On the following morning, at tea, Lemm requested Lavretzky to furnish him with horses, that he might return to town. "It is time that I should set about my work,--that is to say, my lessons," remarked the old man:--"but here I am only wasting time in vain." Lavretzky did not immediately reply to him: he seemed preoccupied. "Very well,"--he said at last;--"I will accompany you myself."--Without any aid from the servants, grunting and fuming, Lemm packed his small trunk, and tore up and burned several sheets of music-paper. The horses were brought round. As he emerged from his study, Lavretzky thrust into his pocket the newspaper of the day before. During the entire journey, Lemm and Lavretzky had very little to say to each other: each of them was engrossed with his own thoughts, and each was delighted that the other did not disturb him. And they parted rather coldly,--which, by the way, frequently happens between friends in Russia. Lavretzky drove the old man to his tiny house: the latter alighted, got out his trunk, and without offering his hand to his friend (he held his trunk in front of his chest with both hands), without even looking at him,--he said in Russian: "Good-bye, sir!"--"Good-bye,"--repeated Lavretzky, and ordered his coachman to drive him to his own lodgings. (He had hired a lodging in the town of O * * * in case he might require it.) After writing several letters and dining in haste, Lavretzky took his way to the Kalitins. In their drawing-room he found no one but Panshin, who informed him that Marya Dmitrievna would be down directly, and immediately entered into conversation with him, with the most cordial amiability. Up to that day, Panshin had treated Lavretzky, not exactly in a patronizing way, yet condescendingly; but Liza, in telling Panshin about her jaunt of the day before, had expressed herself to the effect that Lavretzky was a very fine and clever man; that was enough: the "very fine" man must be captivated. Panshin began with compliments to Lavretzky, with descriptions of the raptures with which, according to his statement, Marya Dmitrievna's whole family had expressed themselves about Vasilievskoe, and then, according to his wont, passing adroitly to himself, he began to talk about his own occupations, his views of life, of the world, of the government service;--he said a couple of words about the future of Russia, about the proper way of keeping the governors in hand; thereupon, merrily jeered at himself, and added, that, among other things, he had been commissioned in Petersburg--"_de populariser l'idee du cadastre_." He talked for quite a long time, with careless self-confidence solving all difficulties, and juggling with the most weighty administrative and political questions, as a sleight-of-hand performer juggles with his balls. The expressions: "This is what I would do, if I were the government"; "You, as a clever man, will immediately agree with me"--were never absent from his tongue.