ancy, done up like this, it rolled under the chest of drawers. I
must have thrown it down carelessly on the chest when I went out. It was
only found the day before yesterday, when the floor was scrubbed. You
did set me a task, though!"

Lembke dropped his eyes sternly.

"I haven't slept for the last two nights, thanks to you. It was found
the day before yesterday, but I kept it, and have been reading it ever
since. I've no time in the day, so I've read it at night. Well, I don't
like it; it's not my way of looking at things. But that's no matter;
I've never set up for being a critic, but I couldn't tear myself away
from it, my dear man, though I didn't like it! The fourth and fifth
chapters are... they really are... damn it all, they are beyond words!
And what a lot of humour you've packed into it; it made me laugh! How
you can make fun of things _sans que cela paraisse!_ As for the ninth
and tenth chapters, it's all about love; that's not my line, but it's
effective though. I was nearly blubbering over Egrenev's letter, though
you've shown him up so cleverly.... You know, it's touching, though at
the same time you want to show the false side of him, as it were, don't
you? Have I guessed right? But I could simply beat you for the ending.
For what are you setting up? Why, the same old idol of domestic
happiness, begetting children and making money; 'they were married and
lived happy ever afterwards'--come, it's too much! You will enchant your
readers, for even I couldn't put the book down; but that makes it all
the worse! The reading public is as stupid as ever, but it's the duty
of sensible people to wake them up, while you... But that's enough.
Good-bye. Don't be cross another time; I came in to you because I had a
couple of words to say to you, but you are so unaccountable..."

Andrey Antonovitch meantime took his novel and locked it up in an oak
bookcase, seizing the opportunity to wink to Blum to disappear. The
latter withdrew with a long, mournful face.

"I am not unaccountable, I am simply... nothing but annoyances," he
muttered, frowning but without anger, and sitting down to the table.
"Sit down and say what you have to say. It's a long time since I've seen
you, Pyotr Stepanovitch, only don't burst upon me in the future with
such manners... sometimes, when one has business, it's..."

"My manners are always the same...."

"I know, and I believe that you mean nothing by it, but sometimes one is
worried.... S