A pause.
"I keep thinking you'll learn by experience, Henry. That you'll realize you can't be forever blowing the roof off the laboratory, or Lord knows what else, and quit fooling around with things you don't understand.
"But instead, you go right on. You dabble into some new branch of science, and a cloud of trouble sweeps down on us like a typhoon on Zamboanga."
Together, the friends climbed the porch steps and took seats on the ancient but comfortable wicker settee.
Henry darted a quick glance at his partner. Saw that the professor's face once more was placid; that the storm was over. Unconsciously, the little man's goatee perked up. He readjusted his steel-rimmed glasses to a more stable position.
"Honestly, Joseph, this time my invention can't do any harm," he ventured. "Really it can't."
For a moment fire flashed in the scientist's eyes. Then faded again.
"All right, Henry. What is it this time?"
Henry extended the binoculars.