We thanked the director and hurried out into the car again, carrying the package, after his warning, as though it were so much dynamite.
Altogether, I don't suppose that we could have been gone more than an hour.
We burst into the laboratory, but, to my surprise, I did not see
Kennedy at his table. I stopped short and looked around.
There he was over in the corner, sprawled out in a chair, a tank of oxygen beside him, from which he was inhaling laboriously copious draughts. He rose as he saw us and walked unsteadily toward the table.
"Why—what's the matter?" I cried, certain that m our absence an attempt had been made on his life, perhaps to carry out the threat of the curse.
"N-nothing," he gasped, with an attempt at a smile. "Only I—think I was right—about the poison."
I did not like the way he looked. His hand was unsteady and his eyes looked badly. But he seemed quite put out when I suggested that he was working too hard over the case and had better take a turn outdoors with us and have a bite to eat.
"You—you got it?" he asked, seizing the package that contained the gourd and unwrapping it nervously.
He laid the gourd on the table, on which were also several jars of various liquids and a number of other chemicals. At the end of the table was a large, square package, from which sounds issued, as if it contained something alive.
"Tell me," I persisted, "what has happened. Has any one been here since we have been gone?"