The Los Amigos Fiasco - Page 2

Westmacott, the chairman of the Los Amigos
Electrical Supply Company, Limited. Then there was
myself as the chief medical man, and lastly an old
German of the name of Peter Stulpnagel. The Germans
were a strong body at Los Amigos, and they all voted
for their man. That was how he got on the committee.
It was said that he had been a wonderful electrician
at home, and he was eternally working with wires and
insulators and Leyden jars; but, as he never seemed
to get any further, or to have any results worth
publishing he came at last to be regarded as a
harmless crank, who had made science his hobby. We
three practical men smiled when we heard that he had
been elected as our colleague, and at the meeting we
fixed it all up very nicely among ourselves without
much thought of the old fellow who sat with his ears
scooped forward in his hands, for he was a trifle
hard of hearing, taking no more part in the
proceedings than the gentlemen of the press who
scribbled their notes on the back benches.

We did not take long to settle it all. In New
York a strength of some two thousand volts had been
used, and death had not been instantaneous.
Evidently their shock had been too weak. Los Amigos
should not fall into that error. The charge should
be six times greater, and therefore, of course, it
would be six times more effective. Nothing could
possibly be more logical. The whole concentrated
force of the great dynamos should be employed on
Duncan Warner.

So we three settled it, and had already risen to
break up the meeting, when our silent companion
opened his month for the first time.

"Gentlemen," said he, "you appear to me to show
an extraordinary ignorance upon the subject of
electricity. You have not mastered the first
principles of its actions upon a human being."

The committee was about to break into an angry
reply to this brusque comment, but the chairman of
the Electrical Company tapped his forehead to claim
its indulgence for the crankiness of the speaker.

"Pray tell us, sir," said he, with an ironical
smile, "what is there in our conclusions with which
you find fault?"

"With your assumption that a large dose of
electricity will merely increase the effect of a
small dose. Do you not think it possible that it
might have an entirely different result? Do you know
anything, by actual experiment, of the effect of such
powerful shocks?"

"We know it by analogy," said the chairman,
pompously. "All drugs increase their effect when
they increase their dose; for example--for
example----"

"Whisky," said Joseph M'Connor.

"Quite so. Whisky. You see it there."

Peter Stulpnagel smiled and shook his