"Thank you so much: it is always better to repeat an experiment, especially when the result is so unexpected," said Delapine as he poured a few drops of the fresh coffee on another sun-dew plant. "How odd," he muttered, his grey eyes lighting up with a peculiar smile of surprise, mingled with severity.
"It is very strange," he continued, "in this case nothing whatever has happened—the tentacles have not even moved."
"But look at this plant here," said Riche, pointing to the Drosera on which a drop of Delapine's coffee had been poured.
"Why, bless my soul, it is dead."
"This is very interesting," said Delapine, "I must take some of the coffee out of my first cup to a friend of mine, a very clever analyst—and find out what he thinks of it. This is just the kind of delicate experiment that delights my friend Paul Romaine."
At the sound of this name uttered so calmly and apparently so casually, Pierre Duval—already alarmed at the turn which events were taking—became deathly pale, and felt that he could not restrain himself a moment longer, nor prevent his growing agitation from betraying him. With a supreme effort, however, he pulled himself together, and it was almost with his usual every-day sang-froid that he quietly excused himself owing to a legal appointment, and hurriedly went back to the house.
"Well," said Riche as the three slowly retraced their steps towards the summer-house, "there's no doubt about it but your experiment in botany was something out of the common, and besides, it seemed to me that there was something in it which so far I cannot fathom, but it has not allowed me to forget your promise to give us an exhibition of your wonderful powers of thought-reading. When are you going to keep that promise?"
"My dear doctor," replied Delapine with a peculiar smile, half sad, half severe, "I have just now done so. Are you not satisfied?"
Riche and Villebois looked at each other for a moment, and then at Delapine as if seeking an explanation.
Then a sudden thought flashed across Riche's mind, but he said nothing.