“We have come to you,” Rob explained, “from Professor Andrew McEwen, of Edinburgh University, who met with an accident while visiting an old friend near our home, on Long Island, New York State, and while not seriously injured could not finish his journey across the continent.”
The little man immediately showed signs of tremendous excitement. He glued his eyes on the suitcase Rob was carrying.
“Yes, yes, glad to hear that he is not seriously injured. Professor McEwen is one of the most famous of his class, and the world could ill afford to lose him at this interesting stage of events. But he was to bring with him a collection too precious to trust to ordinary channels. I sincerely trust that it was not harmed when he met with his accident?”
“Oh! no, sir,” exclaimed Rob, hastily, “not in the least, since he did not have it with him at the time. But he grieved to think it might be delayed in reaching you, and so he intrusted it to the keeping of myself and my comrade here, as we happened to be of some assistance to him at the time.”
The scientist seemed to be actually dumfounded. He stared from Rob to Andy, and then looked hard at the suitcase.
“Can it be possible that Professor McEwen intrusted those priceless papyrus relics to the care of two mere boys? I am astounded, and likewise worried. Oh! I hope you have taken great care with them. Give me the bag, and let me see for myself. It would be a shock indeed if anything had happened to destroy the labor of years, and caused such a dreadful loss to science.”
He almost snatched the suitcase from Rob’s hand and vanished like a streak through a door that led to another room, leaving the two boys exchanging amused glances.
“Whew! I’m sorry for you if anything has gone wrong with those rolls, Rob,” said Andy, making a wry face. “We’re apt to go out of this building faster than we came in, I’m afraid.”
“No danger,” Rob told him; “they were prepared to resist ordinary shocks in transit, and we’ve handled them as carefully as Professor McEwen himself could have done. But he did look actually frightened, for a fact.”
“Isn’t it queer what a pile these learned scientists think of things that other people wouldn’t give five cents for?” remarked Andy.