Throughout this time they sensed especially keenly the tension, the tugging to one side and the other, of the chain that bound them. Generally, that honeymoon - that is, the month following the wedding, from which, by tradition, Levin had expected so much - not only had no honey in it, but remained in both their memories as the most difficult and humiliating time of their life. They both tried equally in later life to cross out of their recollections all the ugly, shameful circumstances of that unhealthy time when they were rarely in a normal state, were rarely themselves.
Only in the third month of marriage, after their return from Moscow where they had gone for a month, did their life become smoother.
XV
They had only just come back from Moscow and were glad of their solitude. He was sitting at the desk in his study writing. She, in that dark lilac dress she had worn in the first days after their marriage and had now put on again, and which was especially memorable and dear to him, was sitting on the sofa, that same old leather sofa that had always stood in the study of Levin’s father and grandfather, and doing broderie anglaise. He thought and wrote, rejoicing all the while at the feeling of her presence. He had not given up work either on the estate or on his book, which was to explain the principles of a new way of farming; but as this work and thought had once appeared small and insignificant to him compared to the darkness that covered his whole life, so now, too, they appeared unimportant and small compared to the life flooded with the bright light of happiness that lay before him. He continued his occupations, but he now felt that the centre of gravity of his attention had shifted elsewhere, and owing to that he looked at his work quite differently and more clearly. Formerly his work had been a salvation from life for him. Formerly he had felt that without it his life would have been too bleak. But now this work was necessary to him so that life would not be so uniformly bright. Taking up his papers again, rereading what he had written, he was pleased to find that the thing was worth working on. It was new and useful. Many of his former thoughts seemed superfluous and extreme, but many gaps became clear to him as he refreshed the whole thing in his memory. He was now writing a new chapter on the reasons for the unprofitable state of agriculture in Russia. He maintained that Russia’s poverty came not only from an incorrect distribution of landed property and a false orientation, but had recently been contributed to by an alien civilization abnormally grafted on to Russia, particularly by the means of communication and the railways, entailing a centralization in cities, the development of luxury and, as a result of that, to the detriment of agriculture, the development of factory industry, of credit and its companion - the stock exchange. It seemed to him that when the wealth of a state develops normally, all these phenomena occur only after considerable labour has already been invested in agriculture, after it has arrived at the correct or at least at definite conditions; that the wealth of a country should grow uniformly and, in particular, so that other branches of wealth do not outstrip agriculture; that, in conformity with a given state of agriculture, there should exist corresponding means of communication, and that considering our incorrect use of the land, the railways, brought about not by economic but by political necessity, were premature and, instead of contributing to agriculture, which was what they were expected to do, had outstripped agriculture and halted it, causing the development of industry and credit, and that therefore, just as the one-sided and premature development of one organ in an animal would hinder its general development, so credit, the means of communication, the increase of factory industry - though undoubtedly necessary in Europe, where their time had come - here in Russia only harmed the general development of wealth by setting aside the main, immediate question of the organization of agriculture.
While he was doing his writing, she was thinking of how unnaturally attentive her husband had been to the young prince Charsky, who had very tactlessly bantered with her on the eve of their departure. ‘He’s jealous,’ she thought. ‘My God, how sweet and silly he is! He’s jealous of me! If he only knew that they’re all the same as Pyotr the cook for me,’ she thought, gazing at his nape and red neck with a proprietary feeling strange to her. ‘Though it’s a pity to distract him from his work (but he’ll have time to do it!), I must look at his face. Will he feel me looking at him? I want him to turn round... I want him to!’ And she opened her eyes wide, wishing thereby to increase the effect of her gaze.
‘Yes, they draw all the juices off to themselves and lend a false glitter,’ he muttered, stopped writing and, feeling her looking at him and smiling, turned to her.
