even the poison doctors of St. Petersburg have never employed. Dr.
Kharkoff is completely baffled. Your American doctors - two were
called in to see Saratovsky - say it is the typhus fever. But
Kharkoff knows better. There is no typhus rash. Besides" - and he
leaned forward to emphasise his words - " one does not get over
typhus in a week and have it again as Saratovsky has." I could see
that Kennedy was growing impatient. An idea had occurred to him,
and only politeness kept him listening to Kazanovitch longer.
"Doctor," he said, as Kharkoff entered the room again, "do you
suppose you could get some perfectly clean test-tubes and sterile
bouillon from Miss Nevsky's laboratory? I think I saw a rack of
tubes on the table."
"Surely," answered Kharkoff.
"You will excuse us, Mr. Kazanovitch," apologised Kennedy briskly,
"but I feel that I am going to have a hard day to-morrow and - by
the way, would you be so kind as to come up to my laboratory some
time during the day, and continue your story."
On the way out Craig took the doctor aside for a moment, and they
talked earnestly. At last Craig motioned to me.
"Walter," he explained, "Dr. Kharkoff is going to prepare some
cultures in the test-tubes to-night so that I can make a microscopic
examination of the blood of Saratovsky, Samarova, and later of his
servant. The tubes will be ready early in the morning, and I have
arranged with the doctor for you to call and get them if you have
no objection."
I assented, and we started downstairs. As we passed a door on the
second floor, a woman's voice called out, "Is that you, Boris?"
"No, Olga, this is Nicholas," replied the doctor. "It is Samarova,"
he said to us as he entered.
In a few moments he rejoined us. "She is no better," he continued,
as we again started away. "I may as well tell you, Professor
Kennedy, just how matters stand here. Samarova is head over heels
in love with Kazanovitch - you heard her call for him just now?
Before they left Paris, Kazanovitch showed some partiality for Olga,
but now Nevsky has captured him. She is indeed a fascinating woman,
but as for me, if Olga would consent to become Madame Kharkoff, it
should be done to-morrow, and she need worry no longer over her
broken contract with the American theatre managers. But women are
not that way. She prefers the hopeless love. Ah, well, I shall
let you know if anything new happens. Good-night, and a thousand
thanks for your help, gentlemen."
Nothing was said by either of us on our journey uptown, for it was
late and I, at least, was tired.
But Kennedy had no intention of going to bed, I found. Instead,
he sat down in his easy chair and shaded his eyes, apparently in
deep thought. As I stood by the table to fill my pipe for a last
smoke, I saw that he was carefully regarding the letter he had
picked up, turning it over and over, and apparently debating with
himself what to do with it.
"Some kinds of paper can be steamed open without leaving any trace,"
he remarked in answer to my unspoken question, laying the letter
down before me.
I read the address: "M. Alexander Alexandrovitch Orloff, - Rue
de - , Paris, France."
"Letter-opening has been raised to a fine art by the secret service
agents of foreign countries," he continued. "Why not take a chance?
The simple operation of steaming a letter open is followed by
reburnishing the flap with a bone instrument, and no trace is left.
I can't do that, for this letter is sealed with wax. One way would
be to take a matrix of the seal before breaking the wax and then
replace a duplicate of it. No, I won't risk it. I'll try a
scientific way."
Between two pieces of smooth wood, Craig laid the letter flat, so
that the edges projected about a thirty-second of an inch. He
flattened the projecting edge of the envelope, then roughened it,
and finally slit it open.
"You see, Walter, later I will place the letter back, apply a hair
line of strong white gum, and unite the edges of the envelope under
pressure. Let us see what we have here."
He drew out what seemed to be a manuscript on very thin paper, and
spread it out flat on the table before us. Apparently it was a
scientific paper on a rather unusual subject, "Spontaneous Generation
of Life." It was in longhand and read:
*Many thanks for the copy of the paper by Prof. Betallion of Dijon
on the artificial fertilization of the eggs of frogs. I consider
it a most important advance in the artificial generation of life.
__________________________________________________________________
*In the printed book this is shown as handwritten
__________________________________________________________________
=20
I will not attempt to reproduce in facsimile the entire manuscript,
for it is unnecessary, and, in fact, I merely set down part of its
contents here because it seemed so utterly valueless to me at the
time. It went on to say:
While Betallion punctured the eggs with a platinum needle and
developed them by means of electric discharges, Loeb in America
placed eggs of the sea-urchin in a strong solution of sea water,
then in a bath where they were subjected to the action of butyric
acid. Finally they were placed in ordinary sea water again, where
they developed in the natural manner. Delage at Roscorf used a
liquid containing salts of magnesia and tannate of ammonia to produce
the same result.
