The conductor walked onstage to applause she had not earned that night and knew it. The orchestra had rehearsed the symphony only twice; the brass entered a half-beat late in the second movement, and she had covered the seam with a broadening of tempo that the audience read as interpretive depth. Reviewers the next morning praised her 'unhurried gravity.' She kept the clipping, not out of pride but as a reminder of how easily a flaw, met without panic, is reread as intention. Mastery, she came to think, was partly the art of making accidents look chosen.