Page 109 - ANNA KARENINA
P. 109
Anna Karenina
‘I do like it when he looks down at me from the height
of his grandeur, or breaks off his learned conversation with
me because I’m a fool, or is condescending to me. I like
that so; to see him condescending! I am so glad he can’t
bear me,’ she used to say of him.
She was right, for Levin actually could not bear her,
and despised her for what she was proud of and regarded
as a fine characteristic—her nervousness, her delicate
contempt and indifference for everything coarse and
earthly.
The Countess Nordston and Levin got into that
relation with one another not seldom seen in society,
when two persons, who remain externally on friendly
terms, despise each other to such a degree that they cannot
even take each other seriously, and cannot even be
offended by each other.
The Countess Nordston pounced upon Levin at once.
‘Ah, Konstantin Dmitrievitch! So you’ve come back to
our corrupt Babylon,’ she said, giving him her tiny, yellow
hand, and recalling what he had chanced to say early in
the winter, that Moscow was a Babylon. ‘Come, is
Babylon reformed, or have you degenerated?’ she added,
glancing with a simper at Kitty.
108 of 1759
