THE CEREBRAL LIBRARY, by David H. Keller, M.D.

Originally published in Amazing Stories, May 1931.

WANTED. Five hundred college graduates, male, to perform secretarial work of a pleasing nature. Salary adequate to their position. Five year contract. Address No. 23 A, New York Times.

* * * * *

WANTED. Three librarians, well versed in world literature. Five year contract. Address No. 23 A, New York Times.

* * * * *

These two advertisements attracted a great deal of attention. The market of supply, as far as college graduates were concerned, was over-stocked; and there was any number of young men who were willing to do almost any kind of work for any kind of a salary, let alone a salary described as adequate. The letters poured into the 23 A box, and every effort was made to ascertain the identity of the advertiser so that personal application could be made; but all in vain.

Each of the thousands of applicants received a lengthy questionnaire. Each recipient filled out his paper, and sent it to a numbered letter box in the New York Post Office. Those who were fortunate had a personal interview with a sharp business man who admitted that he was simply engaged to select 503 men, capable of doing a certain work and willing to do it for a five-year period.

At last, the five hundred and three men were selected. They were given tickets and expense money for a trip to an isolated town in Maine. They were told that the full scope of their work would be explained to them there, and that then, if there were any unwilling to sign the final contract, they would be permitted to leave.

In small groups of twenty or less, the collegiates left New York. Their absence was hardly missed. None of them had been able, so far, to do anything else but graduate from an A.B. course in some university. They were mainly plodders: good men, but not brilliant.

The town in Maine was simply a town in Maine. Including its two hotels, boarding houses, and private homes, it could, by crowding, take care of the unusual flood of visitors. The Methodist Church had been rented for a one-day meeting. It was understood that the meeting would take place when everyone had arrived.

At last, the five hundred and three men were in the church. The young men were, to say the least, slightly excited. Up to the present time, they had formed no idea at all of what they were supposed to do. A five-year contract with an adequate salary was attractive, but, on the other hand, the work might be so unattractive that it could not be considered.

The three men selected for the position of librarians were seated on one side, up front, in the Amen corners. The others filled the church. The doors were locked. And then the speaker stepped out in front of the pulpit. He was a well known publicity man from Boston, by the name of Gates. He explained that he had simply been engaged to present a certain proposition to them, and that he had nothing to do with the proposed work after they had signed their five-year contract.

His client, he explained, was a man interested in literary research. He was working on a new plan of universal knowledge which would require the reading of hundreds and thousands of books of all descriptions and in at least three foreign languages, though most of the books would be in the English language. All that the five hundred young men would be asked to do would be to spend a certain number of hours each day in reading. There would be no note-taking and no examinations. They should simply read the books given them. The three librarians would, under instructions, run the library, issue books, and keep a careful record of the books read by each man. If a reader had a hobby, such as mathematics or biology, that hobby was to be given consideration in his reading assignment. Adequate facilities were to be given for exercise, and the salaries would be ten thousand a year for five years; but during those five years, the readers would be out of communication with the world. If they wanted to, they could consider that they were in a glorified prison, or in an excellent hotel on a desert island. At the end of five years, they would each have fifty thousand dollars and an extensive addition to their education. The librarians would each receive twenty thousand a year, or a hundred thousand at the end of five years.

Quickly, a hundred questions arose for answer. Mr. Gates answered them to the best of his ability. Some secrets, he explained, could not be divulged. In fact, there were some things about the whole affair that he himself was absolutely ignorant of. The Farmers’ Bank in Philadelphia had informed him that the man in back of the plan was worth at least twenty-five million dollars, and no one need have any doubt in regard to receiving his salary. He did not know where the library was, where the reading would be done; but he did know that everything possible would be done for the comfort of the readers. Of course, it would mean isolation, but at that salary, isolation was preferable to contact and the ever present chance of poverty and actual starvation.

All that the applicants had to do was to sign a contract. They would then be given instructions as to their destination.

One and all rushed forward to sign on the dotted line. They were all serious young men, and the work looked attractive to them, even with the threatened isolation. As they signed, each man was given a ticket to Boston and an envelope to be opened on arriving there.

