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 stand," interrupted Dolly. "But I .... you forget me; .... does that make the pain less for me?"

"Wait! when he made his confession to me, I acknowledge that I did not appreciate the whole horror of your position. I saw only him and the fact that the family was broken up. I was sorry for him; but now that I have been talking with you, I, as a woman, look on it in a different light. I see your suffering, and I cannot tell you how sorry I am. But, Dolly, dushenka, while I fully appreciate your misfortune, there is one thing which I do not know: I do not know .... I do not know to what degree you still love him. You alone can tell whether you love him enough to forgive him. If you do, then forgive him."

"No," began Dolly; but Anna interrupted her, kissing her hand again.

"I know the world better than you do," she said. "I know how such men as Stiva look on these things. You say that they have discussed you between them. Don't you believe it. These men can be unfaithful to their marriage vows, but their homes and their wives remain no less sacred in their eyes. Between these women and their families, they draw a line of demarcation which is never crossed. I cannot understand how it can be, but so it is."

"Yes, but he has kissed her .... "

"Wait, Dolly, dushenka! I saw Stiva when he was in love with you. I remember the time when he used to come to me and talk about you with tears in his eyes. I know to what a poetic height he raised you, and I know that the longer he lived with you the more he admired you. We always have smiled at his habit of saying at every opportunity, Dolly is an extraordinary woman. You have been, and you always will be, an object of adoration in his eyes, and this passion is not a defection of his heart .... "

"But supposing this defection should be repeated?"

"It is impossible, as I think .... "

"Yes, but would you have forgiven him?"

"I don't know; I can't say .... Yes, I could," said