CHAPTER XLIV

THE LAYING OF THE MINE

Doctor Bersonin lunched at the Tokyo Club.

For three days the rain had fallen steadily, in one of those seasons of torrential downpour which in Japan are generally confined to the typhoon season and which flood its low-lands, turn its creeks into raging rivers and play havoc with its bridges. For three days the sky had been a dull expanse of pearl-gray, and the city a waste of drenched green foliage and gleaming tile, whose roadways were lines of brown mud with a surface of thin glue, dotted with glistening umbrellas of oil-paper and bamboo. Under their trickling eaves the shop-fronts, dark and hollow and comfortless, had held the red glow of _hibachi_; teamsters had shown bristling tunics of rice-straw and loads covered with saffron tarpaulin; _rick'sha_ had reeled past with rubber fronts tightly buttoned against the slanting spears of rain, and the foreign carriages that dragged by had borne coachmen swathed to the ears. This morning, however, the rain had ceased and wind had supervened.

The Club was cheerful, with a sprinkling of the younger diplomatic set, Japanese business men and journalists, all men of note. The up-stairs dining-room was full of talk as the expert arrived and chose a small table by himself.

While he waited, the boy brought him one of the English-printed newspapers, and he cast his eyes over the head-lines. He read:

SQUADRON'S SAILING ORDERS

To Leave To-morrow Morning. An Answer to the Alarmists.

All Differences Between the Two Governments to Yield to Diplomacy.

On the other side was the caption in smaller type:

BEAR RAID ON MARKETS

Mysterious Selling Movement Causes Uneasiness.

He read the latter despatch--an Associated Press wire, under a New York date-line:

"At noon to-day the bear movement, heretofore regarded as a natural reaction following an over-advancement, and hence of purely academic interest, suddenly assumed such proportions as to make the outlook one of anxiety. It seems significant that before the Wall Street opening this morning the London market responded to an attack of the same nature. In an era of industrial prosperity and general peace such a phenomenon is alarming, and a serious decline is anticipated in some quarters. The short sales which were such a factor in to-day's market were so distributed that it seems impossible to trace them to any single interest."

Bersonin's face expressed nothing. He folded the crackling sheet and laid it to one side.

Most of the comment about him turned on the departure of the Squadron. Since the royal death, whose announcement had so abruptly ended the festivities, the black battle-ships had lain motionless in the bay. The appointment of a regent of confessedly more positive policy had given rise to many speculations, and the apostles of calamity had seized the opportunity to sow the seeds of disquiet. The great world, however, had as yet given little thought to their prognostications. The bourses had gone higher and higher. Only in diplomatic circles, where the mercury is habitually unquiet, had there been perceptible effect. To-day the comment showed a sub-tone of relief.

The doctor ate little. He left the _petit verre_ with his coffee untouched, signed his _chit_ and went down to his automobile.

"Bersonin must be under the weather," one of the men at another table observed, as he passed them. "He looks like a putty image."

"Curious chap," remarked the other. "Got a lot in his head, no doubt. Some queer stories afloat about him, but I don't suppose there's anything in them."

The other lit his cigar reflectively. "I can't somehow 'go' him, myself," he said.

Bersonin was whirled to his house, and presently was in his laboratory with its glass shelves, its books and its wall-safe. A cheerful fire burned in the grate against the dampness.

He began to walk restlessly up and down the floor. To-day his government contract expired and Japan had not asked its renewal. He thought of this with a sudden recrudescence of the hatred he had nurtured for the Empire. This had been based on fancied slights, on his failure to receive a decoration, on the surveillance he had lately imagined had been kept on his movements. Well, to-morrow would repay all with interest! There was no hitch in the plan which chance had aided so well. The Roost was the one house on the Yokohama Bluff that could have served his purpose, planted on the cliff-edge and in line with the anchorage. And it had happened to be in the hands of this weak fool for his cat's-paw!

His great, cunning brain turned to the future--to that vast career which his stupendous egotism had painted for himself. His discovery was so epoch-making, so terrifying in its possibilities to civilization, that it had nonplussed him. It was too big to handle. He had made the greatest dynamic engine the world had seen--possibly the greatest it would ever see--and yet he knew that the Ambassador had laid his finger on the truth when he had said: "_Humanity would revolt! The man who knew the secret would be too dangerous to be at large!_"

But with wealth--wealth enough to buy men and privilege--what might he not do? It would take time, and scheming, and secrecy, but he had them all. And the great secret was always his, and his alone! It would make him more powerful than Emperors, for he who possessed it, with the means to use it, could laugh at fleets and fortifications. Before the machines that he should build the greatest steel-clad that was ever floated would vanish like smoke! He clenched his great hands and his massive frame quivered.

"The future, the future!" he said in a low, tense voice. "I shall be greater than Caesar, greater than Napoleon, for I shall hold the force that can make and unmake kings! So surely as force rules the world, so surely shall I, Bersonin, rule the world!"

A knock came at the door and Phil entered. He was as pale as the doctor and his clothing was soaked with the rain. Without a word Bersonin locked the door, wheeled an arm-chair before the blaze, pushed him into it and mixed him a glass of spirits. Then he stood looking at him.

"It's all right," said Phil. "The tripod fitted to a hair. It can't be seen from either side, and I've sent the boy away and locked the house."

"Good," said Bersonin. "All is ready, then. The mechanism is set for the moment of daybreak. Our gains will be enormous, for in spite of the selling the market is up. There has been a little distrust of the situation here and there, though the optimists have had their way. And this latent distrust will add to the _débâcle_ when it comes. We are just in time, for the Squadron has its sailing-orders for to-morrow. Strange how near we were to failure! Who could have foreseen the death of the King? And the rains, too. They say it is doubtful if the trains will run to-morrow."

Phil's hand, holding the drink, shook and wavered.

"The damned clock-work in the thing!" he said. "I could hear it all the way--I thought every one would hear it. I can't get the ticking out of my brain!" He set down the glass and turned a glittering gaze on the other.

"It's worth all that comes from it," he said. "You play me fair! Do you understand? You'll play me fair, or I'll settle with you!"

The doctor smiled, a smile of horrible cunning.

"As you settled with your brother?" he said.

Phil shrank into the chair speechless, looking at him with trepidation in his eyes. The shot had gone home.

"Pshaw!" said Bersonin. "Do you take me for a fool not to guess? Come, we needn't quarrel. Our interests are the same. Go home, now, to your Japanese butterfly--and wait!"