He kept the papers under his coat. It was noticeable at once that he was holding something. When it happened that he had to take his hand out to shake hands with someone, he clutched the papers under his coat with his left hand, and imagined that no one would guess that anything was there. When his acquaintances asked him where he was going he lied to them very clumsily, but was very satisfied himself with his awkward inventions.
He explained to Roubovsky:
"They're all traitors. They pretend to be your friends so as to be more certain of deceiving you. But none of them stop to think that I know things about them that would send them all to Siberia."
Roubovsky listened to him in silence. The first denunciation, which was patently absurd, he sent to the Head-Master, and he did the same thing with several others. He kept certain others in case he should need them. The Head-Master wrote to the Director of National Schools that Peredonov was showing clear symptoms of mental disease.
At home Peredonov constantly heard ceaseless, exasperating and mocking rustlings. He said to Varvara dejectedly:
"Someone's walking about on tip-toe. There are so many spies in the house, jostling each other. Varya, you're not taking care of me."
Varvara did not understand the meaning of Peredonov's ravings. At one time she taunted him, at another she felt afraid. She said to him malignantly and yet with fear:
"You see all sorts of things when you're drunk."
The door to the hall seemed especially suspicious to Peredonov. It did not close tightly. The crevice between the two halves hinted at something that was hiding outside. Wasn't it the knave who was peeping through it? Someone's evil, penetrating eye gleamed behind it.
The cat followed Peredonov everywhere with its wide, green eyes. Sometimes it blinked its eyes, sometimes it mewed fearfully. It was obvious that the animal wanted to catch Peredonov at something, but it could not and was therefore angry. Peredonov exorcised the cat by spitting, but the cat remained unmoved.