I encourage it, of course; Yulia Mihailovna, in the first place, Gaganov too....

You laugh?
But you know I have my policy; I babble away and suddenly I say something clever just as they are on the look-out for it.

They crowd round me and I humbug away again.
They've all given me up in despair by now: 'he's got brains but he's dropped from the moon.' Lembke invites me to enter the service so that I may be reformed.

You know I treat him mockingly, that is, I compromise him and he simply stares, Yulia Mihailovna encourages it.

Oh, by the way, Gaganov is in an awful rage with you.