ministers, merchants, and adjutant-generals, so that many
of his intimate chums were to be found at the extreme ends of
the social ladder, and would have been very much surprised
to learn that they had, through the medium of Oblonsky,
something in common. He was the familiar friend of everyone with whom he took a glass of champagne, and he took
a glass of champagne with everyone, and when in consequence he met any of his disreputable chums, as he used in
joke to call many of his friends, in the presence of his subordinates, he well knew how, with his characteristic tact, to
diminish the disagreeable impression made on them. Levin
was not a disreputable chum, but Oblonsky, with his ready
tact, felt that Levin fancied he might not care to show his
intimacy with him before his subordinates, and so he made
haste to take him off into his room.
Levin was almost of the same age as Oblonsky; their intimacy did not rest merely on champagne. Levin had been
the friend and companion of his early youth. They were fond
of one another in spite of the difference of their characters
and tastes, as friends are fond of one another who have been
together in early youth. But in spite of this, each of them—
as is often the way with men who have selected careers of
different kinds—though in discussion he would even justify the other’s career, in his heart despised it. It seemed to
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each of them that the life he led himself was the only real
life, and the life led by his friend was a mere phantasm.
Oblonsky could not restrain a slight mocking smile at the
sight of Levin. How often he had seen him come up to Moscow from the country where he was doing something, but
what precisely Stepan Arkadyevitch could never quite make
out, and indeed he took no interest in the matter. Levin arrived in Moscow always excited and in a hurry, rather ill at
ease and irritated by his own want of ease, and for the most
part with a perfectly new, unexpected view of things. Stepan Arkadyevitch laughed at this, and liked it. In the same
way Levin in his heart despised the town mode of life of his
friend, and his official duties, which he laughed at, and regarded as trifling. But the difference was that Oblonsky, as
he was doing the same as every one did, laughed complacently and good-humoredly, while Levin laughed without
complacency and sometimes angrily.
‘We have long been expecting you,’ said Stepan
Arkadyevitch, going into his room and letting Levin’s hand
go as though to show that here all danger was over. ‘I am
very, very glad to see you,’ he went on. ‘Well, how are you?
Eh? When did you come?’
Levin was silent, looking at the unknown faces of Oblonsky’s two companions, and especially at the hand of
the elegant Grinevitch, which had such long white fingers,
such long yellow filbert-shaped nails, and such huge shining studs on the shirt-cuff, that apparently they absorbed
all his attention, and allowed him no freedom of thought.
Oblonsky noticed this at once, and smiled.
33
‘Ah, to be sure, let me introduce you,’ he said. ‘My colleagues: Philip Ivanitch Nikitin, Mihail Stanislavitch
Grinevitch’—and turning to Levin—‘a district councilor, a
modern district councilman, a gymnast who lifts thirteen
stone with one hand, a cattle-breeder and sportsman, and
my friend, Konstantin Dmitrievitch Levin, the brother of
Sergey Ivanovitch Koznishev.’
‘Delighted,’ said the veteran.
‘I have the honor of knowing your brother, Sergey Ivanovitch,’ said Grinevitch, holding out his slender hand with
its long nails.
Levin frowned, shook hands coldly, and at once turned
to Oblonsky. Though he had a great respect for his halfbrother, an author well known to all Russia, he could not
endure it when people treated him not as Konstantin Levin,
but as the brother of the celebrated Koznishev.
‘No, I am no longer a district councilor. I have quarreled
with them all, and don’t go to the meetings any more,’ he
said, turning to Oblonsky.
‘You’ve been quick about it!’ said Oblonsky with a smile.
‘But how? why?’
‘It’s a long story. I will tell you some time,’ said Levin,
but he began telling him at once. ‘Well, to put it shortly, I
was convinced that nothing was really done by the district
councils, or ever could be,’ he began, as though some one
had just insulted him. ‘On one side it’s a plaything; they play
at being a parliament, and I’m neither young enough nor
old enough to find amusement in playthings; and on the
other side’ (he stammered) ‘it’s a means for the coterie of
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Anna Karenina
the district to make money. Formerly they had wardships,
courts of justice, now they have the district council—not in
the form of bribes, but in the form of unearned salary,’ he
said, as hotly as though someone of those present had opposed his opinion.
‘Aha! You’re in a new phase again, I see—a conservative,’
said Stepan Arkadyevitch. ‘However, we can go into that later.’
‘Yes, later. But I wanted to see you,’ said Levin, looking
with hatred at Grinevitch’s hand.
Stepan Arkadyevitch gave a scarcely perceptible smile.
‘How was it you used to say you would never wear European dress again?’ he said, scanning his new suit, obviously
cut by a French tailor. ‘Ah! I see: a new phase.’
