Arriving dusty at Pokrovsk

Not knowing when he could leave, Koznyshev sent no telegram, so nobody meets them; he and Katavasov arrive at the Pokrovsk porch toward noon in a hired tarantas, dark as Arabs with dust. Kitty, on the balcony with her father and Dolly, runs down. Koznyshev teases her about enjoying tranquil happiness in her peaceful shallows; Katavasov asks what Levin thinks of the Serbian war, which Kitty answers awkwardly — nothing in particular, the same as everybody. The Prince finds the visit trying in the heat, and Kitty defends Katavasov as someone Kostya is fond of. Feeling the flow of milk, she hurries to the nursery, where Mitya is screaming with hunger; Agatha Mikhaylovna insists on tidying his cap first and declares that he knows her. Mother and baby are both impatient, the baby takes hold in the wrong place, and only after desperate screaming and choking does it go smoothly. Kitty watches his cheeks rise and fall and the rosy palm circling, and privately believes he knows and understands everything — for everyone else Mitya requires material care, for her he has long been a moral being.

After the platform and the mangled body, Tolstoy moves to dust, lunch arrangements and a hungry baby, and the shift is the argument. Koznyshev's 'peaceful shallows' is offered as a joke and the rest of the part will test it. Kitty's certainty that Mitya is already a moral being answers the philosophies Levin has been reading without engaging them.