Liputin was the only one I did not have time to visit, and I kept putting it off--to tell the real truth I was afraid to go to him.

I knew beforehand that he would not believe one word of my story, that he would certainly imagine that there was some secret at the bottom of it, which they were trying to hide from him alone, and as soon as I left him he would set to work to make inquiries and gossip all over the town.

While I was picturing all this to myself I happened to run across him in the street.

It turned out that he had heard all about it from our friends, whom I had only just informed.

But, strange to say, instead of being inquisitive and asking questions about Stepan Trofimovitch, he interrupted me, when I began apologising for not having come to him before, and at once passed to other subjects.