The officer scrutinized the schooner's flag, while the Count d'Artigas added:
"Will you be good enough to tell me, sir, to what circumstance I owe the pleasure of your visit on board my vessel?"
"Orders have been received," replied the officer, "to search every vessel now anchored in Pamlico Sound, or which attempts to leave it."
He did not deem it necessary to insist upon this point since the _Ebba_, above every other, was to be subjected to the bother of a rigorous examination.
"You, of course, sir, have no intention of refusing me permission to go over your schooner?"
"Assuredly not, sir. My vessel is at your disposal from peaks to bilges. Only I should like to know why all the vessels which happen to be in Pamlico Sound to-day are being subjected to this formality."
"I see no reason why you should not be informed, Monsieur the Count," replied the officer. "The governor of North Carolina has been apprised that Healthful House has been broken into and two persons kidnapped, and the authorities merely wish to satisfy themselves that the persons carried off have not been embarked during the night."
"Is it possible?" exclaimed the Count, feigning surprise. "And who are the persons who have thus disappeared from Healthful House?"
"A madman, sir? Do you, may I ask, refer to the Frenchman, Thomas Roch?"
"The Thomas Roch whom I saw yesterday during my visit to the establishment--whom I questioned in presence of the director--who was seized with a violent paroxysm just as Captain Spade and I were leaving?"
The officer observed the stranger with the keenest attention, in an effort to surprise anything suspicious in his attitude or remarks.
"It is incredible!" added the Count, as though he had just heard about the outrage for the first time.
"I can easily understand, sir, how uneasy the authorities must be," he went on, "in view of Thomas Roch's personality, and I cannot but approve of the measures taken. I need hardly say that neither the French inventor nor his keeper is on board the _Ebba_. However, you can assure yourself of the fact by examining the schooner as minutely as you desire. Captain Spade, show these gentlemen over the vessel."
Then saluting the lieutenant of the _Falcon_ coldly, the Count d'Artigas sank into his deck-chair again and replaced his cigar between his lips, while the two officers and eight sailors, conducted by Captain Spade, began their search.