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But yet inevitably the Shtcherbatskys were thrown most into the

society of a Moscow lady, Marya Yevgenyevna Rtishtcheva and her

daughter, whom Kitty disliked, because she had fallen ill, like

herself, over a love affair, and a Moscow colonel, whom Kitty had

known from childhood, and always seen in uniform and epaulets,

and who now, with his little eyes and his open neck and flowered

cravat, was uncommonly ridiculous and tedious, because there was

no getting rid of him. When all this was so firmly established,

Kitty began to be very much bored, especially as the prince went

away to Carlsbad and she was left alone with her mother. She took

no interest in the people she knew, feeling that nothing fresh

would come of them. Her chief mental interest in the

watering-place consisted in watching and making theories about

the people she did not know.