“Driven there by a certain man,” said Chickering solemnly.
“Driven there by his own blank foolishness,” said Gene positively. “No man can be in the condition Defarge was in and drink absinth without quickly paying the penalty.”
“Tempwance lecture by Mithter Thkelding!” cried Veazie, and Ollie snickered.
Gene gave the two little fellows a look that seemed full of positive disgust and contempt, but he held his temper, going on:
“Defarge, like some of the rest of us, has been bucking up against the wrong man, and he did not know enough to throw up the sponge when he was beaten. That is the whole of it in a nutshell.”
“I don’t understand you, Gene,” said Julian Ives, staring at Skelding. “Do you mean that we have bucked against the wrong man when we bucked against Merriwell?”
“That’s what I mean. Doesn’t it look that way? Now, be honest in answering.”
There was consternation in that room at once. Always Skelding had been the fiercest and bitterest against Merriwell.
“Good Lord!” croaked Hull, standing on his tiptoes in order to glare down over his collar at Gene. “What’s this I hear? One of our number talking like a Merriwell saphead? I must be dreaming! I know I am!”
“Gwathuth! What a queer joke!” murmured Lew.
“I want to tell you fellows what I did with Defarge before I left him the next morning,” said Gene, who had risen to his feet. “All night I listened to his ravings. Now, you all know I’m not squeamish, but I confess that some of the things I heard gave me cold chills. He had some of the most horrible fancies, and through them all he was hunted by Merriwell’s eyes. Those eyes seemed to follow him everywhere. He fought them, he threw the furniture at them, he covered his own eyes to shut out the sight of them, but he could not get away from them.
“I pitied the poor fellow. His face was ghastly and drawn, and great beads of perspiration started out on it at times. His lips would be drawn back from his teeth, and he looked like a grinning death-head. Of course, I knew that the most of the things he raved about were fancies, but with those he mixed lots of facts. I found that more than once he had thought of murdering Merriwell. He had even tried it. Now, I’m no saint, and I have fancied that I could kill Merriwell; but never have I been ready to carry it to that extent when the time came to lift my hand. In listening to the mutterings of Defarge I found that Merriwell had caught and baffled him. Still, for some reason, Merriwell had not crushed him. He had seen at last that he must make his peace with Merriwell if he was to get into ‘Bones,’ and so he went and played a part.