"Can you think of any reason for that?"
"No. I didn't understand it. I forgot until this moment, indeed, that you were the suspected Englishman."
It was obviously useless to question him any more about that. "Now, as to this other purpose--the bigger plan of your associates?"
"You know that too?"
"Have I not proved to you that I know things? But I am not a traitor, Baron."
He smiled childishly. He had become almost like a child, indeed, now. "It will be a grand stroke against the Government. We shall destroy the vessel, of course; but there will be no loss of life. I will not sanction the taking of lives, Herr Bastable."
So this was the scheme. To blow up one of the Kaiser's warships. I repressed all signs of astonishment and tried to look as if I had expected the reply. "But you cannot avoid loss of life, Baron."
It proved a very fortunate remark. With a very cunning smile he looked up and nodded his head knowingly. "I shall not allow it to be done until I am sure of that. I keep the bomb in my own possession till then"; and he hugged the little bag closer than ever to his side.
Here was a complication indeed. A lunatic in the house with a bomb in his possession capable of blowing a warship to fragments.
And this was the man I had described to Bessie as harmless!