[Next Chapter] [Table of Contents]TOLSTOY: Anna Karenina Part 4, Chapter 05[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] Chapter 5 The waiting room of the celebrated Peterburg lawyer was full when Alexei Alexandrovich entered it. Three ladies - an old lady, a young lady, and a merchant's wife, and three gentlemen - one a German banker with a ring on his finger, the second a merchant with a beard, and the third a wrathful-looking government clerk in official uniform, with a cross on his neck - had obviously been waiting a long while already. Two clerks were writing at tables with scratching pens. The appurtenances of the writing tables, about which Alexei Alexandrovich was himself very fastidious, were exceptionally good. He could not help observing this. One of the clerks, without getting up, turned fretfully to Alexei Alexandrovich, half-closing his eyes.
`What is it you wish?'
`My business has to do with the lawyer.'
`He is engaged,' the clerk responded severely, and he pointed with his pen at the persons waiting, and went on writing.
`Can't he spare time to see me?' said Alexei Alexandrovich.
`He has no time free; he is always busy. Kindly wait your turn.'
`Then I must trouble you to give him my card,' Alexei Alexandrovich said with dignity, seeing the impossibility of preserving his incognito.
The clerk took the card and, obviously not approving of what he read on it, went to the door.
Alexei Alexandrovich was in principle in favor of the publicity of legal proceedings, though for some higher official considerations he disliked the application of the principle in Russia, and disapproved of it, as far as he could disapprove of anything instituted by authority of the Emperor. His whole life had been spent in administrative work, and consequently, when he did not approve of anything, his disapproval was softened by the recognition of the inevitability of mistakes and the possibility of reform in every department. In the new public law courts he disliked the restrictions laid on the lawyers conducting cases. But till then he had had nothing to do with the law courts, and so had disapproved of their publicity simply in theory; now his disapprobation was strengthened by the unpleasant impression made on him in the lawyer's waiting room.
`He will be out right away,' said the clerk; and two minutes later there did actually appear in the doorway the large figure of an old student of jurisprudence who had been consulting with the lawyer, and the lawyer himself.
The lawyer was a little, squat, bald man, with a dark, reddish beard, light-colored long eyebrows, and beetling brow. He was attired as though for a wedding, from his cravat to his double watch chain and patent-leather shoes. His face was clever and rustic, but his dress was dandified and in bad taste.
`Pray walk in,' said the lawyer, addressing Alexei Alexandrovich;and, gloomily ushering Karenin in before him, he closed the door. `Won't you sit down?' He indicated an armchair at a writing table covered with papers. He sat down himself, and, rubbing his little hands with short fingers covered with white hairs, he bent his head on one side. But as soon as he was settled in this position a moth flew over the table. The lawyer, with a swiftness that could never have been expected of him, opened his hands, caught the moth, and resumed his former attitude.
`Before beginning to speak of my business,' said Alexei Alexandrovich, following the lawyer's movements with wondering eyes, `I ought to observe that the matter about which I have to speak to you is to be a secret.'
The lawyer's drooping reddish mustaches were stirred by a scarcely perceptible smile.
`I should not be a lawyer if I could not keep the secrets confided to me. But if you would like proof...'
Alexei Alexandrovich glanced at his face, and saw that the shrewd, gray eyes were laughing, and seemed to know all about it already.
`You know my name?' Alexei Alexandrovich resumed.
`I know you and the good' - again he caught a moth - `work you are doing, like every Russian,' said the lawyer, bowing.
Alexei Alexandrovich sighed, plucking up his courage. But, having once made up his mind, he went on in his shrill voice, without timidity or hesitation, accentuating a word here and there.
`I have the misfortune,' Alexei Alexandrovich began, `to be a deceived husband, and I desire to break off all relations with my wife by legal means - that is, to be divorced; but do this so that my son may not remain with his mother.'
The lawyer's gray eyes tried not to laugh, but they were dancing with irrepressible glee, and Alexei Alexandrovich saw that it was not simply the delight of a man who has just got a profitable job: there was triumph and joy, there was a gleam like the malignant gleam he had seen in his wife's eyes.
`You desire my assistance in securing a divorce?'
`Yes, precisely; but I ought to warn you that I may be wasting your time and attention. I have come simply to consult you as a preliminary step. I want a divorce, but the form which it may take is of great consequence to me. It is very possible that if that form does not correspond with my requirements I may give up a legal action.'
`Oh, that's always the case,' said the lawyer, `and that's always for you to decide.'
He let his eyes rest on Alexei Alexandrovich's feet, feeling that he might offend his client by the sight of his irrepressible amusement.
He looked at a moth that flew before his nose, and moved his hand, but did not catch it from regard for Alexei Alexandrovich's situation.
`Though in their general features our laws on this subject are known to me,' pursued Alexei Alexandrovich, `I should be glad to have an idea of the forms in which such things are done, in practice.'
`You would be glad,' the lawyer, without lifting his eyes, responded, adopting, with a certain satisfaction, the tone of his client's remarks, `for me to lay before you all the methods by which you could secure what you desire?'