Leaning forward, he said in the same soft voice—though Monsieur did not recognize the deadly purpose behind it:
"Professor, if you seriously want to see Azuria again I think we'd better arrange this thing, somehow. You came here to look for a princess; Jack came—pardon me, Jack, but it's unavoidable—for a sweetheart. Every man to his trade, you know!"
"Yes, and if I find Her Serene Highness I shall most certainly restore her to——"
"You'll most certainly do nothing of the kind," Tommy interrupted him. "You see, old fellow, we couldn't trust her to you—it wouldn't be fair. The fact is, you've been acting mighty queerly of late, saying all kinds of strange things!"
A puzzled look came into the professor's eyes as he glanced at me and then back at Tommy, who now leaned confidentially nearer.
"Do you realize," he soothingly continued, "that you thought someone was trying to blow up our yacht?"
"Trying to blow it up? Did I not have the bomb in my hands?"
"He still believes it, Jack," Tommy sighed. "There's nothing to be done, I reckon, but take him back to Key West. They've a pretty fair hospital there."
Monsieur's face turned so livid and looked so weird in its frame of straw-colored hair that I began to think all the hospitals on earth could not save him. Sputtering, he appealed to me:
"The truth, my boy Jack—he is cut-upping?"