Jennie Baxter, Journalist, Robert Barr [i want to read a book .txt] 📗

who in Vienna knew most about explosives, and he gave me your address. That is why I am here."

"But the explosion--you have not told me when and where it occurred!"

"That, as I have said, is a Government secret."

"But you stated you are not in the Government employ, therefore it can be no breach of confidence if you let me have full particulars."

"I suppose not. Very well, then, the explosion occurred after midnight on the seventeenth in the vault of the Treasury."

The old man, in spite of the prohibition, rose uncertainly to his feet.

Jennie sprang up and said menacingly, "Stay where you are!"

"I am not going to touch you. If you are so suspicious of every move I make, then go yourself and bring me what I want. There is a map of Vienna pinned against the wall yonder. Bring it to me."

Jennie proceeded in the direction indicated. It was an ordinary map of the city of Vienna, and as Jennie took it down she noticed that across the southern part of the city a semi-circular line in pencil had been drawn. Examining it more closely, she saw that the stationary part of the compass had been placed on the spot where stood the building which contained the Professor's studio. She paid closer attention to the pencil mark and observed that it passed through the Treasury building.

"Don't look at that map!" shrieked the Professor, beating the air with his hands. "I asked you to bring it to me. Can't you do a simple action like that without spying about?"

Jennie rapidly unfastened the paper from the wall and brought it to him. The scientist scrutinized it closely, adjusting his glasses the better to see, then deliberately tore the map into fragments, numerous and minute. He rose--and this time Jennie made no protest--went to the window, opened it, and flung the fluttering bits of paper out into the air, the strong wind carrying them far over the roofs of Vienna. Closing the casement, he came back to his chair.

"Was--was anyone hurt at this explosion?" he asked presently.

"Yes, four men were killed instantly, a dozen were seriously injured and are now in hospital."

"Oh, my God--my God!" cried the old man, covering his face with his hands, swaying from side to side in his chair like a man tortured with agony and remorse. At last he lifted a face that had grown more pinched and yellow within the last few minutes.

"I can tell you nothing," he said, moistening his parched lips.

"You mean that you _will_ tell me nothing, for I see plainly that you know everything."

"I knew nothing of any explosion until you spoke of it. What have I to do with the Treasury or the Government?"

"That is just what I want to know."

"It is absurd. I am no conspirator, but a man of learning."

"Then you have nothing to fear, Herr Seigfried. If you are innocent, why are you so loth to give me any assistance in this matter?"

"It has nothing to do with me. I am a scientist--I am a scientist. All I wish is to be left alone with my studies. I have nothing to do with governments or newspapers, or anything belonging to them."

Jennie sat tracing a pattern on the dusty floor with the point of her parasol. She spoke very quietly:--

"The pencilled line which you drew on the map of Vienna passed through the Treasury building; the centre of the circle was this garret. Why did you draw that pencilled semi-circle? Why were you anxious that I should not see you had done so? Why did you destroy the map?"

Professor Seigfried sat there looking at her with dropped jaw, but he made no reply.

"If you will excuse my saying so," the girl went on, "you are acting very childishly. It is evident to me that you are no criminal, yet if the Director of Police had been in my place he would have arrested you long ago, and that merely because of your own foolish actions."

"The map proved nothing," he said at last, haltingly, "and besides, both you and the Director will now have some difficulty in finding it."

"That is further proof of your folly. The Director doesn't need to find it. I am here to testify that I saw the map, saw the curved line passing through the Treasury, and saw you destroy what you thought was an incriminating piece of evidence. It would be much better if you would deal as frankly with me as I have done with you. Then I shall give you the best advice I can--if my advice will be of any assistance to you."

"Yes, and publish it to all the world."

"It will have to be published to all the world in any case, for, if I leave here without full knowledge, I will simply go to the police office and there tell what I have learned in this room."

"And if I do speak, you will still go to the Director of the Police and tell him what you have discovered."

"No, I give you my word that I will not."

"What guarantee have I of that?" asked the old man suspiciously.

"No guarantee at all except my word!"

"Will you promise not to print in your paper what I tell you?"

"No, I cannot promise that!"