In his latest book on the Origin of Life Dr. Charlton Bastian tells
of using two solutions. One consisted of two or three drops of
dilute sodium silicate with eight drops of liquor fern pernitratis
to one ounce of distilled water. The other was composed of the same
amount of the silicate with six drops of dilute phosphoric acid and
six grains of ammonium phosphate. He filled sterilised tubes, sealed
them hermetically, and heated them to 125 or 145 degrees, Centigrade,
although 60 or 70 degrees would have killed any bacteria remaining
in them.
Next he exposed them to sunlight in a south window for from two to
four months. When the tubes were opened Dr. Bastian found organisms
in them which differed in no way from real bacteria. They grew and
multiplied. He contends that he has proved the possibility of
spontaneous generation of life.
Then there were the experiments of John Butler Burke of Cambridge,
who claimed that he had developed "radiobes" in tubes of sterilised
bouillon by means of radium emanations. Daniel Berthelot in France
last year announced that he had used the ultra-violet rays to
duplicate nature's own process of chlorophyll assimilation. He has
broken up carbon dioxide and water-vapour in the air in precisely
the same way that the green cells of plants do it.
Leduc at Nantes has made crystals grow from an artificial egg
composed of certain chemicals. These crystals show all the apparent
vital phenomena without being actually alive. His work is
interesting, for it shows the physical forces that probably control
minute life cells, once they are created.
"What do you make of it?" asked Kennedy, noting the puzzled look on
my face as I finished reading.
"Well, recent research in the problem of the origin of life may be
very interesting," I replied. "There are a good many chemicals
mentioned here - I wonder if any of them is poisonous? But I am
of the opinion that there is something more to this manuscript than
a mere scientific paper."
"Exactly, Walter," said Kennedy in half raillery. "What I wanted
to know was how you would suggest getting at that something."
Study as I might, I could make nothing out of it. Meanwhile Craig
was busily figuring with a piece of paper and a pencil.
"I give it up, Craig," I said at last. "It is late. Perhaps we had
better both turn in, and we may have some ideas on it in the morning."
For answer he merely shook his head and continued to scribble and
figure on the paper. With a reluctant good-night I shut my door,
determined to be up early in the morning and go for the tubes that
Kharkoff was to prepare.
But in the morning Kennedy was gone. I dressed hastily, and was
just about to go out when he hurried in, showing plainly the effects
of having spent a sleepless night. He flung an early edition of a
newspaper on the table.
"Too late," he exclaimed. "I tried to reach Kharkoff, but it was
too late."
"Another East Side Bomb Outrage," I read. "While returning at a
late hour last night from a patient, Dr. Nicholas Kharkoff, of
- East Broadway, was severely injured by a bomb which had been
placed in his hallway earlier in the evening. Dr. Kharkoff, who is
a well-known physician on the East Side, states that he has been
constantly shadowed by some one unknown for the past week or two.
He attributes his escape with his life to the fact that since he
was shadowed he has observed extreme caution. Yesterday his cook
was poisoned and is now dangerously ill. Dr. Kharkoff stands high
in the Russian community, and it is thought by the police that the
bomb was placed by a Russian political agent, as Kharkoff has been
active in the ranks of the revolutionists."
"But what made you anticipate it?" I asked of Kennedy, considerably
mystified.
"The manuscript," he replied.
"The manuscript? How? Where is it?"
"After I found that it was too late to save Kharkoff and that he
was well cared for at the hospital, I hurried to Saratovsky's.
Kharkoff had fortunately left the tubes there, and I got them. Here
they are. As for the manuscript in the letter, I was going to ask
you to slip upstairs by some strategy and return it where I found it,
when you went for the tubes this morning. Kazanovitch was out, and
I have returned it myself, so you need not go, now."
"He's coming to see you to-day, isn't he?"
"I hope so. I left a note asking him to bring Miss Nevsky, if
possible, too. Come, let us breakfast and go over to the laboratory.
They may arrive at any moment. Besides, I'm interested to see what
the tubes disclose."
