I can so clearly picture now that 'mockery' of life.

(A wonderfully subtle expression of yours!) That insatiable thirst of contrast, that gloomy background against which he stands out like a diamond, to use your comparison again, Pyotr Stepanovitch.

And then he meets there a creature ill-treated by every one, crippled, half insane, and at the same time perhaps filled with noble feelings." "H'm....

Yes, perhaps." "And after that you don't understand that he's not laughing at her like every one.

Oh, you people! You can't understand his defending her from insult, treating her with respect 'like a marquise' (this Kirillov must have an exceptionally deep understanding of men, though he didn't understand Nicolas).