“Yes, but what is a girl to do who has no family?” put in Stepan
Arkadyevitch, thinking of Masha Tchibisova, whom he had had in his mind
all along, in sympathizing with Pestsov and supporting him.
“If the story of such a girl were thoroughly sifted, you would find she had
abandoned a family—her own or a sister’s, where she might have found a
woman’s duties,” Darya Alexandrovna broke in unexpectedly in a tone of
exasperation, probably suspecting what sort of girl Stepan Arkadyevitch
was thinking of.
“But we take our stand on principle as the ideal,” replied Pestsov in his
mellow bass. “Woman desires to have rights, to be independent, educated.
She is oppressed, humiliated by the consciousness of her disabilities.”
“And I’m oppressed and humiliated that they won’t engage me at the
Foundling,” the old prince said again, to the huge delight of Turovtsin, who
in his mirth dropped his asparagus with the thick end in the sauce.
Chapter 11
Everyone took part in the conversation except Kitty and Levin. At first,
when they were talking of the influence that one people has on another,
there rose to Levin’s mind what he had to say on the subject. But these
ideas, once of such importance in his eyes, seemed to come into his brain as
in a dream, and had now not the slightest interest for him. It even struck
him as strange that they should be so eager to talk of what was of no use to
anyone. Kitty, too, should, one would have supposed, have been interested
in what they were saying of the rights and education of women. How often
she had mused on the subject, thinking of her friend abroad, Varenka, of her
painful state of dependence, how often she had wondered about herself
what would become of her if she did not marry, and how often she had
argued with her sister about it! But it did not interest her at all. She and
Levin had a conversation of their own, yet not a conversation, but some sort
of mysterious communication, which brought them every moment nearer,
and stirred in both a sense of glad terror before the unknown into which
they were entering.
At first Levin, in answer to Kitty’s question how he could have seen her
last year in the carriage, told her how he had been coming home from the
mowing along the highroad and had met her.
“It was very, very early in the morning. You were probably only just
awake. Your mother was asleep in the corner. It was an exquisite morning. I
was walking along wondering who it could be in a four-in-hand? It was a
splendid set of four horses with bells, and in a second you flashed by, and I
saw you at the window—you were sitting like this, holding the strings of
your cap in both hands, and thinking awfully deeply about something,” he
said, smiling. “How I should like to know what you were thinking about
then! Something important?”
“Wasn’t I dreadfully untidy?” she wondered, but seeing the smile of
ecstasy these reminiscences called up, she felt that the impression she had
made had been very good. She blushed and laughed with delight; “Really I
don’t remember.”
“How nicely Turovtsin laughs!” said Levin, admiring his moist eyes and
shaking chest.
“Have you known him long?” asked Kitty.
“Oh, everyone knows him!”
“And I see you think he’s a horrid man?”
“Not horrid, but nothing in him.”
“Oh, you’re wrong! And you must give up thinking so directly!” said
Kitty. “I used to have a very poor opinion of him too, but he, he’s an
awfully nice and wonderfully good-hearted man. He has a heart of gold.”
“How could you find out what sort of heart he has?”
“We are great friends. I know him very well. Last winter, soon after …
you came to see us,” she said, with a guilty and at the same time confiding
smile, “all Dolly’s children had scarlet fever, and he happened to come and
see her. And only fancy,” she said in a whisper, “he felt so sorry for her that
he stayed and began to help her look after the children. Yes, and for three
weeks he stopped with them, and looked after the children like a nurse.”
“I am telling Konstantin Dmitrievitch about Turovtsin in the scarlet
fever,” she said, bending over to her sister.
