“An explanation would be wasted on you,” said Professor Bumper stiffly. “But in order that you may know I fully understand what you did I will say that your efforts to thwart us through your tool Jacinto came to nothing. We are here ahead of you.”
“Jacinto!” cried Professor Beecher in real or simulated surprise. “Why, he was not my `tool,’ as you term it.”
“Your denial is useless in the light of his confession,” asserted Professor Bumper.
“Confession?”
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“Now look here!” exclaimed the older professor, “I do not propose to lower myself by quarreling with you. I know certainly what you and your party tried to do to prevent us from getting here. But we got out of the trap you set for us, and we are on the ground first. I recognize your right to make explorations as well as ourselves, and I presume you have not fallen so low that you will not recognize the unwritten law in a case of this kind — the law which says the right of discovery belongs to the one who first makes it.”
“I shall certainly abide by such conduct as is usual under the circumstances,” said Professor Beecher more stiffly than before. “At the same time I must deny having set a trap. And as for Jacinto — — ”
“It will be useless to discuss it further!” broke in Professor Bumper.
“Then no more need be said,” retorted the younger man. “I shall give orders to my friends, as well as to the natives, to keep away from your camp, and I shall expect you to do the same regarding mine.”
“I should have suggested the same thing myself,” came from Tom’s friend, and the two rival scientists fairly glared at one another, the others of both parties looking on with interest.