City of Endless Night Part 20

"Then why did you say those things to me?" she asked haughtily.

I gazed at her across the narrow table. Was it possible that such a woman had no understanding of ideals of honour in love? Could it be that she had no appreciation of the fight I had waged, and so nearly lost, to respect the trust and confidence that the old doctor had placed in me.

With these thoughts the ardour of my pa.s.sion cooled and a feeling of pity swept over me, as I sensed the tragedy of so fine a woman ethically impoverished by false training and environment. Had she known honour, and yet discarded it, I too should have been unable to resist the impulse of youth to deny to age its less imperious claims.

But either she chose artfully to ignore my struggle or she was truly unaware of it. In either case she would not share the responsibility for the breach of faith. I was puzzled and confounded.

It was Marguerite who broke the bewildering silence. "I wish you would go now," she said coolly; "I am afraid I misunderstood."

"And shall I come again?" I asked awkwardly.

She looked up at me and smiled bravely. "Yes," she said, "if--you are sure you wish to."

A resurge of pa.s.sionate longing to take her in my arms swept over me, but she held out her hand with such rare and dignified grace that I could only take the slender fingers and press them hungrily to my fevered lips and so bid her a wordless adieu.

~3~

But despite wild longing to see her again, I did not return to Marguerite's apartment for many weeks. A crisis in my work at the laboratory denied me even a single hour of leisure outside brief s.n.a.t.c.hes of food and sleep.

I had previously reported to the Chemical Staff that I had found means to increase materially the extraction percentage of the precious element protium from the crude imported ore. I had now received word that I should prepare to make a trial demonstration before the Staff.

Already I had revealed certain results of my progress to Herr von Uhl, as this had been necessary in order to get further grants of the rare material and of expensive equipment needed for the research, but in these smaller demonstrations, I had not been called upon to disclose my method. Now the Staff, hopeful that I had made the great discovery, insisted that I prepare at once to make a large scale demonstration and reveal the method that it might immediately be adopted for the wholesale extraction in the industrial works.

If I now gave away the full secret of my process, I would receive compensation that would indeed seem lavish for a man whose mental horizon was bounded by these enclosing walls; yet to me for whom these walls would always be a prison, credit at the banks of Berlin and the baubles of decoration and rank and social honour would be sounding bra.s.s. But I wanted power; and, with the secret of protium extraction in my possession, I would have control of life or death over three hundred million men. Why should I sacrifice such power for useless credit and empty honour? If Eitel I of the House of Hohenzollern would lengthen the days of his rule, let him deal with me and meet whatever terms I chose to name, for in my chemical retorts I had brewed a secret before which vaunted efficiency and hypocritical divinity could be made to bend a hungry belly and beg for food!

It was a laudable and rather thrilling ambition, and yet I was not clear as to just what terms I would dictate, nor how I could enforce the dictation. To ask for an audience with the Emperor now, and to take any such preposterous stand would merely be to get myself locked up for a lunatic. But I reasoned that if I could make the demonstration so that it would be accepted as genuine and yet not give away my secret, the situation would be in my hands. Yet I was expected to reveal the process step by step as the demonstration proceeded. There was but one way out and that was to make a genuine demonstration, but with falsely written formulas.

To plan and prepare such a demonstration required more genuine invention than had the discovery of the process, but I set about the task with feverish enthusiasm. I kept my a.s.sistants busy with the preparation of the apparatus and the more simple work which there was no need to disguise, while night after night I worked alone, altering and disguising the secret steps on which my great discovery hinged. As these preparations were nearing completion I sent for Dr. Zimmern and Col.

h.e.l.lar to meet me at my apartment.

"Comrades," I said, "you have endangered your own lives by confiding in me your secret desires to overthrow the rule of the House of Hohenzollern as it was overthrown once before. You have done this because you believed that I would have power that others do not have."

The two old men nodded in grave a.s.sent.

"And you have been quite fortunate in your choice," I concluded, "for not only have I pledged myself to your ends, but I shall soon possess the coveted power. In a few days I shall demonstrate my process on a large scale before the Chemical Staff. But I shall do this thing without revealing the method. The formulas I shall give them will be meaningless. As long as I am in charge in my own laboratory the process will be a success; when it is tried elsewhere it will fail, until I choose to make further revelations.

"So you see, for a time, unless I be killed or tortured into confession, I shall have great power. How then may I use that power to help you in the cause to which we are pledged?"

The older men seemed greatly impressed with my declaration and danced about me and cried with joy. When they had regained their composure Zimmern said: "There is but one thing you can do for us and that is to find some way to get word of the protium mines to the authorities of the World State. Berlin will then be at their mercy, but whatever happens can be no worse than the continuance of things as they are."

"But how," I said, "can a message be sent from Berlin to the outer world?"

