at last to see the bridal pair. But the door had already opened more than ten times, and each time it proved to be some belated guest, or guests, admitted among the number of the friends on the right, or some spectator who had been clever enough to deceive or elude the police officer, and sat down among the strangers on the left.
The friends and strangers had passed through every phase of waiting; at first they supposed that the bride and bridegroom would be there any minute, and did not attach any importance to the delay; then they began to look around at the door more and more frequently, wondering what could have happened; at last the delay began to be awkward, and the relatives and invited guests tried to assume an air of indifference, as if they were absorbed in their conversation.
The archdeacon, as if to let people know that his time was precious, every now and then gave an impatient cough, which made the windows rattle; in the choir the singers, tired of waiting, could be heard, now trying their voices, and now blowing their noses; the priest kept sending, now a sacristan, now a deacon, to find out if the bridegroom was coming, and appeared himself more and more frequently at the side doors in his lilac cassock with its embroidered sash.
Finally a lady looked at her watch, and said to the one sitting next her, "This is very strange!" And immediately all the invited guests began to express their surprise and discontent aloud. One of the shafers, or best men, went to see what had happened.
During ail this time Kitty, in her white dress, long veil, and wreath of orange blossoms, was standing in the "hall" of the Shcherbatsky mansion with her sister, Madame Lvova, and her nuptial godmother,[1] looking out of the window, and had been waiting for half an hour for the shafer to announce the bridegroom's arrival at the church.
Levin, meanwhile, in black trousers, but without either coat or waistcoat, was walking up and down his
- ↑ Posazhonaya mat'.
