列文无法平静地看着哥哥；在哥哥面前，他也无法保持自然与平静。走进病人房间时，他的目光和注意力都不自觉地变得模糊，看不清也分辨不出哥哥处境中的细节。他闻到可怕的臭气，看到污秽、凌乱和凄惨的状况，听到呻吟声，感到无论做什么都无济于事。他从未想过要分析病人状况的细节，思考那副身躯如何蜷缩在被子下，那些瘦骨嶙峋的腿、大腿和脊椎怎样挤成一团，能否让它们更舒适些，能否做些什么让状况哪怕无法好转，至少不那么糟糕。一想到这些细节，他就感到不寒而栗。他确信，无论是延长哥哥的生命还是减轻他的痛苦，都已无计可施。然而，病人感觉到了他这种认为一切帮助都无济于事的想法，这激怒了他。而这让列文更加痛苦。待在病房里对他来说是种煎熬，不在那里则更糟。于是，他不断借故进进出出，因为他无法独自留下。
但基蒂的想法、感受和做法却截然不同。一看到病人，她就心生怜悯。在她女人的心中，这种怜悯并没有像在丈夫心中那样激起恐惧和厌恶，而是激发了一种行动的欲望，想要了解他状况的一切细节，并加以改善。因为她丝毫没有怀疑帮助他是自己的责任，所以她也毫不怀疑此事可行，并立刻着手行动。那些让她丈夫一想到就心惊胆战的细节，反而立刻吸引了她的注意。她派人去请医生，派人去药店，让跟她来的女仆和玛丽亚·尼古拉耶夫娜扫地、掸灰、擦洗；她亲自洗了些东西，又擦了些东西，还把一些东西垫在被子下。按照她的吩咐，有些东西被拿进病房，有些东西被搬了出去。她不顾在走廊里遇到的男人们，亲自回了几次自己的房间，拿出并带来了床单、枕套、毛巾和衬衫。
那个正忙着伺候在餐厅用餐的一群工程师的侍者，几次面带怒色地应她的召唤而来，却也不得不执行她的命令，因为她下命令时带着如此亲切的坚持，让人无法推脱。列文并不赞成这一切；他不相信这对病人会有什么好处。他尤其担心病人会因此生气。但病人虽然看起来似乎对此漠不关心，实际上也的确是漠不关心，但并没有生气，只是有些尴尬，总体上好像对她为他所做的一切还有点兴趣。列文被基蒂派去找医生回来，一开门，正好撞见病人按基蒂的吩咐在换衬衣。那长长的、苍白的脊椎，连同巨大突出的肩胛骨、凸起的肋骨和脊椎骨，都裸露着，玛丽亚·尼古拉耶夫娜和侍者正跟睡衣袖子较劲，怎么也塞不进那条松弛无力的胳膊。基蒂在列文身后匆匆关上门，没有看那个方向；但病人呻吟了一声，她便迅速朝他走去。
"快点。"她说。
"噢，你别过来。"病人生气地说，"我自己来……"
"什么？"玛丽亚·尼古拉耶夫娜问道。但基蒂听到并看到，他是因为在她面前赤裸着身体而感到羞耻和不安。
"我没看，我没看！"她一边说，一边帮着把胳膊塞进袖子里。"玛丽亚·尼古拉耶夫娜，你到这边来，你来弄。"她补充道。
"劳驾你去帮我拿一下，我的小包里有个小瓶子，"她对丈夫说，"你知道，就在侧袋里；请帮我拿来，这边他们很快就收拾好了。"
拿着瓶子回来时，列文发现病人已经安顿得很舒适，周围的一切都焕然一新。浓重的臭味被芳香醋的味道取代了，基蒂正撅着嘴唇，鼓起玫瑰色的脸颊，通过一个小管子往里喷着醋。到处都看不到灰尘，床边铺了一块小地毯。桌上整齐地摆着药瓶和玻璃瓶，需要的亚麻布也叠好放在那里，还有基蒂的英国刺绣活儿。病人床边的另一张桌子上放着蜡烛、饮料和药粉。病人本人也洗过、梳过头，躺在干净的被单里，靠着高高垫起的枕头，穿着干净的衬衣，衬衣的白色领子围着他那瘦得惊人的脖子，他带着一种新的、充满希望的表情，定定地看着基蒂。
列文带来的医生，是他从俱乐部找到的，并非一直给尼古拉·列文看病的那位，因为病人对他不满意。新医生拿起听诊器给病人听了听，摇了摇头，开了药，然后极其详细地解释了先如何服药，再要遵守什么饮食规定。他建议吃鸡蛋，生的或稍微煮一下的，还有苏打水，以及特定温度的热牛奶。医生走后，病人对哥哥说了些什么，列文只听清了最后几个字："你的卡佳。"从他注视基蒂的神情来看，列文知道他在称赞她。他确实叫她卡佳，就像他称呼她那样。
"我已经好多了，"他说，"要是有你在，我早就好了。真是太好了！"他拿起她的手，拉到唇边，但好像怕她会不喜欢，又改变了主意，松开手，只是轻轻抚摸了一下。基蒂用双手握住他的手，紧紧按了一下。
"现在帮我翻到左边侧卧，然后你去睡吧。"他说。
除了基蒂，没人能听懂他说的话；只有她明白。她明白，是因为她一直在心里留意着他需要什么。
"翻到另一边，"她对丈夫说，"他总是朝那边睡。帮他翻一下身，叫佣人来太麻烦了。我没那么大力气。你能行吗？"她对玛丽亚·尼古拉耶夫娜说。
"恐怕不行。"玛丽亚·尼古拉耶夫娜回答。
虽然列文非常害怕用胳膊去抱那副可怕的身躯，去触摸那被子下他宁愿一无所知的东西，但在妻子的影响下，他作出了她非常熟悉的坚定的表情，把手伸进被子，抓住了那具身体。然而，尽管他自恃有力，还是被那些无力的四肢那奇怪的沉重感所震惊。当他翻动他时，感觉到那条瘦骨嶙峋的巨大胳膊搭在自己脖子上，基蒂迅速而无声地转动枕头，拍松，把病人的头枕好，又把他那再次黏在潮湿额头上的头发抚平。
病人握着哥哥的手不放。列文感到他想用这只手做什么，并把它往某个方向拉。列文怀着下沉的心顺从了：是的，他把他的手拉到嘴边吻了一下。列文抽泣着浑身发抖，一句话也说不出来，走出了房间。
Levin could not look calmly at his brother; he could not himself be
