Time passed by and the paper, announcing his appointment as inspector, so eagerly expected day after day, still did not come. He had no private information of the situation. Peredonov did not dare to find out from the Princess herself—Varvara constantly frightened him by saying that the Princess was a very great lady, and he thought that if he wrote to her it might cause him extreme unpleasantness. He did not know precisely what they could do to him if the Princess complained of him, but this made him think of dreadful possibilities. Varvara said to him:
"Don't you know aristocrats? You must wait until they act of themselves. But once you remind them, they get offended, and it'll be the worse for you. They're so touchy. They're proud, and they like to be taken at their word."
And Peredonov was still credulous. But he got angry with the Princess. Sometimes he even thought that the Princess would inform against him in order to rid herself of her obligations to him. Or else she would inform against him because he had married Varvara when perhaps she herself was in love with him. That was why she had surrounded him with spies, he thought, who kept an eye on him everywhere. They had so hemmed him in that he had no air to breathe, no light. She was not an eminent lady for nothing. She could do whatever she liked. From spite he invented most unlikely stories about the Princess. He told Routilov and Volodin that he had formerly been her lover and that she had given him large sums of money.
"But I've drunk it all away," he said. "Why the devil should I save it! She also promised me a pension for life, but she took me in over that."
"And would you have accepted it?" asked Routilov with a snigger.
Peredonov was silent. He did not understand the question. But Volodin answered for him gravely and judiciously:
"Why not accept it, if she's rich? She's gratified herself with pleasures and she ought to pay for them."
"If she were at least a beauty," said Peredonov mournfully. "She's freckled and pug-nosed. She paid very well, otherwise I wouldn't even want to spit at the hag! She must attend to my request."
"You're a liar, Ardalyon Borisitch," said Routilov.