Their journey to Boston was a far more cheerful one than the one to the isolated town in Maine. This condition was at least one of living. They had graduated, and now they had made good. They were white collar men, but they had an assured income that would put them on easy street in five years.

In Boston, each man opened his envelope. It contained a ticket to another city or town, expense money for the trip, and another sealed envelope to be opened on arriving there. And each ticket was to a different destination. Theirs was not to question why; but each man was secretly sure that at the end of his trip he would find the new library and his five-year job.

The sealed envelope told another story. Another ticket, another amount of cash for traveling expenses, another destination. This time the destinations for all were the same. The guiding hand had deliberately tossed five hundred and three men to five hundred and three parts of the United States and Canada and had then tossed them back again to one place. There was no doubt of his purpose. Secrecy!

For some months, the realtors of Stroudsburg had been thrilled by the news that Pennsylvania Manor, on the crest of the Poconos, was at last sold. For some years it had been a source of worry. Built on an elaborate scale to provide a pleasure resort for six hundred guests, it had failed to pay the necessary interest on the investment, and had been kept closed. Its wonderful ballroom, golf course, and four thousand acres of land had been useless and worthless. Now it was sold, and no doubt the resort business would pick up. There were a thousand rumors, ten thousand pieces of idle gossip. Everybody guessed, and no one knew the truth.

A high wire fence was run around the four thousand acres, and then the bare statement was given to the press that the Manor was to be used as a retreat for the intellectual, a place where education would take the part of religion and where, shut off from the rest of the world, consolation could be sought in higher intellectual development.

This information was all a very great disappointment to the people of Stroudsburg. They wanted the Manor filled with six hundred pleasure-seekers who had only one idea, and that should be to spend money. The thought of turning the place into a monastery, with higher education as the only aim and the world shut out with iron gates and a steel fence, was not at all what the business men of the community wanted. Still, there it was, and they had to make the best of it.

There were some changes made in the main building of the Manor. The most startling was the conversion of the ballroom and the rooms adjoining it into a library. Books were brought to the Manor by the truckload, books by the thousand, almost hundreds of thousands. The placing of the shelves, the arrangement of the books, the card cataloguing, were all done rapidly and efficiently by a trained company of librarians. When the work was done, the workmen left a perfect library. It was by no means the largest library in the United States, but few could compare with it in the scope of information which it covered.

The kitchen was opened; and servants, well-trained and efficient, were installed. The golf course and tennis courts were put in perfect order. A lounge was fitted for a moving picture hall. There was everything for comfort, but there was no post office.

One by one the young men arrived at Pennsylvania Manor. They were assigned to comfortable bedrooms. Verbal instructions of a very simple nature were given them. Additional data was obtained from them concerning the courses they had majored in while at college and their preferences in reading material. The three librarians, arriving, expressed delight at the perfect order of their workshop and at once arranged their part of the five-year program. Assignments were made to each man in such a variety that the entire range of human knowledge would be covered by their reading. Each man was to read three hundred books a year. That meant fifteen hundred books per man, or a total of 750,000 books for the five years.

That number of books, three quarters of a million, was by no means the largest collection in the world. The Library of the British Museum contained two million books and over five million separate pieces of printed matter, while the Imperial Library in Petrograd contained nearly two million books. Even the New York Public Library held one million, eight hundred thousand books and hundreds of thousands of pamphlets.

But it was a remarkable collection of books, considering the fact that it was most hastily gathered together for an unknown purpose. It had been purchased mainly from second-hand book stores, which, with a thrill that comes once in a lifetime, emptied their treasuries into the Pennsylvania Manor.

Quiet days followed. The activity was constantly present, but almost noiseless. Following breakfast, the readers went in different groups to various sections of the library and handed in the read volume of the day before, in order to receive a new book for the new day’s reading. Some read in the morning and evening and exercised in the afternoon, while others devoted the morning hours to exercise. The time during which the book was read was optional with the individual, the only requirement being that the book must be diligently and slowly read during the course of the twenty-four hours.

The young men had been carefully selected. They were all of the methodical, studious type, who took life seriously, and who would have felt insulted had anyone dared keep a watch on them. Each day five hundred books were read, each day five hundred were returned, and five hundred more issued in their places.

