Further, if
there be some who think my observations needlessly minute at a moment
when they ought to be completely held by rapidity of movement and
decision of action, I reply that I have wished to report here, at
length and completely, all the details of a plan of attack conceived
so rapidly that it is only the slowness of my pen that gives an
appearance of slowness to the execution. I have wished, by this
slowness and precision, to be certain that nothing should be omitted
from the conditions under which the strange phenomenon was produced,
which, until some natural explanation of it is forthcoming, seems to
me to prove, even better than the theories of Professor Stangerson,
the Dissociation of Matter--I will even say, the instantaneous
Dissociation of Matter."
Chapter XVI
Strange Phenomenon of the Dissociation of Matter
(EXTRACT FROM THE NOTE-BOOK OF JOSEPH ROULETABILLE, continued)
"I am again at the window-sill," continues Rouletabille, "and once
more I raise my head above it. Through an opening in the curtains,
the arrangement of which has not been changed, I am ready to look,
anxious to note the position in which I am going to find the murderer,
--whether his back will still be turned towards me!--whether he is
still seated at the desk writing! But perhaps--perhaps--he is no
longer there!--Yet how could he have fled?--Was I not in possession
of his ladder? I force myself to be cool.
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