Jennie Baxter, Journalist, page 149 by Robert Barr
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s of half a mile. I drew the pencilled semi-circle that you saw on the map of Vienna, for in my excitement in placing the machine upright I had not noticed exactly where it had pointed, but I knew that, along the line I had drawn, an explosion must have occurred, and could only hope that it had not been a serious one, which it seems it was. I waited and waited, hardly daring to leave my attic, but hearing no news of any disaster, I was torn between the anxiety that would naturally come to any humane man in my position who did not wish to destroy life, and the fear that, if nothing had occurred, I had not actually made the discovery I thought I had made. You spoke of my actions being childish; but when I realized that I had myself been the cause of the explosion, a fear of criminal prosecution came over me. Not that I should object to imprisonment if they would allow me to continue my experiments; but that, doubtless, they would not do, for the authorities know nothing of science, and care less."
In spite of her initial scepticism, Jennie found herself gradually coming to believe in the efficiency of the harmless-looking mechanism of glass and iron Which she saw on the table before her, and a sensation of horror held her spellbound as she gazed at it. Its awful possibilities began slowly to develop in her mind, and she asked breathlessly,--"What would happen if you were to turn that machine and point it towards the centre of the earth?"
"I told you what would happen. Vienna would lie in ruins, and possibly the whole Austrian Empire, and perhaps some adjoining countries would become a mass of impalpable dust. It may be that the world itself would dissolve. I cannot tell what the magnitude of the result might be, for I have not dared to risk the experiment."
"Oh, this is too frightful to think about," she cried. "You must destroy the machine, Professor, and you must never make another." "What! And give up the hope that my name will descend to posterity?"
"Professor Seigfried, when onc