natural and calm in his presence. When he went in to the sick man, his
eyes and his attention were unconsciously dimmed, and he did not see
and did not distinguish the details of his brother’s position. He smelt
the awful odor, saw the dirt, disorder, and miserable condition, and
heard the groans, and felt that nothing could be done to help. It never
entered his head to analyze the details of the sick man’s situation, to
consider how that body was lying under the quilt, how those emaciated
legs and thighs and spine were lying huddled up, and whether they could
not be made more comfortable, whether anything could not be done to
make things, if not better, at least less bad. It made his blood run
cold when he began to think of all these details. He was absolutely
convinced that nothing could be done to prolong his brother’s life or
to relieve his suffering. But a sense of his regarding all aid as out
of the question was felt by the sick man, and exasperated him. And this
made it still more painful for Levin. To be in the sick-room was agony
to him, not to be there still worse. And he was continually, on various
pretexts, going out of the room, and coming in again, because he was
unable to remain alone.
But Kitty thought, and felt, and acted quite differently. On seeing the
sick man, she pitied him. And pity in her womanly heart did not arouse
at all that feeling of horror and loathing that it aroused in her
husband, but a desire to act, to find out all the details of his state,
and to remedy them. And since she had not the slightest doubt that it
was her duty to help him, she had no doubt either that it was possible,
and immediately set to work. The very details, the mere thought of
which reduced her husband to terror, immediately engaged her attention.
She sent for the doctor, sent to the chemist’s, set the maid who had
come with her and Marya Nikolaevna to sweep and dust and scrub; she
herself washed up something, washed out something else, laid something
under the quilt. Something was by her directions brought into the
sick-room, something else was carried out. She herself went several
times to her room, regardless of the men she met in the corridor, got
out and brought in sheets, pillow cases, towels, and shirts.
