“This is what I want, my dear fellow,” said the count to the deferential young man who had entered. “Bring me …” he reflected a moment, “yes, bring me seven hundred rubles, yes! But mind, don’t bring me such tattered and dirty notes as last time, but nice clean ones for the countess.”
“Yes, Mítenka, clean ones, please,” said the countess, sighing deeply.
“When would you like them, your excellency?” asked Mítenka. “Allow me to inform you … But, don’t be uneasy,” he added, noticing that the count was beginning to breathe heavily and quickly which was always a sign of approaching anger. “I was forgetting … Do you wish it brought at once?”
“Yes, yes; just so! Bring it. Give it to the countess.”
“What a treasure that Mítenka is,” added the count with a smile when the young man had departed. “There is never any ‘impossible’ with him. That’s a thing I hate! Everything is possible.”
“Ah, money, Count, money! How much sorrow it causes in the world,” said the countess. “But I am in great need of this sum.”
“You, my little countess, are a notorious spendthrift,” said the count, and having kissed his wife’s hand he went back to his study.
When Anna Mikháylovna returned from Count Bezúkhov’s the money, all in clean notes, was lying ready under a handkerchief on the countess’ little table, and Anna Mikháylovna noticed that something was agitating her.
“Well, my dear?” asked the countess.
“Oh, what a terrible state he is in! One would not know him, he is so ill! I was only there a few moments and hardly said a word …”