A JACKIE AGAINST WOLVES.
Ned, gliding softly as a cat stalking a mouse, among the
trees--choosing the shady spots to conceal his movements--soon came
within earshot of the three men in whose conversation he was so deeply
interested.
The moonlight, as intense as it usually is in the tropics, flooded the
beautiful grounds of the hotel, making checker-work patterns of black
and white beneath the tropical growth.
The Pulsifers and Mr. Varian were standing full in the center of a
moonlight flooded opening as the Dreadnought Boy approached them.
"Now, see here, Varian," the elder of the two Pulsifers was saying,
"it's sheer madness for a man in your position to refuse our offer."
"I confess that your knowledge of my 'position,' as you call it,
puzzles me," rejoined the inventor of the most powerful explosive
known, quizzically.
Ned, crouching low in the dark shadow of a poinsettia bush, saw the
inventor's face in the flood of silver light, and noted that a smile of
disdain had curled his lips.
"Come, come, Varian," urged the other Pulsifer, "let's talk as men to
a man. You are not wealthy. You have spent most of what little fortune
you had in perfecting Chaosite, until it has become, as it is to-day,
the most terrible destructive agent known. As if this were not enough,
you have invented a gun-breech of sufficient strength and elasticity to
withstand the terrific pressure exerted by the gases liberated when a
charge of your explosive is fired."
The inventor nodded, still in the same mocking manner, at the
flattering tone. He blew a big cloud of smoke from his cigar, but
said nothing. Obviously he was waiting for the other to go on; while
Pulsifer, for his part, appeared to be expecting speech of some sort
from the inventor. Disappointed in this, he continued.
"You have, as I said, done all these things--crowned your life, I
might say--if I wished to be florid--with a magnificent flower of
achievement, and what are you going to do with it?"
Pulsifer paused impressively, and came closer to the unmoved inventor,
who stood like a figure of stone.
"I say, what are you going to do with your achievement? Fling it away
on a notoriously ungrateful government. Waste it on a navy which will
not repay you a thousandth part of the sum we are prepared to offer?
The power we represent is apt to become involved in war at any moment.
The situation in Europe is, as you know, an extremely ticklish one. A
spark in the powder-barrel, and 'Woof!' there is an explosion!"
"What you say may be, and undoubtedly is, true," remarked Varian
coolly, "but was that what you brought me out here to tell me? You told
me you had important business matters to discuss--a proposition to
make."
Ned's heart sank. Could it be possible that the inventor was
contemplating the dastardly act of selling out his country? He listened
with eager attention as the conversation went on.
"Ah, now we are getting down to business," smiled the elder Pulsifer
amiably; "we did bring you out here to make a proposition to you, and
one that we flatter ourselves will interest you deeply."
Varian bowed gravely, and seemed to wait for the other to continue.
"If you sell out Uncle Sam, I'll knock you down if it's the last thing
I do," muttered Ned to himself, clenching his capable fist menacingly.
"You are interested, above all things, in the success of the Varian
type of gun--handling the Varian explosive, are you not?"
The elder Pulsifer was doing the talking now. From his earnest manner
things were evidently coming to a climax.
"Why, of course, that is obvious. It has been, as you said, my life
work. Naturally, I wish to see its full fruition."
"Exactly; and Pulsifer Brothers are going to help you. You have heard
of Baron Von----"
To Ned's disappointment, the elder Pulsifer's oily voice sank to a mere
whisper, and the lad could not catch the name the gun manufacturer
breathed.
"Of course, he----"
"Is at the present time in Washington. Ah, Mr. Varian, there is a
genius. He is actually engaged, or reported to be--it serves his
purpose just as well--to one of our wealthiest women, and yet all
the time his wonderful mind is plotting, planning, scheming for his
country. Of course, I tell you this under the pledge of secrecy we
exacted from you before leaving the banquet hall?"
"That goes without saying; but you were going to remark?"
"That the baron," again the name was omitted, "came armed with letters
to us, and we have consented to transact this business for him. I need
scarcely tell you, after having promised this much--that the baron's
mission to this country is to acquire the formula of Chaosite; and not
only that, but to take back with him the blueprints and specifications
of the Varian breech-block and explosion-absorbing machinery, without
which the other would be useless."
"The baron is here for that purpose?"
The inventor seemed deeply interested. He thoughtfully inhaled long
puffs of his cigar and expelled the smoke slowly.
The Pulsifers were watching him narrowly, without seeming to do so. His
attitude, it appeared, puzzled them as much as it did Ned, watching
from his leafy bower. In the case of the Dreadnought Boy, however, his
mind was practically made up. Varian was prepared to sell his secret to
a foreign power--possibly for use against his own country. He was, or
so Ned judged the situation, only awaiting the naming of a price.
"Yes, Mr. Varian, I will not conceal anything from you. We will be
perfectly frank," went on Pulsifer. "The baron is here solely for that
purpose, cleverly as he has masked the object of his visit. He has
declared through the papers that he is here to study our society and
write a book about it. I need scarcely add that the humorous interviews
with him printed in the New York dailies--which have made him appear in
a clownish light--have aided his plans tremendously."
