"It's exceedingly nice at their place," Veslovsky was telling
them about Vronsky and Anna. "I can't, of course, take it upon
myself to judge, but in their house you feel the real feeling of
home."
"What do they intend doing?"
"I believe they think of going to Moscow."
"How jolly it would be for us all to go over to them together!
When are you going there?" Stepan Arkadyevitch asked Vassenka.
"I'm spending July there."
"Will you go?" Stepan Arkadyevitch said to his wife.
"I've been wanting to a long while; I shall certainly go," said
Dolly. "I am sorry for her, and I know her. She's a splendid
woman. I will go alone, when you go back, and then I shall be in
no one's way. And it will be better indeed without you."
"To be sure," said Stepan Arkadyevitch. "And you, Kitty?"
"I? Why should I go?" Kitty said, flushing all over, and she
glanced round at her husband.
"Do you know Anna Arkadyevna, then?" Veslovsky asked her. "She's
a very fascinating woman."
"Yes," she answered Veslovsky, crimsoning still more. She got up
and walked across to her husband.
"Are you going shooting, then, tomorrow?" she said.
His jealousy had in these few moments, especially at the flush
that had overspread her cheeks while she was talking to
Veslovsky, gone far indeed. Now as he heard her words, he
construed them in his own fashion. Strange as it was to him
afterwards to recall it, it seemed to him at the moment clear
that in asking whether he was going shooting, all she cared to
know was whether he would give that pleasure to Vassenka
Veslovsky, with whom, as he fancied, she was in love.
"Yes, I'm going," he answered her in an unnatural voice,
disagreeable to himself.
"No, better spend the day here tomorrow, or Dolly won't see
anything of her husband, and set off the day after," said Kitty.
The motive of Kitty's words was interpreted by Levin thus: "Don't
separate me from _him_. I don't care about _your_ going, but do
let me enjoy the society of this delightful young man."
"Oh, if you wish, we'll stay here tomorrow," Levin answered,
with peculiar amiability.
Vassenka meanwhile, utterly unsuspecting the misery his presence
had occasioned, got up from the table after Kitty, and watching
her with smiling and admiring eyes, he followed her.
Levin saw that look. He turned white, and for a minute he could
hardly breathe. "How dare he look at my wife like that!" was the
feeling that boiled within him.