Barr Robert
Jennie Baxter, Journalist
CHAPTER XVI. JENNIE VISITS A MODERN WIZARD IN HIS MAGIC ATTIC
When Jennie entered the carriage in which her friend was waiting, the other cried, “Well, have you seen him?” apparently meaning the Director of Police.
“No, I did not see him, but I talked with him over the telephone. I wish you could have heard our conversation; it was the funniest interview I ever took part in. Two or three times I had to shut off the instrument, fearing the Director would hear me laugh. I am afraid that before this business is ended you will be very sorry I am a guest at your house. I know I shall end by getting myself into an Austrian prison. Just think of it! Here have I been ‘holding up’ the Chief of Police in this Imperial city as if I were a wild western brigand. I have been terrorizing the man, brow-beating him, threatening him, and he the person who has the liberty of all Vienna in his hands; who can have me dragged off to a dungeon-cell any time he likes to give the order.”
“Not from the Palace Steinheimer,” said the Princess, with decision.
“Well, he might hesitate about that; yet, nevertheless, it is too funny to think that a mere newspaper woman, coming into a city which contains only one or two of her friends, should dare to talk to the Chief of Police as I have done to-night, and force him actually to beg that I shall remain in the city and continue to assist him.”
“Tell me what you said,” asked the Princess eagerly; and Jennie related all that had passed between them over the telephone.
“And do you mean to say calmly that you are going to give that man the right to use the astounding information you have acquired, and allow him to accept complacently all the kudos that such a discovery entitles you to?”
“Why, certainly,” replied Jennie. “What good is the kudos to me? All the credit I desire I get in the office of the Daily Bugle in London.”
“But, you silly girl, holding such a secret as you held, you could have made your fortune,” insisted the practical Princess, for the principles which had been instilled into her during a youth spent in Chicago had not been entirely eradicated by residence in Vienna. “If you had gone to the Government and said, ‘How much will you give me if I restore to you the missing gold?’ just imagine what their answer would be.”
“Yes, I suppose there was money in the scheme if it had really been a secret. But you forget that to-morrow morning the Chief of Police would have known as much as he knows to-night. Of course, if I had gone alone to the Treasury vault and kept my discovery to myself, I might, perhaps, have ‘held up’ the Government of Austria-Hungary as successfully as I ‘held up’ the Chief of Police to-night. But with the Director watching everything I did, and going with me to the chemist, there was no possibility of keeping the matter a secret.”
“Well, Jennie, all I can say is that you are a very foolish girl. Here you are, working hard, as you said in one of your letters, merely to make a living, and now, with the greatest nonchalance, you allow a fortune to slip through your fingers. I am simply not going to allow this. I shall tell my husband all that has happened, and he will make the Government treat you honestly; if not generously. I assure you, Jennie, that Lord Donal—no, I won’t mention his name, since you protest so strenuously—but the future young man, whoever he is, will not think the less of you because you come to him with a handsome dowry. But here we are at home; and I won’t say another word on the subject if it annoys you.”
When Jennie reached her delightful apartments—which looked even more luxuriantly comfortable bathed in the soft radiance that now flooded them from quiet-toned shaded lamps than they did in the more garish light of day—she walked up and down her sitting-room in deep meditation. She was in a quandary—whether or not to risk sending a coded telegram to her paper was the question that presented itself to her. If she were sure that no one else would learn the news, she would prefer to wait until she had further particulars of the Treasury catastrophe. A good deal would depend on whether or not the Director of Police took anyone into his confidence that night. If he did not, he would be aware that only he and the girl possessed this important piece of news. If a full account of the discovery appeared in the next morning’s Daily Bugle, then, when that paper arrived in Vienna, or even before, if a synopsis were telegraphed to the Government, as it was morally certain to be, the Director would know at once that she was the correspondent of the newspaper whom he was so anxious to frighten out of Vienna. On the other hand, her friendship with the Princess von Steinheimer gave her such influence with the Chief’s superiors, that, after the lesson she had taught him, he might hesitate to make any move against her. Then, again, the news that to-night belonged to two persons might on the morrow come to the knowledge of all the correspondents in Vienna, and her efforts, so far as the Bugle was concerned, would have been in vain. This consideration decided the girl, and, casting off all sign of hesitation, she sat down at her writing table and began the first chapter of the solution of the Vienna mystery. Her opening sentence was exceedingly diplomatic: “The Chief of Police of Vienna has made a most startling discovery.” Beginning thus, she went on to details of the discovery she had that day made. When her account was finished and codified, she went down to her hostess and said,—
“Princess, I want a trustworthy man, who will take a long telegram to the central telegraph office, pay for it, and come away quickly before anyone can ask him inconvenient questions.”
