"Arthur C. Doyle - The Poison Belt" - читать интересную книгу автора (Clarke Arthur C)

it? Then we began to quarrel over friend Challenger's letter in
the _Times_."

"Oh, you did, did you?" rumbled our host, his eyelids beginning to droop.

"You said, Summerlee, that there was no possible truth in his contention."

"Dear me!" said Challenger, puffing out his chest and stroking
his beard. "No possible truth! I seem to have heard the words
before. And may I ask with what arguments the great and famous
Professor Summerlee proceeded to demolish the humble individual
who had ventured to express an opinion upon a matter of
scientific possibility? Perhaps before he exterminates that
unfortunate nonentity he will condescend to give some reasons
for the adverse views which he has formed."

He bowed and shrugged and spread open his hands as he spoke with
his elaborate and elephantine sarcasm.

"The reason was simple enough," said the dogged Summerlee. "I
contended that if the ether surrounding the earth was so toxic
in one quarter that it produced dangerous symptoms, it was
hardly likely that we three in the railway carriage should be
entirely unaffected."

The explanation only brought uproarious merriment from
Challenger. He laughed until everything in the room seemed to
rattle and quiver.

"Our worthy Summerlee is, not for the first time, somewhat out
of touch with the facts of the situation," said he at last,
mopping his heated brow. "Now, gentlemen, I cannot make my point
better than by detailing to you what I have myself done this
morning. You will the more easily condone any mental abberation
upon your own part when you realize that even I have had moments
when my balance has been disturbed. We have had for some years
in this household a housekeeper--one Sarah, with whose second
name I have never attempted to burden my memory. She is a woman
of a severe and forbidding aspect, prim and demure in her
bearing, very impassive in her nature, and never known within
our experience to show signs of any emotion. As I sat alone at
my breakfast--Mrs. Challenger is in the habit of keeping her
room of a morning--it suddenly entered my head that it would be
entertaining and instructive to see whether I could find any
limits to this woman's inperturbability. I devised a simple but
effective experiment. Having upset a small vase of flowers which
stood in the centre of the cloth, I rang the bell and slipped
under the table. She entered and, seeing the room empty,
imagined that I had withdrawn to the study. As I had expected,
she approached and leaned over the table to replace the vase. I