Two portraits of the same woman

Mikhaylov sells the picture and paints Anna's portrait, and after the fifth sitting it astonishes everyone by finding her sweetest spiritual expression — which Vronsky believes only a man who loved her could see, though he learned it from the portrait. In the palazzo the painter is another man: deferential, calling Vronsky Your Excellency, never staying to dinner, stubbornly silent about Vronsky's picture and Golenishchev's lectures. When the sittings end they are relieved, and Golenishchev supplies the explanation — jealousy of a rich Count who can do as well without difficulty. Vronsky defends him and privately agrees. The two portraits of the same woman should have shown him the difference and do not; he simply stops painting Anna and continues his mediaeval picture, which all three prefer because it resembles famous pictures more closely. To Mikhaylov, dilettante painting is a man caressing a wax doll in front of a lover. Vronsky's interest ends; the palazzo turns old and dirty overnight; they decide to go back to Russia.

Tolstoy grants Vronsky enough taste to abandon his picture and denies him enough to see why — the two portraits stand side by side and teach him nothing. The wax doll is Mikhaylov's only articulate objection and it is never spoken. Vronsky's firmness in quitting without excuses is set against Golenishchev's self-deception and is, for once, to his credit.