Advanced Chemistry Read online

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  ADVANCED CHEMISTRY

  By JACK G. HUEKELS

  _There is a lot of entertainment and also a great deal of truth in this story. We recommend it highly._

  Professor Carbonic was diligently at work in his spacious laboratory,analyzing, mixing and experimenting. He had been employed for more thanfifteen years in the same pursuit of happiness, in the same house, samelaboratory, and attended by the same servant woman, who in her longperiod of service had attained the plumpness and respectability of twohundred and ninety pounds.

  The electric current lighted up everything in sight!]

  "Mag Nesia," called the professor. The servant's name was MaggieNesia--Professor Carbonic had contracted the title to save time, for infifteen years he had not mounted the heights of greatness; he must workharder and faster as life is short, and eliminate such shameful wasteof time as putting the "gie" on Maggie.

  "Mag Nesia!" the professor repeated.

  The old woman rolled slowly into the room.

  "Get rid of these and bring the one the boy brought today."

  He handed her a tray containing three dead rats, whose brains had beensubjected to analysis.

  "Yes, Marse," answered Mag Nesia in a tone like citrate.

  The professor busied himself with a new preparation of zinc oxide andcopper sulphate and sal ammoniac, his latest concoction, which was aboutto be used and, like its predecessors, to be abandoned.

  Mag Nesia appeared bringing another rat, dead. The professor made noexperiments on live animals. He had hired a boy in the neighborhood tobring him fresh dead rats at twenty-five cents per head.

  Taking the tray he prepared a hypodermic filled with the newpreparation. Carefully he made an incision above the right eye of thecarcass through the bone. He lifted the hypodermic, half hopelessly,half expectantly. The old woman watched him, as she had done many timesbefore, with always the same pitiful expression. Pitiful, either for theman himself or for the dead rat. Mag Nesia seldom expressed her views.

  Inserting the hypodermic needle and injecting the contents of thesyringe, Professor Carbonic stepped back.

  _Prof. Carbonic Makes a Great Discovery_

  "Great Saints!" His voice could have been heard a mile. Slowly the rat'stail began to point skyward; and as slowly Mag Nesia began to turnwhite. Professor Carbonic stood as paralyzed. The rat trembled and movedhis feet. The man of sixty years made one jump with the alacrity of aboy of sixteen, he grabbed the enlivened animal, and held it high abovehis head as he jumped about the room.

  Spying the servant, who until now had seemed unable to move, he threwboth arms around her, bringing the rat close to her face. Around thelaboratory they danced to the tune of the woman's shrieks. The professorheld on, and the woman yelled. Up and down spasmodically on thelaboratory floor came the two hundred and ninety pounds with theprofessor thrown in.

  Bottles tumbled from the shelves. Furniture was upset. Precious liquidsflowed unrestrained and unnoticed. Finally the professor dropped withexhaustion and the rat and Mag Nesia made a dash for freedom.

  Early in the morning pedestrians on Arlington Avenue were attracted by asign in brilliant letters.

  Professor Carbonic early in the morning betook himself to the nearesthardware store and purchased the tools necessary for his new profession.He was an M.D. and his recently acquired knowledge put him in a positionto startle the world. Having procured what he needed he returned home.

  * * * * *

  Things were developing fast. Mag Nesia met him at the door and told himthat Sally Soda, who was known to the neighborhood as Sal or Sal Sodagenerally, had fallen down two flights of stairs, and to use her ownwords was "Putty bad." Sal Soda's mother, in sending for a doctor, hadread the elaborate sign of the new enemy of death, and begged that hecome to see Sal as soon as he returned.

  Bidding Mag Nesia to accompany him, he went to the laboratory andsecured his precious preparation. Professor Carbonic and the unwillingMag Nesia started out to put new life into a little Sal Soda who livedin the same block.

  Reaching the house they met the family physician then attendant onlittle Sal. Doctor X. Ray had also read the sign of the professor andhis greeting was very chilly.

  "How is the child?" asked the professor.

  "Fatally hurt and can live but an hour." Then he added, "I have done allthat can be done."

  "All that _you_ can do," corrected the professor.

  With a withering glance, Doctor X. Ray left the room and the house. Hisreputation was such as to admit of no intrusion.

  * * * * *

  "I am sorry she is not dead, it would be easier to work, and also a morereasonable charge." Giving Mag Nesia his instruments he administered alocal anesthetic; this done he selected a brace and bit that he hadprocured that morning. With these instruments he bored a small hole intothe child's head. Inserting his hypodermic needle, he injected theimmortal fluid, then cutting the end off a dowel, which he had alsoprocured that morning, he hammered it into the hole until it wedgeditself tight.

  Professor Carbonic seated himself comfortably and awaited the action ofhis injection, while the plump Mag Nesia paced or rather waddled thefloor with a bag of carpenter's tools under her arm.

  The fluid worked. The child came to and sat up. Sal Soda had regainedher pep.

  "It will be one dollar and twenty-five cents, Mrs. Soda," apologized theprofessor. "I have to make that charge as it is so inconvenient to workon them when they are still alive."

  Having collected his fee, the professor and Mag Nesia departed, amid theever rising blessings of the Soda family.

  * * * * *

  At 3:30 P.M. Mag Nesia sought her employer, who was asleep in thesitting room.

  "Marse Paul, a gentleman to see you."

  The professor awoke and had her send the man in.

  The man entered hurriedly, hat in hand. "Are you Professor Carbonic?"

