"Here it is," he said, "the very heart of the mechanism. Without this it is useless. Without this, it is merely a transformer. It can do no one any harm—can betray no secret."
Kasia took the little box and looked at it.
"Is this difficult to make, father?" she asked.
"It took me eight years to make that one; but I can make another in two days, or perhaps three."
"You are sure of that?"
"Oh, yes," and he smiled. "It is very intricate, yet very simple when one has the clue. Every convolution of those filaments is photographed on my brain. I can close my eyes and see them winding in and out."
The girl hesitated, the little box still in her hand.
"Then it would be safe to destroy this?" she asked, at last.
"Safe? Yes! That is my meaning! Let us destroy it!"
Still a moment she paused, then she closed her hand.