Page 1603 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

‘Respect was invented to cover the empty place where
love should be. And if you don’t love me any more, it
would be better and more honest to say so.’
‘No, this is becoming unbearable!’ cried Vronsky,

getting up from his chair; and stopping short, facing her,
he said, speaking deliberately: ‘What do you try my
patience for?’ looking as though he might have said much
more, but was restraining himself. ‘It has limits.’
‘What do you mean by that?’ she cried, looking with
terror at the undisguised hatred in his whole face, and
especially in his cruel, menacing eyes
‘I mean to say...’ he was beginning, but he checked
himself. ‘I must ask what it is you want of me?’
‘What can I want? All I can want is that you should not
desert me, as you think of doing,’ she said, understanding
all he had not uttered. ‘But that I don’t want; that’s
secondary. I want love, and there is none. So then all is
over.’
She turned towards the door.
‘Stop! sto—op!’ said Vronsky, with no change in the
gloomy lines of his brows, though he held her by the
hand. ‘What is it all about? I said that we must put off
going for three days, and on that you told me I was lying,
that I was not an honorable man.’

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