CROOKED CHAIRS

Hawera Star, Volume LIV, 18 September 1934, Page 8

CROOKED CHAIRS

By FAREMAN WELLS

By the Author of “‘Speed Boat”

CHAPTER VII. AN EXPERT OPINION. When. Adam arrived at the tea-room •his man was already seated, waiting patiently for his meal and staring- shortsightedly at the pages of a scientific periodical. Adam went "boldly up to the table. It possessed three chair®, of which, of course, (two. only were vacant. He put his bag on one and seated himself on the other. The man of science did not so much as look up, though an immediate and ominous silence fell over the whole room at the- sight of this unprecedented liberty.

Adam politely said “Good evening.”

“Good evening,” answered the Professor without raising his eyes. “I •ordered, two eggs on- toast and a pot of tea, thank you.” “It’s Meriston, sir. I wanted to speak to you, please.” “Oh, it’s you, is it, Meriston?” The Professor now looked up blindly. “How’s your mother?” Now as the man had assuredly never so much as heard of Adam’s mother he decided wisely to ignore the question. “I’ve something extremely important to ask your advice on if I may. I’ve been making a short-wave wireless valve and. I’ve hit on something that looks interesting!” “You take your stuff over to my room,” said Professor Starling, after Adam had outlined his discovery. “We’ll have a go at it as soon as I get the rabble started.”

There was a remarkably short lecture at. the institute that evening, and laboratory work started a full' quarter of an hour before the scheduled time. The students obediently busied themselves with microscopes and Bunsen burners, and the Professor signalled superstitiously to Adam with his eyebrow® and went out. A few minutes later they were unpacking the apparatus together in the Professor’s private room.

“Needn’t have bothered to bring all this,” grumbled the old fellow. ‘‘Plenty of apparatus here to 1 choose from.” “I thought I’d better bring the lot, sir, just as I Used it. You see I don’t know how far some of the accessories may be concerned in the results as yet.” “No, no. Very good idea. You’ve got the scientific outlook, I’m glad to see, Meriston.” Adam thrilled with pride .as he continued to wire up his circuit. “We haven’t yet decided' whom we shall test it on,” he remarked presently. “Oh, that’s all right. Try it on me, try it on me. Takes a lot to make me frightened, young man. More than you’d think, I daresay.” Of course in spite of his unfeigned interest the man was sceptical, and realising this, Adam himself began, to feel considerable doubt, whether, after all, the phenomena that had appeared so infallibly in all his stable experiments would repeat themselves among these new surroundings. At length, having arranged the earth-shield so that th.e slit faced the Professor, he switched on. They waited a long minute in silence while an ironical smile slowly gathered about the firm old mouth. “I don’t seem to experience anything out of the ordinary so far,” he said in tones of resigned irony.

Completely abashed, Adam turned the shield: so that the slit came round to his own side. He, too, felt none of themysterious excitement. The experiment was a fiasco. He felt bitterly ashamed. "It looks to me as if you have not been sufficiently careful to eliminate outside causes for your alleged phenomena. Sure, there’s no ghost in your stables?” the Professor remarked acidly. "There are many things besides extremely short waves that may act on the nerve centres of young men like yourself. When you get to my age things like you have described simply don’t happen to you.” "But there was the cat, sir. I got the same reaction from him,” objected Adam, still fumbling.

A moment later he felt once again l a shiver of apprehension. The circuit was now: working. He had made a bad connection in his nervous haste. Without a word he turned the shield so that the rays were once more directed towards the old man.

"All you young men are alike,” the Professor was saying tolerantly. "You aTe in too much of a hurry always. You never stop to verify. . . Oh, Lord, Oh Lord!” His face had gone a nasty grey. His mouth dropped open to display an infamous set of artificial teeth. His hands went shoulder high, the thin old fingers stiffening as if with cramp. Then he staggered. Adam switched off and ran round to support him.

"Good Lord above!” he murmured distractedly. Tottering to a chair, Starling sat down, or rather slumped. Adam, at first seriously alarmed foT him, was relieved to find the recovery as rapid as the attack had been. In a fewoninutes he was sitting up and talking jrationally once more. "This is a ver/ remarkable phenomenon, Meriston,” he said. "Very remarkable. I presume you had made a bad connection.”

