Varvara, to get even with him for what had happened before the marriage, tormented him with vague hints, taunts and half-timid, malignant insinuations. She smiled insolently, and said to him in that strained voice which is usually heard from a person who lies knowingly without the hope of being believed:
"How should I know where the Princess lives now?"
"You're lying—you do know!" said Peredonov in terror.
He did not know what to believe—the meaning of her words, or the lie betrayed in the sound of her voice—and this, like everything he did not understand, terrified him. Varvara retorted:
"What an idea! Perhaps she left Peter for somewhere else. She doesn't have to ask me when she goes away."
"But perhaps she really has come here?" asked Peredonov timidly.
"Perhaps she really has come here!" Varvara mimicked him. "She's smitten with you and she's come here to see you."
"You're a liar! Is it likely that she'd fall in love with me?"
Varvara laughed spitefully.
From that time Peredonov began to look about attentively for the Princess. Sometimes it seemed to him that she was looking in at the window, through the door, eavesdropping, and whispering with Varvara.