“It’s a rest to waltz with you,” he said to her, as they glided through the waltz. “It’s exquisite-such lightness, precision.” He said to her the same thing he said to almost all his partners whom he knew well.
She smiled at his praise, and continued to look down at the room below them. She was not like a girl at her first float, for whom the tops of all the heads melt into one vision of fairyland. And she was not a girl who had gone the stale round of floats till every pate was familiar and tiresome. But she was in the middle stage between these two; she was excited, and at the same time she had sufficient self-possession to be able to observe.
Kitty turned her attention to her fellow dancers, as the music slowed from triple time to a common four-four and the air slowed with it, transforming from the swift, giddy puff-puff-puff of waltzfloating to a controlled series of magisterial gusts. Doing a slow pirouette in the air was the beauty Lidi, Korsunsky’s wife; swanning past, nearly horizontal, was the lady of the house; dancing upside down, catching the air with his rear end and kicking his legs in a comical bicycling motion, was old Krivin, always to be found where the best people were. Down below, in the seating area, Kitty caught sight of Stiva, and beside him the exquisite figure and head of Anna, with Android Karenina beside her, glowing not lilac, but purest black.
And he was here too, silver uniform gleaming in the candlelight, his hot-whip crackling wickedly where it encircled his upper thigh. Kitty had not seen him since the evening she refused Levin. With her longsighted eyes, she knew him at once, and was even aware that he was looking at her.
“Where shall I alight you?” said Korsunsky, a little out of breath, as the air song came to the end and the airstreams began to weaken in force, bringing the dancers closer to the floor with each subsequent gust.
“Madame Karenina’s here, I think… take me to her.”
“Wherever you command.”
And Korsunsky began waltzing their measured way, downward and diagonally, straight toward the group in the left corner, continually saying, “Pardon, Mesdames, pardon, pardon, Mesdames” and steering his course through the sea of lace, tulle, and ribbon.
“This is one of my most faithful supporters,” said Korsunsky, bowing to Anna Arkadyevna, whom he had not yet seen, and exchanging polite nods with Android Karenina. “Anna Arkadyevna, a waltz?” he said, bending down to her.
“I don’t dance when it’s possible not to dance,” she said.
“But tonight it’s impossible,” answered Korsunsky.
At that instant Vronsky came up.
“Well, since it’s impossible tonight, let us start,” she said, not noticing Vronsky’s bow, and she hastily put her hand on Korsunsky’s shoulder as the air-chime sounded for the next waltz, the steady huffing of the hidden pipes began anew, and he launched them into the air.
“What is she vexed with him about?” thought Kitty, discerning that Anna had intentionally not responded to Vronsky’s bow. Vronsky went up to Kitty reminding her of the first quadrille, and expressing his regret that he had not seen her all this time. Kitty gazed in admiration at Anna waltzing, and listened to him. She expected him to ask her for a waltz, but he did not, and she glanced wonderingly at him. Kitty looked into his face, which was so close to her own, and long afterward-for several years after-that look, full of love, to which he made no response, cut her to the heart with an agony of shame.
He flushed slightly, and hurriedly asked her to waltz, but they had only just ascended to the first tier when a whistle blew, the music stopped, the air jets cut off abruptly, and everybody tumbled toward the ground.
Kitty cried out as she fell, but the floor of the ballroom was of course lined with plush mats of eiderdown, and so the greatest risk was not physical injury but embarrassment, which in fact was the result. As the erstwhile floaters, some laughing, some calling out in confusion and discomposure, struggled to their feet, Kitty blushed to find herself entangled with Count Vronsky, who calmly pulled them both upright.
Korsunsky, who had landed on top of Anna Karenina, assumed the drop was triggered accidentally, and was among those taking the incident with good-natured merriment, until, in the next moment, he and Anna were encircled by four 77s. The Caretaker who controlled them-and who had ordered the drop-was striding manfully toward them, dragging behind him a fat, bright orange Class III who was twittering confusedly.
“Your Excellency,” began this Caretaker, who wore a thin black mustache and a smirk of self-satisfaction. “Can you confirm the provenance of this machine?”
“Why, indeed,” replied Korsunsky readily, pulling away from Anna and to the side of his beloved-companion. “This is my Class III, Portcullis. Is there some sort of difficulty?”
Kitty watched Korsunsky’s eyes darting rapidly from his robot to the suspicious and hawk-like gaze of the Caretaker to the strong, pincer-like end-effectors of the 77s.
“Pardon, your Excellency. I did not inquire as to the machine’s name or master. I asked if you can vouch for its origins.”
The Caretaker’s tone was unmistakably hardening. Looking away from Korsunsky, Kitty’s gaze fell on Anna, who had not set Android Karenina to glow in lilac, as Kitty had so urgently wished, but instead to gently silhouette her, with the subtlest overtones of velvet, brilliantly complementing Anna’s throat and shoulders, which looked as though carved in old ivory, and her rounded arms, with tiny, slender wrists. On Anna’s head, among her black hair-her own, with no false additions-was a little wreath of pansies, and a bouquet of the same in the black ribbon of her sash among white lace. Her coiffure was not striking. All that was noticeable were the little willful tendrils of her curly hair that would always break free about her neck and temples. Round her well-cut, strong neck was a thread of pearls.
Kitty had been seeing Anna every day; she adored her, and had pictured her invariably haloed in lilac. But now seeing her silhouetted in black, Kitty felt that she had not fully seen her charm. She saw her now as someone quite new and surprising to her. Now she understood that Anna could not have been in lilac, and that her charm was just that she always stood out against her attire, that her companion light could never be noticeable on her. It was only that, the light, and all that was seen was she-simple, natural, elegant, and at the same time gay and eager.
“The difficulty is simply this, sir,” the Caretaker continued in a smooth, almost supplicating tone. “This Class III device has been implanted with a recorder/transmitter by enemies of the state, and sadly must be destroyed.”
An audible gasp came from the assembled crowd, followed by a ripple of disapproval and excitement. Korsunsky could only throw up his hands with confusion. “What? This cannot be! I am not with UnConSciya!”
“No one has suggested so,” the Caretaker responded, his lips tightening and turning up almost imperceptibly. “No one, that is, until yourself, at this moment. But this machine, your excellency, has been corrupted, and must be destroyed.”
“Wait! No-no,” cried Korsunsky, as the massive 77s, their heads performing their slow, watchful revolutions, surrounded his small orange Class III, which clucked and whirred frightfully. “Portcullis!”
Count Vronsky separated from Kitty’s side and strode across the floor, raising his hands before him in a calming manner. The Caretaker, noting Count Vronsky’s air of presumed authority and glinting silver regimental uniform, stepped slightly backward and gestured to the 77s to allow him entry into the tight circle of enforcer robots around the terrified Korsunsky and his Class III.
“Alexei Kirillovich,” said Korsunsky imploringly to Vronsky, sensing his chance to make an appeal. “This is an old and dearly beloved family android. It belonged to my grandfather and to his grandfather before him. It fought beside him in Kazakhstan.”