The inventor admitted his carelessness and accepted Teproof. All young men were alike in the Professor’s estimation. Too much in a hurry, there was always something they did wrong in their excitement. But from reproof the victim rapidly passed on to speculation.

"There appear to be remarkable possibilities in this, you know. Remarkable possibilities. We shall have to do'

a lot df work on it, you and I, for I think I may say that you will need the help I shall be very happy to afford you as far as my modest attainments will permit. What steps shall we take next? That’s always the investigator’s most important problem. My own ideas incline to a little experiment in the mass. It would be interesting to study the effect on a group of people at varying distances and of different temperamental and physical make-up. Suppose we remove the circuit to the laboratory.” PANIC IN THE LABORATORY. They did so promptly, with the result that a group of earnest young experimenters were afforded an extremely unusual and inexplicable experience. (Diligently absorbed in their own pur.suits, few of them took any- notice of Starling and Adam 1 ' tinkering with a wireless set in a corner of the lab. They were used .to Adam conducting •experiments. It was therefore not much surprise to them to see the affair taken a stage further, and the Professor actually assisting him. Miss Scowerman, a tall peevish creature, with an extremely reserved attitude towards all male students, started it. She was slightly nearer the valve than the others. She suddenly dropped a beaker, screamed and sprang on Mr Benscoinbe, the assistant demonstrator, twining both her arms frenziedly about his neck. He reeled under her weight, Struggled wildly for a moment, and then burst free, to clamber agitatedly under a bench. Miss Scowerman, de-. prived of his support, slumped to the floor, screaming, as Adam; switched off. The Professor seemed profoundly satisfied. “I think we have seen enough for the present,” he said quietly. “i>id you notice, Meriston, that Benscoinbe, essentially a phlegmatic type, and I should say at least a couple of feet further oft than Perries, who is redheaded and excitable, reacted appreciably the sooner and more violently? We are going to .record some exceedingly interesting data, I can see.”

There was not much room for Adam to assist Miss Scowerman, now developing a perfectly normal attack of hysteria on the floor, for by this time the whole class had' gathered in excited sympathy about her. Presently she was carried solicitously to thfe rest room. ‘ ‘ Gave me the fright of my life I can tell you,” Mr Benscombe was explaining. “Sprang right on my back like a tiger. Never said a word. Just jumped.” “I always thought she had a secret passion for you,” one of the senior students assured him gravely, and for a long time to come the relations of the precise Miss Scowerman and the phlegmatic Benscombe were a source of facetiousness in the laboratory, and a cause of great embarrassment to them both. Adam was relieved to think afterwards that nothing worse than a joke of this kind had resulted, and at the moment he was rather disgusted at the lack of humanity displayed by Professor Starling, who seemed to' regard the poor young woman’s distress as so much purely objective phenomena.

When the examination was concluded and the students back at their tasks, the Professor carefully collected the loose sheets on which he had recorded his evidence. He seemed to be in an extraordinarily good humour. , "A very illuminating preliminary experiment, Meriston,” he remarked contentedly. "The effective range at present for people of normal susceptibility seems to be- about twelve feet, that is for an exposure of only twelve and onefifth seconds, though I doubt whether a longer exposure would have resulted in greater range of penetration. Most probably the only effect on increasing the time would be the intensification of the reactions. We shall have to confirm that later. ,Of course with a valve of greater capacity, using higher voltages, we can expect to increase the range. I can remember when what are known as wireless transnfissions were not detectable beyond a few yards. You’d better come along to my office after the class and we will arrange a programme.”

Adam and the Professor left the college premises so late after official hours that night that the caretaker was visibly indignant. When at last they stood in the dark street together the old man still 1 , like a child 1 , refused to allow the discussion to be ended l . "We’ll have to get someone else in on this, a neurologist preferably,” he insisted, holding his pupil by a lapel. "I think I’ll write to my old colleague Hobson, of Cambridge. He’d be just the man to work out the precise nature of the effect on the nerve ganglia. I’ll do that right away.

