“Oh no, not at all! On the contrary, I am very glad to make your acquaintance,” said Pierre. And again, glancing at the stranger’s hands, he looked more closely at the ring, with its skull⁠—a Masonic sign.

“Allow me to ask,” he said, “are you a Mason?”

“Yes, I belong to the Brotherhood of the Freemasons,” said the stranger, looking deeper and deeper into Pierre’s eyes. “And in their name and my own I hold out a brotherly hand to you.”

“I am afraid,” said Pierre, smiling, and wavering between the confidence the personality of the Freemason inspired in him and his own habit of ridiculing the Masonic beliefs⁠—“I am afraid I am very far from understanding⁠—how am I to put it?⁠—I am afraid my way of looking at the world is so opposed to yours that we shall not understand one another.”