part 3, Chapter 22[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] Chapter 22 It was six o'clock already, and so, in order to be there quickly, and at the same time not to drive with his own horses, known to everyone, Vronsky got into Iashvin's hackney coach and told the coachman to drive as quickly as possible. It was a roomy, old-fashioned coach, with seats for four.

He sat in one corner, stretched his legs out on the front seat, and sank into deep thought.

A vague sense of the clearness to which his affairs had been brought, a vague recollection of the friendliness and flattery of Serpukhovskoy, who had considered him a man who was needed, and, most of all, the anticipation of the meeting before him - all blended into a general, joyous sense of life. This feeling was so strong that he could not help smiling. He dropped his legs, crossed one leg over the other knee, and, taking it in his hand, felt the springy muscle of the calf, where it had been grazed the day before by his fall, and, leaning back he drew several deep breaths.

`I'm happy, very happy!' he said to himself. He had often before had this sense of physical joy in his own body, but he had never felt so fond of himself, of his own body, as at that moment. He enjoyed the slight ache in his strong leg, he enjoyed the muscular sensation of movement in his chest as he breathed. The bright, cold August day, which had made Anna feel so hopeless, seemed to him keenly stimulating, and refreshed his face and neck that still tingled from the cold water. The scent of brilliantine on his mustaches struck him as particularly pleasant in the fresh air.

Everything he saw from the carriage window, everything in that cold pure air, in the pale light of the sunset, was as fresh, and gay, and strong as he was himself: the roofs of the houses shining in the rays of the setting sun, the sharp outlines of fences and angles of buildings, the figures of passers-by and carriages that met him now and then, the motionless green of the trees and grass, the fields with evenly drawn furrows of potatoes, and the slanting shadows that fell from the houses, and trees, and bushes, and even from the rows of potatoes - everything was bright like a pretty landscape freshly painted and varnished.

`Get on, get on!' he said to the driver, putting his head out of the window, and pulling a three-rouble note out of his pocket he handed it to the man as he looked round. The driver's hand fumbled with something at the lamp, the whip cracked, and the coach rolled rapidly along the smooth highroad.