im so. He felt sorry for her, and he felt he could not help
her, and with that he knew that he was to blame for her
wretchedness, and that he had done something wrong.

"Is not a divorce possible?" he said feebly. She shook her head,
not answering. "Couldn't you take your son, and still leave
him?"

"Yes; but it all depends on him. Now I must go to him," she
said shortly. Her presentiment that all would again go on in the
old way had not deceived her.

"On Tuesday I shall be in Petersburg, and everything can be
settled."

"Yes," she said. "But don't let us talk any more of it."

Anna's carriage, which she had sent away, and ordered to come
back to the little gate of the Vrede garden, drove up. Anna said
good-bye to Vronsky, and drove home.

Chapter 23

On Monday there was the usual sitting of the Commission of the
2nd of June. Alexey Alexandrovitch walked into the hall where
the sitting was held, greeted the members and the president, as
usual, and sat down in his place, putting his hand on the papers
laid ready before him. Among these papers lay the necessary
evidence and a rough outline of the speech he intended to make.
But he did not really need these documents. He remembered every
point, and did not think it necessary to go over in his memory
what he would say. He knew that when the time came, and when he
saw his enemy facing him, and studiously endeavoring to assume an
expression of indifference, his speech would flow of itself
better than he could prepare it now. He felt that the import of
his speech was of such magnitude that every word of it would have
weight. Meantime, as he listened to the usual report, he had the
most innocent and inoffensive air. No one, looking at his white
hands, with their swollen veins and long fingers, so softly
stroking the edges of the white paper that lay before him, and at
the air of weariness with which his head drooped on one side,
would have suspected that in a few minutes a torrent of words
would flow from his lips that would arouse a fearful storm, set
the members shouting and attacking one another, and force the
president to call for order. When the report was over, Alexey
Alexandrovitch announced in his subdued, delicate voice that he
had several points to bring before the meeting in regard to the
Commission for the Reorganization of the Native Tribes. All
attention was turned upon him. Alexey Alexandrovitch cleared his
throat, and not look