The Wizard of Light By DAVID ELY Illustrated by ADKINS _For Sampson to destroy the Philistines, he had to bring their very temple crashing to the ground. But for Dr. Browl to destroy the culture-mongers, he needed merely a monstrous easel._ [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Amazing Stories March 1962. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] The old man's tour of the art museums was quite an amusing spectacle. Indeed, it became a standing joke among those polite and cultivated gentlemen whose chief function in life is to obtain and display great paintings. They were accustomed to dealing with eccentric members of the public--but never had they witnessed anything to match the ludicrous performance of old Dr. Browl! (Of course, they carefully concealed their mirth, for Dr. Browl was far too rich to be laughed at openly; and after all, he might decide some day to honor the museums with bequests from the fortune he had amassed with his remarkable inventions in the field of optics, which had earned him the sobriquet, the Wizard of Light.) Dr. Browl was a copyist. He had his easel, his brushes and his paints. He had a little smock, too, and a beret that perched on his bald dome. But he had not the slightest resemblance to any of the other earnest amateurs who sat dutifully daubing their canvases in imitation of the masterpieces that hung before them. No, Dr. Browl was different! He would arrive at a museum in princely fashion, in an enormous black limousine. Two liveried servants would lug in his easel, another would carry his encased palette, and Dr. Browl himself would hobble in on the arm of a nurse. Then he would sit down grumpily in a folding chair while the easel was being set up by his servants, and glare around at the little crowd that always gathered to watch him. The easel itself was remarkable. It was a monument in wood and brass and steel, and as massive as an upright piano. It was equipped, moreover, with one of Dr. Browl's own inventions, a bank of mysterious lamps that gave off no visible light, but which presumably bathed each picture he sought to copy in a special radiance seen by him alone, through a great pair of black-lensed spectacles he clapped on his nose. His painting technique was even more bizarre. Dr. Browl would fairly fling the colors from palette to canvas, his little claw-hands darting back and forth with demonic speed. Faster and faster his jerky movements would become, until it seemed that the only remaining step in hastiness would be to hurl the palette itself against the canvas. His copies, naturally, were gross caricatures, and his only accomplishments the spoilage of innocent canvas and good paint.