The Beaver herald. [volume] (Beaver, O.T. [Okla.]) 1895-1923, 1914-11-19
CHAPTER XIII.
How IL All Was.

For his share in the foregoing Percy
Darrow was extensively blamed. 1t
was universally conceded that his ac-
tion in permitting Monsieur X to con-
tinue his activities up to the danger
point was inexcusable. The public
mind should have been reassured long
before. Much terror and physical suf-
fering might thus have been avoided
not to speak of financial loss. Scien-
tihc men. furthermore. went frantic
over his unwarranted destruction of
the formulas. Percy Darrow was va
riously described as a heartless mon
ster and a scientific vandal. To these
aspersions he paid no attention what
ever.
Helen Warford, however, became
vastly indignant and partisan, and in
consequence Percy Darrow's course in
the matter received from her It's full
credit for a genuine altruism. Hal
lowell. also, held persistently to this
point. as far as his editors would per-
NIT him, until at last, the public mind
was somewhat calmed, 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 newspa-
pers, once to the capitalists from whom
he demanded the promised reward,
and once to the Warfords. This last
account vas the more detailed and
interesting.
1t was Of 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 Darrow
lounged gracefully In front Of the fire.
From the beginning!" Helen was
commanding him, "and expect inter-
ruptions."
WELL" began Darrow. ''it's little
difficult to get started. But let's be-
gin with the phenomena themselves.
I've told you before, how, when was
In jail. 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 a distance
and on a height. He took as the
basis of his reasoning one fact in con:
nection with the wireless messages
we were receiving--that they were
faint, and therefore presumably far
distant or sent by weak battery. He
neglected, or passed over as an i'm
portant item of tuning, the further
fact that the instrument In the Atlas
Building was the only instrument to
receive Monsieur KS messages.
Now, that fact might be explained
either on the very probable supposi-
ton that our receiving instrument
happened in what we may call it's un-
dertones to be the only one tuned to
the sending instrument of Monsieur
x; or 1t might be because our instru-
ment was nearer Monsieur KS instru-
ment than any other. This was un-
likely because of the quality OF the
s';and-it sounded to the expert op-
orator as though 1t came from a dis
tance. Nevertheless. 1t was a possi-
bility. Taken by itself, It was not
nearly so good possibility as the
other. Therefore. Eidridge chose the
other.
There were number OF other
strictly scientific considerations of
equal importance. l do not hesitate to
say that II had been Influenced only
by the scientific considerations, I
should have followed Eldri6ge's lead