CHAPTER XVI.
STRIKE NOT WOMAN, EVEN WITH ROSES.
"Stop a bit," said M. Cantagnac, pulling a newspaper out of his pocket. "This is a journal I picked up in the cars. I always do that. There is sure to be some passenger to throw them down and so I never buy any myself when I am traveling, ha, ha! Well, in this very sheet, there is a long article about you. It is called 'The Ideal Cannon' and the writer declares that the experiment was a great hit, ha, ha! and he undertakes to explain the new system."
Clemenceau smiled contemptuously. He was not one of those to make a secret public property on which a nation's salvation might depend. In such momentous matters, he would have had arsenals, armories, navy yards and military museums labeled over the door:
"Speech is silver, silence is of gold;
Death unto him who dares the tale unfold!"
"Ah, he wouldn't know everything, of course. However, he makes out that you obtain the wonderful result by fixing essential oils in a special magazine and that you managed to project a solid shot to the prodigious distance of—of—" he referred to the newspaper—"fifteen miles by means of—of—I do not understand these jaw-breaking scientific terms. Is it not nitroglycerine?"
"I do not use them myself," remarked Clemenceau, dryly.
"But he adds—look here!" continued the worthy Man from Marseilles, regretfully, "that what you managed to perform with your model and material, specially prepared by yourself, could not be attained on the proper scale in a war campaign. He goes on to say that the scientific world await the explanation of the means to obtain such power as, heretofore, the pressure of liquefied gases has been but some five hundred pounds to the square inch, about a tenth of that of explosives now used. It is admitted, however, that there may be something in your increase of effectiveness by reiterated emissions—" He began to stammer, as if he were speaking too glibly, but his auditor took no alarm. "He continues that, up to this day, gases have failed as propelling powers from their instantaneous explosions."
"The writer is correct," said Clemenceau, a little warmed, "or, rather, he had foundation for his criticism when he wrote. The powerful agent was not perfectly controllable at the period of my last official experiments, but that is not the case at present. This enormous, almost incalculable power is so perfectly under my thumb, monsieur, that not only is it manageable in the largest cannon, but it is suitable for a parlor pistol, which a child might play with."
"Wonderful!" ejaculated Cantagnac, with undoubted sincerity, for his eyes gleamed.