Part Seven: Chapter 29

by Leo Tolstoy

　　Anna got into the carriage again in an even worse frame of mindthan when she set out from home. To her previous tortures wasadded now that sense of mortification and of being an outcastwhich she had felt so distinctly on meeting Kitty.

　　"Where to? Home?" asked Pyotr.

　　"Yes, home," she said, not even thinking now where she was going.

　　"How they looked at me as something dreadful, incomprehensible,and curious! What can he be telling the other with such warmth?"she thought, staring at two men who walked by. "Can one evertell anyone what one is feeling? I meant to tell Dolly, and it'sa good thing I didn't tell her. How pleased she would have beenat my misery! She would have concealed it, but her chief feelingwould have been delight at my being punished for the happinessshe envied me for. Kitty, she would have been even more pleased.How I can see through her! She knows I was more than usuallysweet to her husband. And she's jealous and hates me. And shedespises me. In her eyes I'm an immoral woman. If I were animmoral woman I could have made her husband fall in love with me...if I'd cared to. And, indeed, I did care to. There's someonewho's pleased with himself," she thought, as she saw a fat,rubicund gentleman coming towards her. He took her for anacquaintance, and lifted his glossy hat above his bald, glossyhead, and then perceived his mistake. "He thought he knew me.Well, he knows me as well as anyone in the world knows me. Idon't know myself. I know my appetites, as the French say. Theywant that dirty ice cream, that they do know for certain," shethought, looking at two boys stopping an ice cream seller, whotook a barrel off his head and began wiping his perspiring facewith a towel. "We all want what is sweet and nice. If notsweetmeats, then a dirty ice. And Kitty's the same--if notVronsky, then Levin. And she envies me, and hates me. And weall hate each other. I Kitty, Kitty me. Yes, that's the truth.'Tiutkin, coiffeur.' Je me fais coiffer par Tiutkin.... I'lltell him that when he comes," she thought and smiled. But thesame instant she remembered that she had no one now to tellanything amusing to. "And there's nothing amusing, nothingmirthful, really. It's all hateful. They're singing forvespers, and how carefully that merchant crosses himself! as ifhe were afraid of missing something. Why these churches and thissinging and this humbug? Simply to conceal that we all hate eachother like these cab drivers who are abusing each other soangrily. Yashvin says, 'He wants to strip me of my shirt, and Ihim of his.' Yes, that's the truth!"

　　She was plunged in these thoughts, which so engrossed her thatshe left off thinking of her own position, when the carriage drewup at the steps of her house. It was only when she saw theporter running out to meet her that she remembered she had sentthe note and the telegram

　　"Is there an answer?" she inquired.

　　"I'll see this minute," answered the porter, and glancing intohis room, he took out and gave her the thin square envelope of atelegram. "I can't come before ten o'clock.--Vronsky," sheread.

　　"And hasn't the messenger come back?"

　　"No," answered the porter.

　　"Then, since it's so, I know what I must do," she said, andfeeling a vague fury and craving for revenge rising up withinher, she ran upstairs. "I'll go to him myself. Before goingaway forever, I'll tell him all. Never have I hated anyone as Ihate that man!" she thought. Seeing his hat on the rack, sheshuddered with aversion. She did not consider that his telegramwas an answer to her telegram and that he had not yet receivedher note. She pictured him to herself as talking calmly to hismother and Princess Sorokina and rejoicing at her sufferings."Yes, I must go quickly," she said, not knowing yet where she wasgoing. She longed to get away as quickly as possible from thefeelings she had gone through in that awful house. The servants,the walls, the things in that house--all aroused repulsion andhatred in her and lay like a weight upon her.

　　"Yes, I must go to the railway station, and if he's not there,then go there and catch him." Anna looked at the railwaytimetable in the newspapers. An evening train went at twominutes past eight. "Yes, I shall be in time." She gave ordersfor the other horses to be put in the carriage, and packed in atraveling-bag the things needed for a few days. She knew shewould never come back here again.

　　Among the plans that came into her head she vaguely determinedthat after what would happen at the station or at the countess'shouse, she would go as far as the first town on the Nizhni roadand stop there.

　　Dinner was on the table; she went up, but the smell of the breadand cheese was enough to make her feel that all food wasdisgusting. She ordered the carriage and went out. The housethrew a shadow now right across the street, but it was a brightevening and still warm in the sunshine. Annushka, who came downwith her things, and Pyotr, who put the things in the carriage,and the coachman, evidently out of humor, were all hateful toher, and irritated her by their words and actions.

　　"I don't want you, Pyotr."

　　"But how about the ticket?"

　　"Well, as you like, it doesn't matter," she said crossly.

　　Pyotr jumped on the box, and putting his arms akimbo, told thecoachman to drive to the booking-office.