"Well, as for gossip I can assure you that no town is worse," shouted the host. "What a town! No matter what you do, all the pigs begin to grunt at you at once." "Princess Volchanskaya has promised to get me an inspector's job, and suddenly they all begin to gossip. This might hurt my prospects. It all comes from envy. Now there's the Head-Master, he's corrupted the entire school--the schoolboys, who live in apartments, smoke, drink and run after girls and even the town-boys are no better. He's done all the corrupting himself and now he persecutes me. It's likely that someone's carried tales to him about me. And then it goes still farther. It might reach the Princess." Peredonov dwelt long and incoherently on his apprehensions. Avinovitsky listened with an angry countenance and punctuated his discourse with exclamations: "Villains! Scamps! Children of Herod!" "What sort of Nihilist am I?" said Peredonov. "It's ridiculous. I have an official cap with a badge, but I don't always wear it--and I sometimes wear a bowler. As for the fact that Mickiewicz hangs on my wall, I put him there because of his poetry and not because he was a rebel. I haven't even read his 'Kolokol.'"[1] "Well, you've caught that from another opera," said Avinovitsky unceremoniously. "Herzen published it and not Mickiewicz." "That was another 'Kolokol,'" said Peredonov. "Mickiewicz also published a 'Kolokol.'" "I didn't know it--you'd better publish the fact. It would be a great discovery. You'd become celebrated." "It's forbidden to publish it," said Peredonov angrily; "I'm not allowed to read forbidden books. And I never read them. I'm a patriot." After lengthy lamentations in which Peredonov poured himself out, Avinovitsky concluded that someone was trying to blackmail Peredonov, and with this purpose in view was spreading rumours about him in order to frighten him and to prepare a basis for a sudden demand for money. That these rumours did not reach him, Avinovitsky explained by the fact that the blackmailer was acting skilfully upon Peredonov's immediate circle--because it was only necessary to frighten Peredonov. Avinovitsky asked: "Whom do you suspect?" Peredonov fell into thought. Quite by chance Grushina came into his mind, he recalled confusedly the recent conversation with her, during which he interrupted her by a threat of informing against her. The fact that it was he who had threatened to inform against Grushina became in his mind a vague idea of informing in general. Whether he was to inform against someone or whether they were to inform against him was not clear, and Peredonov had no desire to exert himself to recall the matter precisely--one thing was clear, that Grushina was an enemy. And what was worse she had seen where he hid Pisarev. He would have to hide the books somewhere else. Peredonov said at last: "Well, there's Grushina." "Yes, I know, she's a first class rogue," said Avinovitsky sharply.