第22章

There are people who, on meeting a successful rival, no matter in what, are at once disposed to turn their backs on everything good in him, and to see only what is bad. There are people who, on the contrary, desire above all to find in that successful rival the qualities by which he has worsted them, and seek with a throbbing ache at heart only what is good. Levin belonged to the second class. But he had no difficulty in finding what was good and attractive in Vronsky. It was apparent at the first glance. Vronsky was a squarely built, dark man, not very tall, with a good-humored, handsome and exceedingly calm and firm face. Everything about his face and figure, from his short-cropped black hair and freshly shaven chin down to his loosely fitting, brand-new uniform, was simple and at the same time elegant. Making way for the lady who had come in, Vronsky went up to the Princess and then to Kitty.

As he approached her, his beautiful eyes shone with an especially tender light, and with a faint, happy and modestly triumphant smile (so it seemed to Levin), bowing carefully and respectfully over her, he held out his small broad hand to her.

Greeting and saying a few words to everyone, he sat down without once glancing at Levin, who had never taken his eyes off him.

`Let me introduce you,' said the Princess, indicating Levin. `Constantin Dmitrievich Levin, Count Alexei Kirillovich Vronsky.'

Vronsky got up and, looking cordially at Levin, shook hands with him.

`I believe I was to have dined with you this winter,' he said, smiling his simple and open smile; `but you had unexpectedly left for the country.'

`Constantin Dmitrievich despises and hates the town, and us townspeople,'

said Countess Nordstone.

`My words must make a deep impression on you, since you remember them so well,' said Levin, and, suddenly becoming conscious that he had said just the same thing before, he reddened.

Vronsky looked at Levin and Countess Nordstone, and smiled.

`Are you always in the country?' he inquired. `I should think it must be dull in the winter.'

`It's not dull if one has work to do; besides, one's not dull by oneself,' Levin replied abruptly.

`I am fond of the country,' said Vronsky, noticing, yet affecting not to notice, Levin's tone.

`But I hope, Count, you would not consent to live in the country always,' said Countess Nordstone.

`I don't know; I have never tried for long. I experienced a queer feeling once,' he went on. `I never longed so for the country - Russian country, with bast shoes and peasants - as when I was spending a winter with my mother in Nice. Nice itself is dull enough, you know. And, indeed, Naples and Sorrento are only pleasant for a short time. And it's just there that Russia comes back to one's mind most vividly, and especially the country.

It's as though...'

He talked on, addressing both Kitty and Levin, turning his serene, friendly eyes from one to the other, and saying obviously just what came into his head.

Noticing that Countess Nordstone wanted to say something, he stopped short without finishing what he had begun, and listened attentively to her.

The conversation did not flag for an instant, so that the old Princess, who always kept in reserve, in case a subject should be lacking, two heavy guns - the classical and professional education, and universal military service - had not to move out either of them, while Countess Nordstone had no chance of chaffing Levin.

Levin wanted to, and could not, take part in the general conversation;saying to himself every instant, `Now go,' he still did not go, as though waiting for something.

The conversation fell upon table turning and spirits, and Countess Nordstone, who believed in spiritualism, began to describe the miracles she had seen.

`Ah, Countess, you really must take me; for pity's sake do take me to see them! I have never seen anything extraordinary, though I am always on the lookout for it everywhere,' said Vronsky, smiling.

`Very well - next Saturday,' answered Countess Nordstone. `But you, Constantin Dmitrievich - are you a believer?' she asked Levin.

`Why do you ask me? You know what I shall say.'

`But I want to hear your opinion.'

`My opinion,' answered Levin, `is merely that this table turning proves that educated society - so called - is no higher than the peasants.

They believe in the evil eye, and in witchcraft and conjurations, while we...'

`Oh, then you aren't a believer?'

`I can't believe, Countess.'

`But if I've seen for myself?'

`The peasant women, too, tell us they have seen hobgoblins.'

`Then you think I tell a lie?'

And she laughed a mirthless laugh.

`Oh, no, Masha, Constantin Dmitrievich merely said he could not believe,' said Kitty, blushing for Levin, and Levin saw this, and, still more exasperated, would have answered; but Vronsky with his bright frank smile rushed to the support of the conversation, which was threatening to become disagreeable.

`You do not admit the possibility at all?' he queried. `But why not? We admit the existence of electricity, of which we know nothing. Why should there not be some new force, still unknown to us, which...'

`When electricity was discovered,' Levin interrupted hurriedly, `it was only the phenomenon that was discovered, and it was unknown from what it proceeded and what were its effects, and ages passed before its applications were conceived. But the spiritualists, on the contrary, have begun with tables writing for them, and spirits appearing to them, and have only later started saying that it is an unknown force.'

Vronsky listened attentively to Levin, as he always did listen, obviously interested in his words.

`Yes, but the spiritualists say we don't know at present what this force is, but there is a force, and these are the conditions in which it acts. Let the scientific men find out what the force consists of. No, I don't see why there should not be a new force, if it...'