The waiter, who was busy with a party of engineers dining in the dining
hall, came several times with an irate countenance in answer to her
summons, and could not avoid carrying out her orders, as she gave them
with such gracious insistence that there was no evading her. Levin did
not approve of all this; he did not believe it would be of any good to
the patient. Above all, he feared the patient would be angry at it. But
the sick man, though he seemed and was indifferent about it, was not
angry, but only abashed, and on the whole as it were interested in what
she was doing with him. Coming back from the doctor to whom Kitty had
sent him, Levin, on opening the door, came upon the sick man at the
instant when, by Kitty’s directions, they were changing his linen. The
long white ridge of his spine, with the huge, prominent shoulder blades
and jutting ribs and vertebrae, was bare, and Marya Nikolaevna and the
waiter were struggling with the sleeve of the night shirt, and could
not get the long, limp arm into it. Kitty, hurriedly closing the door
after Levin, was not looking that way; but the sick man groaned, and
she moved rapidly towards him.
“Make haste,” she said.
“Oh, don’t you come,” said the sick man angrily. “I’ll do it my
myself....”
“What say?” queried Marya Nikolaevna. But Kitty heard and saw he was
ashamed and uncomfortable at being naked before her.
“I’m not looking, I’m not looking!” she said, putting the arm in.
“Marya Nikolaevna, you come this side, you do it,” she added.
“Please go for me, there’s a little bottle in my small bag,” she said,
turning to her husband, “you know, in the side pocket; bring it,
please, and meanwhile they’ll finish clearing up here.”
Returning with the bottle, Levin found the sick man settled comfortably
and everything about him completely changed. The heavy smell was
replaced by the smell of aromatic vinegar, which Kitty with pouting
lips and puffed-out, rosy cheeks was squirting through a little pipe.
There was no dust visible anywhere, a rug was laid by the bedside. On
the table stood medicine bottles and decanters tidily arranged, and the
linen needed was folded up there, and Kitty’s _broderie anglaise_. On
the other table by the patient’s bed there were candles and drink and
powders. The sick man himself, washed and combed, lay in clean sheets
on high raised pillows, in a clean night-shirt with a white collar
about his astoundingly thin neck, and with a new expression of hope
looked fixedly at Kitty.
The doctor brought by Levin, and found by him at the club, was not the
one who had been attending Nikolay Levin, as the patient was
dissatisfied with him. The new doctor took up a stethoscope and sounded
the patient, shook his head, prescribed medicine, and with extreme
minuteness explained first how to take the medicine and then what diet
was to be kept to. He advised eggs, raw or hardly cooked, and seltzer
water, with warm milk at a certain temperature. When the doctor had
gone away the sick man said something to his brother, of which Levin
could distinguish only the last words: “Your Katya.” By the expression
with which he gazed at her, Levin saw that he was praising her. He
called indeed to Katya, as he called her.
“I’m much better already,” he said. “Why, with you I should have got
well long ago. How nice it is!” he took her hand and drew it towards
his lips, but as though afraid she would dislike it he changed his
mind, let it go, and only stroked it. Kitty took his hand in both hers
and pressed it.
“Now turn me over on the left side and go to bed,” he said.
No one could make out what he said but Kitty; she alone understood. She
understood because she was all the while mentally keeping watch on what
he needed.
“On the other side,” she said to her husband, “he always sleeps on that
side. Turn him over, it’s so disagreeable calling the servants. I’m not
strong enough. Can you?” she said to Marya Nikolaevna.
“I’m afraid not,” answered Marya Nikolaevna.
Terrible as it was to Levin to put his arms round that terrible body,
to take hold of that under the quilt, of which he preferred to know
nothing, under his wife’s influence he made his resolute face that she
knew so well, and putting his arms into the bed took hold of the body,
but in spite of his own strength he was struck by the strange heaviness
of those powerless limbs. While he was turning him over, conscious of
the huge emaciated arm about his neck, Kitty swiftly and noiselessly
turned the pillow, beat it up and settled in it the sick man’s head,
smoothing back his hair, which was sticking again to his moist brow.
The sick man kept his brother’s hand in his own. Levin felt that he
meant to do something with his hand and was pulling it somewhere. Levin
yielded with a sinking heart: yes, he drew it to his mouth and kissed
it. Levin, shaking with sobs and unable to articulate a word, went out
of the room.
