Goodness only knows why, perhaps Ivanov was to blame or perhaps the sensational news just travelled through the air on its own, but in the huge seething city of Moscow people suddenly started talking about the ray and Professor Persikov.
True, only in passing and vaguely.
The news about the miraculous discovery hopped like a wounded bird round the shining capital, disappearing from time to time, then popping up again, until the middle of July when a short item about the ray appeared in the Science and Technology News section on page 20 of the newspaper Izvestia.
It announced briefly that a well-known professor at the Fourth University had invented a ray capable of increasing the activity of lower organisms to an incredible degree, and that the phenomenon would have to be checked.
There was a mistake in the name, of course, which was given as
"Pepsikov".
Ivanov brought the newspaper and showed Persikov the article.
"Pepsikov," muttered Persikov, as he busied himself with the chamber in his laboratory. "How do those newsmongers find out everything?"
Alas, the misprinted surname did not save the Professor from the events that followed, and they began the very next day, immediately turning Persikov's whole life upside down.
After a discreet knock, Pankrat appeared in the laboratory and handed Persikov a magnificent glossy visiting card.
"'E's out there," Pankrat added timidly.
The elegantly printed card said:
Alfred Arkadyevich Bronsky
Correspondent for the Moscow magazines Red Light, Red Pepper, Red Journal and Red Searchlight and the newspaper Red Moscow Evening News
"Tell him to go to blazes," said Persikov flatly, tossing the card under the table.
Pankrat turned round and went out, only to return five minutes later with a pained expression on his face and a second specimen of the same visiting card.
"Is this supposed to be a joke?" squeaked Persikov, his voice shrill with rage.
"Sez 'e's from the Gee-Pee-Yoo," Pankrat replied, white as a sheet.
Persikov snatched the card with one hand, almost tearing it in half, and threw his pincers onto the table with the other.
The card bore a message in ornate handwriting:
"Humbly request three minutes of your precious time, esteemed Professor, on public press business, correspondent of the satirical magazine Red Maria, a GPU publication."
"Send him in," said Persikov with a sigh.
A young man with a smoothly shaven oily face immediately popped out from behind Pankrat's back.
He had permanently raised eyebrows, like a Chinaman, over agate eyes which never looked at the person he was talking to.
The young man was dressed impeccably in the latest fashion.
He wore a long narrow jacket down to his knees, extremely baggy trousers and unnaturally wide glossy shoes with toes like hooves.
In his hands he held a cane, a hat with a pointed top and a note-pad.
"What do you want?" asked Persikov in a voice which sent Pankrat scuttling out of the room. "Weren't you told that I am busy?"
In lieu of a reply the young man bowed twice to the Professor, to the left and to the right of him, then his eyes skimmed over the whole laboratory, and the young man jotted a mark in his pad.
"I am busy," repeated the Professor, looking with loathing into the visitor's eyes, but to no avail for they were too elusive.
"A thousand apologies, esteemed Professor," the young man said in a thin voice, "for intruding upon you and taking up your precious time, but the news of your incredible discovery which has astounded the whole world compels our journal to ask you for some explanations."
"What explanations, what whole world?" Persikov whined miserably, turning yellow. "I don't have to give you any explanations or anything of the sort... I'm busy... Terribly busy."
"What are you working on?" the young man asked ingratiatingly, putting a second mark in his pad.
"Well, I'm... Why?
Do you want to publish something?"
"Yes," replied the young man and suddenly started scribbling furiously.
"Firstly, I do not intend to publish anything until I have finished my work ... and certainly not in your newspapers... Secondly, how did you find out about this?" Persikov suddenly felt at a loss.
"Is it true that you have invented a new life ray?"
"What new life?" exploded the Professor. "You're talking absolute piffle!
The ray I am working on has not been fully studied, and nothing at all is known yet!
It may be able to increase the activity of protoplasm..."
"By how much?" the young man asked quickly.
Persikov was really at a loss now.
"The insolent devil!
What the blazes is going on?" he thought to himself.
"What ridiculous questions!
Suppose I say, well, a thousand times!"
Predatory delight flashed in the young man's eyes.'
"Does that produce gigantic organisms?"
"Nothing of the sort!