  "I am, what can I do for you?"

  "Can you----?" the man hesitated. "My friend has just been killed in anaccident. You couldn't----" he hesitated again.

  "I know that it is unbelievable," answered the professor. "But I can."

  * * * * *

  Professor Carbonic for some years had suffered from the effects of aweak heart. His fears on this score had recently been entirely relieved.He now had the prescription--Death no more! The startling discovery, andthe happenings of the last twenty-four hours had begun to take effect onhim, and he did not wish to make another call until he was feelingbetter.

  "I'll go," said the professor after a period of musing. "My discoveriesare for the benefit of the human race, I must not consider myself."

  He satisfied himself that he had all his tools. He had just sufficientof the preparation for one injection; this, he thought, would be enough;however, he placed in his case, two vials of different solutions, whichwere the basis of his discovery. These fluids had but to be mixed, andafter the chemical reaction had taken place the preparation was readyfor use.

  He searched the house for Mag Nesia, but the old servant had made itcertain that she did not intend to act as nurse to dead men on theirjourney back to life. Reluctantly he decided to go without her.

  "How is it possible!" exclaimed the stranger, as they climbed into thewaiting machine.

  "I have worked for fifteen years before I found the solution," answeredthe professor slowly.

  "I cannot understand on what you could have based a theory forexperimenting on something that has been universally accepted asimpossible of solution."

  "With el
ectricity, all is possible; as I have proved." Seeing theskeptical look his companion assumed, he continued, "Electricity is thebasis of every motive power we have; it is the base of every formationthat we know." The professor was warming to the subject.

  "Go on," said the stranger, "I am extremely interested."

  "Every sort of heat that is known, whether dormant or active, is onlyone arm of the gigantic force electricity. The most of our knowledge ofelectricity has been gained through its offspring, magnetism. A bodyentirely devoid of electricity, is a body dead. Magnetism is apparent inmany things including the human race, and its presence in many people isprominent."

  "But how did this lead to your experiments?"

  "If magnetism or motive force, is the offspring of electricity, thehuman body must, and does contain electricity. That we use moreelectricity than the human body will induce is a fact; it is apparenttherefore that a certain amount of electricity must be generated withinthe human body, and without aid of any outside forces. Science has knownfor years that the body's power is brought into action through thebrain. The brain is our generator. The little cells and the fluid thatseparate them, have the same action as the liquid of a wet battery; likea wet battery this fluid wears out and we must replace the fluid or thesal ammoniac or we lose the use of the battery or body. I havediscovered what fluid to use that will produce the electricity in thebrain cells which the human body is unable to induce."

  "We are here," said the stranger as he brought the car to a stop at thecurb.

  "You are still a skeptic," noting the voice of the man. "But you shallsee shortly."

  The man led him into the house and introduced him to Mrs. Murray Attic,who conducted him to the room where the deceased Murray Attic was laid.

  Without a word the professor began his preparations. He was ill, andwould have preferred to have been at rest in his own comfortable house.He would do the work quickly and get away.

  * * * * *

  Selecting a gimlet, he bored a hole through the skull of the dead man;inserting his hypodermic he injected all the fluid he had mixed. He hadnot calculated on the size of the gimlet and the dowels he carried wouldnot fit the hole. As a last resource he drove in his lead pencil, brokeit off close, and carefully cut the splinters smooth with the head.

  "It will be seventy-five cents, madam," said the professor as hefinished the work.

  * * * * *

  Mrs. Murray Attic paid the money unconsciously; she did not know whetherhe was embalming her husband or just trying the keenness of his newtools. The death had been too much for her.

  The minutes passed and still the dead man showed no signs of reviving.Professor Carbonic paced the floor in an agitated manner. He began to bedoubtful of his ability to bring the man back. Worried, he continued histramp up and down the room. His heart was affecting him. He was temptedto return the seventy-five cents to the prostrate wife when--THE DEADMAN MOVED!

  The professor clasped his hands to his throat, and with his head thrownback dropped to the floor. A fatal attack of the heart.

  He became conscious quickly. "The bottles there," he whispered. "Mix--,make injection." He became unconscious again.

  The stranger found the gimlet and bored a hole in the professor's head,hastily seizing one of the vials, he poured the contents into the deeplymade hole. He then realized that there was another bottle.

  "Mix them!" shrieked the almost hysterical woman.

  It was too late, the one vial was empty, and the professor's body laylifeless.

  In mental agony the stranger grasped the second vial and emptied itscontents also into the professor's head, and stopped the hole with thecork.

  Miraculously Professor Carbonic opened his eyes, and rose to his feet.His eyes were like balls of fire; his lips moved inaudibly, and as theymoved little blue sparks were seen to pass from one to another. His hairstood out from his head. The chemical reaction was going on in theprofessor's brain, with a dose powerful enough to restore ten men. Hetottered slightly.

  Murray Attic, now thoroughly alive, sat up straight in bed. He graspedthe brass bed post with one hand and stretched out the other to aid thestaggering man.

  He caught his hand; both bodies stiffened; a slight crackling sound wasaudible; a blue flash shot from where Attic's had made contact with thebed post; then a dull thud as both bodies struck the floor. Both menwere electrocuted, and the formula is still a secret.

  THE END

  Transcriber's Note:

  This etext was produced from _Amazing Stories_ April 1956 and was first published in _Amazing Stories_ March 1927. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed. Minor spelling and typographical errors have been corrected without note.