Page 178 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

her eyes, and the smile of happiness curved her red lips.
she seemed to make an effort to control herself, to try not
to show these signs of delight, but they came out on her
face of themselves. ‘But what of him?’ Kitty looked at him

and was filled with terror. What was pictured so clearly to
Kitty in the mirror of Anna’s face she saw in him. What
had become of his always self-possessed resolute manner,
and the carelessly serene expression of his face? Now every
time he turned to her, he bent his head, as though he
would have fallen at her feet, and in his eyes there was
nothing but humble submission and dread. ‘I would not
offend you,’ his eyes seemed every time to be saying, ‘but
I want to save myself, and I don’t know how.’ On his face
was a look such as Kitty have never seen before.
They were speaking of common acquaintances,
keeping up the most trivial conversation, but to Kitty it
seemed that every word they said was determining their
fate and hers. And strange it was that they were actually
talking of how absurd Ivan Ivanovitch was with his
French, and how the Eletsky girl might have made a better
match, yet these words had all the while consequence for
them, and they were feeling just as Kitty did. The whole
ball, the whole world, everything seemed lost in fog in
Kitty’s soul. Nothing but the stern discipline of her

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