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The first of them, in Loge's handwriting, contained a series of notes, mostly unintelligible to Cleggett, dealing with experiments in two sorts of manufacture: first, the preparation of counterfeit money; second, the production of dynamite bombs. The second of the manuscript books was in cipher.
There was a trace of surliness in Loge's voice as he answered: "YOU were enough interested in her to buy her, it seems. Why shouldn't I have the same interest?" Cleggett was silent a moment, and then he leaned across the table and said with emphasis: "I have noticed your interest in the Jasper B. since the day I first set foot on her.
"It's a ticklish thing," said Farnsworth, rumpling his hair. "If I give him enough sedative to keep him quiet his heart may stop any time. If I don't, he'll thrash himself to pieces in his delirium before the day's over." But Cleggett scarcely heeded the Doctor. The reference to "Loge's" skull had flashed a sudden light into his mind.
It is true that he now knew why Loge's men had been in the hold of the vessel; they had been there, no doubt, in an attempt to get possession of the oblong, unpainted box which had caused Loge's explosion of wrath; the box which was the real thing Loge had tried to buy from Cleggett when he dickered for the purchase of the Jasper B. But why this box should have been in the hold of the vessel, Cleggett could not understand.
The reflection of Loge's defence pales. There greets our ear suddenly a sturdy strain, resembling something we have heard before. By analysis, we discover in it one of the Siegfried-motifs, the horn-call, but grown so robust and weighty, so firm, strong, commanding, that it hardly more than reminds us of the youthful Lock-weise, fluttering forth hopefully to find a "dear companion."
Three hundred yards away, however, Loge rose again and shook a furious fist at the Jasper B., and though Cleggett could not distinguish the words, the sense of Loge's impotent rage rolled towards him on the wind in a roaring, vibrant bass.
The French are the best fencers in the world; the Italians the deadliest duelists. Cleggett, as has been said, knew all the schools without being the slave of any of them. He brought his sword en tierce; Loge's blade met his with strength and delicacy. The strength Cleggett was prepared for. The delicacy surprised him. But he was too much the master, too confident of his own powers, to trifle.
He sighted along the barrel with an eager, anticipatory smile upon his face; Pierre would, no doubt, have preferred to see a man boiled in oil rather than merely shot, but shooting was something, and Pierre evidently intended to get all the delight possible out of the situation. Cleggett's own pistol was within an inch of Loge's stomach.
Besides their firearms, each of Loge's men carried a wicked-looking machete. "Fire!" shouted Cleggett. "Let them have it, men!" And the rifles blazed from the deck of the Jasper B. in a crashing volley. Instantly the world was dark again; it was impossible to determine whether the fire of the Jasper B. had taken effect.
Twilight has fallen; the guardian fire glows more brightly as the darkness thickens. Of a sudden, the flames leap high, Loge's signal that some one draws near. At the same moment Siegfried's horn is heard, approaching. With the cry: "In my god's arm!" Brünnhilde rushes to meet him. A figure springs from the flames upon a rock, a form foreign to Brünnhilde's eyes. The flames drop back.
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