Anna Karenina - LimpidSoft

PART TWO CHAPTER 27
hers. He heard only her words and gave them only the direct sense they bore. And
he answered simply, though jestingly. There was nothing remarkable in all this conversation,
but never after could Anna recall this brief scene without an agonizing
pang of shame.
Seryozha came in preceded by his governess. If Alexey Alexandrovitch had allowed
himself to observe he would have noticed the timid and bewildered eyes with
which Seryozha glanced first at his father and then at his mother. But he would not
see anything, and he did not see it.
“Ah, the young man! He’s grown. Really, he’s getting quite a man. How are you,
young man?”
And he gave his hand to the scared child. Seryozha had been shy of his father
before, and now, ever since Alexey Alexandrovitch had taken to calling him young
man, and since that insoluble question had occurred to him whether Vronsky were a
friend or a foe, he avoided his father. He looked round towards his mother as though
seeking shelter. It was only with his mother that he was at ease. Meanwhile, Alexey
Alexandrovitch was holding his son by the shoulder while he was speaking to the
governess, and Seryozha was so miserably uncomfortable that Anna saw he was on
the point of tears.
Anna, who had flushed a little the instant her son came in, noticing that Seryozha
was uncomfortable, got up hurriedly, took Alexey Alexandrovitch’s hand from her
son’s shoulder, and kissing the boy, led him out onto the terrace, and quickly came
back.
“It’s time to start, though,” said she, glancing at her watch. “How is it Betsy
doesn’t come?...”
“Yes,” said Alexey Alexandrovitch, and getting up, he folded his hands and
cracked his fingers. “I’ve come to bring you some money, too, for nightingales, we
know, can’t live on fairy tales,” he said. “You want it, I expect?”
“No, I don’t...yes, I do,” she said, not looking at him, and crimsoning to the roots
of her hair. “But you’ll come back here after the races, I suppose?”
“Oh, yes!” answered Alexey Alexandrovitch. “And here’s the glory of Peterhof,
Princess Tverskaya,” he added, looking out of the window at the elegant English
carriage with the tiny seats placed extremely high. “What elegance! Charming! Well,
let us be starting too, then.”
Princess Tverskaya did not get out of her carriage, but her groom, in high boots, a
cape, and black hat, darted out at the entrance.
“I’m going; good-bye!” said Anna, and kissing her son, she went up to Alexey
Alexandrovitch and held out her hand to him. “It was ever so nice of you to come.”
Alexey Alexandrovitch kissed her hand.
“Well, au revoir, then! You’ll come back for some tea; that’s delightful!” she said,
and went out, gay and radiant. But as soon as she no longer saw him, she was aware
of the spot on her hand that his lips had touched, and she shuddered with repulsion.
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