"They've dabbed pieces of gold on the sky and they're falling off. Who ever saw such a waste!"
The locksmith's sons met them just outside the town in a crowd of other street boys. They ran alongside and hooted. Peredonov trembled with fear. Varvara uttered curses, spat at the boys, and showed them the Koukish. The guests and the bride's-men roared with laughter.
At last they reached home. The entire company tumbled into Peredonov's house with a shout, a hubbub and whistling. They drank champagne, then took to vodka and began to play cards. They kept on drinking all night. Varvara got tipsy, danced, and was happy; Peredonov was also happy—Volodin had not yet been substituted for him. As always, the visitors conducted themselves disrespectfully and indecently towards Varvara; this seemed to her to be in the order of things.
After the wedding the Peredonovs' existence changed very little. Only Varvara's attitude towards her husband became more assured and independent. She ran about less for her husband—but, through deep-rooted habit, she was still a little afraid of him. Peredonov, also from habit, shouted at her as he used to do and sometimes even beat her. But he too scented the assurance she had acquired with her new position. And this depressed him. It seemed to him that if she was not so afraid of him as she had been, it was because she had strengthened her criminal idea to leave him and get Volodin into his place.
"I must be on my guard," he thought.
Varvara triumphed. She, together with her husband, paid visits to the town ladies, even to those with whom she was little acquainted. At these visits she showed a ridiculous pride and awkwardness. She was received everywhere though in many houses with astonishment. Varvara had ordered in good time for these visits a hat from the best local modiste. The large vivid flowers set abundantly on the hat delighted her.
The Peredonovs began their visits with the Head-Master's wife. Then they went to the wife of the Marshal of the Nobility.
On the day that the Peredonovs had prepared to make the visits—of which, of course, the Routilovs knew beforehand—the sisters went to Varvara Nikolayevna Khripatch, to see out of curiosity how Varvara Peredonov would conduct herself. The Peredonovs soon arrived. Varvara made a curtsy to the Head-Master's wife, and in a more than usually jarring voice said:
"Well, we've come to see you. Please love us and be kind to us."