The evening after the funeral, on my way to the life class, I met the poodle again, and, in reply to his recognition, drove him away with my cane. Both Tyck and Henley related at the class a similar experience with the dog, which we had now come to look upon as a fiend in disguise. After this the meetings with the poodle were daily and almost hourly. He would quietly march into the hotel court-yard as we were at dinner; we would stumble over him on the stairs; at a café the _garçon_ would hunt him from the room; at the academy he would startle us, amuse the rest of the students, and enrage the professor by breaking the guard of the old surveillant, and rushing into the life class. He seemed to belong to no one and to have no home, and yet he was an attractive animal with his long, glossy coat, saucy ears and tail, and bright, intelligent eyes. We often endeavored to rid ourselves of him. Many times I tried my best to kill him, arming myself expressly with my heavy stick; but he avoided all my attacks, and always met me cheerfully at our next interview. At times he was morose and meditative. It used to be a theory of mine that at these seasons he was making up his mind which one of us he had better adopt as his master, declaring--only half in earnest, however--that the one whom the animal especially favored would be sure to meet poor Reiner’s fate. The months of January and February passed, and the poodle still haunted us. In the course of these dark months we repeatedly attempted to make friends with the dog, finding that we could not make an enemy of him, and hoped thus to disprove the imagined fatality of the beast or else to break the spell by our own wills. All efforts at conciliation failed; he would never enter even to take food the room where we three were alone, and would show signs of general recognition only, and those but sparingly, when we were together. He seemed content with simply watching us, and not desirous of further acquaintance. Yet, in the face of this mysterious behavior, I doubt very much if any one of us really believed that anything would come of our forebodings; for we began to speak of the dog at first quite in jest, and grew more serious only as we were impressed after the death of Reiner by the consistent impartiality of his fondness for our society, and by the unequalled persistency with which he haunted us wherever we went abroad.