Page 761 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

feeling of selfish disappointment vanished instantly and was
replaced by pity. Terrible as his brother Nikolay had been
before in his emaciation and sickliness, now he looked still
more emaciated, still more wasted. He was a skeleton

covered with skin.
He stood in the hall, jerking his long thin neck, and
pulling the scarf off it, and smiled a strange and pitiful
smile. When he saw that smile, submissive and humble,
Levin felt something clutching at his throat.
‘You see, I’ve come to you,’ said Nikolay in a thick
voice, never for one second taking his eyes off his
brother’s face. ‘I’ve been meaning to a long while, but I’ve
been unwell all the time. Now I’m ever so much better,’
he said, rubbing his beard with his big thin hands.
‘Yes, yes!’ answered Levin. And he felt still more
frightened when, kissing him, he felt with his lips the
dryness of his brother’s skin and saw close to him his big
eyes, full of a strange light.
A few weeks before, Konstantin Levin had written to
his brother that through the sale of the small part of the
property, that had remained undivided, there was a sum of
about two thousand roubles to come to him as his share.
Nikolay said that he had come now to take this money
and, what was more important, to stay a while in the old

760 of 1759