Page:Amazing Stories Volume 16 Number 06.djvu/115

Rh opponent already was sprinting off into the darkness, shrilling a tremendous vocabulary of unfamiliar oaths as he fled. Panting like a Percheron with the heaves, the tall scientist watched them go, while Henry stared bug-eyed at the shotgun, still astounded at his own audacity.

Papers strewed the floor of the laboratory. Every drawer of the lone filing cabinet had been dumped out ruthlessly. But otherwise, the place was undisturbed.

Professor Paulsen scratched his gray head bewilderedly. "They must have been searching for something. What on earth—?"

"I told you!" Henry babbled excitedly. "They were spies. Japanese spies!"

"Don't talk nonsense. There's no data here anyone—let alone a spy—would give two hoots for."

"Oh, so my invention isn't worth two hoots! Well, just let me tell you, Joseph Paulsen, my bomb is—" Henry stopped short. "Oh—!" He clamped one hand across his mouth and his eyes went wide in consternation. A little shudder ripped through his scrawny form. He clamped his eyes and teeth tight shut, every muscle rigid. Even his goatee hung at its guiltiest angle.

HERE was a moment of silence. Two moments. Three. Henry ventured to open one eye speculatively. He found himself staring straight into gaunt Professor Paulsen's arctic orbs.

"I want the truth, do you understand?" the tall scientist grated, his voice shaking with barely controlled anger. "What have you been doing now? Answer me, you witless wonder! What have you been doing?"

"Eeuhhh!"

It was a strange sound. Part of it was a sharp intake of breath and part of it was shock and there was a considerable element of just plain being scared. It came from far back in Henry's throat as he leaped out of range of his friend's clutching fingers.

But a crack panzer division's onslaught was wishy-washy beside the professor's relentless advance. He cornered the trembling Henry next to the sink.

"Start talking! " he ordered savagely.

Henry made an elaborate business of cleaning his steel-rimmed spectacles. Or starting to. Because Professor Paulsen interrupted him by seizing his coat lapels and shaking him until his teeth chattered.

"I've just suffered assault by two oriental ruffians," snapped the savant, "and I'm in no mood to give you time to think up excuses. Tell me now: What do you know about it?"

His little friend swallowed hard and put on his most innocent expression.

"Why, Joseph," he exclaimed incredulously, "I always thought you were patriotic."

The professor gave Henry a shake that nearly skidded the steel-rimmed glasses off the end of the little man's nose. "What's my patriotism got to do with it?" he demanded stormily.

Henry wriggled free long enough to shrug superciliously. "Well, maybe you don't care whether the United States wins this war or not—"

"What's the war got to do with it, you misbegotten little son of Satan?"

"The war?" Henry surveyed his friend's lank figure scornfully from head to toe. Then, with the air of a teacher explaining something very elementary to an extremely stupid child, he elaborated: "Well, Joseph, you know how bad it looks for our side just as well as I do, what with Singapore captured and India threatened and the German fleet loose—"