"Now, my dear Humphrey," said the Professor, "let us take two chairs; yes ... two chairs ... two chairs. Ah! yes, two chairs." They took two chairs. "And let me pull up this little table...." He had become almost businesslike, not to say sprightly, in concentrating upon what he was about to do.
"Now, then; here we are, we two on these two chairs as it were, are we not? Yes! And here you see this little instrument, do you not? Yes! And do you know what it does ... what it is? What it is ...? It's a talcometer."
"A what?" said the Home Secretary.
"A talcometer," said Professor de Bohun, lying freely, and puffing slightly after the effort. "Now, Humphrey, I want you to watch something. To watch something, eh! Ah! yes. You have, I take it—ah!—or Marjorie has, or some one has a jewel—sure to have one. A diamond, say. Any stone—crystal. A stone, at any rate...."
"I don't know," began Humphrey de Bohun, wondering what was to be. "Will this do?" he asked, leaning over towards his writing table and pulling off it the little crystal Chinese god which was used to weight down the papers which he had abandoned there so many days.
Anything would do for the deceitful pedant. He nodded cheerfully.
Professor de Bohun explains to the head of the
family his theory—or rather, certitude—upon
the whereabouts of the Great Emerald.
"Yes," he said, "so long as it's crystal. Anything crystal. Crystal." Then he added, "Now, Humphrey, watch. Here," holding the little round brass disk with its trembling needle, "I have our talcometer. Now here," moving the Chinese god into line with the axis round which the tiny filament of metal trembled, "here we have this talcometer, and the crystal. Eh! And the crystal.... Now watch, Humphrey!"