Lezhnyov began to take leave.
‘Good-bye, Monsieur Lezhnyov! Pardon me for having troubled you.’
‘Oh, not at all!’ said Lezhnyov, and he went away.
‘Well, what do you say to that?’ Darya Mihailovna asked of Rudin. ‘I had heard he was eccentric, but really that was beyond everything!’
‘His is the same disease as Pigasov’s,’ observed Rudin, ‘the desire of being original. One affects to be a Mephistopheles—the other a cynic. In all that, there is much egoism, much vanity, but little truth, little love. Indeed, there is even calculation of a sort in it. A man puts on a mask of indifference and indolence so that some one will be sure to think. “Look at that man; what talents he has thrown away!” But if you come to look at him more attentively, there is no talent in him whatever.’
‘Et de deux!’ was Darya Mihailovna’s comment. ‘You are a terrible man at hitting people off. One can hide nothing from you.’
‘Do you think so?’ said Rudin.... ‘However,’ he continued, ‘I ought not really to speak about Lezhnyov; I loved him, loved him as a friend... but afterwards, through various misunderstandings...’
‘You quarrelled?’
‘No. But we parted, and parted, it seems, for ever.’
‘Ah, I noticed that the whole time of his visit you were not quite yourself.... But I am much indebted to you for this morning. I have spent my time extremely pleasantly. But one must know where to stop. I will let you go till lunch time and I will go and look after my business. My secretary, you saw him—Constantin, c’est lui qui est mon secrétaire—must be waiting for me by now. I commend him to you; he is an excellent, obliging young man, and quite enthusiastic about you. Au revoir, cher Dmitri Nikolaitch! How grateful I am to the baron for having made me acquainted with you!’