Instead of Kazanovitch awaiting us at the laboratory, however, we
found Miss Nevsky, haggard and worn. She was a tall, striking girl
with more of the Gaul than the Slav in her appearance. There was a
slightly sensuous curve to her mouth, but on the whole her face was
striking and intellectual. I felt that if she chose she could
fascinate a man so that he would dare anything. I never before
understood why the Russian police feared the women revolutionists
so much. It was because they were themselves, plus every man they
could influence.
Nevsky appeared very excited. She talked rapidly, and fire flashed
from her grey eyes. "They tell me at the club," she began, " that
you are investigating the terrible things that are happening to us.
Oh, Professor Kennedy, it is awful! Last night I was staying with
some friends on East Broadway. Suddenly we heard a terrific
explosion up the street. It was in front of Dr. Kharkoff's house.
Thank Heaven, he is still alive! But I was so unnerved I could not
sleep. I fancied I might be the next to go.
"Early this morning I hastened to return to Fifth Avenue. As I
entered the door of my room I could not help thinking of the
horrible fate of Dr. Kharkoff. For some unknown reason, just as
I was about to push the door farther open, I hesitated and looked
- I almost fainted. There stood another bomb just inside. If I
had moved the door a fraction of an inch it would have exploded.
I screamed, and Olga, sick as she was, ran to my assistance - or
perhaps she thought something had happened to Boris. It is
standing there yet. None of us dares touch it. Oh, Professor
Kennedy, it is dreadful, dreadful. And I cannot find Boris - Mr.
Kazanovitch, I mean. Saratovsky, who is like a father to us all,
is scarcely able to speak. Dr. Kharkoff is helpless in the
hospital. Oh, what are we to do, what are we to do?"
She stood trembling before us, imploring.
"Calm yourself, Miss Nevsky," said Kennedy in a reassuring tone.
"Sit down and let us plan. I take it that it was a chemical bomb
and not one with a fuse, or you would have a different story to
tell. First of all, we must remove it. That is easily done."
He called up a near-by garage and ordered an automobile. "I will
drive it myself," he ordered, "only send a man around with it
immediately."
"No, no, no," she cried, running toward him, you must not risk it.
It is bad enough that we should risk our lives. But strangers must
not. Think, Professor Kennedy. Suppose the bomb should explode at
a touch! Had we not better call the police and let them take the
risk, even if it does get into the papers?"
"No," replied Kennedy firmly. "Miss Nevsky, I am quite willing to
take the risk. Besides, here comes the automobile."
"You are too kind," she exclaimed. "Kazanovitch himself could do
no more. How am I ever to thank you?"
On the back of the automobile Kennedy placed a peculiar oblong box,
swung on two concentric rings balanced on pivots, like a most
delicate compass.
We rode quickly downtown, and Kennedy hurried into the house,
bidding us stand back. With a long pair of tongs he seized the
bomb firmly. It was a tense moment. Suppose his hand should
unnecessarily tremble, or he should tip it just a bit - it might
explode and blow him to atoms. Keeping it perfectly horizontal
he carried it carefully out to the waiting automobile and placed
it gingerly in the box.
"Wouldn't it be a good thing to fill the box with water?" I
suggested, having read somewhere that that was the usual way of
opening a bomb, under water.
"No," he replied, as he closed the lid, "that wouldn't do any good
with a bomb of this sort. It would explode under water just as
well as in air. This is a safety bomb-carrier. It is known as the
Cardon suspension. It was invented by Professor Cardono, an Italian.
You see, it is always held in a perfectly horizontal position, no
matter how you jar it. I am now going to take the bomb to some
safe and convenient place where I can examine it at my leisure.
Meanwhile, Miss Nevsky, I will leave you in charge of Mr. Jameson."
"Thank you so much," she said. "I feel better now. I didn't dare
go into my own room with that bomb at the door. If Mr. Jameson can
only find out what has become of Mr. Kazanovitch, that is all I
want. What do you suppose has happened to him? Is he, too, hurt
or ill?"
"Very well, then," Craig replied. " I will commission you, Walter,
to find Kazanovitch. I shall be back again shortly before noon to
examine the wreck of Kharkoff's office. Meet me there. Goodbye,
Miss Nevsky."
