Читать книгу Anna Karenina (Maude Translation, Unabridged and Annotated) - Leo Tolstoy - Страница 17

WHEN they entered the restaurant Levin could not help noticing something peculiar in his friend’s expression, a kind of suppressed radiance in his face and whole figure. Oblonsky took off his overcoat, and with his hat on one side walked into the dining-room, giving his orders to the Tartar waiters, in their swallowtail coats, with napkins under their arms, who attached themselves to him. Bowing right and left to his acquaintances who, here as elsewhere, greeted him joyfully, he passed on to the buffet, drank a glass of vodka and ate a bit of fish as hors d’œuvre, and said something to the painted Frenchwoman, bedecked with ribbons and lace, who sat at a little counter — something that made even this Frenchwoman burst into frank laughter.

Levin did not take any vodka, simply because that Frenchwoman — made up, as it seemed to him, of false hair, powder, and toilet vinegar — was offensive to him. He moved away from her as from some dirty place. His whole soul was filled with Kitty’s image, and his eyes shone with a smile of triumph and happiness.

‘This way, please your Excellency! This way — no one will disturb your Excellency here,’ said a specially officious waiter, an old white-headed Tartar, so wide in the hips that the tails of his coat separated behind.

‘If you please, your Excellency,’ he said, turning to Levin and as a mark of respect to Oblonsky paying attention to his guest. In a moment he had spread a fresh cloth on a round table already covered with a cloth beneath a bronze chandelier, moved two velvet chairs to the table, and stood with a napkin and menu awaiting the order.

‘If your Excellency would like a private room, one will be vacant in a few moments. Prince Golitzin is there with a lady. We’ve some fresh oysters in, sir.’

‘Ah — oysters!’ Oblonsky paused and considered.

‘Shall we change our plan, Levin?’ he said, with his finger on the bill of fare and his face expressing serious perplexity. ‘But are the oysters really good? Now be careful …’

‘Real Flensburg, your Excellency! We’ve no Ostend ones.’

‘They may be Flensburg, but are they fresh?’

‘They only arrived yesterday.’

‘Well then, shall we begin with oysters and change the plan of our dinner, eh?’

‘I don’t mind. I like buckwheat porridge and cabbage-soup best, but they don’t have those things here.’

‘Would you like Buckwheat à la Russe?’ said the Tartar, stooping over Levin like a nurse over a child.

‘No — joking apart, whatever you choose will suit me, I’ve been skating and I’m hungry! Don’t think that I do not appreciate your choice,’ he added, noticing a dissatisfied look on Oblonsky’s face. ‘I shall be glad of a good dinner.’

‘I should think so! Say what you like, it is one of the pleasures of life!’ said Oblonsky. ‘Well then, my good fellow, bring us two — or that will be too little, … three dozen oysters, and vegetable soup …’

‘Printanier,’ chimed in the waiter.

But Oblonsky evidently did not wish to give him the pleasure of calling the dishes by their French names.

‘… vegetable, you know. Then turbot with thick sauce; then … roast beef (and mind it’s good!); and then capon, shall we say? Yes. And stewed fruit.’

The waiter, remembering Oblonsky’s way of calling the items on the French menu by their Russian names, did not repeat the words after him, but afterwards allowed himself the pleasure of repeating the whole of the order according to the menu: ‘Potage printanier, turbot, sauce Beaumarchais, poularde à l’estragon, macédoine de fruits …’ and immediately, as if moved by springs, he put down the bill of fare in one cardboard cover, and seizing another containing the wine-list held it out to Oblonsky.

‘What shall we have to drink?’

‘Whatever you like, only not too much … Champagne!’ said Levin.

‘What, to begin with? However, why not? You like the white seal?’

‘Cachet blanc,’ chimed in the waiter.

‘Yes, bring us that with the oysters, and then we’ll see.’

‘Yes, sir, and what sort of table wine?’

‘Nuit … no, let’s have the classic Chablis.’

‘Yes sir. And your special cheese?’

‘Well, yes — parmesan. Or do you prefer some other kind?’

‘No, I really don’t care,’ said Levin, unable to restrain a smile.

