“Thomas Roch!” I exclaim.
My voice seems to strike him, and after gazing at me fixedly for an instant he averts his eyes quickly.
I take his hand and press it. He withdraws it brusquely and walks away, without having recognized me, in the direction of Captain Spade and Engineer Serko.
Does he think of speaking to one or other of these men, and if they speak to him will he be more reasonable than he was with me, and reply to them?
At this moment his physiognomy lights up with a gleam of intelligence. His attention, obviously, has been attracted by the queer progress of the schooner. He gazes at the masts and the furled sails. Then he turns back and stops at the place where, if the Ebba were a steamer, the funnel ought to be, and which in this case ought to be belching forth a cloud of black smoke.
What appeared so strange to me evidently strikes Thomas Roch as being strange, too. He cannot explain what I found inexplicable, and, as I did, he walks aft to see if there is a screw.
On the flanks of the Ebba a shoal of porpoises are sporting. Swift as is the schooner’s course they easily pass her, leaping and gambolling in their native element with surprising grace and agility.
Thomas Roch pays no attention to them, but leans over the stern.
Engineer Serko and Captain Spade, fearful lest he should fall overboard, hurry to him and drag him gently, but firmly, away.
I observe from long experience that Roch is a prey to violent excitement. He turns about and gesticulates, uttering incoherent phrases the while.