"How long has this--this--baron been here?"
"Oh, but a short time. But, as you will have gathered, he has not let
the grass grow under his feet."
"So it would seem," agreed Varian, with a curious, dry intonation.
"As I was about to say, Mr. Varian, the government he represents is a
power of the first class. It has unlimited money at its control. The
financial resources at its command are unquestioned. The war into which
it may shortly be plunged will undermine its credit, its home prestige
and its colonial power if it is not brought to a successful conclusion.
To win that war, which will be largely an affair of naval engagements,
it will spare no expense to acquire the tools of victory. The baron,
and we also, regard the Varian gun and Chaosite as an unbeatable
combination. At the trials at the Sandy Hook proving grounds, the
gun----"
"But the trials were secret," protested the inventor.
"Money will open any door," suavely rejoined the elder Pulsifer; "it is
to our interest to keep abreast of the times; therefore, we made it our
business to acquire--I need not insult your intelligence by saying by
what means--a complete record of the three-day tests."
"Your enterprise is only equalled by your resourcefulness," remarked
the inventor. Again Ned noted in his voice that queer, dry intonation,
as if he were trying to mask some other feeling.
"Oh, yes," smiled the elder Pulsifer greasily, "we are very
enterprising, Mr. Varian."
He fumbled in his pocket and drew out a paper.
"Let me read you some of the gun's performances, and you can judge if
I am speaking the truth or not. On Monday, April the 25th, target at
two miles, wind thirty miles, weather clear: The first shot at nine
forty-five scored a bulls-eye; but, the charge being light, three
hundred pounds only, the projectile did not----"
"Enough," snapped the inventor. "I see that you had some one there. It
is getting late, gentlemen, and if you will come to the point, I shall
feel vastly obliged."
"Ah," exclaimed the elder Pulsifer, rubbing his bediamonded hands till
they flashed and sparkled in the moonlight, "you are as anxious as we
to conclude the negotiations. Well, to put the matter in a nutshell,
Mr. Varian, we are authorized by the baron to offer you----"
Ned's heart beat so loud and fast that he half-unconsciously placed his
hand over it, as if he could in that way dull its sound.
"Five hundred thousand dollars for the plans, specifications and
formula."
"Five hundred thousand, why, gentlemen, I----"
"And a royalty which can be arranged later to suit your own terms," the
younger Pulsifer hastened to add.
"Look out, Hank Varian," Ned muttered to himself, as the inventor
hesitated, or seemed to, "you are nearer getting a punch on your nose
right now than you ever were before, you double-dyed traitor."
"It is a very generous offer," rejoined the inventor, "but----"
Again the Pulsifers interrupted him.
"We are authorized, I may say," added the elder one, "to make the sum
eight hundred thousand----"
"Or more," put in his younger brother.
"Eight hundred thousand dollars," mused the inventor in a quiet tone;
"why, the government you act for must be made of money."
"They are generous when they have determined to get a thing," smiled
the elder Pulsifer, "and they have determined to get the Varian
inventions. After all, you see, you can withdraw gracefully from
negotiations with Washington. Nothing has been actually accomplished
yet, and as matters have only reached an experimental stage nobody is
compromised."
"See here, gentlemen," asked Varian suddenly, as if his mind had been
fixed on this question all the time Pulsifer had been speaking, "how
much money has this government got to spend in cold cash?"
"Why, my dear sir, what a question----"
"Answer me!"
"Well, if you must know--though it is wholly foreign to our
discussion--I suppose they could raise a war fund to-morrow of seventy
million dollars, to be raised by loans to a billion dollars and a half."
"They could do all this in two days?"
"Undoubtedly."
"Well, you go back to your baron and tell him that if his government
worked for ninety days and raised ninety times ninety millions _they
would still be a million miles away from buying Henry Varian to betray
his government_!"
"You are insane!"
The elder Pulsifer's fat face quivered, while his brother's already red
visage deepened in color to an angry crimson.
"No; not insane, gentlemen," quietly replied the inventor. "It is you
who must be that for imagining for a moment that I would set a price
for selling out Uncle Sam."
"Hurray!" breathed Ned from behind his bush; "it's the Pulsifers I'm
aching, twitching, dying to get a slam at now."
"So, then, you have been trying to draw us out!" shouted the elder
Pulsifer, beside himself with fury at the unexpected turn of affairs.
"You have led us on, you cur, you sneak, you hound, you----"
Smack!
The inventor's palm shot out and struck Pulsifer's fat face a stinging
blow. In the moonlight Ned could see a dark, angry patch appear where
it had struck.
The younger Pulsifer made a leap for the inventor as the blow
resounded. The Dreadnought Boy saw something glitter in his hand as he
leaped forward.
It was a revolver that the would-be briber had drawn.
At the same instant, and just as Ned was about to spring forward, the
elder man drew from his coat-tail pocket a silver whistle. He placed it
to his lips and blew a shrill blast.
Simultaneously four dark forms leaped from behind a sort of
summer-house shrouded in creepers, and flung themselves on the inventor.
They bore him to the ground, as the Dreadnought Boy, with a loud shout
of:
"Stand clear!" dashed from his place of concealment.