Facing the Flag Part 28

"Ah! it is you, Simon Hart!" he replies calmly, even indifferently.

He knows my name. Engineer Serko must have informed him that it was Simon Hart, and not Keeper Gaydon who was watching over him at Healthful House.

"You know who I am?" I say.

"Yes, as I know what your object was in undertaking such a position.

You lived in hopes of surprising a secret that they would not pay for at its just value!"

Thomas Roch knows everything, and perhaps it is just as well, in view of what I am going to say.

"Well, you did not succeed, Simon Hart, and as far as this is concerned," he added, flouris.h.i.+ng the phial, "no one else has succeeded, or ever will succeed."

As I conjectured, he has not, then, made known the composition of his deflagrator.

Looking him straight in the face, I reply:

"You know who I am, Thomas Roch, but do you know in whose place you are?"

"In my own place!" he cries.

That is what Ker Karraje has permitted him to believe. The inventor thinks he is at home in Back Cup, that the riches acc.u.mulated in this cavern are his, and that if an attack is made upon the place, it will be with the object of stealing what belongs to him! And he will defend it under the impression that he has the right to do so!

"Thomas Roch," I continue, "listen to me."

"What do you want to say to me, Simon Hart?"

"This cavern into which we have been dragged, is occupied by a band of pirates, and--"

Roch does not give me time to complete the sentence--I doubt even whether he has understood me.

"I repeat," he interrupts vehemently, "that the treasures stored here are the price of my invention. They have paid me what I asked for my fulgurator--what I was everywhere else refused--even in my own country--which is also yours--and I will not allow myself to be despoiled!"

What can I reply to such insensate a.s.sertions? I, however, go on:

"Thomas Roch, do you remember Healthful House?"

"Healthful House, where I was sequestrated after Warder Gaydon had been entrusted with the mission of spying upon me in order to rob me of my secret? I do, indeed."

"I never dreamed of depriving you of the benefit of your secret, Thomas Roch. I would never have accepted such a mission. But you were ill, your reason was affected, and your invention was too valuable to be lost. Yes, had you disclosed the secret during one of your fits you would have preserved all the benefit and all the honor of it."

"Really, Simon Hart!" Roch replies disdainfully. "Honor and benefit!

Your a.s.surances come somewhat late in the day. You forget that on the pretext of insanity, I was thrown into a dungeon. Yes, it was a pretext; for my reason has never left me, even for an hour, as you can see from what I have accomplished since I am free."

"Free! Do you imagine you are free, Thomas Roch? Are you not more closely confined within the walls of this cavern than you ever were at Healthful House?"

"A man who is in his own home," he replies angrily, "goes out as he likes and when he likes. I have only to say the word and all the doors will open before me. This place is mine. Count d'Artigas gave it to me with everything it contains. Woe to those who attempt to attack it.

I have here the wherewithal to annihilate them, Simon Hart!" The inventor waves the phial feverishly as he speaks."

"The Count d'Artigas has deceived you," I cry, "as he has deceived so many others. Under this name is dissembled one of the most formidable monsters who ever scoured the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. He is a bandit steeped in crime--he is the odious Ker Karraje!"

"Ker Karraje!" echoes Thomas Roch.

And I wonder if this name has not impressed him, if he remembers who the man is who bears it. If it did impress him, it was only momentarily.

"I do not know this Ker Karraje," he says, pointing towards the door to order me out. "I only know the Count d'Artigas."

"Thomas Roch," I persist, in a final effort, "the Count d'Artigas and Ker Karraje are one and the same person. If this man has purchased your secret, it is with the intention of ensuring impunity for his crimes and facilities for committing fresh ones. He is the chief of these pirates."

"Pirates!" cries Roch, whose irritation increases the more I press him. "The real pirates are those who dare to menace me even in this retreat, who tried it on with the _Sword_--for Serko has told me everything--who sought to steal in my own home what belongs to me, what is but the just price of my discovery."

"No, Thomas Roch, the pirates are those who have imprisoned you in this cavern of Back Cup, who will utilize your genius to defend it, and who will get rid of you when they are in entire possession of your secrets!"

Thomas Roch here interrupts me. He does not appear to listen to what I say. He has a fixed idea, that of vengeance, which has been skilfully worked upon by Engineer Serko, and in which his hatred is concentrated to the exclusion of everything else.

"The bandits," he hisses, "are those who spurned me without a hearing, who heaped injustice and ignominy upon me, who drove me from country to country, whereas I offered them superiority, invincibleness, omnipotence!"

It is the eternal story of the unappreciated inventor, to whom the indifferent or envious refuse the means of testing his inventions, to pay him the value he sets upon them. I know it well--and also know all the exaggeration that has been written upon this subject.

It is clearly no time for reasoning with Thomas Roch. My arguments are entirely lost upon the hapless dupe of Ker Karraje and his accomplices. In revealing to him the real name of the Count d'Artigas, and denouncing to him this band and their chief I had hoped to wean him from their influence and make him realize the criminal end they have in view. My hope was vain. He does not believe me. And then what does he care whether the brigand's name is Count 'd'Artigas or Ker Karraje? Is not he, Thomas Roch, master of Back Cup? Is he not the owner of these riches acc.u.mulated by twenty years of murder and rapine?

Disarmed before such moral degeneracy, knowing not how I can touch his ulcerated, irresponsible heart, I turn towards the door. It only remains for me to withdraw. What is to be, will be, since it is out of my power to prevent the frightful _denouement_ that will occur in a few hours.

Thomas Roch takes no more notice of me. He seems to have forgotten that I am here. He has resumed his manipulations without realizing that he is not alone.

There is only one means of preventing the imminent catastrophe. Throw myself upon Roch, place him beyond the power of doing harm--strike him--kill him--yes, kill him! It is my right--it is my duty!

I have no arms, but on a near-by shelf I see some tools--a chisel and a hammer. What is to prevent me from knocking his brains out? Once he is dead I have but to smash the phials and his invention dies with him. The wars.h.i.+ps can approach, land their men upon the island, demolish Back Cup with their sh.e.l.ls. Ker Karraje and his band will be killed to a man. Can I hesitate at a murder that will bring about the chastis.e.m.e.nt of so many crimes?

I advance to the shelf and stretch forth my hand to seize the chisel.

As I do so, Thomas Roch turns round.

It is too late to strike. A struggle would ensue. The noise and his cries would be heard, for there are still some pirates not far off, I can even now hear some one approaching, and have only just time to fly if I would not be seen.

Nevertheless, I make one last attempt to awaken the sentiment of patriotism within him.

"Thomas Roch," I say, "wars.h.i.+ps are in sight. They have come to destroy this lair. Maybe one of them flies the French flag!"

He gazes at me. He was not aware that Back Cup is going to be attacked, and I have just apprised him of the fact. His brow darkens and his eyes flash.

"Thomas Roch, would you dare to fire upon your country's flag--the tricolor flag?"

He raises his head, shakes it nervously, and with a disdainful gesture:

"What do you mean by 'your country?' I no longer have any country, Simon Hart. The inventor spurned no longer has a country. Where he finds an asylum, there is his fatherland! They seek to take what is mine. I will defend it, and woe, woe to those who dare to attack me!"

Then rus.h.i.+ng to the door of the laboratory and throwing it violently open he shouts so loudly that he must be heard at the Beehive: