Page 177 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

tired and begged for a rest. But as she was dancing the last
quadrille with one of the tiresome young men whom she
could not refuse, she chanced to be vis-a-vis with Vronsky
and Anna. She had not been near Anna again since the

beginning of the evening, and now again she saw her
suddenly quite new and surprising. She saw in her the
signs of that excitement of success she knew so well in
herself; she saw that she was intoxicated with the delighted
admiration she was exciting. She knew that feeling and
knew its signs, and saw them in Anna; saw the quivering,
flashing light in her eyes, and the smile of happiness and
excitement unconsciously playing on her lips, and the
deliberate grace, precision, and lightness of her
movements.
‘Who?’ she asked herself. ‘All or one?’ And not assisting
the harassed young man she was dancing with in the
conversation, the thread of which he had lost and could
not pick up again, she obeyed with external liveliness the
peremptory shouts of Korsunsky starting them all into the
grand round, and then into the chaine, and at the same
time she kept watch with a growing pang at her heart.
‘No, it’s not the admiration of the crowd has intoxicated
her, but the adoration of one. And that one? can it be he?’
Every time he spoke to Anna the joyous light flashed into

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