I did not, however, collapse, as the alleged Count d'Artigas perhaps expected I would.
No! I looked him straight in the eyes, which glittered angrily, and crossed my arms defiantly, as he had done.

And yet he held my life in his hands! At a sign a bullet would have laid me dead at his feet.
Then my body, cast into the lagoon, would have been borne out to sea through the tunnel and there would have been an end of me.
After this scene I am left at liberty, just as before.

No measure is taken against me, I can walk among the pillars to the very end of the cavern, which--it is only too clear--possesses no other issue except the tunnel.
When I return to my cell, at the extremity of the Beehive, a prey to a thousand thoughts suggested by my situation, I say to myself: "If Ker Karraje knows I am Simon Hart, the engineer, he must at any rate never know that I am aware of the position of Back Cup Island." As to the plan of confiding Thomas Roch to my care, I do not think he ever seriously entertained it, seeing that my identity had been revealed to him.

I regret this, inasmuch as the inventor will indubitably be the object of pressing solicitations, and as Engineer Serko will employ every means in his power to obtain the composition of the explosive and deflagrator, of which he will make such detestable use during future piratical exploits.

Yes, it would have been far better if I could have remained Thomas Roch's keeper here, as in Healthful House.
For fifteen days I see nothing of my late charge.