It was not the first time that I had had a roving commission to
find some one who had disappeared in New York. I started by
inquiring for every possible place that he might be found. No
one at the Fifth Avenue house could tell me anything definite,
though they were able to give me a number of places where he was
known. I consumed practically the whole morning going from one
place to another on the East Side. Some of the picturesque
haunts of the revolutionists would have furnished material for
a story in themselves. But nowhere had they any word of
Kazanovitch, until I visited a Polish artist who was illustrating
his stories. He had been there, looking very worn and tired, and
had talked vacantly about the sketches which the artist had
showed him. After that I lost all trace of him again. It was
nearly noon as I hurried to meet Craig at Kharkoff's.
Imagine my surprise to see Kazanovitch already there, seated in
the wrecked office, furiously smoking cigarettes and showing
evident signs of having something very disturbing on his mind. The
moment he caught sight of me, he hurried forward.
"Is Professor Kennedy coming soon?" he inquired eagerly. "I was
going up to his laboratory, but I called up Nevsky, and she said
he would be here at noon." Then he put his hand up to my ear and
whispered, "I have found out who it was who shadowed Kharkoff."
"Who?" I asked, saying nothing of my long search of the morning.
"His name is Revalenko - Feodor Revalenko. I saw him standing
across the street in front of the house last night after you had
gone. When Kharkoff left, he followed him. I hurried out quietly
and followed both of them. Then the explosion came. This man
slipped down a narrow street as soon as he saw Kharkoff fall. As
people were running to Kharkoff's assistance, I did the same. He
saw me following him and ran, and I ran, too, and overtook him.
Mr. Jameson, when I looked into his face I could not believe it.
Revalenko - he is one of the most ardent members of our organisation.
He would not tell me why he had followed Kharkoff. I could make him
confess nothing. But I am sure he is an agent provocateur of the
Russian government, that he is secretly giving away the plans that
we are making, everything. We have a plot on now - perhaps he has
informed them of that. Of course he denied setting the bomb or
trying to poison any of us, but he was very frightened. I shall
denounce him at the first opportunity."
I said nothing. Kazanovitch regarded me keenly to see what
impression the story made on me, but I did not let my looks betray
anything, except proper surprise, and he seemed satisfied.
It might be true, after all, I reasoned, the more I thought of it.
I had heard that the Russian consul-general had a very extensive
spy system in the city. In fact, even that morning I had had
pointed out to me some spies at work in the public libraries,
watching what young Russians were reading. I did not doubt that
there were spies in the very inner circle of the revolutionists
themselves.
At last Kennedy appeared. While Kazanovitch poured forth his story,
with here and there, I fancied, an elaboration of a particularly
dramatic point, Kennedy quickly examined the walls and floor of the
wrecked office with his magnifying-glass. When he had concluded his
search, he turned to Kazanovitch.
"Would it be possible," he asked, "to let this Revalenko believe
that he could trust you, that it would be safe for him to visit you
to-night at Saratovsky's? Surely you can find some way of reassuring
him."
"Yes, I think that can be arranged," said Kazanovitch. "I will go
to him, will make him think I have misunderstood him, that I have
not lost faith in him, provided he can explain all. He will come.
Trust me."
"Very well, then. To-night at eight I shall be there," promised
Kennedy, as the novelist and he shook hands.
"What do you think of the Revalenko story?" I asked of Craig, as we
started uptown again.
"Anything is possible in this case," he answered sententiously.
"Well," I exclaimed, "this all is truly Russian. For intrigue they
are certainly the leaders of the world to-day. There is only one
person that I have any real confidence in, and that is old Saratovsky
himself. Somebody is playing traitor, Craig. Who is it?"
"That is what science will tell us to-night," was his brief reply.
There was no getting anything out of Craig until he was absolutely
sure that his proofs had piled up irresistibly.
Promptly at eight we met at the old house on Fifth Avenue. Kharkoff's
wounds had proved less severe than had at first been suspected, and,
having recovered from the shock, he insisted on being transferred
from the hospital in a private ambulance so that he could be near
his friends. Saratovsky, in spite of his high fever, ordered that
the door to his room be left open and his bed moved so that he
could hear and see what passed in the room down the hall. Nevsky
was there and Kazanovitch, and even brave Olga Samarova, her pretty
face burning with the fever, would not be content until she was
carried upstairs, although Dr. Kharkoff protested vigorously that
it might have fatal consequences. Revalenko, an enigma of a man,
sat stolidly. The only thing I noticed about him was an occasional
look of malignity at Nevsky and Kazanovitch when he thought he was
unobserved.
