Vronsky stood still and asked directly: “How so? Do you mean he made your belle-soeur an offer yesterday?”

This moment of exchanged confidences was interrupted by Lupo, who sat back on his haunches, flattened his ears against his head, and howled. Vronsky looked down at his beloved-companion inquiringly, but in the next moment the rest heard what Lupo had sensed: The gentle pulse of the Grav shooshing forward could be both heard and felt reverberating along the magnet bed.

“Maybe,” said Stepan Arkadyich. “I fancied something of the sort yesterday. Yes, if he went away early, and was out of humor too, it must mean it… He’s been so long in love, and I’m very sorry for him.”

“So that’s it! I should imagine, though, she might reckon on a better match,” said Vronsky, “though I don’t know him, of course,” he added. “Yes, that is a hateful position! That’s why most fellows prefer to have to do with II/Klara/X14s. If you don’t succeed with them it only proves that you’ve not enough cash, but in this case one’s dignity’s at stake. But here’s the Grav.”

Now the platform was quivering, and with visible lines of electric force quivering above the magnet bed, the great hovering massive transport eased magnificently forward into the station, the stern figure of the II/Engineer/L42 covered with frost. Behind the tender, setting the platform more and more slowly swaying, came the luggage van with a dog whining in it. At last the passenger carriages whooshed in, de-oscillating for a full three minutes after the circuits were switched off and the Grav came to a standstill.

A II/GravGuard/FF9 appeared, emitted a high whistle from a slanting slot in his groznium torso, and after him one by one the impatient passengers began to get down: an officer of the Border Regiments, holding himself erect in his silver uniform, and looking severely about him; a nimble little merchant with a Class II suitcase tucked under his arm, smiling gaily; a whistling peasant with a sack over his shoulder.

Vronsky, standing beside Oblonsky, watched the carriages and the passengers, totally oblivious of his mother. What he had just heard about Kitty excited and delighted him. Unconsciously he swelled his chest, and his eyes flashed. He stooped to run his hand through Lupo’s bristling metallic fur. He drew himself erect and stood with his hand on the handle of the hot-whip that curled along his thigh. He felt himself a conqueror.

“Countess Vronskaya is in that compartment,” said the Border Officer, going up to Vronsky.

The officer’s words roused him, and forced him to think of his mother and his approaching meeting with her.

CHAPTER 15

VRONSKY FOLLOWED HIS FELLOW officer to the carriage, and at the door of the compartment he stopped short to make room for a lady getting out, followed by a tall, elegant Class III.

As the woman and her beloved-companion stepped from the carriage, Lupo, uncharacteristically, narrowed his eyes to slits and growled in the back of his throat. Alexei Kirillovich, horrified at the implied insult, gestured sharply to his Class III for silence and then stood back from the door of the compartment to allow the woman and her android to pass. But for a long moment they simply stood in this tableau at the door of the carriage: Vronsky with his head bowed, Lupo back on his haunches, the stranger and her striking robot standing regally in the doorway.

With the insight of a man of the world, it was clear to Vronsky that this woman belonged to the best society. When at last the tableau broke, and she and her Class III exited, and Vronsky was finally getting into the carriage, he felt he must glance at her once more; not because she was very beautiful, not on account of the elegance and modest grace which were apparent in her whole figure, but because in the expression of her charming face, as she passed close by him, there was something peculiarly caressing and soft. As he looked round, she too turned her head. Her shining gray eyes, which looked dark from the thick lashes, rested with friendly attention on his face, as though she were recognizing him, and then promptly turned away to the passing crowd, as though seeking someone. In that brief look Vronsky had time to notice the suppressed eagerness that played over her face, and flitted between the brilliant eyes and the faint smile that curved her red lips. It was as though her nature were so brimming over with something that, against her will, it showed itself now in the flash of her eyes, and now in her smile. Deliberately she shrouded the light in her eyes, but it shone against her will in the faintly perceptible smile. The android, walking a half step behind the woman, glowed a deep and regal indigo, allowing no expression, only accenting all that was remarkable about her mistress as she traveled at her side.

SHE SHROUDED THE LIGHT IN HER EYES, BUT IT SHONE AGAINST HER WILL; THE ANDROID, WALKING BEHIND, GLOWED A REGAL INDIGO

Vronsky stepped into the carriage. His mother, a dried-up old lady with black eyes and ringlets, screwed up her eyes, scanning her son, and smiled slightly with her thin lips. Getting up from the seat and handing her robot a bag, she gave her little wrinkled hand to her son to kiss, and lifting his head from her hand, kissed him on the cheek.

“You got my communiqué? Quite well? Thank God.”

“You had a good journey?” said her son, sitting down beside her, and involuntarily listening to a woman’s voice outside the door. He knew it was the voice of the lady he had met at the door.

In the next moment, the mysterious woman and her robot appeared again in the door of the Grav. “Could you see if Stepan Arkadyich Oblonsky is here, and send him to me?” she said politely to a II/Porter/7e62, who scuttled off obligingly. Vronsky understood now that this was Madame Karenina, and this her Class III, Android Karenina.

“Your brother is here,” he said, standing up. “Excuse me, I did not know you, and, indeed, our acquaintance was so slight,” said Vronsky, bowing, “that no doubt you do not remember me.”

“Oh, no,” she said, “I should have known you because your mother and I have been talking, I think, of nothing but you all the way.” As she spoke she let the eagerness that would insist on coming out show itself in her smile. “And still no sign of my brother.”

“Do call him, Alexei,” said the old countess. Vronsky stepped out onto the platform, and shouted, “Oblonsky! Here!” Lupo let out a corresponding howl, long and low.

Madame Karenina, meanwhile, did not wait for her brother, but catching sight of him she stepped out with her light, resolute step. And as soon as her brother had reached her, with a gesture that struck Vronsky by its decision and its grace, she flung her left arm around his neck, drew him rapidly to her, and kissed him warmly. Vronsky gazed, never taking his eyes from her, and smiled; he could not have said why. But recollecting that his mother was waiting for him, he went back again into the carriage.

“She’s very sweet, isn’t she?” said the countess of Madame Karenina. “Her husband put her with me, and I was delighted to have her.” Madame Karenina entered the carriage again to say good-bye to the countess.

“Well, Countess, you have met your son, and I my brother,” she said. “And all my gossip is exhausted. I should have nothing more to tell you.”

“Oh, no,” said the countess, taking her hand. “I could go all around the world with you and never be dull. You are one of those delightful women in whose company it’s sweet to be silent as well as to talk. Now please don’t fret over your son; you can’t expect never to be parted.”

Madame Karenina stood quite still, holding herself very erect, and her eyes were smiling. Vronsky noted with interest how his mother’s beloved-companion, a wiry gray machine-woman called Tunisia, looked distractedly about the carriage during this exchange, while Android Karenina’s careful and attentive posture mimicked that of her mistress precisely.