Anna Karenina - Part 5

"Seryozha! my darling boy!" she said, breathing hard and putting

her arms round his plump little body. "Mother!" he said,

wriggling about in her arms so as to touch her hands with

different parts of him.

Smiling sleepily still with closed eyes, he flung fat little arms

round her shoulders, rolled towards her, with the delicious

sleepy warmth and fragrance that is only found in children, and

began rubbing his face against her neck and shoulders.

"I know," he said, opening his eyes; "it's my birthday today. I

knew you'd come. I'll get up directly."

And saying that he dropped asleep.

Anna looked at him hungrily; she saw how he had grown and changed

in her absence. She knew, and did not know, the bare legs so

long now, that were thrust out below the quilt, those

short-cropped curls on his neck in which she had so often kissed

him. She touched all this and could say nothing; tears choked

her.

"What are you crying for, mother?" he said, waking completely up.

"Mother, what are you crying for?" he cried in a tearful voice.

"I won't cry...I'm crying for joy. It's so long since I've seen

you. I won't, I won't," she said, gulping down her tears and

turning away. "Come, it's time for you to dress now," she added,

after a pause, and, never letting go his hands, she sat down by

his bedside on the chair, where his clothes were put ready for

him.

"How do you dress without me? How..." she tried to begin talking

simply and cheerfully, but she could not, and again she turned

away.

"I don't have a cold bath, papa didn't order it. And you've not

seen Vassily Lukitch? He'll come in soon. Why, you're sitting

on my clothes!"

And Seryozha went off into a peal of laughter. She looked at him

and smiled.

"Mother, darling, sweet one!" he shouted, flinging himself on her

again and hugging her. It was as though only now, on seeing her

smile, he fully grasped what had happened.

"I don't want that on," he said, taking off her hat. And as it

were, seeing her afresh without her hat, he fell to kissing her

again.

"But what did you think about me? You didn't think I was dead?"

"I never believed it."

"You didn't believe it, my sweet?"

"I knew, I knew!" he repeated his favorite phrase, and snatching

the hand that was stroking his hair, he pressed the open palm to

his mouth and kissed it.