"Ah! Alexey Alexandrovitch!" said the little old man, with a malicious light in his eyes, at the moment when Karenin was on a level with them, and was nodding with a frigid gesture, "I haven't congratulated you yet," said the old man, pointing to his newly received ribbon.

"Thank you," answered Alexey Alexandrovitch.

" What an _exquisite_ day to-day," he added, laying emphasis in his peculiar way on the word _exquisite_.

That they laughed at him he was well aware, but he did not expect anything but hostility from them; he was used to that by now.