The library was being regularly and systematically used. The librarians were busy; the readers were busy. It was by no means the largest library in the world, but it was a well-used one.

The work done by these men was monotonous in its nature, but diversified in its scope. The daily book was a new book, and it meant one less book to have to read before the new freedom could be won at the end of five years. One year passed, and then two. Pennsylvania Manor ceased to be a novelty to the casual summer visitor. It no longer was a curiosity; it almost ceased to exist as far as Monroe County was concerned. The summer sun burned the Pocono Mountains; the winter winds swept them clear of snow only to bring more snow; season followed season, but the readers read on.

For some years, the activities at Pennsylvania Manor had attracted the attention of the Chief of the Secret Service of the United States, headquarters Washington, D.C. He was a man who believed in the prevention of crime rather than in the detection of crime, and nothing pleased him more than to look forward into the future, see that a crime was premeditated, and then prevent the completion of the conspiracy by prompt action.

Among his various boxes of card indexes, was one which he called his question box. Here, each on a separate card, were listed the details of extraordinary occurrences and happenings in the national life which he could not explain. He claimed that behind each of these lay a crime against society, and he spent long hours in two forms of study with these cards, going over them slowly, one at a time, trying to prepare for the future, first, by their story, and second, by comparing the details of unsolved felonies by going backward to the story told in the cards.

He was at this kind of work when a caller was announced. He looked at the card: Taine of San Francisco.

“I wonder who he is and what he wants? Some crank, judging by his card,” he said.

“What do you want?” he asked, “This is my busy day, and I cannot give you much time.”

“You sent for me. I thought you would know by my visiting card.”

“Hmm! That doesn’t tell me anything.”

“It should. You wired the Chief of the San Francisco Secret Service for the loan of his best man; and here I am.”

“So, the best they have out there is Taine?”

“It looks that way.”

“I never heard of you.”

“That may be true. But some of my best work has not been broadcast. I married the Chief’s daughter. He likes me. Of course, she does too, but she is busy now, so the old man sent me. Want me?”

The Chief looked at the little man standing on the carpet in front of him. A trifle more than five feet tall, rather stockily built, with baby features and buxom cheeks, blue eyes and blond hair. It was a face hard to describe and harder to remember. There was no force of character there, and but little intellectual gleam in the eyes.

The Chief wanted to say something, but did not know how. At last he blurted out:

“Not the killer type, are you?”

“Is that what you wanted? And so sent to our city for it?”

“Just a joke,” apologized the Washington man, “and I suppose not in the best of taste. Sit down and have a smoke.”

“Thanks, I never smoke. I find that the nicotine injures the delicate enamel of the teeth, and when that is gone, all soon follows.”

The Chief went to his files and came back with a folder of papers. He pulled one card out of his question box.

“Read this stuff over, and tell me what you think about it.”

Taine started to read. An hour passed, and then two. The Chief went ahead with his work, while the San Francisco man assorted and read the newspaper clippings.

At last, the Chief could not stand it any longer.

“What do you think about it?” he asked. “About all those books, and the fence, and those young men?”

“There must be someone back of it with lots of money and fond of books,” said Mr. Taine.

“Quite original! You really think things like that?”

“I think worse things than that sometimes.”

“How would you like to go up there for a year or two, and find out what it is all about?”

“Will it take that long?”

“How do I know? You might have to stay a lifetime. I honestly believe that there is something wrong going on up there, but all the information we receive makes it look perfectly harmless. At the same time, it will not do any harm for you to go up in some disguise, and give me a report on it.”

“I have the very idea. The proper disguise for a case like that would be something literary, something like the Encyclopedia Britannica. Well, I guess I had better go. If I have any trouble, I will let you know. Otherwise, I will report when the case is ended.”

He was out of the office before the Chief had time even to reply.

The Chief took it out in thinking:

“Either he is a fool, or I am!”

Taine had a harder time than he expected in crashing the gate of the Pennsylvania Manor. He had expected that it would be easy to obtain employment in some way, but his polite questionings at the main entrance concerning work simply met with equally polite refusals. He watched that main gate for three days, but the only persons to go in were a few truck drivers, and they came out as soon as they unloaded their trucks. Taine finally was almost convinced that the only way he could go in was to enter disguised as a package of books.

