ply _activite devorante_. I've
told them here straight in their faces: 'Dear sirs, to maintain the
equilibrium and to develop all the provincial institutions one thing
is essential; the increase of the power of the governor.' You see it's
necessary that all these institutions, the zemstvos, the law-courts,
should have a two-fold existence, that is, on the one hand, it's
necessary they should exist (I agree that it is necessary), on the other
hand, it's necessary that they shouldn't. It's all according to the
views of the government. If the mood takes them so that institutions
seem suddenly necessary, I shall have them at once in readiness. The
necessity passes and no one will find them under my rule. That's what
I understand by _activite devorante_, and you can't have it without an
increase of the governor's power. We're talking _tete-a-tete_. You know
I've already laid before the government in Petersburg the necessity of a
special sentinel before the governor's house. I'm awaiting an answer."

"You ought to have two," Pyotr Stepanovitch commented.

"Why two?" said Von Lembke, stopping short before him.

"One's not enough to create respect for you. You certainly ought to have
two."

Andrey Antonovitch made a wry face.

"You... there's no limit to the liberties you take, Pyotr Stepanovitch.
You take advantage of my good-nature, you say cutting things, and play
the part of a _bourru bienfaisant_...."

"Well, that's as you please," muttered Pyotr Stepanovitch; "anyway you
pave the way for us and prepare for our success."

"Now, who are 'we,' and what success?" said Von Lembke, staring at him
in surprise. But he got no answer.

Yulia Mihailovna, receiving a report of the conversation, was greatly
displeased.

"But I can't exercise my official authority upon your favourite,"
Andrey Antonovitch protested in self-defence, "especially when we're
_tete-a-tete_.... I may say too much... in the goodness of my heart."

"From too much goodness of heart. I didn't know you'd got a collection
of manifestoes. Be so good as to show them to me."

"But... he asked to have them for one day."

"And you've let him have them, again!" cried Yulia Mihailovna getting
angry. "How tactless!"

"I'll send some one to him at once to get them."

"He won't give them up."

"I'll insist on it," cried Von Lembke, boiling over, and he jumped up
from his seat. "Who's he that we should be so afraid of him, and who am
I that I shouldn't dare