Levin suddenly blushed, not as grown men blush, slightly, without being themselves aware of it, but as boys blush,
feeling that they are ridiculous through their shyness, and
consequently ashamed of it and blushing still more, almost
to the point of tears. And it was so strange to see this sensible, manly face in such a childish plight, that Oblonsky left
off looking at him.
‘Oh, where shall we meet? You know I want very much to
talk to you,’ said Levin.
Oblonsky seemed to ponder.
‘I’ll tell you what: let’s go to Gurin’s to lunch, and there
we can talk. I am free till three.’
‘No,’ answered Levin, after an instant’s thought, ‘I have
got to go on somewhere else.’
‘All right, then, let’s dine together.’
35
‘Dine together? But I have nothing very particular, only
a few words to say, and a question I want to ask you, and we
can have a talk afterwards.’
‘Well, say the few words, then, at once, and we’ll gossip
after dinner.’
‘Well, it’s this,’ said Levin; ‘but it’s of no importance,
though.’
His face all at once took an expression of anger from the
effort he was making to surmount his shyness.
‘What are the Shtcherbatskys doing? Everything as it
used to be?’ he said.
Stepan Arkadyevitch, who had long known that Levin
was in love with his sister-in-law, Kitty, gave a hardly perceptible smile, and his eyes sparkled merrily.
‘You said a few words, but I can’t answer in a few words,
because…. Excuse me a minute…’
A secretary came in, with respectful familiarity and the
modest consciousness, characteristic of every secretary,
of superiority to his chief in the knowledge of their business; he went up to Oblonsky with some papers, and began,
under pretense of asking a question, to explain some objection. Stepan Arkadyevitch, without hearing him out, laid
his hand genially on the secretary’s sleeve.
‘No, you do as I told you,’ he said, softening his words
with a smile, and with a brief explanation of his view of the
matter he turned away from the papers, and said: ‘So do it
that way, if you please, Zahar Nikititch.’
The secretary retired in confusion. During the consultation with the secretary Levin had completely recovered
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Anna Karenina
from his embarrassment. He was standing with his elbows
on the back of a chair, and on his face was a look of ironical attention.
‘I don’t understand it, I don’t understand it,’ he said.
‘What don’t you understand?’ said Oblonsky, smiling
as brightly as ever, and picking up a cigarette. He expected
some queer outburst from Levin.
‘I don’t understand what you are doing,’ said Levin,
shrugging his shoulders. ‘How can you do it seriously?’
‘Why not?’
‘Why, because there’s nothing in it.’
‘You think so, but we’re overwhelmed with work.’
‘On paper. But, there, you’ve a gift for it,’ added Levin.
‘That’s to say, you think there’s a lack of something in
me?’
‘Perhaps so,’ said Levin. ‘But all the same I admire your
grandeur, and am proud that I’ve a friend in such a great
person. You’ve not answered my question, though,’ he went
on, with a desperate effort looking Oblonsky straight in the
face.
‘Oh, that’s all very well. You wait a bit, and you’ll come to
this yourself. It’s very nice for you to have over six thousand
acres in the Karazinsky district, and such muscles, and the
freshness of a girl of twelve; still you’ll be one of us one day.
Yes, as to your question, there is no change, but it’s a pity
you’ve been away so long.’
‘Oh, why so?’ Levin queried, panic-stricken.
‘Oh, nothing,’ responded Oblonsky. ‘We’ll talk it over.
But what’s brought you up to town?’
37
‘Oh, we’ll talk about that, too, later on,’ said Levin, reddening again up to his ears.
‘All right. I see,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch. ‘I should ask
you to come to us, you know, but my wife’s not quite the
thing. But I tell you what; if you want to see them, they’re
sure now to be at the Zoological Gardens from four to five.
Kitty skates. You drive along there, and I’ll come and fetch
you, and we’ll go and dine somewhere together.’
‘Capital. So good-bye till then.’
‘Now mind, you’ll forget, I know you, or rush off home to
the country!’ Stepan Arkadyevitch called out laughing.
‘No, truly!’
And Levin went out of the room, only when he was in the
doorway remembering that he had forgotten to take leave of
Oblonsky’s colleagues.
‘That gentleman must be a man of great energy,’ said
Grinevitch, when Levin had gone away.
‘Yes, my dear boy,’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch, nodding
his head, ‘he’s a lucky fellow! Over six thousand acres in the
Karazinsky district; everything before him; and what youth
and vigor! Not like some of us.’
‘You have a great deal to complain of, haven’t you, Stepan
Arkadyevitch?’
‘Ah, yes, I’m in a poor way, a bad way,’ said Stepan
Arkadyevitch with a heavy sigh.
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Anna Karenina
Chapter 6
When Oblonsky asked Levin what had brought him
to town, Levin blushed, and was furious with himself for
blushing, because
