Page 1380 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

curls, he will find something better still, just as my
disgusting, pitiful, and charming husband does.’
Dolly made no answer, she merely sighed. Anna
noticed this sigh, indicating dissent, and she went on. In

her armory she had other arguments so strong that no
answer could be made to them.
‘Do you say that it’s not right? But you must consider,’
she went on; ‘you forget my position. How can I desire
children? I’m not speaking of the suffering, I’m not afraid
of that. Think only, what are my children to be? Ill-fated
children, who will have to bear a stranger’s name. For the
very fact of their birth they will be forced to be ashamed
of their mother, their father, their birth.’
‘But that is just why a divorce is necessary.’ But Anna
did not hear her. She longed to give utterance to all the
arguments with which she had so many times convinced
herself.
‘What is reason given me for, if I am not to use it to
avoid bringing unhappy beings into the world!’ She
looked at Dolly, but without waiting for a reply she went
on:
‘I should always feel I had wronged these unhappy
children,’ she said. ‘If they are not, at any rate they are not

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