ople who saw reason to suppose that there was anything
wrong with him; his conduct seemed to them perfectly normal, and so much
so that the action he had taken in the square the morning before was
accepted and approved.

"That's how it should have been from the first," the higher officials
declared. "If a man begins as a philanthropist he has to come to the
same thing in the end, though he does not see that it was necessary
from the point of view of philanthropy itself"--that, at least, was the
opinion at the club. They only blamed him for having lost his temper.
"It ought to have been done more coolly, but there, he is a new man,"
said the authorities.

All eyes turned with equal eagerness to Yulia Mihailovna. Of course no
one has the right to expect from me an exact account in regard to one
point: that is a mysterious, a feminine question. But I only know one
thing: on the evening of the previous day she had gone into Andrey
Antonovitch's study and was there with him till long after midnight.
Andrey Antonovitch was comforted and forgiven. The husband and wife came
to a complete understanding, everything was forgotten, and when at
the end of the interview Lembke went down on his knees, recalling with
horror the final incident of the previous night, the exquisite hand,
and after it the lips of his wife, checked the fervent flow of penitent
phrases of the chivalrously delicate gentleman who was limp with
emotion. Every one could see the happiness in her face. She walked in
with an open-hearted air, wearing a magnificent dress. She seemed to
be at the very pinnacle of her heart's desires, the fete--the goal and
crown of her diplomacy--was an accomplished fact. As they walked
to their seats in front of the platform, the Lembkes bowed in all
directions and responded to greetings. They were at once surrounded. The
marshal's wife got up to meet them.

But at that point a horrid misunderstanding occurred; the orchestra,
apropos of nothing, struck up a flourish, not a triumphal march of any
kind, but a simple flourish such as was played at the club when some
one's health was drunk at an official dinner. I know now that Lyamshin,
in his capacity of steward, had arranged this, as though in honour of
the Lembkes' entrance. Of course he could always excuse it as a blunder
or excessive zeal.... Alas! I did not know at the time that they no
longer cared even to find excuses, and that all such considerations were
from that day a th