The Air Trust | Page 6

Master took snuff,
as the saying is, Herzog never failed to sneeze.
He therefore appeared, now, in some ten minutes--a fat, rubicund,
spectacled man, with a cast in his left eye and two fingers missing, to
remind him of early days in experimental work on explosives. Under
his arm he carried several tomes and pamphlets; and so, bowing first to
one financier, then to the other, he stood there on the threshold,
awaiting his masters' pleasure.
"Come in, Herzog," directed Flint. "Got some material there on liquid
air, and nitrogen, and so on?"
"Yes, sir. Just what is it you want, sir?"
"Sit down, and I'll tell you,"--for the chemist, hat in hand, ventured not
to seat himself unbidden in presence of these plutocrats.
Herzog, murmuring thanks for Flint's gracious permission, deposited
his derby on top of the revolving book-case, sat down tentatively on the
edge of a chair and clutched his books as though they had been so
many shields against the redoubted power of his masters.
"See here, Herzog," Flint fired at him, without any preliminaries or
beating around the bush, "what do you know about the practical side of
extracting nitrogen from atmospheric air? Or extracting oxygen, in
liquid form? Can it be done--that is, on a commercial basis?"

"Why, no, sir--yes, that is--perhaps. I mean--"
"What the devil do you mean?" snapped Flint, while Waldron smiled
maliciously as he smoked. "Yes, or no? I don't pay you to muddle
things. I pay you to know, and to tell me! Get that? Now, how about
it?"
"Well, sir--hm!--the fact is," and the unfortunate chemist blinked
through his glasses with extreme uneasiness, "the fact of the matter is
that the processes involved haven't been really perfected, as yet.
Beginnings have been made, but no large-scale work has been done, so
far. Still, the principle--"
"Is sound?"
"Yes, sir. I imagine--"
"Cut that! You aren't paid for imagining!" interrupted the Billionaire,
stabbing at him with that characteristic gesture. "Just what do you know
about it? No technicalities, mind! Essentials, that's all, and in a few
words!"
"Well, sir," answered Herzog, plucking up a little courage under this
pointed goading, "so far as the fixation of atmospheric nitrogen goes,
more progress has been made in England and Scandinavia, than here.
They're working on it, over there, to obtain cheap and plentiful
fertilizer from the air. Nitrogen can be obtained from the air, even now,
and made into fertilizers even cheaper than the Chili saltpeter. Oxygen
is liberated as a by-product, and--"
"Oh, it is, eh? And could it be saved? In liquid form for instance?"
"I think so, sir. The Siemens & Halske interests, in Germany, are doing
it already, on a limited scale. In Norway and Austria, nitrogen has been
manufactured from air, for some years."
"On a paying, commercial basis?" demanded Flint, while Waldron,
now a trifle less scornful, seemed to listen with more interest as his

eyes rested on the rotund form of the scientist.
"Yes, sir, quite so," answered Herzog. "It's commercially feasible,
though not a very profitable business at best. The gas is utilized in
chemical combination with a substantial base, and--"
"No matter about that, just yet," interrupted Flint. "We can have details
later. Do you know of any such business as yet, in the United States?"
"Well, sir, there's a plant building at Great Falls, South Carolina, for the
purpose. It is to run by waterpower and will develop 5000 H.P."
"Hear that, Waldron?" demanded the Billionaire. "It's already
beginning even here! But not one of these plants is working for what I
see as the prime possibility. No imagination, no grasp on the subject!
No wonder most inventors and scientists die poor! They incubate ideas
and then lack the warmth to hatch them into general application. It
takes men like us, Wally--practical men--to turn the trick!" He spoke a
bit rapidly, almost feverishly, under the influence of the subtle drug.
"Now if we take hold of this game, why, we can shake the world as it
has never yet been shaken! Eh, Waldron? What do you think now?"
Waldron only grunted, non-committally. Flint with a hard glance at his
unresponsive partner, once more turned to Herzog.
"See here, now," directed he. "What's the best process now in use?"
"For what, sir?" ventured the timid chemist.
"For the simultaneous production of nitrogen and oxygen, from the
atmosphere!"
"Well, sir," he answered, deprecatingly, as though taking a great liberty
even in informing his master on a point the master had expressly asked
about, "there are three processes. But all operate only on a small scale."
"Who ever told you I wanted to work on a large scale?" demanded Flint,
savagely.

"I--er--inferred--beg pardon, sir--I--" And Herzog quite lost himself and
floundered hopelessly, while his mismated eyes wandered about