What then was the next thing, as fuse or mechanism were unavailable? There was the bomb that exploded when it struck, and Dupré had himself made several. A man might stand in the middle of the street and shy it in through the open door. But then he might miss the doorway. Also until the hour the café closed the street was as light as day. Then the policeman was all alert for people in the middle of the street. His own safety depended upon it too. How was the man in the street to be dispensed with, yet the result attained? If the Boulevard was not so wide, a person on the opposite side in a front room might fire a dynamite bomb across, as they do from dynamite guns, but then there was
"By God!" cried Dupré, "I have it!"
He drew in his outstretched legs, went to the window and threw it open, gazing down for a moment at the pavement below. He must measure the distance at nightand late at night toohe said to himself. He bought a ball of cord, as nearly the colour of the front of the building as possible. He left his window open, and after midnight ran the cord out till he estimated that it about reached the top of the café door. He stole quietly down and let himself out, leaving the door unlatched. The door to the apartments was at the extreme edge of the building, while the café doors were in the middle, with large windows on each side. As he came round to the front, his heart almost ceased to beat when a voice from the café door said
"What do you want? What are you doing here at this hour?"
The policeman had become so much a part of the pavement in Dupré's mind that he had actually forgotten the officer was there night and day. Dupré allowed himself the luxury of one silent gasp, then his heart took up its work again.
"I was looking for you," he said quietly. By straining his eyes he noticed at the same moment that the cord dangled about a foot above the policeman's head, as he stood in the dark doorway.
"I was looking for you. I suppose you don't know of anyany chemist's shop open so late as this? I have a raging toothache and can't sleep, and I want to get something for it."
"Oh, the chemist's at the corner is open all night. Ring the bell at the right hand."
"I hate to disturb them for such a trifle."
"That's what they're there for," said the officer philosophically.
"Would you mind standing at the other door till I get back? I'll be as quick as I can. I don't wish to leave it open unprotected, and I don't want to close it, for the concierge knows I'm in and he is afraid to open it when any one rings late. You know me, of course; I'm in No. 16."
"Yes, I recognise you now, though I didn't at first. I will stand by the door until you return."
Dupré went to the corner shop and bought a bottle of toothache drops from the sleepy youth behind the counter. He roused him up however, and made him explain how the remedy was to be applied. He thanked the policeman, closed the door, and went up to his room. A second later the cord was cut at the window and quietly pulled in.
Dupré sat down and breathed hard for a few moments.
"You fool!" he said to himself; "a mistake or two like that and you are doomed. That's what comes of thinking too much on one branch of your subject. Another two feet and the string would have been down on his nose. I am certain he did not see it; I could hardly see it myself, looking for it. The guarding of the side door was an inspiration. But I must think well over every phase of the subject before acting again. This is a lesson."
As he went on with his preparations it astonished him to find how many various things had to be thought of in connexion with an apparently simple scheme, the neglect of any one of which would endanger the whole enterprise. His plan was a most uncomplicated one. All he had to do was to tie a canister of dynamite at the end of a string of suitable length, and at night, before the café doors were closed, fling it from his window so that the package would sweep in by the open door, strike against the ceiling of the café, and explode. First he thought of holding the end of the cord in his hand at the open window, but reflection showed him that if, in the natural excitement of the moment, he drew back or leant too far forward the package might strike the front of the house above the door, or perhaps hit the pavement. He therefore drove a stout nail in the window-sill and attached the end of the cord to that. Again, he had to render his canister of explosive so sensitive to any shock that he realised if he tied the cord around it and flung it out into the night the can might go off when the string was jerked tight and the explosion take place in mid-air above the street. So he arranged a spiral spring between can and cord to take up harmlessly the shock caused by the momentum of the package when the string became suddenly taut. He saw that the weak part of his project was the fact that everything would depend on his own nerve and accuracy of aim at the critical moment, and that a slight miscalculation to the right or to the left would cause the bomb, when falling down and in, to miss the door altogether. He would have but one chance, and there was no opportunity of practising. However, Dupré, who was a philosophical man, said to himself that if people allowed small technical difficulties to trouble them too much, nothing really worth doing would be accomplished in this world. He felt sure he was going to make some little mistake that would ruin all his plans, but he resolved to do the best he could and accept the consequences with all the composure at his command.
