Vronsky stepped into the carriage.

His mother, a dried-up old lady with black eyes and ringlets, screwed up her eyes, scanning her son, and smiled slightly with her thin lips.

Getting up from the seat and handing her maid a bag, she gave her little wrinkled hand to her son to kiss, and lifting his head from her hand, kissed him on the cheek.

"You got my telegram? Quite well? Thank God.

" "You had a good journey?" said her son, sitting down beside her, and involuntarily listening to a woman's voice outside the door.