The Ozark spectator., 1916-08-18

and inside it wooden case. l man. aged to wrench it open, and within lay half dozen little gray bricks. each about a couple of inches square.
 I took up one and found that it crumbled easily in my hand. Then smelled it and put my tongue to it. After that sat down to think. I had not been a mining engineer for noth- ing, and I knew lentonite when saw it.
 With one of these bricks I could blow the stuff in Rhodesia and knew It's power But the trouble was that my knowledge wasn't exact.
 had forgotten the proper charge and the right way of firing 1t, or, rather, knew that it needed an electric spark, but 1 wasn't sure about the timing. l had only vague notion to add to its power, for though I had used it had not handled it with my own fingers.
 But 1t was chance, the only poSsi ble chance.
 It was a mighty risk. but against it was an absolute black certainty. If nsed 1t the odds were. as reckoned. about five to one in favor of my blow ing myself into the treetops, but if l didn't should very likely be occupy ing six foot hole in the garden by the evening
 The remembrance of little Scudder decided me It was about the beast II. Co good at these cold blooded resolutions. still. I managed to rake up the pluck to set my teeth and choke back the horrid doubts that flooded in on me I simply shut off my mind and pre- tended l was doing an experiment as simple as Guy Hawkes. fireworks. pulled couple of the electric torches to pieces and with their small batteries and coils of wire constructed an elementary fu." Then 1 took quarter of a lentoai'c brick and buried it near the door below one of the sacks in crack of the floor, linking up my fuse to it. For all knew half those boxes might be dynamite.
 If the cupboard held such deadly ex- plosives why not the boxes?
 In that case there would be q glorious skyward journey for me and the Ger man servant and about an acre or two of the surrounding country. There was. also the risk that the detonation might set off the other bricks in the cupboard. for l had forgotten most that I knew about lentonite
 But 1t didn't do to begin thinking about the possibilities. The odds were horrible but had to take them.
 ensconced myself just below the sill of the window Then I waited for moment or two
 commended my soul to my Maker and touched off the fuse
 great wave of heat seemed to surge upward from the floor and hang for . blistern" i'Stant ill the air. Then the wall oppo itC mr flashed into golden yellow Hnd dissolved with a rending thunder that hammered my brain into pulp Something dropped on me. catching the point of my left shoulder. And then I think I became uncon- sciouS.
 My stupor can scarcely have lasted beyond a few seconds. I felt myself being chokcd by thick yellow fumes and struggled out of the debris to my feet Somewhere behind me felt fresh air The lambs of the window had fallen and through the ragged rent the smoke was pouring out to the summer noon.
 I stepped over the broken lintel and found myself standing in a yard in n dense and acrid fog. l felt very sick and i'll. but l could move my limbs, and l staggered blindly forward away from the house.
 small mill lode ran in wooden aqueduct at the other side of the yard, and into this l fell. The cool water revived me and had just enough wits left to think of escape l crawled up the lode among the slippery green slime till l reached the mill wheel Then l wriggled through the axle hole into the old mill and tumbled on to a