Page 912 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

forward with an expression of an intense effort of thought,
he stood with the revolver in his hand, motionless,
thinking.
‘Of course,’ he said to himself, as though a logical,

continuous, and clear chain of reasoning had brought him
to an indubitable conclusion. In reality this ‘of course,’
that seemed convincing to him, was simply the result of
exactly the same circle of memories and images through
which he had passed ten times already during the last
hour—memories of happiness lost forever. There was the
same conception of the senselessness of everything to
come in life, the same consciousness of humiliation. Even
the sequence of these images and emotions was the same.
‘Of course,’ he repeated, when for the third time his
thought passed again round the same spellbound circle of
memories and images, and pulling the revolver to the left
side of his chest, and clutching it vigorously with his
whole hand, as it were, squeezing it in his fist, he pulled
the trigger. He did not hear the sound of the shot, but a
violent blow on his chest sent him reeling. He tried to
clutch at the edge of the table, dropped the revolver,
staggered, and sat down on the ground, looking about him
in astonishment. He did not recognize his room, looking
up from the ground, at the bent legs of the table, at the

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