"There is only one way," replied h.e.l.lar, "and that is by the submarines that go out for this ore. The Submarine Staff are members of the Royal House. So, indeed, are the captains. We have tried for years to gain the confidence of some of these men, but without avail. Perhaps through your work on the protium ore you can succeed where we have failed."

"And how," I asked eagerly, "do the ore-bringing vessels get from Berlin to the sea?"

My visitors glanced at each other significantly. "Do you not know that?"

exclaimed Zimmern. "We had supposed you would have been told when you were a.s.signed to the protium research."

By way of answer I explained that I knew the source of the ore but not the route of its coming.

"All such knowledge is suppressed in books," commented h.e.l.lar; "we older men know of this by word of mouth from the days when the submarine tunnel was completed to the sea, but you are younger. Unless this was told you at the time you were a.s.signed the work it is not to be expected that you would know."

I questioned h.e.l.lar and Zimmern closely but found that all they knew was that a submarine tunnel did exist leading from Berlin somewhere into the open sea; but its exact location they did not know. Again I pressed my question as to what I could do with the power of my secret and they could only repeat that they staked their hopes on getting word to the outer world by way of submarines.

Much as I might admire the strength of character that would lead men to rebel against the only life they knew because they sensed that it was hopeless, I now found myself a little exasperated at the vagueness of their plans. Yet I had none better. To defy the Emperor would merely be to risk my life and the possible loss of my knowledge to the world.

Perhaps after all the older heads were wiser than my own rebellious spirit; and so, without making any more definite plans, I ended the interview with a promise to let them know of the outcome of the demonstration.

Returning once more to my work I finished my preparations and sent word to the Chemical Staff that all was ready. They came with solemn faces.

The laboratory was locked and guards were posted. The place was examined thoroughly, the apparatus was studied in detail. All my ingredients were tested for the presence of extracted protium, lest I be trying to "salt the mine." But happily for me they accepted my statement as to their chemical nature in other respects. Then when all had been approved the test lot of ore was run. It took us thirty hours to run the extraction and sample and weigh and test the product. But everything went through exactly as I had planned.

With solemn faces the Chemical Staff unanimously declared that the problem had been solved and marvelled that the solution should come from the brain of so young a man. And so I received their adulation and worship, for I could not give credit to the chemists of the world outside to whom I was really indebted for my seeming miraculous genius.

Telling me to take my rest and prepare myself for an audience with His Majesty three days later, the Chemical Staff departed, carrying, with guarded secrecy, my false formulas.

~4~

Exultant and happy I left the laboratory. I had not slept for forty hours and scarcely half my regular allotment for many weeks. And yet I was not sleepy now but awake and excited. I had won a great victory, and I wanted to rejoice and share my conquest with sympathetic ears. I could go to Zimmern, but instead I turned my steps toward the elevator and, alighting on the Level of the Free Women, I went straightway to Marguerite's apartment.

Despite my feeling of exhilaration, my face must have revealed something of my real state of exhaustion, for Marguerite cried in alarm at the sight of me.

"A little tired," I replied, in answer to her solicitous questions; "I have just finished my demonstration before the Chemical Staff."

"And you won?" cried Marguerite in a burst of joy. "You deceived them just as the doctor said you would. And they know you have solved the protium problem and they do not know how you did it?"

"That is correct," I said, sinking back into the cushions of the divan.

"I have done all that. I came here first to tell you. You see I could not come before, all these weeks, I have had no time for sleep or anything. I would have telephoned or written but I feared it would not be safe. Did you think I was not coming again?"

"I missed you at first,--I mean at first I thought you were staying away because you did not want to see me, and then Dr. Zimmern told me what you were doing, and I understood--and waited, for I somehow knew you would come as soon as you could."

"Yes, of course you knew. Of course, I had to come--Marguerite--" But Marguerite faded before my vision. I reached out my hand for her--and it seemed to wave in empty s.p.a.ce....

~5~

When I awoke, I was lying on a couch and a screen bedecked with cupids was standing before me. At first I thought I was alone and then I realized that I was in Marguerite's apartment and that Marguerite herself was seated on a low stool beside the couch and gazing at me out of dreamy eyes.

"How did I get here?" I asked.

"You fell asleep while you were talking, and then some one came for books, and when the bell rang I hid you with the screen."

"How long have I slept?"

"For many hours," she answered.

"I ought not to have come," I said, but despite my remark I made no haste to go, but reached out and ran my fingers through her ma.s.sy hair.

And then I slowly drew her toward me until her luxuriant locks were tumbled about my neck and face and her head was pillowed on my breast.

"I am so happy," she whispered. "I am so glad you came first to me."

For a moment my reason was drugged by the opiate of her touch; and then, as the realization of the circ.u.mstances re-formed in my brain, the feeling of guilt arose and routed the dreamy bliss. Yet I could only blame myself, for there was no guile in her act or word, nor could I believe there was guile in her heart. Gently I pushed her away and arose, stating that I must leave at once.