Part 7 Chapter 11

"What a marvelous, sweet and unhappy woman!" he was thinking, as he stepped out into the frosty air with Stepan Arkadyevitch.

"Well, didn't I tell you?" said Stepan Arkadyevitch, seeing that Levin had been completely won over.

"Yes," said Levin dreamily, "an extraordinary woman! It's not her cleverness, but she has such wonderful depth of feeling. I'm awfully¹ sorry for her!"

"Now, please God everything will soon be settled. Well, well, don't be hard on people in future," said Stepan Arkadyevitch, opening the carriage door. "Good-bye; we don't go the same way."

Still thinking of Anna, of everything, even the simplest phrase in their conversation with her, and recalling the minutest changes in her expression, entering more and more into her position, and feeling sympathy for her, Levin reached home.

At home Kouzma told Levin that Katerina Alexandrovna was quite well, and that her sisters had not long been gone, and he handed him two letters. Levin read them at once in the hall, that he might not over look them later. One was from Sokolov, his bailiff. Sokolov wrote that the corn could not be sold, that it was fetching only five and a half roubles, and that more than that could not be got for it. The other letter was from his sister. She scolded him for her business being still unsettled.

"Well, we must sell it at five and a half if we can't get more," Levin decided² the first question, which had always before seemed such a weighty one, with extraordinary facility on the spot. "It's extraordinary how all one's time is taken up here," he thought, considering the second letter. He felt himself to blame for not having got done what his sister had asked him to do for her. "Today, again, I've not been to the court, but today I've certainly not had time." And resolving that he would not fail to do it next day, he went up to his wife. As he went in, Levin rapidly ran through mentally the day he had spent. All the events of the day were conversations, conversations he had heard and taken part in. All the conversations were upon subjects which, if he had been alone at home, he would never have taken up, but here they were very interesting. And all these conversations were right enough, only in two places there was something not quite right. One was what he had said about the carp, the other was something not "quite the thing" in the tender sympathy he was feeling for Anna.

Levin found his wife low-spirited and dull. The dinner of the three sisters had gone off very well, but then they had waited and waited for him, all of them had felt dull, the sisters had departed, and she had been left alone.

"Well, and what have you been doing?" she asked him, looking straight into his eyes, which shone with rather a suspicious brightness. But that she might not prevent his telling her everything, she concealed³ her close scrutiny⁴ of him, and with an approving smile listened to his account of how he had spent the evening.

"Well, I'm very glad I met Vronsky. I felt quite at ease and natural with him. You understand, I shall try not to see him, but I'm glad that this awkwardness is all over," he said, and remembering that by way of trying not to see him, he had immediately gone to call on Anna, he blushed. "We talk about the peasants drinking; I don't know which drinks most, the peasantry or our own class; the peasants do on holidays, but..."

But Kitty took not the slightest interest in discussing the drinking habits of the peasants. She saw that he blushed, and she wanted to know why.

"Well, and then where did you go?"

"Stiva urged me awfully to go and see Anna Arkadyevna."

And as he said this, Levin blushed even more, and his doubts as to whether he had done right in going to see Anna were settled once for all. He knew now that he ought not to have done so.

Kitty's eyes opened in a curious way and gleamed at Anna's name, but controlling herself with an effort, she concealed her emotion and deceived him.

"Oh!" was all she said.

"I'm sure you won't be angry at my going. Stiva begged me to, and Dolly wished it," Levin went on.

"Oh, no!" she said, but he saw in her eyes a constraint⁵ that boded⁶ him no good.

"She is a very sweet, very, very unhappy, good woman," he said, telling her about Anna, her occupations, and what she had told him to say to her.

"Yes, of course, she is very much to be pitied," said Kitty, when he had finished. "Whom was your letter from?"

He told her, and believing in her calm tone, he went to change his coat.

Coming back, he found Kitty in the same easy chair. When he went up to her, she glanced at him and broke into sobs⁷.

"What? what is it?" he asked, knowing beforehand what.

"You're in love with that hateful woman; she has bewitched you! I saw it in your eyes. Yes, yes! What can it all lead to? You were drinking at the club, drinking and gambling⁸, and then you went...to her of all people! No, we must go away.... I shall go away tomorrow."

It was a long while before Levin could soothe⁹ his wife. At last he succeeded in calming her, only by confessing that a feeling of pity, in conjunction with the wine he had drunk, had been too much for him, that he had succumbed¹⁰ to Anna's artful influence, and that he would avoid her. One thing he did with more sincerity¹¹ confess to was that living so long in Moscow, a life of nothing but conversation, eating and drinking, he was degenerating¹². They talked till three o'clock in the morning. Only at three o'clock were they sufficiently¹³ reconciled to be able to go to sleep.

1 awfully   

adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地

参考例句：

• Agriculture was awfully neglected in the past.过去农业遭到严重忽视。
• I've been feeling awfully bad about it.对这我一直感到很难受。

2 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

3 concealed   

a.隐藏的，隐蔽的

参考例句：

• The paintings were concealed beneath a thick layer of plaster. 那些画被隐藏在厚厚的灰泥层下面。
• I think he had a gun concealed about his person. 我认为他当时身上藏有一支枪。

4 scrutiny   

n.详细检查，仔细观察

参考例句：

• His work looks all right,but it will not bear scrutiny.他的工作似乎很好，但是经不起仔细检查。
• Few wives in their forties can weather such a scrutiny.很少年过四十的妻子经得起这么仔细的观察。

5 constraint   

n.(on)约束，限制；限制(或约束)性的事物

参考例句：

• The boy felt constraint in her presence.那男孩在她面前感到局促不安。
• The lack of capital is major constraint on activities in the informal sector.资本短缺也是影响非正规部门生产经营的一个重要制约因素。

6 boded   

v.预示，预告，预言( bode的过去式和过去分词 )；等待，停留( bide的过去分词 )；居住；（过去式用bided）等待

参考例句：

• The beginning of that summer boded ill. 夏季一开始就来势不善。 来自辞典例句

7 sobs   

啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• She was struggling to suppress her sobs. 她拼命不让自己哭出来。
• She burst into a convulsive sobs. 她突然抽泣起来。

8 gambling   

n.赌博；投机

参考例句：

• They have won a lot of money through gambling.他们赌博赢了很多钱。
• The men have been gambling away all night.那些人赌了整整一夜。

9 soothe   

v.安慰；使平静；使减轻；缓和；奉承

参考例句：

• I've managed to soothe him down a bit.我想方设法使他平静了一点。
• This medicine should soothe your sore throat.这种药会减轻你的喉痛。

10 succumbed   

不再抵抗（诱惑、疾病、攻击等）( succumb的过去式和过去分词 )； 屈从； 被压垮； 死

参考例句：

• The town succumbed after a short siege. 该城被围困不久即告失守。
• After an artillery bombardment lasting several days the town finally succumbed. 在持续炮轰数日后，该城终于屈服了。

11 sincerity   

n.真诚，诚意；真实

参考例句：

• His sincerity added much more authority to the story.他的真诚更增加了故事的说服力。
• He tried hard to satisfy me of his sincerity.他竭力让我了解他的诚意。

12 degenerating   

衰退，堕落，退化( degenerate的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• He denied that some young people today were degenerating. 他否认现在某些青年在堕落。
• Young people of today are not degenerating. 今天的青年并没有在变坏。

13 sufficiently   

adv.足够地，充分地

参考例句：

• It turned out he had not insured the house sufficiently.原来他没有给房屋投足保险。
• The new policy was sufficiently elastic to accommodate both views.新政策充分灵活地适用两种观点。