Alexei Alexandrovich, scowling with emotion, muttered something to himself, and made no answer. All that seemed so simple to Stepan Arkadyevich, Alexei Alexandrovich had thought over thousands of times. And, so far from being simple, it all seemed to him utterly impossible: divorce, the details of which he knew by this time, seemed to him now out of the question, because the sense of his own dignity and respect for religion forbade his taking upon himself a fictitious charge of adultery, and still more, suffering his wife, pardoned and beloved by him, to be caught in the fact and put to public shame. Divorce appeared to him impossible also on other, still more weighty grounds.
What would become of his son in case of a divorce? To leave him with his mother was out of the question. The divorced mother would have her own illegitimate family, in which his status as a stepson, and his education, would be probably bad. Keep him with him? He knew that would be an act of vengeance on his part, and that he did not desire. But, apart from this, what more than all made divorce seem impossible to Alexei Alexandrovich was that, by consenting to a divorce, he would be completely ruining Anna.
The saying of Darya Alexandrovna at Moscow, that in deciding on a divorce he was thinking of himself, and not considering that by this he would be ruining her irrevocably, had sunk into his heart. And connecting this saying with his forgiveness of her, with his devotion to the children, he understood it now in his own way. To consent to a divorce, to give her her freedom, meant in his thoughts to take from himself the last tie that bound him to life - the children whom he loved; and to take from her the last prop that kept her on the path of right, to thrust her down to her ruin. If she were divorced, he knew she would join her life to Vronsky's, and their tie would be an illegitimate and criminal one, since a wife, by the interpretation of the ecclesiastical law, could not marry while her husband was living.
`She will join him, and in a year or two he will throw her over, or she will form a new tie,' thought Alexei Alexandrovich. `And I, by agreeing to an unlawful divorce, shall be to blame for her ruin.' He had thought it all over hundreds of times, and was convinced that a divorce was not at all simple, as Stepan Arkadyevich had said, but was utterly impossible.
He did not believe a single word Stepan Arkadyevich said to him; to every word he had a thousand objections to make, but he listened to him, feeling that his words were the expression of that mighty brutal force which controlled his life, and to which he would have to submit.
`The only question is on what terms you agree to give her a divorce.
She does not want anything, does not dare ask you for anything - she leaves it all to your magnanimity.'
`My God, my God! What for?' thought Alexei Alexandrovich, remembering the details of divorce proceedings in which the husband took the blame on himself, and with just the same gesture with which Vronsky had done it, he hid his face in his hands in shame.
`You are troubled, I understand that. But if you think it over...'
`'And unto him that smiteth thee on the one cheek offer also the other; and him that taketh away thy cloak forbid not to take thy coat also,''
thought Alexei Alexandrovich.
`Yes, yes!' he cried in a shrill voice. `I will take the disgrace on myself, I will give up even my son, but... But wouldn't it be better to let it alone? Still, you may do as you like....'
And, turning away so that his brother-in-law could not see him, he sat down on a chair at the window. There was bitterness, there was shame in his heart, but with bitterness and shame he felt joy and emotion at the height of his own meekness.
Stepan Arkadyevich was touched. He was silent for a space.
`Alexei Alexandrovich, believe me, she appreciates your magnanimity,'
he said. `But it seems it was the will of God,' he added, and as he said it felt how foolish a remark it was, and with difficulty repressed a smile at his own foolishness.
Alexei Alexandrovich would have made some reply, but tears stopped him.
`This is an unhappy fatality, and one must accept it as such.
I accept the calamity as an accomplished fact, and am doing my best to help both her and you,' said Stepan Arkadyevich.
When he went out of his brother-in-law's room he was touched, but that did not prevent him from being glad he had successfully brought the matter to a conclusion, for he felt certain Alexei Alexandrovich would not go back on his words. To this satisfaction was added the fact that an idea had just struck him for a conundrum turning on his successful achievement - when the affair was over he would put it to his wife and most intimate friends. He tried this conundrum in two or three different ways. `But I'll work it out better than that,' he said to himself with a smile.
[Next Chapter] [Table of Contents]TOLSTOY: Anna Karenina Part 4, Chapter 23[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] Chapter 23 Vronsky's wound had been a dangerous one, though it did not touch the heart, and for several days he hovered between life and death. The first time he was able to speak, Varia, his brother's wife, was alone in the room.
`Varia,' he said, looking sternly at her, `I shot myself by accident.
And please never speak of it, and tell everyone so. Or else it's too ridiculous.'
Without answering his words, Varia bent over him, and with a delighted smile gazed into his face. His eyes were clear, not feverish; but their expression was stern.
`Thank God!' she said. `You're not in pain?'
`A little here,' he pointed to his breast.
