Chapter 14

HOW WOLODA AND DUBKOFF AMUSED THEMSELVES

THE moment that Dimitri entered my room I perceived from his
face, manner of walking, and the signs which, in him, denoted
ill-humour--a blinking of the eyes and a grim holding of his head
to one side, as though to straighten his collar--that he was in
the coldly-correct frame of mind which was his when he felt
dissatisfied with himself. It was a frame of mind, too, which
always produced a chilling effect upon my feelings towards him.
Of late I had begun to observe and appraise my friend's character
a little more, but our friendship had in no way suffered from
that, since it was still too young and strong for me to be able
to look upon Dimitri as anything but perfect, no matter in what
light I regarded him. In him there were two personalities, both
of which I thought beautiful. One, which I loved devotedly, was
kind, mild, forgiving, gay, and conscious of being those various
things. When he was in this frame of mind his whole exterior, the
very tone of his voice, his every movement, appeared to say: "I
am kind and good-natured, and rejoice in being so, and every one
can see that I so rejoice." The other of his two personalities--
one which I had only just begun to apprehend, and before the
majesty of which I bowed in spirit--was that of a man who was
cold, stern to himself and to others, proud, religious to the
point of fanaticism, and pedantically moral. At the present
moment he was, as I say, this second personality.

With that frankness which constituted a necessary condition of
our relations I told him, as soon as we entered the drozhki, how
much it depressed and hurt me to see him, on this my fete-day in
a frame of mind so irksome and disagreeable to me.

"What has upset you so?" I asked him. "Will you not tell me?"

"My dear Nicolas," was his slow reply as he gave his head a
nervous twitch to one side and blinked his eyes, "since I have
given you my word never to conceal anything from you, you have no
reason to suspect me of secretiveness. One cannot always be in
exactly the same mood, and if I seem at all put out, that is all
there is to say about it."

"What a marvellously open, honourable character his is!" I
thought to myself, and dropped the subject.

We drove the rest of the way to Dubkoff's in silence. Dubkoff's
flat was an unusually fine one--or, at all events, so it seemed
to me. Everywhere were rugs, pictures, gardenias, striped
hangings, photographs, and curved settees, while on the walls
hung guns, pistols, pouches, and the mounted heads of wild
beasts. It was the appearance of this apartment which made me
aware whom, it was that Woloda had imitated