Detective and mystery stories, English; Private investigators -- Fiction
"That's enough, I think," Hewitt said. "Don't touch them, for Heaven's
sake!" He picked up the papers he had dropped. "That has saved us a
little search," he continued. "See here, Brett; I was in the act of
telling you my suspicions when this little affair interrupted me. If you
care to look at one or two of these letters you'll see what I should
have told you. It's Anarchism and bombs, of course. I'm about as certain
as I can be that there's a reversible dynamite bomb inside each of those
innocent loaves, though I assure you I don't mean meddling with them
now. But see here. Will you go and bring in a four-wheeler? Bring it
right down the yard. There's more to do, and we mustn't attract
attention."
I hurried away and found the cab. The meaning of the loaves, the cart,
and the spring-mattress was now plain. There was an Anarchist plot to
carry out a number of explosions probably simultaneously, in different
parts of the city. I had, of course, heard much of the terrible
"reversing" bombs--those bombs which, containing a tube of acid plugged
by wadding, required no fuse, and only needed to be inverted to be set
going to explode in a few minutes. The loaves containing these bombs
would form an effectual "blind," and they were to be distributed,
probably in broad daylight, in the most natural manner possible, in a
baker's cart. A man would be waiting near the scene of each contemplated
explosion. He would be given a loaf taken from the inverted batch. He
would take it--perhaps wrapped in paper, but still inverted, and
apparently the most innocent object possible--to the spot selected,
deposit it, right side up--which would reverse the inner tube and set up
the action--in some quiet corner, behind a door or what not, and make
his own escape, while the explosion tore down walls and--if the
experiment were lucky--scattered the flesh and bones of unsuspecting
people.
The infernal loaves were made and kept reversed, to begin with, in order
to stand more firmly, and--if observed--more naturally, when turned
over to explode. Even if a child picked up the loaf and carried it off,
that child at least would be blown to atoms, which at any rate would
have been something for the conspirators to congratulate themselves
upon. The spring-mattress, of course, was to ease the jolting to the
bombs, and obviate any random jerking loose of the acid, which might
have had the deplorable result of sacrificing the valuable life of the
conspirator who drove the cart. The other loaves, too, with no explosive
contents, had their use. The two long ones, which fitted across the
inside of the cart, would be jammed across so as to hold the bombs in
the centre, and the others would be used to pack the batch on the other
sides and prevent any dangerous slipping about. The thing seemed pretty
plain, except that as yet I had no idea of how Hewitt learned anything
of the business.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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