The Double

“Ah, it’s you!” said Mr. Goliadkin Jr., as if he had just made out Mr. Goliadkin Sr. “So it’s you? Well, what, did you have a good night’s sleep?” Here Mr. Goliadkin Jr., smiling slightly—smiling officially and formally, not at all as he ought to have done (because in any case he owed Mr. Goliadkin Sr. a debt of gratitude), and so, smiling officially and formally, he added that he for his part was extremely glad that Mr. Goliadkin had had a good sleep; then he inclined slightly, minced slightly in place, glanced to the right, to the left, then dropped his eyes to the floor, aimed himself at the side door, and, rapidly whispering that he was on a special mission, darted into the next room. There was not a trace of him left.

“Well, that’s something!…” our hero whispered, dumbstruck for a moment. “That’s really something! There’s a circumstance for you!…” Here Mr. Goliadkin felt that for some reason he was covered with gooseflesh. “However,” he went on to himself, making his way to his section, “however, I’ve long been talking about this circumstance; I’ve long had a presentiment that he was on a special mission—just yesterday I said the man was certainly being employed on some special mission…”

“Did you finish yesterday’s document, Yakov Petrovich?” asked Anton Antonovich Setochkin as Mr. Goliadkin sat down next to him. “Do you have it here?”

“It’s here,” Mr. Goliadkin whispered with a somewhat lost look, gazing at his chief.

“A good thing, sir. I say it because Andrei Filippovich has already asked for it twice. His excellency is likely to request it at any moment…”

“No, sir, it’s finished…”

“Well, very good, sir.”

“I believe, Anton Antonovich, that I have always fulfilled my duties properly, and I am zealous in the matters entrusted to me by my superiors, sir, and apply myself to them diligently.”

“Yes, sir. Well, sir, but what do you mean to say by that?”

“Nothing, Anton Antonovich. I only wanted to explain, Anton Antonovich, that I…that is, I wanted to convey, that sometimes disloyalty and jealousy do not spare any person, seeking their repulsive daily food, sir…”

“Excuse me, I don’t quite understand you. That is, to which person are you alluding now?”

“That is, I only meant to say, Anton Antonovich, that I follow a straight path, and I scorn to take a roundabout path, that I am not an intriguer and, if I may be permitted to say so, I can be justly proud of it…”

“Yes, sir. That is all so, sir, and to the utmost of my understanding I render full justice to your reasoning; but also allow me, Yakov Petrovich, to observe to you that personal references are not entirely permissible in good society; that behind my back, for instance, I’m prepared to put up with it—because who isn’t denounced behind his back!—but to my face, as you will, but I, for instance, my good sir, will not allow insolent things to be said. I, my good sir, have grown gray in government service and will not allow insolent things to be said to me in my old age…”

“No, sir, I, Anton Antonovich, sir, you—you see, Anton Antonovich—it seems, Anton Antonovich, that you did not quite catch my meaning, sir. But, mercy me, Anton Antonovich, for my part I can only take it as as an honor, sir…”

“And we also ask to be excused, sir. We were taught in the old way, sir. And your way, the new way, it’s too late for us to learn. Up to now, it seems, my understanding has sufficed me in serving the fatherland. As you know yourself, my good sir, I have been decorated for twenty-five years of irreproachable service…”

“I am sensible, Anton Antonovich, for my part, I am perfectly sensible of all that, sir. But I’m not talking about that, sir, I’m talking about masks, Anton Antonovich…”

“About masks, sir?”

“That is, again you…I fear that here, too, you will apprehend the meaning from the other side, that is, the meaning of my speech, as you said yourself, Anton Antonovich. I am only developing a theme, that is, I am introducing the idea that people who wear masks are no longer a rarity, sir, and that it is now hard to recognize the man behind the mask, sir…”

“Well, sir, you know, it’s not really so hard, sir. Sometimes it’s even quite easy, sir, sometimes there’s no need to look far, sir.”

“No, sir, you know, Anton Antonovich, I’m talking, sir, I’m talking about myself, that I, for example, put on a mask only when there’s a need for it, that is, uniquely for carnivals or merry gatherings, speaking in a direct sense, but I don’t mask myself before people every day, speaking in another more hidden sense, sir. That is what I meant to say, Anton Antonovich.”