Levin reached the club just at the right time. Members and visitors were driving up as he arrived. Levin had not been at the club for a very long while - not since he lived in Moscow, when he was leaving the university and going into society. He remembered the club, the external details of its arrangement, but he had completely forgotten the impression it had made on him in old days. But as soon as, driving into the wide semicircular court and getting out of the cab, he mounted the steps, and the hall porter, adorned with a crossbelt, noiselessly opened the door to him with a bow; as soon as he saw in the porter's room the cloaks and galoshes of members who thought it less trouble to take them off downstairs; as soon as he heard the mysterious ringing bell that preceded him as he ascended the low-stepped, carpeted staircase, and saw the statue on the landing, and the third porter at the top doors, a familiar figure grown older, in the club livery, opening the door without haste or delay, and scanning the visitors as they passed in - Levin felt the old impression of the club come back in a rush, an impression of repose, comfort, and propriety. .www.ideafutura.co.uk.
`Your hat, please,' the porter said to Levin, who forgot the club rule of checking his hat in the porter's room. `Long time since you've been here. The Prince put your name down yesterday. Prince Stepan Arkadyevich is not here yet.' .cartier love bracelet replica.
The porter not only knew Levin, but also all his connections and relationships, and so immediately mentioned his intimate friends. .bvlgari rings replica.
Passing through the outer hall, divided up by screens, and the room partitioned on the right, where a man sits at the fruit buffet, Levin passed by a shuffling old man, and entered the dining room, full of noise and people. .Christian Louboutin Replica.
He walked along the tables, almost all full, and scrutinized the visitors. He saw people of all sorts, old and young; some he knew a little; some were intimate friends. There was not a single cross or worried-looking face. All seemed to have checked their cares and anxieties in the porter's room with their hats, and were all deliberately getting ready to enjoy the material blessings of life. Sviiazhsky was here and Shcherbatsky, Neviedovsky and the old Prince, and Vronsky and Sergei Ivanovich. .hermes bracelet replica.
`Ah! Why are you late?' the Prince said smiling, and giving him his hand over his own shoulder. `How's Kitty?' he added, smoothing out the napkin he had tucked in at his waistcoat buttons. .cartier love bracelet replica.
`Very well; they are dining at home, all three of them.' .Giuseppe Zanotti Replica.
`Ah, ``Alines-Nadines' to be sure! There's no room with us. Go to that table, and make haste and take a seat,' said the Prince, and turning away he carefully took a plate of burbot soup. .bvlgari rings replica.
`Levin, this way!' a good-natured voice shouted a little farther on. It was Turovtsin. He was sitting with a young officer, and beside them were two chairs tipped over. Levin gladly went up to them. He had always liked the goodhearted rake, Turovtsin - he was associated in his mind with memories of his courtship - and at that moment, after the strain of intellectual conversation, the sight of Turovtsin's good-natured face was particularly welcome. .Replica Christian Louboutin.
`For you and Oblonsky. He'll be here directly.' .bvlgari rings replica.
The young man, holding himself very erect, with eyes forever twinkling with enjoyment, was an officer from Peterburg, Gaghin. Turovtsin introduced them. .Replica Christian Louboutin.
`Oblonsky's always late.' .Giuseppe Zanotti Replica.
`Ah, here he is! .Cartier Juste Un Clou Replica.
`Have you only just come?' said Oblonsky, coming quickly toward them. `Good day. Had some vodka? Well, come along then.' .cartier love ring replica.
Levin got up and went with him to the big table spread with spirits and appetizers of the most varied kinds. One would have thought that out of two dozen delicacies one might find something to one's taste, but Stepan Arkadyevich asked for something special, and one of the liveried waiters standing by immediately brought what was required. They drank a pony each and returned to their table. .cartier love bracelet replica.
At once, while they were still at their soup, Gaghin was served with champagne, and told the waiter to fill four glasses. Levin did not refuse the wine, and asked for a second bottle. He was very hungry, and ate and drank with great enjoyment, and with still greater enjoyment took part in the lively and simple conversation of his companions. Gaghin, dropping his voice, told the last good story from Peterburg, and the story, though improper and stupid, was so ludicrous that Levin broke into roars of laughter so loud that those near looked round.
`That's in the same style as, ``that's a thing I can't endure!' You know the story?' said Stepan Arkadyevich. `Ah, that's exquisite! Another bottle,' he said to the waiter, and he began to relate his good story.
`Piotr Illyich Vinovsky invites you to drink with him,' a little old waiter interrupted Stepan Arkadyevich, bringing two delicate glasses of sparkling champagne, and addressing Stepan Arkadyevich and Levin. Stepan Arkadyevich took the glass, and looking toward a bald man with red mustaches at the other end of the table, he nodded to him, smiling.
`Who's that?' asked Levin.
`You met him once at my place, don't you remember? A good-natured fellow.'
Levin did the same as Stepan Arkadyevich and took the glass.
Stepan Arkadyevich's anecdote too was very amusing. Levin told his story, and that too was successful. Then they talked of horses, of the races, of what they had been doing that day, and of how smartly Vronsky's Atlas had won the first prize. Levin did not notice how the time passed at dinner.
`Ah! And here they are!' Stepan Arkadyevich said toward the end of dinner, leaning over the back of his chair and holding out his hand to Vronsky, who came up with a tall colonel of the Guards. Vronsky's face too beamed with the look of good-humored enjoyment that was general in the club. He propped his elbow playfully on Stepan Arkadyevich's shoulder, whispering something to him, and he held out his hand to Levin with the same good-humored smile.
`Very glad to meet you,' he said. `I looked out for you at the election, but I was told you had gone away.'
`Yes, I left the same day. We've just been talking of your horse. I congratulate you,' said Levin. `It was run in very fast time.'
`Yes; you've race horses too, haven't you?'
`No, my father had; but I remember and know something about them.'
`Where have you dined?' asked Stepan Arkadyevich.
`We were at the second table, behind the columns.'
`We've been celebrating his success,' said the tall colonel. `It's his second Imperial prize. I wish I might have the luck at cards he has with horses.'
`Well, why waste precious time? I'm going to the ``infernal regions,'' added the colonel, and he walked away.
`That's Iashvin,' Vronsky said in answer to Turovtsin, and he sat down in the vacated seat beside them. He drank the glass offered him, and ordered a bottle of wine. Under the influence of the club atmosphere or the wine he had drunk, Levin chatted away to Vronsky of the best breeds of cattle, and was very glad not to feel the slightest hostility to this man. He even told him, among other things, that he had heard from his wife that she had met him at Princess Marya Borissovna's.
`Ah, Princess Marya Borissovna - she's exquisite!' said Stepan Arkadyevich, and he told an anecdote about her which set them all laughing. Vronsky in particular laughed with such simplehearted amusement that Levin felt quite reconciled to him.
`Well, have we finished?' said Stepan Arkadyevich, getting up with a smile. `Let us go.'
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? Leo Tolstoy
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