It was not Vassily’s fault that they had given him unsifted soil, but it was vexing all the same.
Having already experienced more than once the usefulness of the remedy he knew for stifling his vexation and turning all that seemed bad back to good, Levin employed it here as well. He looked at how Mishka strode along, lugging huge lumps of earth stuck to each foot, got off his horse, took the seed basket from Vassily, and went to sow.
‘Where did you stop?’
Vassily pointed to a mark with his foot, and Levin went, as well as he could, scattering the seeds mixed with soil. It was hard walking, as through a swamp, and having gone one row, Levin became sweaty, stopped and handed the seed basket back.
‘Well, master, mind you don’t scold me for this row come summer,’ said Vassily.
‘What for?’ Levin said gaily, already feeling the effectiveness of the remedy.
‘You’ll see come summer. It’ll be different. You just take a look where I sowed last spring. So neat! You know, Konstantin Dmitrich, it seems I try and do it as I would for my own father. I don’t like doing bad work myself and I tell others the same. If the master’s pleased, so are we. Look there now,’ Vassily said, pointing to the field, ‘it brings joy to your heart.’
‘It’s a fine spring, Vassily.’
‘Such a spring as the old folk don’t remember. I went home, and our old man there has also sowed two acres of wheat. He says you can’t tell it from rye.’
‘How long have you been sowing wheat?’
‘Why, it’s you that taught us two years ago. And you gave me two bushels. We sold a quarter of it and sowed the rest.’
‘Well, make sure you rub out these lumps,’ said Levin, going towards his horse, ‘and keep an eye on Mishka. If it comes up well, you’ll get fifty kopecks per acre.’
‘Thank you kindly. Seems we’re right pleased with you anyway.’
Levin mounted his horse and rode to the field where last year’s clover was and to the one that had been ploughed for the spring wheat.
The clover sprouting among the stubble was wonderful. It was all revived already and steadily greening among the broken stalks of last year’s wheat. The horse sank fetlock-deep, and each of his hoofs made a sucking sound as it was pulled from the half-thawed ground. It was quite impossible to go across the ploughed field: it held only where there was ice, but in the thawed furrows the leg sank over the fetlocks. The ploughing was excellent; in two days they could harrow and begin sowing. Everything was beautiful, everything was cheerful. Levin rode back across the brook, hoping the water had subsided. And indeed he did get across and frightened two ducks. ‘There must also be woodcock,’ he thought, and just at the turning to his house he met a forester, who confirmed his guess about woodcock.
Levin went home at a trot, so as to arrive in time to have dinner and prepare a gun for the evening.
XIV
Approaching his house in the cheerfullest spirits, Levin heard a bell from the direction of the main entrance.
‘Yes, it’s from the railway station,’ he thought, ‘exactly the time of the Moscow train ... Who could it be? What if it’s my brother Nikolai? He did say, “Maybe I’ll go to a watering-place, or maybe I’ll come to you.” ’ He found it frightening and unpleasant in the first moment that the presence of his brother might spoil this happy spring mood of his. Then he became ashamed of this feeling, and at once opened, as it were, his inner embrace and with tender joy now expected and wished it to be his brother. He urged the horse on and, passing the acacia tree, saw the hired troika driving up from the railway station with a gentleman in a fur coat. It was not his brother. ‘Ah, if only it’s someone pleasant that I can talk with,’ he thought.
‘Ah!’ Levin cried joyfully, raising both arms high. ‘What a delightful guest! Oh, I’m so glad it’s you!’ he called out, recognizing Stepan Arkadyich.
‘I’ll find out for certain whether she’s married or when she’s going to be,’ he thought.
And on that beautiful spring day he felt that the memory of her was not painful for him at all.
‘What, you didn’t expect me?’ said Stepan Arkadyich, getting out of the sledge with flecks of mud on the bridge of his nose, his cheek and his eyebrow, but radiating health and good cheer. ‘I’ve come - one - to see you,’ he said, embracing and kissing him, ‘and - two - to do some fowling, and - three - to sell a wood in Yergushovo.’
‘Splendid! And what a spring, eh? How did you make it by sledge?’
‘It’s even worse by cart, Konstantin Dmitrich,’ replied the coachman, whom he knew.
‘Well, I’m very, very glad you’ve come,’ Levin said with a sincere and childishly joyful smile.
Levin led his guest to the visitors’ bedroom, where Stepan Arkadyich’s belongings were also brought - a bag, a gun in a case, a pouch for cigars - and, leaving him to wash and change, went meanwhile to the office to give orders about the ploughing and the clover. Agafya Mikhailovna, always very concerned for the honour of the house, met him in the front hall with questions about dinner.
