Overwhelmed with this news, Andrey Antonovitch returned to his study and impulsively ordered the horses.

He could hardly wait for them to be got ready.

His soul was hungering for Yulia Mihailovna--to look at her, to be near her for five minutes; perhaps she would glance at him, notice him, would smile as before, forgive him...

"O-oh! Aren't the horses ready ?" Mechanically he opened a thick book lying on the table.

(He sometimes used to try his fortune in this way with a book, opening it at random and reading the three lines at the top of the right-hand page.) What turned up was: _"Tout est pour le mieux dans le meilleur des mondes possibles."_--Voltaire, _Candide._ He uttered an ejaculation of contempt and ran to get into the carriage.
"Skvoreshniki!" The coachman said afterwards that his master urged him on all the way, but as soon as they were getting near the mansion he suddenly told him to turn and drive back to the town, bidding him "Drive fast; please drive fast!" Before they reached the town wall "master told me to stop again, got out of the carriage, and went across the road into the field; I thought he felt ill but he stopped and began looking at the flowers, and so he stood for a time.