But luck was with him. A little Italian came out on the fourth day, holding his jaw. He was bound for a dental office in Stroudsburg. Taine asked for a ride to town in the same automobile with the Italian, and was granted his request. The extraction of a tooth and the chance of a trip to New York with a hundred dollar bill in his pocket was too much for the little foreigner to resist. The exchange of clothing and credentials was an easy matter. Taine asked a hundred questions in Italian as he made up his face, not much, but all that was necessary.

The Italian took the first train for New York. Taine met the automobile from the Manor and returned in it to the gate, but this time he passed through. His papers were satisfactory. He was the new bus boy for six tables in the dining room of the Pennsylvania Manor.

He held that position for six weeks, and then developed a severe attack of appendicitis. Humanity demanded his release from the bondage which held all the men within the fence. He was sent to Scranton for the operation. In the hospital, he disappeared. Twenty-four hours later, he was in conference with the Chief in Washington.

“I have spent six weeks inside the Manor,” he said, “and I have perfected myself in the work of a bus boy. I do not think that I should care to spend a lifetime at that kind of work, but for a variation it is a very pleasant pastime. When the time came, I left. And some other bus boy is ‘bus-boying’ for me now, or, at least, I suppose so.”

The Chief looked at him with a rather perplexed gaze, as he asked him in somewhat of a harsh tone:

“What did you find out?”

“There are five hundred young men there, Chief, and each one reads a book a day. It seems that they have a motto—‘A book a day keeps ignorance away.’ There are three men who simply act as librarians and keep tabs on the books that each reader reads each day. They are just reading books. Of course, they eat, and sleep, and golf, but their great business in life is reading books. Think of it! It is not much of a library, mostly second-hand books, but think of five hundred books being read day after day! I mean a different five hundred each day.”

“Are you sure of that?”

“Absolutely. I tell you why I am so sure. As fast as a book is read it is burned. They have kept the Pennsylvania Manor warm for over four years now with the books they have destroyed, and you should see that library! Four-fifths of the shelves empty; in fact, they are taking many of them down, and putting up new partitions.”

“That is damn queer! Man must be a fool!”

“Must be. Tell you what I think. He is burning the books, because he has no more use for them. That is what a book is for, you know, to read. Of course, I always keep my books or give them away for Christmas presents, but his way is the best.”

“Who is back of it?”

“No one knows; at least, no one will tell. Here is another point—the men were engaged on a five-year contract, but they are going to start turning them loose sooner, at the end of the fiftieth month, if they have finished reading the fifteen hundred books called for in the contract. They are going to start next March, and let readers go at the rate of five a day. That means that some time next July the place will be empty, and all the books burned.”

“Are they going to be paid?”

“They think they are. Fifty thousand to each man, payable in New York City.”

“That is going to run into money.”

“It certainly is; so much that I doubt if the poor readers will collect. But they have been having a good time and their education has certainly been on the up-and-up.”

The Chief looked puzzled, as he said:

“Something back of this.”

“I am sure of it, and I am sure of another thing.”

“What?”

“That I am going to find out what it is. This is the most interesting case I have been on, and I am going to stay with it till I solve it. I guess I had better leave you now. Busy man and all that.”

This was Taine’s ultimatum.

“What are your plans?”

“Haven’t any. Just going to drift till I get into the main current, and then I will be swept onward into the Great Unknown.”

He walked out without another word. The Chief gave him credit for being at least unusual, probably a crank bordering on the insane.

* * * *

Wing Loo may not have been the greatest surgeon of all times, yet he thought he was, and that is about the same thing. He was not on his way to America for the money which had been offered him, but because of the opportunity which he had to share in one of the greatest experiments of all ages. He might have performed it in China. However, he was a surgeon and not an electro-scientist, and the man who was to furnish the larger part of the machinery lived in the United States. So to the land of the barbarian Wing Loo went. He did not know the full details of the experiment, but what he had learned through correspondence convinced him that he was in for a pleasant time.

