In all the long street he saw only one man, coming toward him with his back to the inner harbor.  Between the two long walls of brick appeared in the background the wharf with its mountains of merchandise, its squadrons of black stevedores, wagons and carts.  On beyond were the hulls of the ships sustaining their grove of masts and smokestacks and, at the extreme end, the yellow breakwater and the sky recently washed by the rain, with flocks of little clouds as white and placid as silky sheep.

The man who was returning from the dock and walking along with his eyes fixed on Ferragut suddenly stopped and, turning upon his tracks, returned again to the quay....  This movement awakened the captain’s curiosity, sharpening his senses.  Suddenly he had a presentiment that this pedestrian was his Englishman, though dressed differently and with less elegance.  He could only see his rapidly disappearing back, but his instinct in this moment was superior to his eyes....  He did not need to look further....  It was the Englishman.

And without knowing why, he hastened his steps in order to catch up with him.  Then he broke into a run, finding that he was alone in the street, and that the other one had disappeared around the corner.

When Ferragut reached the harbor he could see him hastening away with an elastic step which amounted almost to flight.  Before him was a ridge of bundles piled up in uneven rows.  He was going to lose sight of him; a minute later it would be impossible to find him.

The captain hesitated.  “What motive have I for pursuing this unknown person?...”  And just as he was formulating this question, the other one slowed down a little in order to turn his head and see if he were still being followed.

Suddenly a rapid phenomenal transformation took place in Ferragut.  He had not recognized this man’s glance when he had almost run into him on the sidewalk of the Cannebiere, and now that there was between the two a distance of some fifty yards, now that the other was fleeing and showing only a fugitive profile, the captain identified him despite the fact that he could not distinguish him clearly at such a distance.

With a sharp click a curtain of his memory seemed to be dashed aside, letting in torrents of light....  It was the counterfeit Russian count, he was sure of that,—­shaven and disguised, who undoubtedly was “operating” in Marseilles, directing new services, months after having prepared the entrance of the submersibles into the Mediterranean.

Surprise held Ferragut spellbound.  With the same imaginative rapidity with which a drowning person giddily recalls all the scenes of his former life, the captain now beheld his infamous existence in Naples, his expedition in the schooner carrying supplies to the submarines and then the torpedo which had opened a breach in the Californian....  And this man, perhaps, was the one who had made his poor son fly through the air in countless pieces!...