mellow, cultivated voice rolled on, soothing and calming. “If the eminent
doctor’s manner appears a trifle inurbane of our tastes, we must bear in
mind that the doctor may be from a place, or a stratum, not so meticulous
in these matters. Now our good friend and benefactor has asked us to hear
this person and carefully assess the merit of his claims. Let us do so with
dignity and decorum.”
He sat down to a tumble of applause, comfortably aware that he had enhanced
his reputation as an intellectual leader. Tomorrow the papers would again
mention the good sense and persuasive personality of “American’s Handsomest
University President.” Who knows; maybe now old Bidwell would come through
with that swimming-pool donation.
When the applause had ceased, the chairman turned to where the center of
the disturbance sat, hands folded over his little round belly, face serene.
‘Will you continue, Dr. Pinero?”
“Why should I?”
The chairman shrugged his shoulders. “You came for that purpose.”
Pinero arose. “So true. So very true. But was I wise to come? Is there
anyone here who has an open mind, who can stare a bare fact in the face
without blushing? I think not. Even that so-beautiful gentleman who asked
you to hear me out has already judged me and condemned me. He seeks order,
not truth. Suppose truth defies order, will he accept it? Will you? I think
not. Still, if I do not speak you will win your point by default. The
little man in the street will think that you little men have exposed me,
Pinero, as a hoaxer, a pretender.
“I will repeat my discovery. In simple language, I have invented a
technique to tell how long a man will live. r
can give you advance billing of the Angel of Death. I can tell you when the
Black Camel will kneel at your door. In five minutes’ time, with my
apparatus, I can tell any of you how many grains of sand are still left in
your hour-glass.” He passed and folded his arms across his chest. For a
moment no one spoke. The audience grew restless.
Finally the chairman intervened. “You aren’t finished, Dr. Pinero?”
“What more is there to say?”
“You haven’t told us how your discovery works.”
Pinero’s eyebrows shot up. “You suggest that I should turn over the fruits
of my work for children to play with? This is dangerous knowledge, my
friend. I keep it for the man who understands it, myself.” He tapped his
chest.
“How are we to know that you have anything back of your wild claims?”
“So simple. You send a committee to watch me demonstrate. If it works,
fine. You admit it and tell the world so. If it does not work, I am
discredited, and will apologize. Even I, Pinero, will apologize.”
A slender, stoop-shouldered man stood up in the back of the hall. The chair
recognized him and he spoke.
“Mr. Chairman, how can the eminent doctor seriously propose such a course?
Does he expect us to wait around for twenty or thirty years for someone to
die and prove his claims?”
Pinero ignored the chair and answered directly.
“Pfui! Such nonsense! Are you so ignorant of statistics that you do not
know that in any large group there is at least one who will die in the
immediate future? I make you a proposition. Let me test each one of you in
this room, and I will name the man who will die within the fortnight, yes,
and the day and hour of his death.” He glanced fiercely around the room.
“Do you accept?”
Another figure got to his feet, a portly man who spoke in measured
syllables. “I, for one, cannot countenance such an experiment. As a medical
man, I have noted with sorrow the plain marks of serious heart trouble in
many of our elder colleagues. If Dr. Pinero knows those symptoms, as he
may, and were he to select as his victim one of their number, the man so
selected would be likely to die on schedule, whether the distinguished
speaker’s mechanical egg timer works or not.”
Another speaker backed him up at once. “Dr. Shepard is right. Why should we