After this was done, it was thought important to eat, and particularly to drink, in officers’ clubs or the salons of the best restaurants, squandering large sums of money, which came from some invisible source; then theatres, ballets, women, then again riding on horseback, waving of swords and shooting, and again the squandering of money, the wine, cards, and women.  This kind of life acts on military men even more depravingly than on others, because if any other than a military man lead such a life he cannot help being ashamed of it in the depth of his heart.  A military man is, on the contrary, proud of a life of this kind especially at war time, and Nekhludoff had entered the army just after war with the Turks had been declared.  “We are prepared to sacrifice our lives at the wars, and therefore a gay, reckless life is not only pardonable, but absolutely necessary for us, and so we lead it.”

Such were Nekhludoff’s confused thoughts at this period of his existence, and he felt all the time the delight of being free of the moral barriers he had formerly set himself.  And the state he lived in was that of a chronic mania of selfishness.  He was in this state when, after three years’ absence, he came again to visit his aunts.

CHAPTER XIV.

The second meeting with Maslova.

Nekhludoff went to visit his aunts because their estate lay near the road he had to travel in order to join his regiment, which had gone forward, because they had very warmly asked him to come, and especially because he wanted to see Katusha.  Perhaps in his heart he had already formed those evil designs against Katusha which his now uncontrolled animal self suggested to him, but he did not acknowledge this as his intention, but only wished to go back to the spot where he had been so happy, to see his rather funny, but dear, kind-hearted old aunts, who always, without his noticing it, surrounded him with an atmosphere of love and admiration, and to see sweet Katusha, of whom he had retained so pleasant a memory.

He arrived at the end of March, on Good Friday, after the thaw had set in.  It was pouring with rain so that he had not a dry thread on him and was feeling very cold, but yet vigorous and full of spirits, as always at that time.  “Is she still with them?” he thought, as he drove into the familiar, old-fashioned courtyard, surrounded by a low brick wall, and now filled with snow off the roofs.

He expected she would come out when she heard the sledge bells but she did not.  Two bare-footed women with pails and tucked-up skirts, who had evidently been scrubbing the floors, came out of the side door.  She was not at the front door either, and only Tikhon, the man-servant, with his apron on, evidently also busy cleaning, came out into the front porch.  His aunt Sophia Ivanovna alone met him in the ante-room; she had a silk dress on and a cap on her head.  Both aunts had been to church and had received communion.