Emma Watson Pussy
Books:
Anna Karenina
War And Peace
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and hid her face
in it. "I can understand being carried away by feeling," she
went on after a brief silence, "but deliberately, slyly deceiving
me...and with whom?... To go on being my husband together with
her...its awful! You cant understand..."
"Oh, yes, I understand! I understand! Dolly, dearest, I do
understand," said Anna, pressing her hand.
"And do you imagine he realizes all the awfulness of my
position?" Dolly resumed. "Not the slightest! Hes happy and
contented."
"Oh, no!" Anna interposed quickly. "Hes to be pitied, hes
weighed down by remorse..."
"Is he capable of remorse?" Dolly interrupted, gazing intently
into her sister-in-laws face.
"Yes. I know him. I could not look at him without feeling sorry
for him. We both know him. Hes good-hearted, but hes proud,
and now hes so humiliated. What touched me most..." (and here
Anna guessed what would touch Dolly most) "hes tortured by two
things: that hes ashamed for the childrens sake, and that,
loving you--yes, yes, loving you beyond everything on earth,"
she hurriedly interrupted Dolly, who would have answered--"he
has hurt you, pierced you to the heart. No, no, she cannot
forgive me, he keeps saying."
Dolly looked dreamily away beyond her sister-in-law as she
listened to her words.
"Yes, I can see that his position is awful; its worse for the
guilty than the innocent," she said, "if he feels that all the
misery comes from his fault. But how am I to forgive him, how am
I to be his wife again after her? For me to live with him now
would be torture, just because I love my past love for him..."
And sobs cut short her words. But as though of set design, each
time she was softened she began to speak again of what
exasperated her.
"Shes young, you see, shes pretty," she went on. "Do you know,
Anna, my youth and my beauty are gone, taken by whom? By him and
his children. I have worked for him, and all I had has gone in
his service, and now of course any fresh, vulgar creature has
more charm for him. No doubt they talked of me together, or,
worse still, they were silent. Do you understand?"
Again her eyes glowed with hatred.
"And after that he will tell me.... What! can I believe him?
Never! No, everything is over, everything that once made my
comfort, the reward of my work, and my sufferings.... Would you
believe it, I was teaching Grisha just now: once this was a joy
to me, now it is a torture. What have I to strive and toil for?
Why are the children here? Whats so awful is that all at once
my hearts turned, and instead of love and tenderness, I have
nothing but hatred for him; yes, hatred. I could kill him."
"Darling Dolly, I understand, but dont torture yourself. You
are so distressed, so overwrought, that you look at many things
mistakenly."
Dolly grew calmer, and for two minutes both were silent.
"Whats to be done? Think for me, Anna, help me. I have thought
over everything, and I see nothing."
Anna could think of nothing, but her heart responded instantly to
each word, to each change of expression of her sister-in-law.
"One thing I would say," began Anna. "I am his sister, I know
his character, that faculty of forgetting everything, everything"
(she waved her hand before her forehead), "that faculty for being
completely carried away, but for completely repenting too. He
cannot believe it, he cannot comprehend now how he can have acted
as he did."
"No; he understands, he understood!" Dolly broke in. "But
I...you are forgetting me...does it make it easier for me?"
"Wait a minute. When he told me, I will own I did not realize
all the awfulness of your position. I saw nothing but him, and
that the family was broken up. I felt sorry for him, but after
talking to you, I see it, as a woman, quite differently. I see
your agony, and I cant tell you how sorry I am for you! But,
Dolly, darling, I fully realize your sufferings, only there is
one thing I dont know; I dont know...I dont know how much love
there is still in your heart for him. That you know--whether
there is enough for you to be able to forgive him. If there is,
forgive him!"
"No," Dolly was beginning,
Anna Karenina page 38 Anna Karenina page 40
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