After Kitty leaves, Levin feels uneasy. He will see her again in just fourteen short hours, when he will pledge his life to her forever, but his emotions are so strong that he is afraid he might die before then. To pass the time, Levin needs company and Stepan Arkadyevitch is the one he would choose as the most congenial; however, his host has said he is leaving for a soiree, though he is actually going to meet his lover at the ballet.

Levin has time only to tell Stepan Arkadyevitch that he loves him and will never forget what he did to bring Kitty back to him. His host teases him about not wanting to die anymore, and Darya Alexandrovna says she is glad he has reconnected with Kitty. This annoys Levin, for she clearly does not understand the loftiness of this evening’s events and should not have said anything at all to him about it.

In the end, Levin accompanies his brother, Sergey Ivanovitch, who is glad that Levin is happy again. They go to a meeting in which there is typical good-natured disagreement about the laying of pipes and missing money, and Levin now sees how such business is conducted and is surprised he used to think that such meetings were tedious and contentious. Levin and his brother continue their evening over tea at Sviazhsky’s house, and Levin spends hours talking about nothing and having a grand time—not realizing that he is boring everyone terribly and keeping them all up long past their bedtimes.

It is after one o’clock when Levin finally arrives at his hotel, and he is dismayed at being alone for the remaining ten hours before he can see the woman he loves. The servant whose job it is to light the candles for guests and keep the night watch is named Yegor, and he strikes Levin as being a particularly intelligent and good-hearted man.

As they talk, Levin learns that Yegor has a wife and four children, including a daughter he hopes will marry the cashier in a saddler’s shop. When he hears this, Levin says the most important thing is love, of course, and anyone in love will always be happy. Yegor listens attentively and agrees, and then he makes the surprising announcement that he has always been satisfied with his masters as well as his current employer, even though he is French. Yegor seems to have caught Levin’s excitable state and prepares to express even more of his heartfelt emotions.

At that moment, however, a bell rings and Yegor must go; Levin is left alone. He is hungry because he had not eaten much all day, and he is tired because he had not slept the night before; however, he is incapable of thinking about food or sleep. His room is cold, but he is overheated. He opens the windows of his room and muses about many things. Everything he hears and sees is particularly poignant tonight. At seven the next morning, he hears the noises of people stirring and feels as if he is beginning to freeze. He closes the window, washes, dresses, and leaves the hotel.