286 FOR THE FLAG

and profit! You speak of these rather late! You forget
they had thrown me into a cell, under pretext of madness
—yes! pretext, for my reason never deserted me, not
even for an hour, as you may see by all I have done since
I have been free.”

“Free! you think yourself free? Within the walls of
this cavern are you not shut up as closely as you were
between the walls of Healthful House?”

“The man who is at home,” replied Roch, in a voice
rising with anger, “goes out as he pleases and when he
pleases! I have only to say the word and all the
doors open before me! This abode is mine! Count
d’Artigas has given me the property and all it contains !
Woe to those who come to attack it! I have something
here that will annihilate them !”

While speaking thus, the inventor shook the glass tube
in his hand excitedly. Then I exclaimed,—

“Count d’Artigas has deceived you as he has deceived
so many others. Under that name one of the most terrible
pirates who has ravaged the waters of both the Pacific and
the Atlantic masquerades. He is an outlaw steeped in
crime. He is the vile Ker Karraje.”

‘Ker Karraje!” repeated Roch.

I wondered whether the name would make any impres-
sion, whether his mind did not recall what the man had
done who bore it. In any case, I noticed that any im-
pression that was made passed almost instantaneously.

“‘T do not know this Ker Karraje,” he said, extending
his arm towards the door to command me to leave him.
“T only know Count d’Artigas.”