Page:Amazing Stories Volume 01 Number 03.djvu/49

240 "Yes, yes," interrupted Mr. Snodgrass. "Just sit perfectly still," he said, turning off the electric fan. "Keep out of all draughts and please try not to cough. I'll telephone the fire department and the police as a precaution."

"Not necessary," said the inventor. "The pressure will sink to forty pounds in ten minutes."

It was a harrowing ten minutes for the president of the Ajax Manufacturing Company. When one has reached the mature age of sixty years and has a large family, even to grand-children, the staking of one's life against the mere sneeze or cough of an utter stranger is an unnerving thing and the shock and suspense of it all is more than apt to leave the faculties in a numb and dazed condition. At any rate, when Mr. Fosdick left the office a few minutes after the ordeal, he had in his pocket Mr. Snodgrass' check of one thousand dollars for the building of the first Seidlitzmobile.

One month later a team drew a queer looking vehicle in front of the Ajax Manufacturing Company and were unhitched.

"I brought it over here from the shop by mule-power," explained Mr. Fosdick, "as I wanted you to take the very first ride in the Seidlitzmobile under its own steam—or gas, rather."

Mr. Snodgrass looked the machine over dubiously. "It looks like a fire extinguisher," he ventured.

"That's the very principle that it works on," said the inventor. "You see this reservoir," and he pointed to a large burnished brass cylinder under the hood, "is the mixing chamber—the stomach of the machine, as it were. Into it the powders are dropped and the carbonic acid gas actuates the two-cylinder engine geared to the back axle. This link motion controls the cut-off and the reverse, and the throttle here permits you to give the engine any head of gas. But climb in," he added, "and we'll be off."

Mr. Snodgrass with some reluctance stepped into the machine and seated himself. Mr. Fosdick followed him and then fishing out of his pocket a Seidlitz powder he unscrewed a brass cap from a tube that protruded from the floor of the machine, dropped the powder through, tooted the horn, released the brakes, and they were off. It was a downhill road and for two miles—in fact for the entire length of the hill—the Seidlitzmobile behaved splendidly.

Mr. Snodgrass became enthusiastic. "It's the most silent machine I ever rode in!" he ejaculated. "It's as quiet as an electric."

"And just think," put in Mr. Fosdick, "the machine can be retailed at two hundred dollars. It will make us millions! All there is to it is a ten dollar engine, a brass cylinder, four wheels, and a Seidlitz powder. The horse is bound to become as extinct as the dodo. Every family in the land will possess one. It will be a convenience to the rich, a blessing to the poor, a" They had reached the bottom of the hill and the machine stopped.

"What's the matter?" demanded Mr. Snodgrass, his vision of riches suddenly fading away.

Mr. Fosdick got out and looked the machine over wisely. "I think the engine has slipped an eccentric," he remarked after a few moments of profound study.

"Why, man, you've no pressure!" exclaimed the passenger, "Look at the gauge."

It was true. The gauge registered not a single pound.

Mr. Fosdick fumbled in his pockets, but could not find another powder.

"I guess that last powder must have been a weak one," he said. "But see, there is a drug store—and every drug store carries Seidlitz powders. As long as you keep near the drug stores you need never run out of power."

Mr. Snodgrass' spirits rose. "We can turn that remark into profit," he said. We will copyright it. The very first thing we will do will be to spend one million dollars in advertising this sentence throughout the entire world: 'The Seidlitzmobile—the machine that can get its power at any drug store.

Together the two men walked into the drug shop.

"A Seidlitz powder, if you please," said Mr. Fosdick, laying ten cents upon the soda counter.

The apothecary dived back into the mysterious region behind the prescription case and hibernated. An hour later he emerged and pleasantly inquired what was wanted.

"A Seidlitz powder, please," reiterated Mr. Fosdick, pointing to the dime.

The druggist rubbed his hands unctuously. "I'm sorry that we're out of Seidlitz powders," he said, "but we have something just as good. We have—"

"Nothing but Seidlitz," roared Mr. Snodgrass, giving way to one of his sudden outbursts.

The druggist smiled blandly. "How old is the patient?" he asked.

"It's a machine," cried Mr. Snodgrass.

"Ah, indeed," remarked the druggist, looking at Mr. Snodgrass queerly. "And may I ask what is the matter with it?"

"It won't go!" bellowed Mr. Snodgrass.

"Yes, yes," agreed the druggist, "It won't go," and he backed behind the counter and reached for the telephone. "I'll have a nice man in a pretty blue suit with bright brass buttons here in just a few minutes, and he will make your head stop aching," he promised them soothingly.

"You think we are crazy," accused Mr, Snodgrass.

"Oh, not at all," reassured the clerk, "You are just merely overheated."

Mr. Fosdick intervened: "The machine is an automobile run by carbonic acid gas," he explained, "and that's why we wanted the Seidlitz powder."

A sigh of relief escaped the druggist. "Why didn't you say so at first?" he said. "I haven't had such a scare in years."

Mr. Fosdick explained the principle of the machine. Mr. Snodgrass bought a handful of cigars and gave the druggist one, who immediately put it back in stock and abstracted a dime out of the cash register, and good feeling was restored.

"As I understand it," said the druggist, "your machine generates gas in the same manner as a fire extinguisher or a soda-water charger."

"Precisely," agreed Mr. Fosdick.

"In that case," said the druggist, "you should use bicarbonate of soda and sulphuric acid."

Mr. Fosdick, with the invariable reluctance of all inventors to adopt the suggestions of outsiders, demurred. "It spoils the name of the machine," he said, "and the name is worth a million in itself."