"Still, the newspaper doesn't matter," continued the scientist. "The story would be valueless to you, because no one would believe it. There is little use in printing a story in a newspaper that will be laughed at, is there? However, I think you are honest, otherwise you would have promised not to print a line of what I tell you, and then I should have known you were lying. It was as easy to promise that as to say you would not tell the Director of Police. I thought at first some scientific rival had sent you here to play the spy on me, and learn what I was doing. I assure you I heard nothing about the explosion you speak of, yet I was certain it had occurred somewhere along that line which I drew on the map. I had hoped it was not serious, and begun to believe it was not. The anxiety of the last month has nearly driven me insane, and, as you say quite truly, my actions have been childish." The old man in his excitement had risen from his chair and was now pacing up and down the room, running his fingers distractedly through his long white hair, and talking more to himself than to his auditor.

Jennie had edged her chair nearer to the door, and had made no protest against his rising, fearing to interrupt his flow of talk and again arouse his suspicions.

"I have no wish to protect my inventions. I have never taken out a patent in my life. What I discover I give freely to the world, but I will not be robbed of my reputation as a scientist. I want my name to go down to posterity among those of the great discoverers. You talked just now of going to the police and telling them what you knew. Foolish creature! You could no more have gone to the central police office without my permission, or against my will, than you could go to the window and whistle back those bits of paper I scattered to the winds. Before you reached the bottom of the stairs I could have laid Vienna in a mass of ruins. Yes, I could in all probability have blown up the entire Empire of Austria. The truth is, that I do not know the limit of my power, nor dare I test it."

"Oh, this is a madman!" thought Jennie, as she edged still nearer to the door. The old man paused in his walk and turned fiercely upon her.

"You don't believe me?" he said.

"No, I do not," she answered, the colour leaving her cheeks.

The aged wizard gave utterance to a hideous chuckle. He took from one of his numerous shelves a hammer-head without the handle, and for a moment Jennie thought he was going to attack her; but he merely handed the metal to her and said,--

"Break that in two. Place it between your palms and grind it to powder."

"You know that is absurd; I cannot do it."

"Why can't you do it?"

"Because it is of steel."

"That is no reason. Why can't you do it?"

He glared at her fiercely over his glasses, and she saw in his wild eye all the enthusiasm of an instructor enlightening a pupil.

"I'll tell you why you can't do it; because every minute particle of it is held together by an enormous force. It may be heated red-hot and beaten into this shape and that, but still the force hangs on as tenaciously as the grip of a giant. Now suppose I had some substance, a drop of which, placed on that piece of iron, would release the force which holds the particles together--what would happen?"

"I don't know," replied Jennie.

"Oh, yes you do!" cried the Professor impatiently; "but you are like every other woman--you won't take the trouble to think. What would happen is this. The force that held the particles together would be released, and the hammer would fall to powder like that gold you showed me. The explosion that followed, caused by the sudden release of the power, would probably wreck this room and extinguish both our lives. You understand that, do you not?"

"Yes, I think I do."

"Well, here is something you won't understand, and probably won't believe when you hear it. There is but one force in this world and but one particle of matter. There is only one element, which is the basis of everything. All the different shapes and conditions of things that we see are caused by a mere variation of that force in conjunction with numbers of that particle. Am I getting beyond your depth?"

"I am afraid you are, Professor."

"Of course; I know what feeble brains the average woman is possessed of; still, try and keep that in your mind. Now listen to this. I have discovered how to disunite that force and that particle. I can, with a touch, fling loose upon this earth a giant whose strength is irresistible and immeasurable."

"Then why object to making your discovery public?"

"In the first place, because there are still a thousand things and more to be learned along such a line of investigation. The moment a man announces his discoveries, he is first ridiculed, then, when the truth of what he affirms is proven, there rise in every part of the world other men who say that they knew all about it ten years ago, and will prove it too--at least, far enough to delude a gullible world; in the second because I am a humane man, I hesitate to spread broadcast a knowledge that would enable any fool to destroy the universe. Then there is a third reason. There is another who, I believe, has discovered how to make this force loosen its grip on the particle--that is Keely, of Philadelphia, in the United States--"

"What! You don't mean the Keely motor man?" cried Jennie, laughing. "That arrant humbug! Why, all the papers in the world have exposed his ridiculous pretensions; he has done nothing but spend other people's money."

"Yes, the newspapers have ridiculed