Anna Karenina - Part 1

The raging tempest rushed whistling between the wheels of the

carriages, about the scaffolding, and round the corner of the

station. The carriages, posts, people, everything that was to be

seen was covered with snow on one side, and was getting more and

more thickly covered. For a moment there would come a lull in

the storm, but then it would swoop down again with such

onslaughts that it seemed impossible to stand against it.

Meanwhile men ran to and fro, talking merrily together, their

steps crackling on the platform as they continually opened and

closed the big doors. The bent shadow of a man glided by at her

feet, and she heard sounds of a hammer upon iron. "Hand over

that telegram!" came an angry voice out of the stormy darkness on

the other side. "This way! No. 28!" several different voices

shouted again, and muffled figures ran by covered with snow. Two

gentlemen with lighted cigarettes passed by her. She drew one

more deep breath of the fresh air, and had just put her hand out

of her muff to take hold of the door post and get back into the

carriage, when another man in a military overcoat, quite close

beside her, stepped between her and the flickering light of the

lamp post. She looked round, and the same instant recognized

Vronsky's face. Putting his hand to the peak of his cap, he

bowed to her and asked, Was there anything she wanted? Could he

be of any service to her? She gazed rather a long while at him

without answering, and, in spite of the shadow in which he was

standing, she saw, or fancied she saw, both the expression of his

face and his eyes. It was again that expression of reverential

ecstasy which had so worked upon her the day before. More than

once she had told herself during the past few days, and again

only a few moments before, that Vronsky was for her only one of

the hundreds of young men, forever exactly the same, that are met

everywhere, that she would never allow herself to bestow a

thought upon him. But now at the first instant of meeting him,

she was seized by a feeling of joyful pride. She had no need to

ask why he had come. She knew as certainly as if he had told her

that he was here to be where she was.

"I didn't know you were going. What are you coming for?" she

said, letting fall the hand with which she had grasped the door

post. And irrepressible delight and eagerness shone in her face.