On the voyage to San Francisco, an able-bodied seaman fell and fractured his skull. Wing Loo, hearing of the accident, offered his assistance and operated in a gale. It was a dangerous operation, performed under the greatest difficulties, so attracting the attention of a newspaper reporter on board ship, that he radioed an account of it to a San Francisco paper. In that article he called the Chinaman “the greatest living brain surgeon” and intimated that he was on his way to America to give a series of lectures before the various national surgical organizations.

The article was published while Wing Loo was on the high seas. He promptly repudiated much of it when he had his attention called to it in San Francisco. His negation was laid to modesty.

Without loss of any time, he took the Trans-Continental to New York. There he changed to European dress, went to Hoboken, took the D., L. & W. to Stroudsburg, and an auto from there to the Pennsylvania Manor. He had dinner there with the three librarians, looked over the card indexes, and by dark was in Philadelphia.

Darkness anywhere is unpleasant; in Philadelphia, it is more so. It was drizzling in Chinatown and dirty on Eighth Street. Without the loss of a single moment, Wing Loo went into the Hoop Sing tea store, went into the main room, and back through a door where a man was waiting for him.

“Are you Wing Loo?” asked the man.

“I am, if you are Charles Jefferson.”

“I am Jefferson. Sit down. I have not had supper; let us eat. I have ordered the best there is, and I hope that it will suffice. Shall I talk?”

“I wait for your words as a bride awaits the footfall of her loved one.”

“I hope that she does not have to wait long. Life is so short under the best of circumstances. I have millions, but I cannot prolong my life. That has been my thought. The shortness of life and the inability to accomplish what I desire in my allotted days.”

“Some day a man can be so treated that he will never die.”

“You think so?” asked Jefferson. “I have been told that you can keep tissues alive for years. Is it true?”

“It is. I have a kidney in glass. It has been working for twenty years. I believe it will keep on.”

“You can do it with other parts of the body?”

“I can.”

“So I was informed. I want you to help me with an experiment. If it is successful, we—you and I—will go down in history as the greatest scientists known.”

“That would be wonderful!”

“It would. Now here is what I want you to do—” and Charles Jefferson, the greatest specialist in electricity in the world, and also the queerest scientist of his age, outlined his plan for the world-revolutionizing experiment. He ended with:

“I will be responsible for everything except the operations and the keeping of the tissues alive. That will be your province. I will finance the glassware and any supplies you need, and when the experiment is finished and you have done your part, I will give you one million dollars.”

“You spoke of adding to the money the Empress’ black pearls?”

“I will add them.”

“And only five hundred operations! Five a day?”

“Yes, but you must keep them alive.”

“That will be my greatest desire. I understand that the whole plan fails if one of them dies. When can I start?”

“Very soon. I have a place prepared in New York. The young men will come there for their money. As they are paid, they will pass from one room to another. You will be ready for them. The specimens can be brought to the Manor, five or six at a time, according to the size of the glassware you will need. If you give me the specifications, I will have my shelves built and all the pumping machinery installed. I do not want to begin the real experiment till your work is finished. Have I made myself clear?”

“Very. The clouds covering my doubt have been removed by the sunshine of your intelligence. What I do not know I can guess, and always I have faith in your wisdom. When will the feet of the young men hasten toward their reward?”

“The first five will arrive on the first of March. After that they will come at the rate of five a day.”

“And each man will be paid fifty thousand dollars?”

“Yes, but the same money can be used over and over.”

“Naturally. I can readily see that the young men will not have any desire to use their gold. Really clever, Mr. Jefferson.”

“It has cost me enough, and they have had several very wonderful years—and to be permitted to take part in this experiment—”

“That,” murmured the Oriental surgeon, “is the greatest reward.”

* * * *

On the first of March, five of the young readers left the Pennsylvania Manor, and five more followed on the second day. And so, day after day, the young men left, confident that life was very much worth while, and all eager for new and more active fields of mental activity. They collected the money, and then passed through the door.

On the seventh of July, the Chief of the National Secret Service received a message in code. Deciphered, it read like this:

“BE AT THE MAIN GATE PENNSYLVANIA MANOR AT MIDNIGHT JULY NINTH. COME ALONE AND UNARMED. TAINE.”

