Anna Karenina - Part 2

"No, why not? I'll tell you simply," said Varenka, and, without

waiting for a reply, she went on: "Yes, it brings up memories,

once painful ones. I cared for someone once, and I used to sing

him that song."

Kitty with big, wide-open eyes gazed silently, sympathetically at

Varenka.

"I cared for him, and he cared for me; but his mother did not

wish it, and he married another girl. He's living now not far

from us, and I see him sometimes. You didn't think I had a

love story too," she said, and there was a faint gleam in her

handsome face of that fire which Kitty felt must once have glowed

all over her.

"I didn't think so? Why, if I were a man, I could never care for

anyone else after knowing you. Only I can't understand how he

could, to please his mother, forget you and make you unhappy; he

had no heart."

"Oh, no, he's a very good man, and I'm not unhappy; quite the

contrary, I'm very happy. Well, so we shan't be singing any more

now," she added, turning towards the house.

"How good you are! how good you are!" cried Kitty, and stopping

her, she kissed her. "If I could only be even a little like

you!"

"Why should you be like anyone? You're nice as you are," said

Varenka, smiling her gentle, weary smile.

"No, I'm not nice at all. Come, tell me.... Stop a minute,

let's sit down," said Kitty, making her sit down again beside

her. "Tell me, isn't it humiliating to think that a man has

disdained your love, that he hasn't cared for it?..."

"But he didn't disdain it; I believe he cared for me, but he was

a dutiful son..."

"Yes, but if it hadn't been on account of his mother, if it had

been his own doing?..." said Kitty, feeling she was giving away

her secret, and that her face, burning with the flush of shame,

had betrayed her already.

"In that case he would have done wrong, and I should not have

regretted him," answered Varenka, evidently realizing that they

were now talking not of her, but of Kitty.

"But the humiliation," said Kitty, "the humiliation one can never

forget, can never forget," she said, remembering her look at the

last ball during the pause in the music.

"Where is the humiliation? Why, you did nothing wrong?"

"Worse than wrong--shameful."