Darya Alexandrovna, meanwhile, after comforting the child and realizing from the sound of the carriage that he had left, retreated back into the bedroom. It was her only refuge from the domestic worries which besieged her as soon as she set foot outside. Even during the short time when she had come out to go into the nursery, the English governess and Matryona Filimonovna had managed to ask her several questions which could not be put off, and which she alone could answer: what should the children wear for their walk? Should they be given milk? Should another cook be sent for?
‘Oh, leave me, leave me alone!’ she said, and after coming back into the bedroom she sat down again in the same place where she had been talking to her husband, clenched her thin hands with the rings which kept slipping down her bony fingers, and started going over the whole of their previous conversation in her mind. ‘He has gone! But how has he left things with her?’ she thought. ‘Surely he can’t still be seeing her? Why didn’t I ask him? No, no, we can’t become intimate again. Even if we stay in the same house, we will be strangers. Forever strangers!’ she said, repeating that word she found so terrible with particular emphasis. ‘And how I loved him, Heavens, how I loved him! … How I loved him! And don’t I love him now? Don’t I love him even more than before? What is terrible, what is the main thing, is that …’ she began, but she did not finish her thought, because Matryona Filimonovna had poked her head round the door.
‘You should send for my brother,’ she said. ‘He will prepare dinner; otherwise the children won’t eat anything until six, like yesterday.’
‘Well, all right, I will come out in a minute and see to things. And has someone been sent for fresh milk?’
And Darya Alexandrovna immersed herself in the day’s chores and drowned her sorrows in them for a while.
5
STEPAN ARKADYICH had done well at school due to his natural abilities, but he was lazy and disobedient so had ended up near the bottom of his year, yet despite his always dissolute life, modest rank, and young age, he occupied a venerable and well-paid post as head of department in one of the Moscow government institutions.* He had obtained this post through his sister Anna’s husband, Alexey Alexandrovich Karenin, who occupied one of the key posts in the ministry to which the institution belonged; but if Karenin had not appointed his brother-in-law to this position, then a hundred other individuals, brothers, sisters, relatives, cousins, uncles, and aunts, would have helped Stiva Oblonsky obtain either this post or something similar, with a salary of about six thousand roubles, which he needed, since despite his wife’s ample means, his affairs were in a bad way.
Half of Moscow and Petersburg were Stepan Arkadyich’s relatives and friends. He had been born into the circle of people who were, or would become, the powerful of this world. One third were government figures, old men, and friends of his father, who had known him in baby clothes; another third were on intimate terms with him, while the third third were good acquaintances; consequently the purveyors of earthly blessings in the form of appointments, leases, concessions, and so forth were all friends of his and could not pass over one of their own; so Oblonsky did not need to exert himself too much in order to obtain a well-paid post; all he needed to do was not refuse, not be envious, not quarrel, and not take offence, which he would never have done anyway owing to his innate good nature. He would have found it ridiculous if he had been told that he would not obtain a post with the salary he needed, not least since he was not asking for anything excessive; he only wanted what his peers were getting, and he could perform the duties of that sort of position no worse than anyone else.
Stepan Arkadyich was not only loved by everyone who knew him for his kind, cheery disposition and undoubted honesty, but there was something in him, in his handsome, bright appearance, his shining eyes, his black brows, his hair, and his pink-and-white complexion, which had the physical effect of instilling friendliness and jollity in the people who met him. ‘Aha! Stiva! Oblonsky! Here he is!’ people would say almost invariably with a delighted smile when they met him. And even if it turned out after talking to him that nothing particularly delightful had taken place, as sometimes happened, they were just as delighted to run into him the following day, and the one after that.
Now into his third year as head of one of the institution’s offices in Moscow, Stepan Arkadyich had won not just the affection but also the respect of his colleagues, subordinates, superiors, and all those who came into contact with him. The principal qualities which had won Stepan Arkadyich this universal respect at work consisted firstly of his extraordinary forbearance towards people, which was based on an awareness of his own faults; secondly, his supremely liberal views, which were not of the kind he found in the newspapers but the kind he had in his blood, and led him to treat all people, whatever their position and rank, completely equally and in the same way; and thirdly—and most importantly—his complete indifference to whatever he was engaged in, as a result of which he never got carried away or made mistakes.
Once he had arrived at his place of work, Stepan Arkadyich proceeded with his portfolio to his small office, accompanied by a deferential porter, then put on his uniform and went into the main chamber. The copyists and clerks all stood up and bowed cheerily and respectfully. Stepan Arkadyich walked over to his place as briskly as always, shook hands with the members, and sat down. He cracked jokes and chatted for as long as was seemly, then got on with the proceedings. No one could do a better job than Stepan Arkadyich in setting the limits of the simplicity and formality necessary for the pleasant conduct of business. The secretary came up with some documents in that cheery and respectful manner shared by everyone in Stepan Arkadyich’s office, and said in the familiar liberal tone which Stepan Arkadyich had introduced:
‘We did after all manage to get the information from the Penza* regional government. Here it is, if you would care …’
‘You got it finally?’ said Stepan Arkadyich, marking a page with his finger; ‘Well, gentlemen …’ And the proceedings began.
‘If they only knew what a guilty boy their chairman was half an hour ago!’ he thought, inclining his head meaningfully as he listened to the report. And his eyes twinkled while the report was being read. Until two o’clock the proceedings were supposed to continue without a break, but at two o’clock there would be a break and lunch.
It was not yet two o’clock when the large glass doors of the chamber suddenly opened and someone entered. All the members sitting under the Tsar’s portrait and behind the symbol of imperial justice* looked round to the door, glad of the distraction; but the caretaker standing by the door immediately expelled the intruder and closed the glass door behind him.
When the case had been read, Stepan Arkadyich stretched as he stood up and, in deference to the liberality of the times, took out a cigarette in the chamber before proceeding to his office. Two of his comrades, the old campaigner Nikitin and the Gentleman of the Bedchamber* Grinevich, went out with him.
‘We will manage to finish after lunch,’ said Stepan Arkadyich.
‘We certainly will!’ said Nikitin.
‘That Fomin must be an utter rogue,’ said Grinevich about one of the people involved in the case which they were examining.
Stepan Arkadyich scowled at Grinevich’s words, thus letting him know that it was improper to make a premature judgement, and said nothing in reply.
‘Who was that who came in?’ he asked the caretaker.
‘Someone who sneaked in without permission the moment my back was turned, Your Excellency. He was asking for you. I told him: when the members come out, then …’