The hall thundered with applause. Two men in the front of the stalls stood up timidly and awkwardly, and bowed to the public.
“For me personally,” continued the lecturer, “there has been the greatest satisfaction to consider the good I was doing my beloved fatherland. Here, ladies and gentlemen, is a token which I have lately received from the governor and nobility of Kursk—with the motto: Similia similibus.”
He detached from its chain and held aloft an immense antique chronometer, about half a pound in weight. From the watch dangled also a massive gold medal.
“I have finished, ladies and gentlemen,” added the lecturer in a low and solemn voice, bowing as he spoke.
But the applause had not died down before there happened something incredible, appalling. The chronometer suddenly slipped from the raised hand of the pedagogue, and fell with a metallic clash right into the urn.
At once the machine began to hum and click. The platform inverted, and the lecturer was suddenly hoist with his own petard. His coat-tails waved in the air; there was a sudden thwack and a wild cry.
2901, indicated the mechanical reckoner.
It is difficult to describe rapidly and definitely what happened in the meeting. For a few seconds everyone was turned to stone. In the general silence sounded only the cries of the victim, the whistling of the rods, and the clicking of the counting machine. Then suddenly everyone rushed up on to the stage.
“For the love of the Lord!” cried the unfortunate man, “for the love of the Lord!”
But it was impossible to help him. The valorous physics teacher put out a hand to catch one of the rods as they came, but drew it back at once, and the blood on his fingers was visible to all. No efforts could raise the cross-beam.