“Would it not be better to call a Dienstmanner?”
“A Dienstmanner? That is your commissionaire, or telegraph messenger? No, I think not. They are all numbered and can be traced.”
“Oh, I know!” cried the Princess; “I will send our coachman. He will be out of his livery now, and he is a most reliable man; he will not answer inconvenient questions, or any others, even if they are asked.”
To her telegram for publication Jennie had added a private despatch to the editor, stating that it would be rather inconvenient for her if he published the account next morning, but she left the decision entirely with him. Here was the news, and if he thought it worth the risk, he might hold it over; if not, he was to print it regardless of consequences.
As a matter of fact, the editor, with fear and trembling, held the news for a day, so that he might not embarrass his fair representative, but so anxious was he, that he sat up all night until the other papers were out, and he heaved a sigh of relief when, on glancing over them, he found that not one of them contained an inkling of the information locked up in his desk. And so he dropped off to sleep when the day was breaking. Next night he had nearly as much anxiety, for although the Bugle would contain the news, other papers might have it as well, and thus for the second time he waited in his office until the other sheets, wet from the press, were brought to him. Again fortune favoured him, and the triumph belonged to the Bugle alone.
The morning after her interview with the Director of Police, Jennie, taking a small hand-satchel, in which she placed the various bottles containing the different dusts which the chemist had separated, went abroad alone, and hailing a fiacre, gave the driver the address of Professor Carl Seigfried. The carriage of the Princess was always at the disposal of the girl, but on this occasion she did not wish to be embarrassed with so pretentious an equipage. The cab took her into a street lined with tall edifices and left her at the number she had given the driver. The building seemed to be one let out in flats and tenements; she mounted stair after stair, and only at the very top did she see the Professor’s name painted on a door. Here she rapped several times without any attention being paid to her summons, but at last the door was opened partially by a man whom she took, quite accurately, to be the Professor himself. His head was white; and his face deeply wrinkled. He glared at her through his glasses, and said sharply, “Young lady, you have made a mistake; these are the rooms of Professor Carl Seigfried.”
“It is Professor Carl Seigfried that I wish to see,” replied the girl hurriedly, as the old man was preparing to shut the door.
“What do you want with him?”
“I want some information from him about explosives. I have been told that he knows more about explosives than any other man living.”
“Quite right—he does. What then?”
“An explosion has taken place producing the most remarkable results. They say that neither dynamite nor any other known force could have had such an effect on metals and minerals as this power has had.”
“Ah, dynamite is a toy for children!” cried the old man, opening the door a little further and exhibiting an interest which had, up to that moment, been absent from his manner. “Well, where did this explosion take place? Do you wish me to go and see it?”
“Perhaps so, later on. At present I wish to show you some of its effects, but I don’t propose to do this standing here in the passageway.”
“Quite right—quite right,” hastily ejaculated the old scientist, throwing the door wide open. “Of course, I am not accustomed to visits from fashionable young ladies, and I thought at first there had been a mistake; but if you have any real scientific problem, I shall be delighted to give my attention to it. What may appear very extraordinary to the lay mind will doubtless prove fully explainable by scientists. Come in, come in.”
The old man shut the door behind her, and led her along a dark passage, into a large apartment, whose ceiling was the roof of the building. At first sight it seemed in amazing disorder. Huge as it was, it was cluttered with curious shaped machines and instruments. A twisted conglomeration of glass tubing, bent into fantastic tangles, stood on a central table, and had evidently been occupying the Professor’s attention at the time he was interrupted. The place was lined with shelving, where the walls were not occupied by cupboards, and every shelf was burdened with bottles and apparatus of different kinds. Whatever care Professor Seigfried took of his apparatus, he seemed to have little for his furniture. There was hardly a decent chair in the room, except one deep arm-chair, covered with a tiger’s skin, in which the Professor evidently took his ease while meditating or watching the progress of an experiment. This chair he did not offer to the young lady; in fact, he did not offer her a seat at all, but sank down on the tiger’s skin himself, placed the tips of his fingers together, and glared at her through his glittering glasses.
“Now, young woman,” he said abruptly, “what have you brought for me? Don’t begin to chatter, for my time is valuable. Show me what you have brought, and I will tell you all about it; and most likely a very simple thing it is.”
