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 replied the ambassador's wife, with a smile, resuming the thread of a conversation which interested her very deeply.

They were criticizing Karenin and his wife.

"Anna is very much changed since her return from Moscow. There is something strange about her," said one of her friends.

"The change is due to the fact that she brought back in her train the shadow of Alekseï Vronsky," said the ambassador's wife.

"What is that? There's a story in Grimm—a man without a shadow—a man deprived of his shadow. It was a punishment for something or other. I cannot see where the punishment lies, but it must be disagreeable for a woman to be without her shadow."

"Yes, but the women who have shadows generally come to some bad end," said Anna's friend.

"Hold your tongues!" cried the Princess Miagkaya, as she heard these words. "Madame Karenina is a charming woman; I don't like her husband, but I like her."

"Why don't you like her husband?" asked the ambassador's wife. "He is such a remarkable man. My husband says there are few statesmen in Europe equal to him."

"My husband says the same thing, but I don't believe it," replied the Princess Miagkaya. "If our husbands had not had this idea, we should have seen Alekseï Aleksandrovitch as he really is; and, in my opinion, he is a blockhead. I only say this in a whisper. .... Is it not true how everything comes out clearly? Formerly when I was told that he was clever I used to try to discover it, and I came to the conclusion that I was stupid because I could not see wherein he was clever; but as soon as I said to myself,—under my breath,—he is stupid, all was explained. Is n't that so?"

"How severe you are to-night!"

"Not at all, I have no other alternative. One of us two is stupid. Now you know that one can never say such a thing of oneself."