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Round The Red Lamp | Arthur Conan Doyle | |
The Los Amigos Fiasco. |
Page 2 of 5 |
We did not take long to settle it all. In New York a strength of some two thousand volts had been used, and death had not been instantaneous. Evidently their shock had been too weak. Los Amigos should not fall into that error. The charge should be six times greater, and therefore, of course, it would be six times more effective. Nothing could possibly be more logical. The whole concentrated force of the great dynamos should be employed on Duncan Warner. So we three settled it, and had already risen to break up the meeting, when our silent companion opened his month for the first time. "Gentlemen," said he, "you appear to me to show an extraordinary ignorance upon the subject of electricity. You have not mastered the first principles of its actions upon a human being." The committee was about to break into an angry reply to this brusque comment, but the chairman of the Electrical Company tapped his forehead to claim its indulgence for the crankiness of the speaker. "Pray tell us, sir," said he, with an ironical smile, "what is there in our conclusions with which you find fault?" "With your assumption that a large dose of electricity will merely increase the effect of a small dose. Do you not think it possible that it might have an entirely different result? Do you know anything, by actual experiment, of the effect of such powerful shocks?" "We know it by analogy," said the chairman, pompously. "All drugs increase their effect when they increase their dose; for example--for example----" "Whisky," said Joseph M`Connor. "Quite so. Whisky. You see it there." Peter Stulpnagel smiled and shook his head. |
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Round The Red Lamp Arthur Conan Doyle |
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