I have been told that her brother Anatole was in love with her and she with him, that there was quite a scandal and that that's why he was sent away.

Hippolyte is her brother... Prince Vasili is her father... It's bad....

" he reflected, but while he was thinking this (the reflection was still incomplete), he caught himself smiling and was conscious that another line of thought had sprung up, and while thinking of her worthlessness he was also dreaming of how she would be his wife, how she would love him become quite different, and how all he had thought and heard of her might be false.

And he again saw her not as the daughter of Prince Vasili, but visualized her whole body only veiled by its gray dress.

" But no! Why did this thought never occur to me before?" and again he told himself that it was impossible, that there would be something unnatural, and as it seemed to him dishonorable, in this marriage.