My Buddy Quilty

The part where H.H. kills Quilty reminds me of the movie Fight Club--more specifically, at the end when Norton kills Brad Pitt, or however it went; it's been a while since I've seen it. The idea is that Pitt is Norman's alter ego, his confident, risky, unrestrained side. Pitt liked fast cars, photography, pets; Norland kept his desires restrained, and wore the mask of a simple office worker.

"because you took
because you took advantage of my disadvantage...

Thats good, you know. That's damn good." (Quilty)

Quilty's flippant attitude even when a gun is pointed at him is just like Pitt's; infact, I loved the interaction between the two, I was wishing Nabokav would have given us more of it, prhaps drawn it out more. One sentence threw me off:

"He kept taking the Drome cigarette apart and munching bits of it."

What is that all about? Cigarette tobacco is disgusting, I've tried it one time (though I cannot remember why) and it threw me immediatly into a fit of gagging and coughing and puking. Why is Quilty munching a cigarette?

"The rich joy was waning. It was high time I destroyed him, but he must understand why he was being destroyed. His condition infected me, the weapon felt limp and clumsy in my hand."