“I thought the boy was a fool, but he has flushed the game,” exclaimed the Chief. “Though there is a chance that this may be a decoy. Taine may be a prisoner, and they may want to take me next. In a way, it is a fool telegram, sent by a fool. Guess I better go. But there is no use of going without protection.”

The night of the ninth, he dismissed the taxi a quarter of a mile from the main gate of the Manor, and walked the rest of the way. There was a full moon, and it was really a very beautiful night. Even the unpoetical Chief felt the influence of the evening. At the gate he paused, and thought what a fool he was to stay in the full moonlight, but he had no reason to be afraid. Taine was there, just on the other side of the gate. They shook hands through the bars.

“Hullo, Chief! Good of you to come. Would not have blamed you if you had not, but it is going to pay you. You will be surprised, Chief. Have to see it to believe it. Let me unlock the gate.”

“What is it, Taine?” asked the anxious Chief.

“Now, don’t allow yourself to get nervous. If anyone gets that way, I will be the one. I just love to get all shaky and trembly now and then, teeth chatter and hair up on end and all that. Come on in. Even July is cold up here in the mountains.”

He led the way into the library. A little table was in the middle of the large room, and two little splint bottom chairs stood on either side of the table. The rest of the room, except just over the table, was filled with black shadows. The Chief exclaimed:

“This is a whale of a room, Taine!”

“It ought to be. First it was a ballroom, then it housed one of the largest libraries in the world, and now it is the laboratory for one of the greatest scientific experiments ever pulled off in the history of the human race.”

Taine took out an electric flashlight and swept it around the large room.

“See those glass jars?” he asked. “What do you suppose is in them? Well, you would not guess, but I guess we will find out tomorrow. I am going to put you to bed behind that screen. You will be safe there. Keep quiet. At nine tomorrow, the experiment will begin, and you can watch it; but don’t get excited and come out too soon. That is why I asked you not to bring a gun. If you shoot, you might hurt somebody, and what I want is a full statement from the man, made in your presence.”

“What man?”

“The man we want to arrest.”

“And you are going to leave me here?”

“I am; and I do not want you to move till nine. Then you can very quietly look through the crack and see what is going on. But don’t shoot. No matter what happens, don’t shoot.”

“But you asked me not to come armed!”

“I know, but I do not think you followed my advice. You keep your gun, but don’t use it. Watch me.”

“Why don’t you tell me more about it, Taine?”

“You would not believe me, Chief. Besides, I have to go through this on my own.”

And that was all the satisfaction the San Francisco man would give. He fixed the Chief on a comfortable cot, and left him there behind the screen.

It was hard for him to do, but he kept his promise to Taine and did not look out through the crack in the screen till nine the next morning. And what he saw gave him occasion for many anxious thoughts.

In the center of the library was a large table of white marble, with thousands of little black points sticking out of it. Directly in front of the table, a middle-aged man sat, facing directly toward the screen sheltering the Chief. The detective could see his face distinctly, but he could not identify him. On one side of him, also facing the screen, sat a Chinese in flowing Oriental costume. At one end of the table was a mahogany box. At the other end was something covered up with a white sheet.

“And now,” said the one man, “the time has come for the final experiment. I have asked you to be here, Wing Loo, because it is your right. Without your wonderful help, I could not have gone ahead. My knowledge of electricity would have been useless without your knowledge of brain surgery.

“This entire experiment was started by a statement of an eminent psychologist which said that nothing is ever lost in the realm of knowledge, that everything once appreciated by a human brain is retained by that brain till the organism is destroyed. That declaration made me think.

“For years I have worried over two things: The shortness of human life and my inability to learn all there was to be known. Think of it! One person, working as fast as he can, would yet be unable, in the scope of a lifetime, to learn all there is to know. I learned a little about electricity, but realized that I was pitifully ignorant about ten thousand other forms of knowledge. And I could only live just so long—and then I had to die.

“Then an idea came to me. From that came other ideas, like little bubbles springing from a central one; but I realized the hopelessness of the idea till I heard of you, Wing Loo, and of your wonderful surgery.”

“I am glad that your servant could participate in your greatness.”

