"You are a brave, sensible--for heaven's sake, what's the matter now?" he cried anxiously, staring at a point behind her. Involuntarily she turned and looked in the same direction. The greater part of the crowd had scattered and fled far down the long hill; only a few groups of the most hardy and venturesome among the villagers remained at varying distances from the deserted tent. The most important of these groups now fell apart slightly, disclosing as its centre a large and writhing human figure, prone on the grass. The light box coat, the great goggles, proclaimed this figure the ill-fated mechanician. Even as he sprawled and twisted, the men who surrounded him turned and looked at Antony and his companion, and there was an unpleasant fixity, an unmistakable threatening, in their regard that chilled the young gentleman slightly, though he was utterly at a loss as to its import. Presently one of the men caught his eye and beckoned commandingly. "They seem to want me over there," he said to the girl, with an attempt at unconcern, "perhaps I'd better step over a moment--I'll return immediately. You don't object?" She looked at him with a curious vague smile, then shook her head slowly. This he took for acquiescence to his request, and as she said nothing, he left her and joined the group about the prostrate foreigner. She stared idly at him, but appeared little impressed by his irritated and repeated pantomimic denials of what was, to judge from the faces of the men, a grave charge of some sort. Even when he threw off a hand on his arm and hastened angrily back to her, his countenance dark with angry concern, she did not alter that vague smile, and this vexed him still further, as he began to explain their situation. "I am very, very sorry Miss--Miss Nette," he began, his voice fairly trembling with irritation, "but a most absurd and disgusting complication has arisen. This French fellow swears he has been bitten, and they think he is accusing you of hissing at the snake. I don't think he is really such a cad as all that, but he is practically hysterical, and now I don't believe he knows what he is saying. There is certainly some mark on his wrist and one of the men says that he saw the snake's head touch him, and they have filled him so thoroughly with whisky that he really is not responsible for what he says. I think,"--he marvelled at her lack of fright or emotion of any kind--"indeed, I am sure, that they have merely misunderstood his broken French, but these people are so idiotically obstinate, you know. They've sent for a doctor, and they insist that they hold--me responsible, and that if we don't stay here quietly they'll--in short, I don't see what to do. I'm dreadfully sorry." He paused, ready for reproaches, for tears, for rebellion. But none of these was apparent. "How silly!" said Nette carelessly, glancing a moment at the group of men. Antony felt slightly relieved, but only slightly.