"There will be none if you do what I shall ask properly. Only two other men living would do it, and, first and foremost, you will have to guard against their vigilance."
"Then, in God's name, what do you ask?" Llwellyn almost shouted. The tension was almost unbearable.
Schuabe rose from his seat. For the first time the Professor saw that he was terribly agitated. His eyes glowed, the apple in his throat worked convulsively.
"You are to change the history of the world!"
He drew Llwellyn into the very centre of the room, and held him firmly by the elbows. Tall as the Professor was, Schuabe was taller, and he bent and whispered into the other's ear for a full five minutes.
There was no sound in the room but the low hissing of his sibilants.
Llwellyn's face became white, and then ashen grey. His whole body seemed to shrink from his clothes; he trembled terribly.
Then he broke away from his host and ran to the fireplace with an odd, jerky movement, and sank cowering into an arm-chair, filled with an unutterable dread.