Soon after her return from Moscow, on arriving at a soiree where she had expected to meet him, and not finding him there, she realized distinctly from the rush of disappointment that she had been deceiving herself, and that this pursuit was not merely not distasteful to her, but that it made the whole interest of her life.

A celebrated singer was singing for the second time, and all the fashionable world was in the theater.

Vronsky, seeing his cousin from his stall in the front row, did not wait till the entr'acte, but went to her box.

"Why didn't you come to dinner?" she said to him.

" I marvel at the second sight of lovers," she added with a smile, so that no one but he could hear; "_she wasn't there_.