It was indeed a strange gathering, the like of which the old house
had never before harboured in all its varied history. Every one
was on the qui vive, as Kennedy placed on the table a small wire
basket containing some test-tubes, each tube corked with a small
wadding of cotton. There was also a receptacle holding a dozen
glass-handled platinum wires, a microscope, and a number of slides.
The bomb, now rendered innocuous by having been crushed in a huge
hydraulic press, lay in fragments in the box.
"First, I want you to consider the evidence of the bomb," began
Kennedy. "No crime, I firmly believe, is ever perpetrated without
leaving some clue. The slightest trace, even a drop of blood no
larger than a pin-head, may suffice to convict a murderer. The
impression made on a cartridge by the hammer of a pistol, or a
single hair found on the clothing of a suspected person, may serve
as valid proof of crime.
"Until lately, however, science was powerless against the
bomb-thrower. A bomb explodes into a thousand parts, and its
contents suddenly become gaseous. You can't collect and investigate
the gases. Still, the bomb-thrower is sadly deceived if he believes
the bomb leaves no trace for the scientific detective. It is
difficult for the chemist to find out the secrets of a shattered
bomb. But it can be done.
"I examined the walls of Dr. Kharkoff's house, and fortunately
was able to pick out a few small fragments of the contents of the
bomb which had been thrown out before the flame ignited them. I
have analysed them, and find them to be a peculiar species of
blasting-gelatine. It is made at only one factory in this country,
and I have a list of purchasers for some time back. One name, or
rather the description of an assumed name, in the list agrees with
other evidence I have been able to collect. Moreover, the explosive
was placed in a lead tube. Lead tubes are common enough. However,
there is no need of further evidence."
He paused, and the revolutionists stared fixedly at the fragments
of the now harmless bomb before them.
"The exploded bomb," concluded Craig, "was composed of the same
materials as this, which I found unexploded at the door of Miss
Nevsky's room - the same sort of lead tube, the same
blasting-gelatine. The fuse, a long cord saturated in sulphur,
was merely a blind. The real method of explosion was by means of
a chemical contained in a glass tube which was inserted after the
bomb was put in place. The least jar, such as opening a door, which
would tip the bomb ever so little out of the horizontal, was all
that was necessary to explode it. The exploded bomb and the
unexploded were in all respects identical - the same hand set both."
A gasp of astonishment ran through the circle. Could it be that
one of their own number was playing false? In at least this instance
in the warfare of the chemist and the dynamiter the chemist had come
out ahead.
"But," Kennedy hurried along, "the thing that interests me most
about this case is not the evidence of the bombs. Bombs are common
enough weapons, after all. It is the evidence of almost diabolical
cunning that has been shown in the effort to get rid of the father
of the revolution, as you like to call him."
Craig cleared his throat and played with our feelings as a cat does
with a mouse. "Strange to say, the most deadly, the most insidious,
the most elusive agency for committing murder is one that can be
obtained and distributed with practically no legal restrictions.
Any doctor can purchase disease germs in quantities sufficient to
cause thousands and thousands of deaths without giving any adequate
explanation for what purpose he requires them. More than that, any
person claiming to be a scientist or having some acquaintance with
science and scientists can usually obtain germs without difficulty.
Every pathological laboratory contains stores of disease germs,
neatly sealed up in test-tubes, sufficient to depopulate whole
cities and even nations. With almost no effort, I myself have
actually cultivated enough germs to kill every person within a radius
of a mile of the Washington Arch down the street. They are here in
these test-tubes."
We scarcely breathed. Suppose Kennedy should let loose this deadly
foe, these germs of death, whatever they were? Yet that was
precisely what some fiend incarnate had done, and that fiend was
sitting in the room with us.
"Here I have one of the most modern dark-field microscopes," he
resumed. "On this slide I have placed a little pin-point of a
culture made from the blood of Saratovsky. I will stain the culture.
Now - er - Walter, look through the microscope under this powerful
light and tell us what you see on the slide."
I bent over. "In the darkened field I see a number of germs like
dancing points of coloured light," I said. "They are wriggling
about with a peculiar twisting motion."
"Like a corkscrew," interrupted Kennedy, impatient to go on. "They
are of the species known as Spirilla. Here is another slide, a
culture from the blood of Samarova."
"I see them there, too," I exclaimed.