t, then resumed musingly:

"All this, you understand, is not the work of a day Mr. Kellner was
nearly eighty-one years old, and it was fifty-eight years ago that
he began work here. The cubes there were made and placed in position
thirty years ago; the guns have been there for twenty-eight years--
so long, in fact, that recollection of them has passed from the minds
of the men who made them. And, until four years ago, he was assisted
by his son, Miss Kellner's father, and her brother. There was some
explosion in this chamber where we stand which killed them both, and
since then he has worked alone. His son--Miss Kellner's father--was
the inventor of the machine which has enabled us to cut all the
stones I showed you. I mailed the application for patent on this
machine to Washington three days ago. It is as intricate as a linotype
and delicate as a chronometer, but it does the work of fifty expert
hand-cutters. Until patent papers are granted I must ask that I be
allowed to protect that."

Mr. Latham turned upon him quickly.

"But you've explained all this to us fully," he exclaimed sharply,
indicating the cube and the guns. "We _could_ duplicate that if we
liked."

"Yes, you could, Mr. Latham," replied Mr. Wynne slowly, "but you
can't duplicate the brain that isolated absolutely pure carbon from
the charred residue of brown sugar. That brain was Mr. Kellner's;
the secret died with him!"

Again there was a long silence, broken at last by Mr. Schultze:

"Dat means no more diamonds can be made undil some one else can make
der pure carbon, ain'd id? Yah! Und dat brings us down to der
question, How many diamonds are made alretty?"

"The diamonds I showed you gentlemen were all that have been cut thus
far," replied Mr. Wynne. "Less than twenty of the disks were used in
making them. There are now some five hundred more of these disks in
existence--roughly a billion dollars' worth--so you see I am prepared
to hold you to my proposition that you buy one hundred million
dollars' worth of them at one-half the carat price you now pay in the
open market."

Mr. Latham passed one hand across a brow bedewed with perspiration,
and stared helplessly at the German.

"The work of cutting could go on steadily here, under the direction of
Mr. Czenki," Mr. Wynne resumed after a moment. "The secrecy of this
place has not been violated for forty years. We are now one hundred
and seventy feet below ground level, in a