As he stood by the window on the fatal night with the canister in his hand he tried to recollect if there was anything left undone or any tracks remaining uncovered. There was no light in his room, but a fire burned in the grate, throwing flickering reflections on the opposite wall.
"There are four things I must do," he murmured: "first, pull up the string; second, throw it in the fire; third, draw out the nail; fourth, close the window."
He was pleased to notice that his heart was not beating faster than usual. "I think I have myself well in hand, yet I must not be too cool when I get downstairs. There are so many things to think of all at one time," he said to himself with a sigh. He looked up and down the street. The pavement was clear. He waited until the policeman had passed the door. He would take ten steps before he turned on his beat. When his back was towards the café door Dupré launched his bomb out into the night.
He drew back instantly and watched the nail. It held when the jerk came. A moment later the whole building lurched like a drunken man, heaving its shoulders as it were. Dupré was startled by a great square of plaster coming down on his table with a crash. Below, there was a roar of muffled thunder. The floor trembled under him after the heave. The glass in the window clattered down, and he felt the air smite him on the breast as if some one had struck him a blow.
He looked out for a moment. The concussion had extinguished the street lamps opposite. All was dark in front of the café where a moment before the Boulevard was flooded with light. A cloud of smoke was rolling out from the lower part of the house.
"Four things," said Dupré, as he rapidly pulled in the cord. It was shrivelled at the end. Dupré did the other three things quickly.
Everything was strangely silent, although the deadened roar of the explosion still sounded dully in his ears. His boots crunched on the plaster as he walked across the room and groped for the door. He had some trouble in pulling it open. It stuck so fast that he thought it was locked; then he remembered with a cold shiver of fear that the door had been unlocked all the time he had stood at the window with the canister in his hand.
Everything was strangely silent, although the deadened roar of the explosion still sounded dully in his ears. His boots crunched on the plaster as he walked across the room and groped for the door. He had some trouble in pulling it open. It stuck so fast that he thought it was locked; then he remembered with a cold shiver of fear that the door had been unlocked all the time he had stood at the window with the canister in his hand.
"I have certainly done some careless thing like that which will betray me yet; I wonder what it is?"
He wrenched the door open at last. The lights in the hall were out; he struck a match, and made his way down. He thought he heard groans. As he went down, he found it was the concierge huddled in a corner.
"What is the matter?" he asked.
"Oh, my God, my God!" cried the concierge, "I knew they would do it. We are all blown to atoms!"
"Get up," said Dupré, "you're not hurt; come with me and see if we can be of any use."
"I'm afraid of another explosion," groaned the concierge.
"Nonsense! There's never a second. Come along."
They found some difficulty in getting outside, and then it was through a hole in the wall and not through the door. The lower hall was wrecked.
Dupré expected to find a crowd, but there was no one there. He did not realise how short a time had elapsed since the disaster. The policeman was on his hands and knees in the street, slowly getting up, like a man in a dream. Dupré ran to him, and helped him on his feet.
"Are you hurt?" he asked.
"I don't know," said the policeman, rubbing his head in his bewilderment.
"How was it done?"
"Oh, don't ask me. All at once there was a clap of thunder, and the next thing I was on my face in the street."
"Is your comrade inside?"
"Yes; he and M. Sonne and two customers."
"And the garçon, wasn't he there?" cried Dupré, with a note of disappointment in his voice.
The policeman didn't notice the disappointed tone, but answered
"Oh, the garçon, of course."
"Ah," said Dupré, in a satisfied voice, "let us go in, and help them." Now the people had begun to gather in crowds, but kept at some distance from the café. "Dynamite! dynamite!" they said, in awed voices among themselves.
A detachment of police came mysteriously from somewhere. They drove the crowd still further back.
"What is this man doing here?" asked the Chief.
The policeman answered, "He's a friend of ours; he lives in the house."
"Oh," said the Chief.
"I was going in," said Dupré, "to find my friend, the officer, on duty in the café."
"Very well, come with us."
