Page 935 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

Chapter 22

Stepan Arkadyevitch, with the same somewhat solemn
expression with which he used to take his presidential
chair at his board, walked into Alexey Alexandrovitch’s
room. Alexey Alexandrovitch was walking about his room
with his hands behind his back, thinking of just what
Stepan Arkadyevitch had been discussing with his wife.
‘I’m not interrupting you?’ said Stepan Arkadyevitch,
on the sight of his brother-in-law becoming suddenly
aware of a sense of embarrassment unusual with him. To
conceal this embarrassment he took out a cigarette case he
had just bought that opened in a new way, and sniffing the
leather, took a cigarette out of it.
‘No. Do you want anything?’ Alexey Alexandrovitch
asked without eagerness.
‘Yes, I wished...I wanted...yes, I wanted to talk to you,’
said Stepan Arkadyevitch, with surprise aware of an
unaccustomed timidity.
This feeling was so unexpected and so strange that he
did not believe it was the voice of conscience telling him
that what he was meaning to do was wrong.

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