"You mustn't wear a badge either," said Peredonov.
"I mustn't and I don't want to," said Volodin. "Still I sometimes put on a badge—only I know where and when one can do it. I go out of the town and I put it on there. It gives me great pleasure, and there's no one to stop me. And when you meet a muzhik you get more respect——"
"A badge doesn't become your mug, Pavloushka," said Peredonov; "and keep farther off, you're making me dusty with your hoofs."
Volodin relapsed into an injured silence, but still walked beside him. Peredonov said in a preoccupied way:
"The Routilov girls ought to be informed against too. They only go to church to chatter and to laugh. They rouge themselves, they dress themselves up and then go to church. And then they steal incense to make scents of—that's why they have such a strong smell."
"What do you think of that?" said Volodin shaking his head with his bulging, dull eyes.
The shadow of a cloud ran quickly over the ground, and brought a feeling of dread on Peredonov. Sometimes the grey nedotikomka glimmered in the clouds of dust. Whenever the grass stirred in the wind Peredonov saw the nedotikomka running through it, feeding on the grass.
"Why is there grass in the town?" he thought. "What neglect; it ought to be rooted out."
A twig stirred in the tree, it rolled up, cawed and flew away in the distance. Peredonov shivered, gave a wild cry and ran off home. Volodin ran after him anxiously, and, with a perplexed expression in his bulging eyes, clutched at his bowler hat and swung his stick.