He returned with a fair-sized keg, which seemed to be heavy. This he placed in a corner of the room.
"What on earth are they going to do?" Ned wondered to himself.
He was not to be left long in doubt.
The younger Pulsifer's next move was to open a cupboard in one corner of the room and produce a short length of candle.
He eyed this critically and then produced a silver match-box.
A tense silence hung over the room, as the flabby-faced Pulsifer moved about making these preparations. Both Mr. Varian and Ned eyed him with close attention. They felt that somehow or other, incomprehensible as these preparations were, that they boded no good to themselves.
The younger Pulsifer lit the candle and then turned to the two captives with a smile.
"This candle will burn, roughly speaking, for five minutes," he said. "I am going to place it in this barrel of powder. The stuff is not as powerful as Chaosite, but it will serve the purpose," he added, with a side glance at the inventor.
As he spoke, the wretch ripped off the wooden heading of the barrel, which had already been loosened, and placed the candle upright on its contents.
This done, he once more turned to the inventor.