The Greatest Invention

"What do you think is going to happen, Jorkens?" one of us asked one day at the club.
"Happen?" Jorkens said. "That is hard to say: in the old days one had a rough idea of what other countries wanted to do and their ability to do it. But it is all different now."
"How is it different?" asked the man.
"There are so many inventions," Jorkens said, "of which we know nothing. Now that a man can carry in a bag a bomb that is more powerful than several battleships, it is hard to find out what any country can do or will do next. I will give you an example."
I was on a ship in the tropics (Jorkens told us), and we put into a port. I was tired of looking at the tropical sea, so I went ashore and walked into a tavern to see if they had any decent wines in that country. As it turned out, they hadn't. But there was a man there with a black mustache and a certain look in his eyes that made me wonder if he might not have something interesting to tell. So I asked him if I might offer him a glass of wine. Well, he was good enough to accept, and I called for a bottle of the strange local wine. When the bottle had been uncorked and the wine poured out, like liquid tropical sunlight, I watched it go down under that black mustache. And when a certain amount had gone down, he began to talk.
"We aimed at the mastery of the whole Caribbean," he said, "and don't think that because we are a little country we could not have succeeded. War is no longer a matter of armies; it depends on the intelligence of scientists. And we had a scientist who, as I have since seen proved, had no rival west of the Atlantic."
"You proved it?" I could not help saying.
"Yes," he said. "You shall hear."
I had another bottle of wine set before him, and I did hear.
"You may not have thought it," he said, "but I was in our Ministry of Warfare."
And I had not thought it, for he was not at all what one would regard as the figure of a soldier. But warfare, as he explained to me, has altered.
"Our Minister," he said, "was a cavalry officer and could not adapt his ideas to modern science. He thought of war simply as an opportunity for cavalry charges and fine uniforms and glory. We had to get rid of him in order to fulfill our just aspirations."
"And what are they?" I asked.
"Why, the domination of the whole Caribbean," he said. "And it is just that we should have it. We are the people who have been born to it."
"Of course," I said soothingly, though I did not know for which country he spoke.
"Once the Minister of Warfare was gone," he went on, "we turned our minds to modern warfare, and we began to make great progress. Modern warfare gives grand opportunities to little countries. Once, if a nation had twelve battleships it was a Great Power, and we could only obey. But what if we know how to let loose a plague capable of destroying whole nations? Must we be silent then about our just aspirations? No. We shall speak."
"Certainly," I said.
"Other nations know something of germ warfare," the stranger said. "We looked for a new and deadlier germ. And we had the man who could not only give us that, but a more effective way to spread it — his name was Silvary Carasierra. We knew that we had marvelous powers within our grasp, if only Carasierra could be kept at his work."
"Idle, was he?" I said, for I thought it very likely in a hot country like that.
"No," said the stranger. "Never idle. Always spurred on by a fierce ambition. His very life was devoted to making inventions. Yes, he worked and he was working for us on something wonderful. Ah, well. We relied, and rightly, on that man's wisdom; but we forgot his folly."
The man was silent.
"What did Carasierra do?" I asked.
"That ambition was driving him all the time," he said. "He knew that he was the greatest scientist in the world, and he was determined to show it. As long as the germ on which he was working seemed the most wonderful thing ever invented, he was more than content. But before he had completed it, another inspiration came to him and drove him away. I tried everything: threats, appeals to him to think of our ancient glory, even bribes. But nothing would turn him from his project. The splendor of his new inspiration gripped him, and he was like a man drugged."
"And the splendor of our position faded like dreams. We were so nearly one of the Great Powers but for a fancy that came to this man's mind."
"What was Carasierra's fancy?" I asked.
"I will tell you," he said. "Day after day I went to his laboratory and appealed to him, almost in tears, to return to his work for us. But no, he would not listen. I gave him every chance. But at last I had to threaten him with death. I told him that if he would not return to his proper work he would have to be shot. But there was a queer light in his eyes that day, and really I think he hardly heard me. He would only say, 'I have done it, have done it.'"
"'Done what?' I asked him," the stranger continued.
"'The most wonderful invention,' he said, 'the most wonderful invention ever achieved by man.'"
"'You will be shot,' I repeated, 'if you don't get on with your work.'"
"'This is more wonderful,' he said."
"'Well, show it to me,' I demanded. He took me out to his lawn. And there he pointed. I saw only a square yard of grass, marked off with a strip of white tape. 'What is it?' I asked."
"He took up his tape and marked off a smaller area, one of only a few inches. 'Do you see anything wonderful there?' he asked. 'Look close.'"