My neighbour was silent again. 'Would you like to make a bet with me?' he said again, rather loudly. 'What about?' I began to be amused by him. 'Hm... what about? Why, about this: I'm certain you take me for a fool.' 'Really,' I muttered, astounded. 'For an ignoramus, for a rustic of the steppes.... Confess....' 'I haven't the pleasure of knowing you,' I responded. 'What can make you infer?...' 'Why, the sound of your voice is enough; you answer me so carelessly.... But I'm not at all what you suppose....' 'Allow me....' 'No, you allow me. In the first place, I speak French as well as you, and German even better; secondly, I have spent three years abroad--in Berlin alone I lived eight months. I've studied Hegel, honoured sir; I know Goethe by heart: add to that, I was a long while in love with a German professor's daughter, and was married at home to a consumptive lady, who was bald, but a remarkable personality. So I'm a bird of your feather; I'm not a barbarian of the steppes, as you imagine.... I too have been bitten by reflection, and there's nothing obvious about me.' I raised my head and looked with redoubled attention at the queer fellow. By the dim light of the night-lamp I could hardly distinguish his features. 'There, you're looking at me now,' he went on, setting his night-cap straight, 'and probably you're asking yourself, "How is it I didn't notice him to-day?" I'll tell you why you didn't notice me: because I didn't raise my voice; because I get behind other people, hang about doorways, and talk to no one; because, when the butler passes me with a tray, he raises his elbow to the level of my shoulder.... And how is it all that comes about? From two causes: first, I'm poor; and secondly, I've grown humble.... Tell the truth, you didn't notice me, did you?' 'Certainly, I've not had the pleasure....' 'There, there,' he interrupted me, 'I knew that.' He raised himself and folded his arms; the long shadow of his cap was bent from the wall to the ceiling. 'And confess, now,' he added, with a sudden sideway glance at me; 'I must strike you as a queer fellow, an original, as they say, or possibly as something worse: perhaps you think I affect to be original!' 'I must repeat again that I don't know you....' He looked down an instant.