Page 1179 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

‘I should be very, very grateful to you,’ said Anna. ‘But
won’t you dine with us?’
Vronsky gave a hardly perceptible shrug. He was at a
complete loss to understand what Anna was about. What

had she brought the old Princess Oblonskaya home for,
what had she made Tushkevitch stay to dinner for, and,
most amazing of all, why was she sending him for a box?
Could she possibly think in her position of going to Patti’s
benefit, where all the circle of her acquaintances would
be? He looked at her with serious eyes, but she responded
with that defiant, half-mirthful, half-desperate look, the
meaning of which he could not comprehend. At dinner
Anna was in aggressively high spirits—she almost flirted
both with Tushkevitch and with Yashvin. When they got
up from dinner and Tushkevitch had gone to get a box at
the opera, Yashvin went to smoke, and Vronsky went
down with him to his own rooms. After sitting there for
some time he ran upstairs. Anna was already dressed in a
low-necked gown of light silk and velvet that she had had
made in Paris, and with costly white lace on her head,
framing her face, and particularly becoming, showing up
her dazzling beauty.
‘Are you really going to the theater?’ he said, trying not
to look at her.

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