Chapter XVI

Villiers had some very singular traits of character to which his old friends paid no attention, but which never failed to astonish those who knew him but slightly and had never been forewarned. He experienced, on occasions, a sort of nervous terror which he did not even attempt to resist.

For instance, one day as he was talking with some one at a street corner, he received in his eye an infinitesimal spatter of saliva. Seized with a sudden panic, Villiers darted away from his amazed interlocutor, and with all speed made for the nearest pharmacy.

His vivid imagination had instantly foreseen all the possibilities of calamity, by this venomous drop he felt himself inoculated with the most baleful maladies. He saw himself condemned, lost! To quiet him, the chemist with great haste had made a point of bathing his eye in all sorts of supposedly powerful lotions.

One afternoon at Tribschen, Villiers was playing with the children; tossing a ball, which, to their great glee, he sent very high in the air. Russ, the Newfoundland, bounding from place to place and barking, did his best to join in the sport.

But once, as he gave a strong impetus to the ball, Villiers' recoiling fist struck a sharp blow on the dog's jowl, drawing from him a reproachful whine. Villiers grew pale as he examined his hand, and found a red mark where the dog's tooth had lightly scratched the skin; then, with one haggard look at us, he turned and fled, running as only he could run.

"What is the matter? Where is he going?" cried Wagner in dismay.

Some answer had to be made.

"Oh, it is nothing. He struck his hand against the teeth of poor Russ, and grazed the skin."

"Yes, I know; but it did not bleed. Is that why he grew so pale?"

"A brain like his receives quick suggestions; in the flash of an eye his thoughts fly to the very limit of possible consequences. Villiers doubtless believes himself in danger of hydrophobia, and as in such case delay adds to the danger, he is running as fast as he can to Lucerne, to have the wound cauterised."

"But there is no wound."

Wagner received an unpleasant impression. He was clearly disturbed by Villiers, whose conversation he found it so difficult to understand, and whose character he could not comprehend.

But it was best to laugh it off. The involuntary culprit, good old Russ, was in perfect health, and there could not be any danger.

When Villiers, feeling rather sheepish, returned to Tribschen on the following day, Wagner, as soon as he saw him in the distance, made a pretence of extreme terror, and exclaimed,

"He is mad! He is mad!"

And as Villiers with a wry smile approached nearer to him, he broke into a run, crying out, "Do not bite me!" Then, as if to escape from the danger, he climbed with extraordinary agility to the very top of a pine-tree.