The Tartar darted off, his coat-tails flying; and five minutes later rushed in again, with a dish of opened oysters in pearly shells and a bottle between his fingers.

Oblonsky crumpled his starched napkin and pushed a corner of it inside his waistcoat, then, with his arms comfortably on the table, attacked the oysters.

‘Not bad,’ he said, pulling the quivering oysters out of their pearly shells with a silver fork, and swallowing one after another. ‘Not bad,’ he repeated, lifting his moist and glittering eyes now to Levin, now to the Tartar.

Levin could eat oysters, though he preferred bread and cheese. But it gave him more pleasure to watch Oblonsky. Even the Tartar, who having drawn the cork and poured the sparkling wine into the thin wide glasses was straightening his white tie, glanced with a smile of evident pleasure at Oblonsky.

‘You don’t care much for oysters?’ said Oblonsky, emptying his champagne glass — ‘or perhaps you’re thinking of something else. Eh?’

He wanted Levin to be in good spirits. But Levin, if not exactly in bad spirits, felt constrained. The feelings that filled his heart made him ill at ease and uncomfortable in this restaurant with its private rooms where men took women to dine. Everything seemed offensive: these bronzes, mirrors, gaslights and Tartar waiters. He was afraid of soiling that which filled his soul.

‘I? Yes, I am preoccupied — and besides, all this makes me feel constrained,’ he said. ‘You can’t imagine how strange it all seems to me who live in the country, — like the nails of that gentleman I saw at your place.’

‘Yes, I noticed that poor Grinevich’s nails interested you greatly,’ said Oblonsky.

‘I can’t help it,’ replied Levin. ‘Put yourself in my place — look at it from a country fellow’s point of view! We try to get our hands into a state convenient to work with, and for that purpose we cut our nails and sometimes roll up our sleeves. But here people purposely let their nails grow until they begin to curl, and have little saucers for studs to make it quite impossible for them to use their hands!’

Oblonsky smiled merrily.

‘Yes, it is a sign that rough work is unnecessary to him. He works with his mind …’

‘Possibly; but still it seems to me strange that while we country people try to get over our meals as quickly as we can, so as to be able to get on with our work, here you and I try to make our meal last as long as possible, and therefore eat oysters.’

‘Well, of course,’ said Oblonsky. ‘The aim of civilization is to enable us to get enjoyment out of everything.’

‘Well, if that is its aim, I’d rather be a savage.’

‘You are a savage as it is. All you Levins are savages.’

Levin sighed. He remembered his brother Nicholas and frowned, feeling ashamed and distressed; but Oblonsky started a subject which at once distracted his thoughts.

‘Well, are you going to see our people tonight? The Shcherbatskys, I mean,’ he said, pushing away the rough and now empty oyster shells and drawing the cheese toward him, while his eyes glittered significantly.

‘Yes, certainly I shall go. Though the Princess appeared to ask me rather unwillingly.’

‘Not a bit of it! What humbug! It’s just her manner … Come, bring us that soup, my good fellow! … It’s her grande dame manner,’ said Oblonsky. ‘I shall come too, but I must first go to a musical rehearsal at the Countess Bonin’s. What a strange fellow you are, though! How do you explain your sudden departure from Moscow? The Shcherbatskys asked me again and again, just as if I ought to know all about you. Yet all I know is that you never do things as anyone else does!’

‘Yes,’ said Levin slowly and with agitation. ‘You are right, I am a savage. Only my savagery lies not in having gone away then, but rather in having come back now. I have now come …’

‘Oh, what a lucky fellow you are!’ interrupted Oblonsky, looking straight into his eyes.

‘Why?’

‘ “Fiery steeds by” something “brands

I can always recognize;

Youths in love at once I know,

By the look that lights their eyes!” ’

declaimed Oblonsky. ‘You have everything before you!’

‘And you — have you everything behind you?’

‘No, not behind me, but you have the future and I have the present; and even that only half-and-half!’

‘Why?’

‘Oh, things are rather bad… . However, I don’t want to talk about myself, and besides it’s impossible to explain everything,’ said Oblonsky. ‘Well, and why have you come to Moscow? … Here, take this away!’ he shouted to the Tartar.

‘Don’t you guess?’ answered Levin, the light shining deep in his eyes as he gazed steadily at Oblonsky.

