The Face and the Mask by Robert Barr (beach read book txt) 📖

“I am almost afraid to tell you,” he said; “and if I could not demonstrate to your entire satisfaction that what I say is true, it would be folly for me to say what I am about to say. If I were to take this bottle and cut a notch in the cork, and walk with it neck downwards along the Boulevard des Italiens, allowing this fluid to fall drop by drop on the pavement, I could walk in that way in safety through every street in Paris. If it rained that day nothing would happen. If it rained the next or for a week nothing would happen, but the moment the sun came out and dried the moisture, the light step of a cat on any pavement over which I had passed would instantly shatter to ruins the whole of Paris.”

“Impossible!” cried the Minister, an expression of horror coming into his face.

“I knew you would say that. Therefore I ask you to come with me to the country, where I can prove the truth of what I allege. While I carry this bottle around with me in this apparently careless fashion, it is corked, as you see with the utmost security. Not a drop of the fluid must be left on the outside of the cork or of the bottle. I have wiped the bottle and cork most thoroughly, and burned the cloth which I used in doing so. Fire will not cause this compound, even when dry, to explode, but the slightest touch will set it off. I have to be extremely careful in its manufacture, so that not a single drop is left unaccounted for in any place where it might evaporate.”

The Minister, with his finger-tips together and his eyes on the ceiling, mused for a few moments on the amazing statement he had heard.

“If what you say is true,” he began at last, “don’t you think it would be more humane to destroy all traces of the experiments by which you discovered this substance, and to divulge the secret to no one? The devastation such a thing would cause, if it fell into unscrupulous hands, is too appalling even to contemplate.”

“I have thought of that,” said the inventor; “but some one else—the time may be far off or it may be near—is bound to make the discovery. My whole ambition, as I told you in my letter, is to have my name coupled with this discovery. I wish it to be known as the Lambelle Explosive. The secret would be safe with the French Government.”

“I am not so sure of that,” returned the Minister. “Some unscrupulous man may become Minister of War, and may use his knowledge to put himself in the position of Dictator. An unscrupulous man in the possession of such a secret would be invincible.”

“What you say,” replied the inventor, “is undoubtedly true; yet I am determined that the name of Lambelle shall go down in history coupled with the most destructive agent the world has ever known, or will know. If the Government of France will build for me a large stone structure as secure as a fortress, I will keep my secret, but will fill that building with bottles like this, and then——”

“I do not see,” said the Minister, “that that would lessen the danger, if the unscrupulous man I speak of once became possessed of the keys; and, besides, the mere fact that such a secret existed would put other inventors upon the track, and some one else less benevolent than yourself would undoubtedly make the discovery. You admitted a moment ago that the chances were a future investigator would succeed in getting the right ingredients together, even without the knowledge that such an explosive existed. See what an incentive it would be to inventors all over the world, if it were known that France had in its possession such a fearful explosive! No Government has ever yet been successful in keeping the secret of either a gun or a gunpowder.”

“There is, of course,” said Lambelle, “much in what you say; but, equally of course, all that you say might have been said to the inventor of gunpowder, for gunpowder in its day was as wonderful as this is now.”

Suddenly the Minister laughed aloud.

“I am talking seriously with you on this subject,” he exclaimed, “as if I really believed in it. Of course, I may say I do nothing of the kind. I think you must have hypnotized me with those calm eyes of yours into crediting your statements for even a few moments.”

“All that I say,” said the inventor quietly, “can be corroborated to- morrow. Make an appointment with me in the country, and if it chances to be a calm and sunny day you will no longer doubt the evidence of your own eyes.”

“Where do you wish the experiment to be made?” asked the Minister.

“It must be in some wild and desolate region, on a hill-top for preference. There should be either trees or old buildings there that we can destroy, otherwise the full effects can hardly be estimated.”

“I have a place in the country,” said the Minister, “which is wild and desolate and unprofitable enough. There are some useless stone buildings, not on a hill-top, but by the edge of a quarry which has been unworked for many years. There is no habitation for several miles around. Would such a spot be suitable?”

“Perfectly so. When would it be convenient for you to go?”

“I will leave with you to-night,” said the Minister, “and we can spend the day to-morrow experimenting.”

“Very well,” answered Lambelle, rising when the Minister had told him the hour and the railway station at which they should meet.

That evening, when the Minister drove to the railway station in time for his train, he found Lambelle waiting for him, holding, by a leash, two sorry-looking dogs.

“Do you travel with such animals as these?” asked the Minister.

“The poor brutes,” said Lambelle, with regret in his voice, “are necessary for our experiments. They will be in atoms by this time to- morrow.”

The dogs were put into the railway-van, and the inventor brought his portmanteau with him into the private carriage reserved for the use of the Minister.

The place, as the Minister of War had said, was desolate enough. The stone buildings near the edge of the deserted quarry were stout and strong, although partly in ruins.

“I have here with me in my portmanteau,” said Lambelle, “some hundreds of metres of electric wire. I will attach one of the dogs by this clip, which we can release from a distance by pressing an electric button. The moment the dog escapes he will undoubtedly explode the compound.”

The insulated wire was run along the ground to a distant elevation. The dog was attached by the electric clip, and chained to a doorpost of one of the buildings. Lambelle then carefully uncorked his bottle, holding it at arm’s length from his person. The Minister looked on with strange interest as Lambelle allowed the fluid to drip in a semicircular line around the chained dog. The inventor carefully re-corked the bottle, wiped it thoroughly with a cloth he had with him, and threw the cloth into one of the deserted houses.