The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939, 1913-06-29
CHAPTER XIII.

For his share in the foregoing Percy
, barrow was extensively blamed. II was
universally conceded that his action in
permitting Monsieur \ to continue his
activities up to the danger point was
inexcusable. The public mind should
have been treasured long before. Much
thus have been avoided-not to speak
of financial loss. Scientific men, fur
thcrmore. went frantic over his un-
warranted destruction of the formulas.
Percy barrow was variously described
as heartless monster and scientific
vandal. To these aspersions he paid no
attention whatever
Helen Warford, however, became in
dignant and partisan, and in conse-
quence Percy Darrow's course in the
matter received from her its full credit
for genuine altruism. Hallowell, also,
held persistently to this point, as far
as his editors would permit him, until
Gained, attention was more focused
on the means by which the man had
reached his conclusions rather than on
the use of them he had made
The story was told three times by
its chief actor: once to the newspapers,
once to the capitalists from whom he
demanded the promised reward, and
once to the Warfords. This last ac-
count was the more detailed and in
teresting.
1t was of a late afternoon again.
The lamps were lighted and tea was
forward. Helen was manipulating the
cups, Jack was standing ready to pass
them. Mr. and Mrs. Warford sat in
the background listening, and barrow
lounged gracefully in front of the FIRE.
From the beginningP Helen was
commanding him, and expect inter-
ruptions-'
We'll" began barrow, cts little
difficult to get started. But let's be-
gin with the phenomena themselves
I've told you before, how, when / was
in jail, l worked out their nature and
the fact that they must draw their
power from some source that could be
exhausted or emptied. You have read
Eldridge's reasoning as to why he
thought Monsieur x was at distance
and on a height He took as the basis
of his reasoning one fact in connec-
ton with the wireless messages we
were receiving-that they were faint.
AID therefore presumably far distant
or sent by weak battery. He neg
lected, or passed over as an important
item of tuning, the further fact that
the instrument in the Atlas Building
was the only instrument to receive
Monsieur KS message.
Now, that fact might be explained
either on the very probable superstition
that our receiving instrument happen
ed in what we may call its undertones
to be the only one tuned to the send
ing instrument of Monsieur X; or il
might be because our instrument was
nearer Monsieur KS instrument than
any other. This was unlikely because
of the quality of the sound-it sound
ed to the expert operator as though
it came from a distance Nevertheless
it was a possibility Taken BY itself,
it was not nearly so good a possibility
as the other. Therefore, Eldridge chose
the other.
There were a number of other
strictly scientific considerations Of
equal importance / do not hesitate
to say that if / had been influenced
only by the scientific considerations, II
should have followed Eldridge's lead
without the slightest hesitation. But as
/ told him at the time, man must
have imagination and human sympathy
to get next to this sort of thing.
Leaving all science aside, for the
moment, what do we find in the mes
sages to Mccarthy First. commando
to leave within specified and brief