We present high-resolution J- , H- , and K-band observations of the carbon star IRC +10 216 .
The images were reconstructed from 6 m telescope speckle interferograms using the speckle masking bispectrum method .
The H image has the unprecedented resolution of 70 mas .
The H and K images consist of at least five dominant components within a 0.21 arcsec radius and a fainter asymmetric nebula .
The J– , H– , and K–band images seem to have an X -shaped bipolar structure .
A comparison of our images from 1995 , 1996 , 1997 , and 1998 shows that the separation of the two brightest components A and B increased from \sim 193 mas in 1995 to \sim 246 mas in 1998 .

The cometary shapes of component A in the H and J images and the 0.79 \mu m and 1.06 \mu m HST images suggest that the core of A is not the central star , but the southern ( nearer ) lobe of the bipolar structure .
The position of the central star is probably at or near the position of component B , where the H–K color has its largest value of H–K = 4.2 .

If the star is located at or near B , then the components A , C , and D are located close to the inner boundary of the dust shell at separations of \sim 200 mas \sim 30 AU ( projected distance ) \sim 6 stellar radii for a distance of \sim 150 pc , in agreement with our 2-dimensional radiative transfer modelling .

In addition to IRC +10 216 we studied the stellar disks and the dust shells of several related objects .
Angular resolutions of 24 mas at 700 nm or 57 mas 1.6 \mu m were achieved .