“His secret—his amazing secret, one unheard of—is mine!” he gasped, glancing around the room, as though half-fearful lest he had been overheard. “I shall be a rich man—one of the richest in all Europe! Before six months is out the whole world will be at the feet of Raymond Diamond!”
Chapter Three.
Shows One of the Fragments.
“Well,” declared the Doctor, speaking to himself, “even my success in intra-laryngeal operations was not half so interesting as this!”
And again he bent to examine the half-charred fragments before him. Some were in typewriting, one was in a small fine script. One hardly legible was in German, others were in English, interspersed here and there with words which he recognised were in Hebrew character.
In that small bedroom, beneath the rather dim electric light, the deformed little man sat pouring over the folios so dry that they cracked and crumbled when touched.
Much was undecipherable; the greater part had indeed been utterly consumed, but here and there he was enabled to read consecutive sentences, and those he made out utterly staggered him.
Indeed, so full of interest, so curious, and so amazing they would have staggered anybody.