Handley’s experience required even less preparation. Several good percussion caps were placed beneath the carpet and covered with a piece of tin as shown in [Fig. 6]. In the center of this piece of tin, a hole was pierced with a nail, making ragged edges on the further side. These ragged edges were placed over the powder in the cap, with the result that so soon as Handley trod upon the carpet over the plate the cap was exploded with a loud report.
Meanwhile Bobbie Cargill, arriving under cover of the darkness, added to the uproar by banging a tin can with a heavy stick, and performed this office so lustily that nothing else could be heard.
It is scarcely necessary to remark that sending Jim into the room to turn on the switch was merely a feint to get him out of the way, and to plunge him into the fracas.
A signal from Bobbie was enough to make his sister turn on the light and release the bell pushes, so that when silence was restored, and the darkness dispelled, there was nothing to show how all the commotion had occurred.
By adjusting a screw in the gas-burner Bobbie had previously arranged matters so that even when the gas was turned full on the light was not very strong. Although sufficient to illumine the room, it was feeble enough to hide several tell-tale features.
Besides being an ornament to the table, the large center-piece of flowers served to conceal the end of a piece of tubing which passed beneath Bobbie’s chair to the far side of the curtain. Amongst the frilled mats, too, there were one or two other contrivances to be explained in their turn.
It had been Miss Dolly’s business to make the fake pieces of bread. Taking a piece of bread and breaking it up into very small crumbs, she had then added just enough milk to enable her to mold the crumbs into the shape of a piece of bread again, and had then let the concoction dry, when it had become sufficiently brittle to suit her purpose.
Concealed by the mat in the center was a small indiarubber tube, one end pointed directly to the spot where White had dropped his mass of crumbs, whilst the other ended in a bulb conveniently placed to Bobbie’s hand. He had nothing to do, therefore, but to press the bulb suddenly, and laugh as the wind thus caused sent the crumbs flying.
A Deceitful Member
The tongue is proverbially a deceitful member, and the one lying before Bobbie Cargill was no exception to the rule. Indeed, except for its appearance there was really very little tongue about it. It consisted of a round tin, in which had been placed a small bar of highly magnetized iron. By fixing a slice of real tongue to the top of the tin, and disguising the sides in a similar manner, Bobbie had made such a good resemblance to the real thing, that it would have been hard to discover the deception in the subdued light of the “Den.”