The Double

Mr. Goliadkin was saying all this as he went down the stairs to the porch. However, on the last step he stopped as if rooted to the spot and suddenly turned so red from a fit of wounded pride that tears even welled up in his eyes. Having stood for half a minute like a post, he suddenly stamped his foot resolutely, leaped from the porch to the street in a single bound, and, without looking back, breathless, feeling no fatigue, set out for his home on Shestilavochnaya Street. At home, not even taking off his street clothes, contrary to his habit of dressing informally at home, not even taking his pipe first, he immediately sat on the sofa, moved the inkstand towards him, picked up the pen, took out a sheet of writing paper, and began to scribble, in a hand trembling from inner agitation, the following missive:

My dear Yakov Petrovich!

I would never have taken up the pen, if my circumstances and you yourself, my dear sir, had not forced me to do so. Believe me, necessity alone has forced me to enter upon such a discussion with you, and therefore I beg you first of all not to consider this measure of mine, my dear sir, as deliberately intended to insult you, but as a necessary consequence of the circumstances which now bind us.

“Seems good, decent, polite, though not without force and firmness?…Nothing offensive to him here, it seems. Besides, I’m within my rights,” thought Mr. Goliadkin, rereading what he had written.

Your unexpected and strange appearance, my dear sir, on a stormy night, after my enemies, whose names I omit out of disdain for them, had acted rudely and indecently with me, has been the germ of all the misunderstandings existing between us at the present time. Your stubborn desire, my dear sir, to have your own way and forcibly enter the circle of my existence and all the relations of my practical life even goes beyond the limits demanded by mere politeness and simple sociality. I think there is no point in mentioning here, my dear sir, your theft of my papers and of my own honorable name in order to win favor with our superiors—favor you did not merit. There is no point in mentioning here your deliberate and offensive avoidance of the explanations necessary on such an occasion. Finally, to say all, I do not mention here your last strange, one might say incomprehensible, act in the coffeehouse. Far be it from me to lament the, for me, useless loss of a silver rouble; yet I cannot but express all my indignation at the recollection of your obvious infringement, my dear sir, to the detriment of my honor, and, moreover, in the presence of several persons who, though not of my acquaintance, are yet of quite good tone…

“Am I not going too far?” thought Mr. Goliadkin. “Won’t it be too much; isn’t it too offensive—this allusion to good tone, for instance?…Well, never mind! I must show firmness of character with him. However, to soften it, maybe I’ll just flatter him and butter him up a little at the end. We’ll see to that.”