Jennie Baxter, Journalist, page 139 by Robert Barr
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acks, 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.
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