They found the policeman insensible under the débris, with a leg and both arms broken. Dupré helped to carry him out to the ambulance. M. Sonne was breathing when they found him, but died on the way to the hospital. The garçon had been blown to pieces.
The Chief thanked Dupré for his assistance.
They arrested many persons, but never discovered who blew up the Café Vernon, although it was surmised that some miscreant had left a bag containing an infernal machine with either the waiter or the proprietor.
AN ELECTRICAL SLIP
Public opinion had been triumphantly vindicated. The insanity plea had broken down, and Albert Prior was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until he was dead, and might the Lord have mercy on his soul. Everybody agreed that it was a righteous verdict, but now that he was sentenced they added, "Poor fellow!"
Albert Prior was a young man who had had more of his own way than was good for him. His own familyfather, mother, brother, and sistershad given way to him so much, that he appeared to think the world at large should do the same. The world differed with him. Unfortunately, the first to oppose his violent will was a womana girl almost. She would have nothing to do with him, and told him so. He stormed, of course, but did not look upon her opposition as serious. No girl in her senses could continue to refuse a young man with his prospects in life. But when he heard that she had become engaged to young Bowen, the telegraph operator, Prior's rage passed all bounds. He determined to frighten Bowen out of the place, and called at the telegraph office for that laudable purpose; but Bowen was the night operator, and was absent. The day man, with a smile, not knowing what he did, said Bowen would likely be found at the Parker Place, where Miss Johnson lived with her aunt, her parents being dead.
Prior ground his teeth and departed. He found Miss Johnson at home, but alone. There was a stormy scene, ending with the tragedy. He fired four times at her, keeping the other two bullets for himself. But he was a coward and a cur at heart, and when it came to the point of putting the two bullets in himself he quailed, and thought it best to escape. Then electricity did him its first dis-service. It sent his description far and wide, capturing him twenty-five miles from his home. He was taken back to the county town where he lived, and lodged in gaol.
Public opinion, ever right and all-powerful, now asserted itself. The outward and visible sign of its action was an ominous gathering of dark-browed citizens outside the gaol. There were determined mutterings among the crowd rather than outspoken anger, but the mob was the more dangerous on that account. One man in its midst thrust his closed hand towards the sky, and from his fist dangled a rope. A cry like the growling of a pack of wolves went up as the mob saw the rope, and they clamoured at the gates of the gaol. "Lynch him! Gaoler, give up the keys!" was the cry.
The agitated sheriff knew his duty, but he hesitated to perform it. Technically, this was a moba mob of outlaws; but in reality it was composed of his fellow-townsmen, his neighbours, his friendsjustly indignant at the commission of an atrocious crime. He might order them to be fired upon, and the order perhaps would be obeyed. One, two, a dozen might be killed, and technically again they would have deserved their fate; yet all that perfectly legal slaughter would befor what? To save, for a time only, the worthless life of a wretch who rightly merited any doom the future might have in store for him. So the sheriff wrung his hands, bewailed the fact that such a crisis should have arisen during his term of office, and did nothing; while the clamours of the mob grew so loud that the trembling prisoner in his cell heard it, and broke out into a cold sweat when he quickly realised what it meant. He was to have a dose of justice in the raw.
"What shall I do?" asked the gaoler. "Give up the keys?"
"I don't know what to do," cried the sheriff, despairingly. "Would there be any use in speaking to them, do you think?"
"Not the slightest."
"I ought to call on them to disperse, and if they refused I suppose I should have them fired on."
"That is the law," answered the gaoler, grimly.
"What would you do if you were in my place?" appealed the sheriff. It was evident the stern Roman Father was not elected by popular vote in that county.
"Me?" said the gaoler. "Oh, I'd give 'em the keys, and let 'em hang him. It'll save you the trouble. If you have 'em fired on, you're sure to kill the very men who are at this moment urging 'em to go home. There's always an innocent man in a mob, and he's the one to get hurt every time."
"Well then, Perkins, you give them the keys; but for Heaven's sake don't say I told you. They'll be sorry for this to-morrow. You know I'm elected, but you're appointed, so you don't need to mind what people say."
"That's all right," said the gaoler, "I'll stand the brunt."