Burnett strode up to the entrance and pressed a knob. I heard the ting of an electric bell, and a man (Thomas, if I remember aright) came out and said the captain would see me alone. Mastering some natural excitement I bowed and followed him in. We passed through the inner portal and found ourselves in a narrow hall, flights of steps from which led down into the inmost vitals of the Attila. On our right was a door half open. My escort motioned me to enter and, pulling the door to, left me face to face with Hartmann.
CHAPTER VII.
THE CAPTAIN OF THE ‘ATTILA.’
Ten years had not rolled away for nothing; still the face which looked into mine vividly recalled my glimpse into the album in the little villa at Islington. Seated before a writing-desk, studded with knobs of electric bells and heaped with maps and instruments, sat a bushy-bearded man with straight piercing glance and a forehead physiognomists would have envied. There was the same independent look, the same cruel hardness that had stamped the mien of the youth, but the old impetuous air had given way to a cold inflexible sedateness, far more appropriate to the dread master of the Attila. As I advanced into the room, he rose, a grand specimen of manhood, standing full six feet three inches in his shoes. He shook hands more warmly than I had expected, and motioned me tacitly to a seat.
“You have heard about my mischance,” I began tentatively. “I had hoped to meet you for an hour or so, but fear I have outstayed my welcome.”
I felt he was weighing me in the balance.
“I know probably more of that mischance than you do. Those luckless detectives were certainly embarrassing, but, after all, they afforded us an incident. Of course, you can understand why we were bound not to leave you. And now that you are restored to vigour, are you sorry that you have seen the Attila?”
“On the contrary, I am lost in wonder. But look, sir, at the cost of my privilege. These unfortunate men you refer to, haunt me, and the purpose of this vessel, I must tell you, fairly appals me.”
He listened approvingly. A man in his position can well afford to be tolerant.
“Oh, the men—such incidents must be looked for. Do generals dissolve into tears when two hostile sentries have to be shot? Do they shrink from the wholesale slaughter which every campaign entails? Nonsense, sir, nonsense!”
“But your war is not against this or that army or nation, but against civilization as a whole.” I was determined to take the bull by the horns at the outset. “You can scarcely justify that on those lines.”