第43章

is it I, or some other woman?' She was afraid of yielding to this trance - but something was drawing her into it, and, at will, she could yield to it or resist it. She got up to rouse herself, and slipped off her plaid and the cape of warm dress. For a moment she regained her self-possession, and realized that the thin peasant who had come in wearing a long nankeen overcoat, with a button missing from it, was the fireman, that he was looking at the thermometer, that the wind and snow had burst in after him through the door; but then everything grew confused again.... That peasant with the long waist took to gnawing something within the wall; the little crone started stretching her legs the whole length of the car and filled it with a black cloud; then there was a dreadful screeching and banging, as though someone were being rent into pieces; then a red blaze blinded her eyes, and, at last, everything was screened by a wall. Anna felt that she had plunged downward. Yet all this was not terrible, but joyful. The voice of a man muffled up and covered with snow shouted something in her very ear. She arose and came to, realizing that they had come to a station, and that this was the conductor. She requested Annushka to hand her the cape she had taken off, and her shawl, put them on, and went toward the door.

`Do you wish to get out?' asked Annushka.

`Yes, I want to get a breath of air. It's very hot in here.'

And she opened the door. The blizzard and the wind rushed to meet her and began to contend with her for the door. And even this seemed joyful to her. She opened the door and stepped out. This seemed to be all that the wind had been lying in wait for; it set up a gleeful whistle and was about to snatch her up and whirl her away, but she clutched the cold doorpost and, holding on to her shawl, descended to the platform and the shelter of the car. The wind had been mighty on the steps, but on the platform, in the lee of the train, there was a lull. With enjoyment she drew deep breaths of the snowy, frosty air and, standing near the car, looked about the platform and the lighted station.

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TOLSTOY: Anna Karenina Part 1, Chapter 30[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] Chapter 30 The frightful storm raged and whistled between the wheels of the cars, along the posts, around the corner of the station. The cars, posts, people - everything in sight - were covered with snow on one side, and were getting more and more snowed under. For a moment there would come a lull in the storm, but then it would again swoop down with such gusts that it seemed impossible to withstand it. Meanwhile some men or other were dashing about, gaily talking to one another, making the boards of the platform creak and ceaselessly opening and shutting the big doors. A stooping human shadow glided by at her feet, and she heard a hammer tapping upon iron. `Let's have the telegram!' came an angry voice out of the stormy murk on the other side. `This way! No. 28!' other voices were also shouting, and muffled figures scurried by, plastered with snow. Two gentlemen passed by her, cigarettes glowing in their mouths. She drew in one more deep breath, and had just taken her hand out of her muff to grasp the doorpost and enter the car, when still another man in a military overcoat, quite close beside her, stepped between her and the flickering light of a lantern. She looked round, and the same instant recognized Vronsky's face. Putting his hand to the peak of his cap, he bowed to her and asked if there weren't anything she wanted, whether he could not be of some service to her? She gazed rather long at him, without any answer, and, in spite of the shadow in which he was standing, she saw (or fancied she saw) the expression both of his face and his eyes. It was again that expression of reverent rapture which had affected her so yesterday. More than once she had told herself during the past few days, and only just now, that Vronsky was for her only one of the hundreds of young men, forever exactly the same, that one meets everywhere;that she would never permit herself even to think of him; yet now at the first flush of meeting him, she was seized by an emotion of joyous pride.

She had no need to ask why he was here. She knew, as surely as if he had told her, that he was here only to be where she was.

`I didn't know you were going. And why are you going?' she said, letting fall the hand which had grasped the doorpost. And irrepressible joy and animation shone in her face.

`Why am I going?' he repeated, looking straight into her eyes.

`You know that I am going to be where you are,' he said; `I cannot do otherwise.'

And at this very point, as though it had overcome all obstacles, the wind scattered the snow from the car roofs, and began to flutter some sheet of iron it had torn off, while the low-pitched whistle of the engine set up a roar in front, dismal and lamenting. All the awesomeness of the blizzard now seemed still more splendid to her. He had uttered precisely what her soul yearned for, but which her reason dreaded. She made no answer, and in her face he beheld a struggle.

`Forgive me, if what I have said displeases you,' he said humbly.

He had spoken courteously, deferentially, yet so firmly, so obdurately that, for long, she could find no answer.

`What you say is wrong, and I beg of you, if you are a good man, to forget what you have said, even as I shall forget it,' she said at last.

`Not a single word of yours, nor a single gesture, shall I ever forget - nor could I forget....'