“Yes, your surgery and ability to keep parts of the body alive were the necessary additions to my plan, and here is what I did. I engaged five hundred readers. They were each to read fifteen hundred books. Their books were to be carefully selected. One was to read biology and another chemistry and so on throughout all the various parts of human endeavor to solve the mysteries of life. And the books that each read were to be carefully indexed, both by subject and by reader. Each man had a number, though he did not know it, and each read every day a book. The three librarians kept up with their work.

“I brought the books here by the hundreds of thousands, and as they were read I had them burned. They were no longer necessary in my experiment because they had become engraved on the convolutions of the brains of the five hundred readers.

“All the time I was working on the electro-dynamic part of the experiment. I had to have fine wire run from each of five hundred glass vessels. These five hundred wires finally came together and then separated again and became attached to the selective black posts you see in front of you. I have other apparatus, intensifiers, and radios, all ending finally in that little radio you see at the other side of the table.

“Now, suppose I want to know all there is to know about toadstools? I want in a few minutes and without any delay to hear a thousand word synopsis of the knowledge of the world on toadstools. I spell out the word on this little typewriter in the middle of the table. Then I go up and down among the thousands of little black points you see there, each of which has a name, and I press those I am interested in, as Food, Toxicology, Botany, Geography, General Interest, and a few others.

“Now I am all ready. I have asked my machine for what I want. I swing this lever and that starts the delivery of the information which I am asking for. I sit here in my chair, and listen to a thousand word essay on the toadstool. If I want to, I can take a subject like Anthropology and listen to it for several days. I can take one poem, such as Dante’s Inferno, and have it recited to me. In fact, I can get anything I ask for, and all I have to do is to know sufficiently about it to ask the question, and press the necessary points. All the information in that entire library is mine; all I have to do is to operate this machine. I do not have to read a single hook, yet, I have the knowledge gained by five hundred men, working nearly five years each.”

“How wonderful that I could help you in all this!”

“Your surgery made it possible. You took the brains from the five hundred readers and three librarians, and, through your skill, you have made it possible for those brains to remain alive and functioning for many years. You placed them in the five hundred glass jars and arranged for the pumping of the fluid to keep them alive. The men are dead, but their acquired wisdom lives on; and I am the beneficiary. I am now the most learned man in the world.

“And I did all this—we did all this, without interference. No one has any idea of what we were doing.”

“You are wrong,” replied the Chinaman. “There was a man by the name of Taine. He suspected something, but he did not know what. He came here once too often. Early this morning, I caught him. His brain will give me great pleasure. It is not often that I dissect the brain of a perfect fool. Here he is, a little doped, but very much alive.”

And at this point, he pulled off the sheet and there sat Taine, pitifully small, dazed, drugged, and tied to the chair with a rope. The American started to laugh.

“That is the best part of the experiment, Wing Loo. At least, it is the most ludicrous part. You are right. Better add him to the collection. Now suppose we start with the testing of the experiment?”

“There is one thing you forgot. How about my million and the Empress’ black pearls?”

“I have them here. One hundred of them. Take them now if you wish to. Please do not delay me. See, I spell out education. Now I touch the following black points, Australia, Statistics, Finance, History. And now I swing the lever and the information comes through the radio.”

He rapidly went through the various steps. In a clear tone came the words:

“Now is the time for all good men and true to come to the aid of their party.”

“That is very interesting! And is that the combined wisdom of five hundred and three brains?”

“It’s that damn detective!” yelled the infuriated scientist. “I am going to kill him! You can do as you wish with his brains.”

“No you are not!” shouted a voice. “Hands up! I have the drop on both of you. Sit down, and don’t make any false moves, and keep those hands up.”

The Chief of the Secret Service came across the space between the screen and the table. There was no doubt that he meant business.

“Thought you were going to kill one of the force, did you?” he sneered. “May be a fool, but he is a detective just the same, and we stick by each other. I will untie you, Taine, just as soon as I put the bracelets on these murderers. Hell! Five hundred and three good men gone! These fellows must be crazy.”

He put the handcuffs on the scientist first, and then turned to the Chinaman.

“You are next, Wing Loo. Put your hands out, and don’t try any monkey business.”