Jennie, interested in so rude a man, smiled, drew up the least decrepit bench she could find, and sat down, in spite of the angry mutterings of her irritated host. Then she opened her satchel, took out the small bottle of gold, and handed it to him without a word. The old man received it somewhat contemptuously, shook it backward and forward without extracting the cork, adjusted his glasses, then suddenly seemed to take a nervous interest in the material presented to him. He rose and went nearer the light. Drawing out the cork with trembling hands, he poured some of the contents into his open palm. The result was startling enough. The old man flung up his hands, letting the vial crash into a thousand pieces on the floor. He staggered forward, shrieking, “Ah, mein Gott—mein Gott!”
Then, to the consternation of Jennie, who had already risen in terror from her chair, the scientist plunged forward on his face. The girl had difficulty in repressing a shriek. She looked round hurriedly for a bell to ring, but apparently there was none. She tried to open the door and cry for help, but in her excitement could neither find handle nor latch. It seemed to be locked, and the key, doubtless, was in the Professor’s pocket. She thought at first that he had dropped dead, but the continued moaning as he lay on the floor convinced her of her error. She bent over him anxiously and cried, “What can I do to help you?”
With a struggle he muttered, “The bottle, the bottle, in the cupboard behind you.”
She hurriedly flung open the doors of the cupboard indicated, and found a bottle of brandy, and a glass, which she partly filled. The old man had with an effort struggled into a sitting posture, and she held the glass of fiery liquid to his pallid lips. He gulped down the brandy, and gasped, “I feel better now. Help me to my chair.”
Assisting him to his feet, she supported him to his arm-chair, when he shook himself free, crying angrily, “Let me alone! Don’t you see I am all right again?”
The girl stood aside, and the Professor dropped into his chair, his nervous hands vibrating on his knees. For a long interval nothing was said by either, and the girl at last seated herself on the bench she had formerly occupied. The next words the old man spoke were, “Who sent you here?”
“No one, I came of my own accord. I wished to meet someone who had a large knowledge of explosives, and Herr Feltz, the chemist, gave me your address.”
“Herr Feltz! Herr Feltz!” he repeated. “So he sent you here?”
“No one sent me here,” insisted the girl. “It is as I tell you. Herr Feltz merely gave me your address.”
“Where did you get that powdered gold?”
“It came from the débris of an explosion.”
“I know, you said that before. Where was the explosion? Who caused it?”
“That I don’t know.”
“Don’t you know where the explosion was?”
“Yes, I know where the explosion was, but I don’t know who caused it.”
“Who sent you here?”
“I tell you no one sent me here.”
“That is not true, the man who caused the explosion sent you here. You are his minion. What do you expect to find out from me?”
“I expect to learn what explosive was used to produce the result that seemed to have such a remarkable effect on you.”
“Why do you say that? It had no effect on me. My heart is weak. I am subject to such attacks, and I ward them off with brandy. Some day they will kill me. Then you won’t learn any secrets from a dead man, will you?”
“I hope, Professor Seigfried, that you have many years yet to live, and I must further add that I did not expect such a reception as I have received from a man of science, as I was told you were. If you have no information to give to me, very well, that ends it; all you have to do is to say so.”
“Who sent you here?”
“No one, as I have repeated once or twice. If anyone had, I would give him my opinion of the errand when I got back. You refuse, then, to tell me anything about the explosive that powdered the gold?”
“Refuse? Of course I refuse! What did you expect? I suppose the man who sent you here thought, because you were an engaging young woman and I an old dotard, I would gabble to you the results of a life’s work. Oh, no, no, no; but I am not an old dotard. I have many years to live yet.”
“I hope so. Well, I must bid you good morning. I shall go to someone else.”
The old man showed his teeth in a forbidding grin.
“It is useless. Your bottle is broken, and the material it contained is dissipated. Not a trace of it is left.”
He waved his thin, emaciated hand in the air as he spoke.
“Oh, that doesn’t matter in the least,” said Jennie. “I have several other bottles here in my satchel.”
The Professor placed his hands on the arms of his chair, and slowly raised himself to his feet.
“You have others,” he cried, “other bottles? Let me see them—let me see them!”
“No,” replied Jennie, “I won’t.”
With a speed which, after his recent collapse, Jennie had not expected, the Professor ambled round to the door and placed his back against it. The glasses over his eyes seemed to sparkle as if with fire. His talon-like fingers crooked rigidly. He breathed rapidly, and was evidently labouring under intense excitement.
