Chapter 18

As soon as Oblonsky uttered Anna's name, the face of Alexei Alexandrovich became completely transformed; all the life went out of it, and it looked weary and dead.

`What is it exactly that you want from me?' he said, moving in his chair and snapping his pince-nez.

`A definite settlement, Alexei Alexandrovich - some settlement of the situation. I'm appealing to you' (`not as to an injured husband,' Stepan Arkadyevich was going to say, but, afraid of wrecking his negotiation by this, he changed the words) `not as to a statesman' (which did not sound apropos), `but simply as to a man, and a goodhearted man, and a Christian. You must have pity on her,' he said.

`That is, in what way, precisely?' Karenin said softly.

`Yes, pity on her. If you had seen her as I have! - I have been spending all the winter with her - you would have pity on her. Her position is awful, simply awful!'

`I had imagined,' answered Alexei Alexandrovich in a higher, almost shrill voice, `that Anna Arkadyevna had everything she had desired for herself.'

`Oh, Alexei Alexandrovich, for God's sake, let's not indulge in recriminations! What is past is past, and you know what she wants and is waiting for - a divorce.'

`But I believe Anna Arkadyevna refuses a divorce, if I make it a condition to leave me my son. I replied in that sense, and supposed that the matter was ended. I consider it at an end,' shrieked Alexei Alexandrovich.

`But, for heaven's sake, don't get excited!' said Stepan Arkadyevich, touching his brother-in-law's knee. `The matter is not ended. If you will allow me to recapitulate, it was like this: when you parted, you were as magnanimous as could possibly be; you were ready to give her everything - freedom, even divorce. She appreciated that. No, make no doubt. She did appreciate it - to such a degree that, at the first moment, feeling how she had wronged you, she did not consider and could not consider everything. She gave up everything. But experience, time, have shown that her position is unbearable, impossible.'

`The life of Anna Arkadyevna can have no interest for me,' Alexei Alexandrovich put in, raising his eyebrows.

`Allow me to disbelieve that,' Stepan Arkadyevich replied gently. `Her position is intolerable for her, and of no benefit to anyone whatever. She has deserved it, you will say. She knows that and asks you for nothing; she says plainly that she dare not ask you. But I, all of us - her relatives, all who love her - beg you, entreat you. Why should she suffer? Who is any the better for it?'

`Excuse me, you seem to put me in the position of the guilty party,' observed Alexei Alexandrovich.

`Oh, no, oh, no, not at all! Please understand me,' said Stepan Arkadyevich again touching him - this time his hand - as though feeling sure this physical contact would soften his brother-in-law. `All I say is this: her position is intolerable, and it might be alleviated by you, and you will lose nothing by it. I will arrange it all for you, so that you'll never notice it. You did promise it, you know.'

`The promise was given before. And I had supposed that the question of my son had settled the matter. Besides, I hoped that Anna Arkadyevna had enough magnanimity...' Alexei Alexandrovich articulated with difficulty, his lips twitching and his face white.

`She leaves it all to your magnanimity. She begs, she implores one thing of you - to extricate her from the impossible position in which she is placed. She does not ask for her son now. Alexei Alexandrovich, you are a good man. Put yourself in her position for a minute. The question of divorce for her in her position is a question of life and death. If you had not promised it once, she would have reconciled herself