With this and the basin of harder rock, he returned at once to the shade. He was soon reducing the charcoal, while Elaine no less industriously attacked the lump of sulphur.
"We need a little only for a trial," he said, as he presently sifted out his powdered product, and began to grind the niter. "I wish I remembered the proportions."
In his haste to obtain results as soon as possible, he finally shook up and ground together a large-sized pinch from each of the three materials, producing thereby a grayish, unpromising mixture, decidedly too rich in both the charcoal and sulphur.
This he placed on a rock, a safe distance away, and attacked with his flint and steel. Elaine had ceased her grinding operations, to stand at his side and watch. He struck, perhaps, a dozen times before he produced a shower of sparks—and nothing occurred. He looked at the stuff for a moment, helplessly, discouragement swiftly lodging in his bosom. Half-heartedly he struck the steel again.
A single spark flew hotly from the flint. It seemed to curve to the outside edge of the powder. Instantly, however, the mixture was ignited.
It did not burn in a quick, fierce flash, but more with a sputtering, imperfect combustion, productive of stifling fumes. Grenville's hand was slightly scorched—but his joy in the triumph was complete.
"We're kings!" he cried, sublimely indifferent to genders. "We're monarchs of all we survey!" He leaped up, waving his flint about his head, his face outbeaming the sun.
Elaine was vaguely glad of his results.
"I'm afraid I don't understand it in the least."
"Not at all necessary," he informed her, candidly. "It's the very worst powder ever made. My charcoal is poor and my proportions wrong, and I only half ground it all together. But it burned! That's enough for me—it burned! It assures us a fire, and I'll make a new batch, that will go off like a Spanish revolution!"