“Don’t you know me, Chief?” sighed the Oriental.

“Yes. I know you for a killer.”

“Why, Chief! After all I did for you. Giving you a nice cot to sleep in, and letting you arrest the greatest scientist of the age, Charles Jefferson; and then you want to put the cuffs on me.”

“Who the devil are you, anyway?” thundered the irate, yet puzzled, detective.

“I am Taine of San Francisco.”

“Then who is that there, roped to the chair?”

“That is Wing Loo. I suppose he is the greatest brain surgeon in the world, but he has had so much luminal for the last three months that his mind is not working right. He has been all in a dream for many days. Had to keep him that way to control him.”

“So he is the man who killed all those people?”

“No. He is the man who was going to. He never killed one of them.”

Charles Jefferson had been following the conversation eagerly. He could stand no more.

“You are a liar!” he yelled. “How about those five hundred and three brains in those glass jars? How about the five hundred dead readers?”

“Those brains over there in the jars are just wax brains,” answered Taine. “I was sure that you would not know the difference. You really are a child, in spite of all your learning. You and the Chinaman did not kill a single person, and I am not sure that you have broken a single law; though, of course, you did not give the readers what you promised.”

“Just wax brains?” moaned Jefferson. “Oh! My beautiful experiment and my lost years!”

“Don’t you worry. You can go to a library and read some books of your own.”

“I cannot wait, Taine,” pleaded the Chief. “Please tell me what you did and how.”

“It won’t take long. I was out in San Francisco with my family. Yes, there is a family now. Wife has a baby, a little girl, and we are all very happy over it. One day, I read in the paper about the great Chinese surgeon, Wing Loo, and his coming to America; but none knew what for. I had a hunch that I would like to find out. A man like that does not travel around just for fun. It was easier when I found he was traveling alone. I met him, drugged him with luminal, and the rest was easy. He had letters, giving the directions for an appointment with Jefferson. At that time, I did not know who Jefferson was, but I thought we ought to keep the appointment. So, I changed into a doctor, and brought Wing Loo with me as a very dangerous epileptic who had to be kept in twilight sleep all the time. I put him in a private New York hospital; and I took his clothes, and met Jefferson in Philadelphia.

“After that, I stayed in New York, and as the young readers came after their pay, I gave them a song and dance—told them they had been working for an insane man, but that if we could collect anything for them, we would. In the meantime, they should be thankful that he had not killed them. I told them all to keep still if they wanted ever to collect the money due them, and for a good many, I found jobs. In the meantime, I ordered five hundred and three brains made out of wax, purchased some glass jars and some fake pumping apparatus, and brought it up here. Jefferson paid all my expenses, including two good shows a week, though he did not know it. The tickets were in the wax brains, only he could not see them. He was not interested much in the brains, even let me attach the wire ends to the middle of the cerebrums. I do not think, to give the devil his due, that he was very enthusiastic over the idea of murder, but he just had to do it to finish his experiment. I pitied him in a way, so I put a portable phonograph in the radio so he could have his first cerebral message.

“When everything was ready, I sent for you, Chief. I told Jefferson that we could go ahead at nine the morning of the tenth of July. Then I made a special trip to New York, and rescued the Chinese from the hospital. He has had a rough time of it, Chief. He has lost in weight, and it has been hard on him. If I were you, I would put him on a ship, and let him go back to China. He is a good man, only over-enthusiastic. I brought him up here and dressed him in my clothes, and painted his face a little so he would look like me. I thought you would like a real confession, and I knew it would make Jefferson mad to think that a detective had been on his trail. So, there are your two babies, and you can do anything you like with them. As far as I am concerned, I am through with the mystery of The Cerebral Library. You can clean up the trash. I am on my way back to wife and baby.”

“But how about your pay, man?” asked the almost dazed Chief.

“I have these black pearls. They are worth a king’s ransom. I earned them honestly, and I know that Jefferson will not mind my taking them; and you can send me a check, if you want to. I don’t have much use for the money; but—well, I am married, and Mildred understands what to do with it. Goodbye. Take care of my friends.

“I am sure that I am leaving them both in very good hands.”