SHOPPING WITH SCYLLA. Adam found a terrible difficulty in rising at seven the next morning. For the first time in his articled career, he was late at the office. There was a great pressure of work and Mr Brewster was at first exceedingly caustic. But as the day wore on and he observed Adam’s almost physically painful' efforts to recover the- lost time he became more genial. "You don’t seem up to much, Meriston,” he remarked in the middle of the afternoon. "Anything the matter?” "I feel just about dead-beat.” "Well, you certainly don’t seem as if you would be much loss to the office in your present state. Better get off home and go to bed. There’s a lot of influenza about. If you are not all right in the morning don’t come in. I

don’t want anyone to be giving influenza to half the staff just now, thaiik you.” Thus Adam found himself free of the oflice at' barely half-past three. There was no train for an hour so he treated himself to a cup of coffee, after which he felt decidedly fresher. The thought of hanging about the dreary premises of the Menston Central Station revolted him. So ho found his way somehow <fr other to the corner of the one street in all the town that at that time held any interest for him. Should he go down it? Was it permissible for him to pay a call at the antique shop? What excuse could he make for calling? Well, there was no harm in going down the street, anyone was free to do that, he decided. So lie went down on the opposite side to the shops until he came in line with the one that interested him most. He stared hard across towards its windows. Still the same few pieces made the same effective display. It was a scmpulous shop, a nice shop, but obviously no shop for the bargain hunter with a few shillings to spare.

While he was wondering which of the curtained windows above might be Priscilla’s she came out of the side entrance dressed for a walk and carrying a shopping basket. She looked neater and more desirable than ever. Why, he asked himself, was he hanging about the opposite side of the street as if . he were spying? If he had blundered .into her as he was going manfully up to the door it'would have at least looked natural. How could he possibly go up and speak to her from the opposite side of the road?

She was walking briskly towards the corner. Completely bewildered by his own absurd irresolution lie crossed the road and hurried after her. When she reached the corner she paused, turned deliberately, and smiled at him. She must have known he was behind her all the time. He rushed into a breathless explanation of his freedom from the office. “I was wondering if it would be all right to call,” lie confessed.

“All right? Why shouldn’t it? I’m sure father would be glad to see you’.” “I wasn’t thinking about him. I was afraid I might be making myself a nuisance to you. I’m not very used to calling on people.” “Do you ever go out?” “Quite a lot. Aren’t I going out now?”

“I mean do you ever go to places like theatres and the pictures?”

“Sometimes, when I feel like it and there is something left over from the housekeeping!” “I was wondering . . .

She did nothing to. help him out. Instead she held out her hand. “I really must get my shopping done,” she said.

He took her hand, not to shake it but to hold, and not from any worldly boldness, but -simply that he felt as if could never let it go. “What I was wondering was whether you would come to a show with me one of these days.” She disengaged the hand with gentle .firmness. “I should like it immensely,” she said. ‘ ‘ Eight! Then when shall it be, and shall it be pictures or a theatre?” “Are you such a very well-to-do young man?” “Not by a long way.” Boastfulness of any kind would have seemed too. crudely out of place with, her. Those deep eyes would assuredly have detected it. “Then we will make it the pictures, and nothing more expensive than the ode and ninepennies,” she said. “When?” _ • “One day when there is something | on that I want to see. I’ll tell you in plenty of time. Now I really must get on.” ' “All right,” he said, “there isn’t any need for us to stand after all, is there? I mean we can talk as we go.” “I did not know you were coming shopping, too.” “I’ve got such an awful lot to tell you,” he said, entirely confident once more. Now that his foolish embarrassment was over he wanted to tell her about his valve. They were so intent on his story that they stood for another long period outside one of the shops she intended to visit. “I’ve got to get some buller in here,” she said at last. “Tell me the rest between shops, will you? I really am dreadfully beliind-hand to-day.” She left him standing blissfully upon a dirty stone pavement-in a dismal urban shopping centre, but standing none tbe less as one within the meads of Paradise.

"You’ll get knocked down and walked on if you stand dreaming like that here.” Her voice aroused him from his dreams, a kindly, mocking voice, tantalising. "I was thinking about you,” he said.

"Time someone knocked into you if you haven’t anything better than that to think about.”

"I’ve been wanting to know you for months.”

"Perhaps you won’t any longer when you really do know me.” He looked at her, caught the dark velvety eyes with his glance, held them for so long as it took for his look to quell the mockery. "Come on,” she said quickly. "Tell me more about your valve and don’t .look at me again, not for ever so long.” (To be continued.)