‘I do, but I can’t begin to speak about it, — by which you can judge whether my guess is right or wrong,’ said Oblonsky, looking at him with a subtle smile.

‘Well, and what do you say to it?’ asked Levin with a trembling voice, feeling that all the muscles of his face were quivering. ‘What do you think of it?’

Oblonsky slowly drank his glass of Chablis, his eyes fixed on Levin.

‘There is nothing I should like better,’ said he, ‘nothing! It is the best that could happen.’

‘But are you not making a mistake? Do you know what we are talking about?’ said Levin, peering into his interlocutor’s face. ‘You think it possible?’

‘I think so. Why shouldn’t it be?’

‘No, do you really think it is possible? No, you must tell me all you really think! And suppose … suppose a refusal is in store for me? … I am even certain …’

‘Why do you think so?’ said Oblonsky, smiling at Levin’s excitement.

‘Well, sometimes it seems so to me. You know, that would he terrible both for her and for me.’

‘Oh no! In any case there’s nothing in it terrible for the girl. Every girl is proud of an offer.’

‘Yes, every girl, but not she.’

Oblonsky smiled. He understood that feeling of Levin’s so well, knew that for Levin all the girls in the world were divided into two classes: one class included all the girls in the world except her, and they had all the usual human failings and were very ordinary girls; while the other class — herself alone — had no weaknesses and was superior to all humanity.

‘Wait a bit: you must take some sauce,’ said Oblonsky, stopping Levin’s hand that was pushing away the sauceboat.

Levin obediently helped himself to sauce, but would not let Oblonsky eat.

‘No, wait, wait!’ he said. ‘Understand that for me it is a question of life and death. I have never spoken to anyone about it, and can speak to no one else about it. Now you and I are quite different in everything — in tastes and views and everything — but I know you like me and understand me, and so I am awfully fond of you. But for God’s sake be quite frank with me!’

‘I am telling you what I think,’ said Oblonsky smiling. ‘And I’ll tell you something more. My wife is a most wonderful woman …’ He sighed, remembering his relations with his wife; then after a minute’s pause he continued: ‘She has the gift of clairvoyance. She sees people through and through! But more than that, she knows what is going to happen especially in regard to marriages. For instance, she predicted that the Shakovskaya girl would marry Brenteln. No one would believe it, but as it turned out she was right. And she is — on your side.’

‘How do you know?’

‘In this way — she not only likes you, but says that Kitty is sure to be your wife.’

At these words a sudden smile brightened Levin’s face, the kind of smile that is not far from tears of tenderness.

‘She says that?’ he cried. ‘I have always thought her a jewel, your wife! But enough — enough about it!’ and he got up.

‘All right, but sit down!’

But Levin could not sit still. He strode up and down the little cage of a room blinking to force back his tears, and only when he had succeeded did he sit down again.

‘Try and realize,’ he said, ‘that this is not love. I have been in love but this is not the same thing. It is not my feeling but some external power that has seized me. I went away, you know, because I had come to the conclusion that it was impossible — you understand? Because such happiness does not exist on earth. But I have struggled with myself and found that without that there’s no life for me. And it must be decided …’

‘Then why did you go away?’

‘Wait a moment! Oh, what a crowd of ideas! How many things I have to ask! Listen. You can’t imagine what you have done for me by saying what you did! I am so happy that I’m acting meanly. I’ve forgotten everything. I heard to-day about my brother Nicholas … he’s here, you know … and I forgot all about him. It seems to me as if he too were happy. It is like madness! But there is one awful thing about it. You who are married, know the feeling … it is awful that we — who are comparatively old and have pasts … not of love but of sin … suddenly we come into close intimacy with a pure innocent being! That is disgusting, and therefore one can’t help feeling oneself unworthy.’

‘Well, there haven’t been many sins in your past!’

‘Ah, but all the same,’ said Levin, ‘looking back at my life, I tremble and curse and bitterly regret… . Yes!’

‘What’s to be done? That’s the way the world is made,’ said Oblonsky.

‘My one consolation is that prayer that I like so much: “Not according to my deserts but according to Thy mercy!” And she too can only forgive me that way.’