“Who knows you came up to see me?” he whispered hoarsely, glaring at her.
Jennie, having arisen, stood there, smoothing down her perfectly fitting glove, and answered with a calmness she was far from feeling,—
“Who knows I am here? No one but the Director of Police.”
“Oh, the Director of Police!” echoed the Professor, quite palpably abashed by the unexpected answer. The rigidity of his attitude relaxed, and he became once more the old man he had appeared as he sat in a heap in his chair. “You will excuse me,” he muttered, edging round towards the chair again; “I was excited.”
“I noticed that you were, Professor. But before you sit down again, please unlock that door.”
“Why?” he asked, pausing on his way to the chair.
“Because I wish it open.”
“And I,” he said in a higher tone, “wish it to remain locked until we have come to some understanding. I can’t let you go out now; but I shall permit you to go unmolested as soon as you have made some explanation to me.”
“If you do not unlock the door immediately I shall take this machine and fling it through the front window out on the street. The crashing glass on the pavement will soon bring someone to my rescue, Professor, and, as I have a voice of my own and small hesitation about shouting, I shall have little difficulty in directing the strangers where to come.”
As Jennie spoke she moved swiftly towards the table on which stood the strange aggregation of reflectors and bent glass tubing.
“No, no, no!” screamed the Professor, springing between her and the table. “Touch anything but that—anything but that. Do not disturb it an inch—there is danger—death not only to you and me, but perhaps to the whole city. Keep away from it!”
“Very well, then,” said Jennie, stepping back in spite of her endeavour to maintain her self-control; “open the door. Open both doors and leave them so. After that, if you remain seated in your chair, I shall not touch the machine, nor shall I leave until I make the explanations you require, and you have answered some questions that I shall ask. But I must have a clear way to the stair, in case you should become excited again.”
“I’ll unlock the doors; I’ll unlock both doors,” replied the old man tremulously, fumbling about in his pockets for his keys. “But keep away from that machine, unless you want to bring swift destruction on us all.”
With an eagerness that retarded his speed, the Professor, constantly looking over his shoulder at his visitor, unlocked the first door, then hastily he flung open the second, and tottered back to his chair, where he collapsed on the tiger skin, trembling and exhausted.
“We may be overheard,” he whined. “One can never tell who may sneak quietly up the stair. I am surrounded by spies trying to find out what I am doing.”
“Wait a moment,” said Jennie.
She went quickly to the outer door, found that it closed with a spring latch, opened and shut it two or three times until she was perfectly familiar with its workings, then she closed it, drew the inner door nearly shut, and sat down.
“There,” she said, “we are quite safe from interruption, Professor Seigfried; but I must request you not to move from your chair.”
“I have no intention of doing so,” murmured the old man. “Who sent you? You said you would tell me. I think you owe me an explanation.”
“I think you owe me one,” replied the girl. “As I told you before, no one sent me. I came here entirely of my own accord, and I shall endeavour to make clear to you exactly why I came. Some time ago there occurred in this city a terrific explosion—”
“Where? When?” exclaimed the old man, placing his hands on the arms of his chair, as if he would rise to his feet.
“Sit where you are,” commanded Jennie firmly, “and I shall tell you all I can about it. The Government, for reasons of its own, desires to keep the fact of this explosion a secret, and thus very few people outside of official circles know anything about it. I am trying to discover the cause of that disaster.”
“Are you—are you working on behalf of the Government?” asked the old man eagerly, a tremor of fear in his quavering voice.
“No. I am conducting my investigations quite independently of the Government.”
“But why? But why? That is what I don’t understand.”
“I would very much rather not answer that question.”
“But that question—everything is involved in that question. I must know why you are here. If you are not in the employ of the Government, in whose employ are you?”
“If I tell you,” said Jennie with some hesitation, “will you keep what I say a secret?”
“Yes, yes, yes!” cried the scientist impatiently.
“Well, I am in the service of a London daily newspaper.”
“I see, I see; and they have sent you here to publish broadcast over the world all you can find out of my doings. I knew you were a spy the moment I saw you. I should never have let you in.”
“My dear sir, the London paper is not even aware of your existence. They have not sent me to you at all. They have sent me to learn, if possible, the cause of the explosion I spoke of. I took some of the débris to Herr Feltz to analyze it, and he said he had never seen gold, iron, feldspar, and all that, reduced to such fine, impalpable grains as was the case with the sample I left with him. I then asked him 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?”
