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 much, far more than you can imagine," and she looked hirh full in the face. "Da svidanya!"

She reached him her hand, and, with a quick elastic step, passed the Swiss, and disappeared in her carriage.

Her look, her pressure of his hand, filled Vronsky with passion. He kissed the palm on the place which she had touched, and went home with the happy conviction that that evening had brought him nearer to the goal of which he dreamed, than all the two months past.

CHAPTER VIII

found nothing unusual or improper in the fact that his wife and Vronsky had been sitting by themselves and having a rather lively talk together; he noticed that to others in the drawing-room it seemed unusual and improper, and therefore it seemed to him also improper. He decided that he ought to speak about it to his wife.

When he reached home, Alekseï Aleksandrovitch, according to his usual custom, went to his library, threw himself into his arm-chair, and opened his book at the place marked by a paper-cutter, in an article on Papistry, and read till the clock struck one, as he usually did. From time to time he passed his hand across his high forehead, and shook his head, as if to drive away an importunate thought. At his usual hour he arose and he prepared to go to bed. Anna Arkadyevna had not yet returned. With his book under his arm, he went upstairs; but that evening, instead of pursuing his usual train of reflections and thinking over his governmental duties, his mind was occupied with his wife and the disagreeable impression which her behavior had caused him. Contrary to his habit, instead of going to bed he walked up and down the rooms with his arms behind his back. He could not go to bed because he felt that first it was incumbent on him to ponder anew over the exigency that had arisen.