Over Baggin's face came a startling change.
The flush of excitement died out of his cheeks, leaving him ghastly pale and overcome with confusion. His mouth, opened to conclude his sentence, hung gaping, as if it had suddenly been frozen in that position. His eyes glared with rage and terror.
Count Poltavo advanced, hat in hand, and bowed gravely to the masked company.
"Monsieur Baggin does me an honour that I do not deserve," he said.
Baggin, recovering himself, shot a swift side glance at a curtained recess behind which stooped a crop-haired man in a convict shirt, fingering a brand-new knife.
"Monsieur Baggin," Count Poltavo went on, "is wrong when he says I am the only man who stands between the Nine Bears of Cadiz and freedom—there is another, and his name is T. B. Smith."
"T. B. Smith is dead, or dying," said Baggin angrily; "we have your word for it."
His antagonist favoured him with the slightest bow.
"Even I may fall into an error," he said magnanimously. "T. B. is neither dead nor dying."
"But he fell?"