‘Remarkably well done, isn’t it?’ Stepan Arkadyich said, noticing that Levin kept glancing at the portrait.
‘I’ve never seen a better portrait.’
‘And isn’t it a remarkable likeness?’ said Vorkuev.
Levin glanced from the portrait to the original. A special glow lit up Anna’s face the moment she felt his eyes on her. Levin blushed and to hide his embarrassment was about to ask if it was long since she had seen Darya Alexandrovna, but just then Anna spoke:
‘Ivan Petrovich and I were just talking about Vashchenkov’s latest pictures. Have you seen them?’
‘Yes, I have,’ Levin replied.
‘But excuse me, I interrupted you, you were about to say ...’
Levin asked if it was long since she had seen Dolly.
‘She came yesterday. She’s very angry with the school on account of Grisha. It seems the Latin teacher was unfair to him.’
‘Yes, I’ve seen the paintings. I didn’t much like them,’ Levin went back to the conversation she had begun.
Now Levin spoke not at all with that workaday attitude towards things with which he had spoken that morning. Each word of conversation with her acquired a special meaning. It was pleasant to talk to her and still more pleasant to listen to her.
Anna spoke not only naturally and intelligently, but intelligently and casually, without attaching any value to her own thoughts, yet giving great value to the thoughts of the one she was talking to.
The conversation turned to the new trend in art, to the new Bible illustrations by a French artist.17 Vorkuev accused the artist of realism pushed to the point of coarseness. Levin said that the French employed conventions in art as no one else did, and therefore they saw particular merit in the return to realism. They saw poetry in the fact that they were no longer lying.
Never had anything intelligent that Levin had said given him so much pleasure as this. Anna’s face lit up when she suddenly saw his point. She laughed.
‘I’m laughing,’ she said, ‘as one laughs seeing a very faithful portrait. What you’ve said perfectly characterizes French art now, painting and even literature: Zola, Daudet.18 But perhaps it always happens that people first build their
‘That’s quite right!’ said Vorkuev.
‘So you were at the club?’ She turned to her brother.
‘Yes, yes, what a woman!’ thought Levin, forgetting himself and gazing fixedly at her beautiful, mobile face, which now suddenly changed completely. Levin did not hear what she said as she leaned towards her brother, but he was struck by the change in her expression. So beautiful before in its calmness, her face suddenly showed a strange curiosity, wrath and pride. But that lasted only a moment. She narrowed her eyes as if remembering something.
‘Ah, yes, however, it’s not interesting for anyone,’ she said, and turned to the English girl:
‘Please order tea in the drawing room.’
The girl got up and went out.
‘Well, did she pass her examination?’ asked Stepan Arkadyich.
‘Splendidly. She’s a very capable girl and with a sweet nature.’
‘You’ll end by loving her more than your own.’
‘That’s a man talking. There is no more or less love. I love my daughter with one love and her with another.’
‘I was just telling Anna Arkadyevna,’ said Vorkuev, ‘that if she spent at least a hundredth of the energy she puts into this English girl on the common cause of the education of Russian children, Anna Arkadyevna would be doing a great and useful thing.’
‘Say what you like, I can’t do it. Count Alexei Kirillych strongly encouraged me’ (in pronouncing the words ’Count Alexei Kirillych‘, she gave Levin a pleadingly timid look, and he involuntarily responded with a respectful and confirming look) ‘- encouraged me to occupy myself with the village school. I went several times. They’re very nice, but I couldn’t get caught up in it. Energy, you say. Energy is based on love. And love can’t be drawn from just anywhere, it can’t be ordered. I love this English girl, I myself don’t know why.’
And again she glanced at Levin. Her eyes, her smile, everything told him that she was addressing what she said to him, valuing his opinion and at the same time knowing beforehand that they understood each other.
‘I understand that perfectly,’ Levin replied. ‘One cannot put one’s heart into a school or generally into institutions of that sort, and that is precisely why I think these philanthropic institutions always produce such meagre results.’
She kept silent and then smiled.
