Start of a transcript of JIGSAW An Interactive History Copyright (c) 1995 by Graham Nelson Release 3 / Serial number 951129 / Inform v1600 Library 6/1 Standard interpreter 1.1 Interpreter 1 Version C / Library serial number 951024 >open upper door You open the upper laboratory door. >u Fleming's Laboratory This laboratory can only be described as untidy. It is a shambles of equipment, notebooks and microscopes. Innumerable test tubes, sealed with swabs of cotton wool, crowd racks which lie on every available shelf. On one wall is a framed certificate. The light is dim, coming from tightly-shut windows over the benches, which face onto arched opaque windows of the terraced houses on the other side of Praed Street. Scattered over a work-bench are forty or fifty Petri dishes. [Your score has just gone up by one point.] >search bench Glancing through the piles of dishes, you come across one with a (rather revolting) circular pattern of mould. >x mould It seems to have been contaminated by a spore of mould, because a circular colony of mould has grown across the surface of the agar. Interestingly, near the edge of the mould, the bacteria seem to have gone, leaving only a faint ghost image. >[ In every case where the mould was thick and coherent the Bacteria died, or became dormant, and fell to the bottom of the sediment. -- John Tyndall, natural philosopher (1876)] s The only exit is back east. Alexander Fleming, a tall Scotsman in his late forties, strides confidently in and puts down a suitcase. As you hastily hide behind a cupboard, he looks around for something, fails to find it and leaves again. >e Clarence Wing Staircase A square spiral staircase runs up and down between two floors, opening out here at a landing with a noticeboard. Some way below the windows are nondescript houses and a quiet city street. There are doors at top and bottom of the stairs, open and closed. >undo Fleming's Laboratory [Previous turn undone.] >put petri dish on suitcase You need to be holding the mouldy dish before you can put it on top of something else. >get dish Taken. >put it on suitcase You put the mouldy dish on the suitcase. >z Time passes. >z Time passes. Fleming comes in again, and you hide once more. His eye is caught by the mouldy dish on top of his suitcase. Tutting with exasperation, he tosses it aside without looking at it, and is about to move the trunk when he thinks of something and wanders back out. >get dish Taken. >put it on suitcase You put the mouldy dish on the suitcase. >push suitcase east Clarence Wing Staircase A square spiral staircase runs up and down between two floors, opening out here at a landing with a noticeboard. Some way below the windows are nondescript houses and a quiet city street. There are doors at top and bottom of the stairs, open and closed. >z Time passes. >z Time passes. Fleming comes along, mildly surprised to find that he accidentally left his suitcase out on the landing. As he begins pushing the trunk into his laboratory, he can't help noticing the mouldy dish on the top. "That's funny," he exclaims, forgetting the trunk and striding away with the dish to show a colleague. [Your score has just gone up by one point.] >x trunk A solid slab of a trunk, it bears chalk-marks suggesting that its owner has just returned from the Continent. >open trunk The trunk is securely clasped and padlocked shut. >d The lower door is closed. >open lower door You open the lower laboratory door. The air here suddenly seems disturbed, and a kind of cloud gathers from light winds and currents. From inside the rucksack, you hear a bell ring. >d Asthma Laboratory A crowded mycological laboratory, full of moulds and the means to grow them: bullocks' hearts in jars, sterilisers, centrifuges, vats of agar medium. On one wall is a diagram of the lungs, and blackboards full of numbers make frequent reference to Asthma. The main door leads back out east; to the north is a lab assistant's office. White mice scurry about in cages along one wall. >sketch mice You sketch in a picture of the white mice. >n Office The small annexe where lab assistants prepare solutions, grow moulds and wash dishes used in the experiments. It is lined with bell jars and demijohns, all neatly labelled in flowing black handwriting. The laboratory lies to the south. One particular bell jar catches your eye: it's full of spores of mould, and labelled "Penicillium". >s Asthma Laboratory A crowded mycological laboratory, full of moulds and the means to grow them: bullocks' hearts in jars, sterilisers, centrifuges, vats of agar medium. On one wall is a diagram of the lungs, and blackboards full of numbers make frequent reference to Asthma. The main door leads back out east; to the north is a lab assistant's office. White mice scurry about in cages along one wall. >e Clarence Wing Staircase A square spiral staircase runs up and down between two floors, opening out here at a landing with a noticeboard. Some way below the windows are nondescript houses and a quiet city street. A heavy trunk-suitcase rests on the linoleum floor here. There are doors at top and bottom of the stairs, both open. >u Fleming's Laboratory This laboratory can only be described as untidy. It is a shambles of equipment, notebooks and microscopes. Innumerable test tubes, sealed with swabs of cotton wool, crowd racks which lie on every available shelf. On one wall is a framed certificate. The light is dim, coming from tightly-shut windows over the benches, which face onto arched opaque windows of the terraced houses on the other side of Praed Street. Scattered over a work-bench are forty or fifty Petri dishes. >take certificate You peel away the certificate, and the grey board it was mounted on falls to the floor. Another jigsaw piece! >undo Fleming's Laboratory [Previous turn undone.] >x certificate Mounted on a grey board, it certifies Alexander Fleming's distinguished record as a surgeon in the Great War. >take certificate You peel away the certificate, and the grey board it was mounted on falls to the floor. Another jigsaw piece! >take piece Taken. [Your score has just gone up by one point.] >x piece A large jigsaw piece, six inches on a side and square. It's a dull grey-white, perhaps depicting the side of a tank. It is currently this way up: O OOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOOOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOO OOO >set clock to 1 You shorten the time left on the clock. >z Time passes. From inside the rucksack, the ormolu clock makes a rustle-click. >turn on alarm The latch on the clock is now on. >set clock to 1 You shorten the time left on the clock. Suddenly you are wrenched out into the time vortex once more, and find yourself back... Disc Room This is a tiny tetrahedral annexe of a room, whose only clear feature is a broad black disc embedded in the floor. >nw Inside the Monument A sloping crevice of metal, sunken into the ground some way to make a larger-than-expected room. Short flights of steps lead up to west and southeast. The air is cool and moist. At the centre is a heavy old table whose top is a beautiful mahogany jigsaw-board, with room for sixteen pieces arranged in a square. There are five played pieces. >x grid "Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus inciderit" 1 2 3 4 +----------------------------------------------------+ |............. ooooooooooooo| a |. Mould Park o| |......o...... oooooo oooooo| |ooooooooooooo | b |o Invalid | |oooooo.oooooo | |.............oooooo oooooo | c |. Glass .. Carriage oo | |.............ooooooooooooo | | . o | d | | | | +----------------------------------------------------+ >x centre A large jigsaw piece, six inches on a side and square. It's a dull grey-white, perhaps depicting the still waters in a canal. It is currently this way up: O OOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOOOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOO OOO >turn piece You turn the piece clockwise, to: O OOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOOOOOO OOOOOOO O >put piece at c3 It fits at c3, and suddenly lights up with a picture: a racing steam train. [Your score has just gone up by one point.] >x grid "Nec deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus inciderit" 1 2 3 4 +----------------------------------------------------+ |............. ooooooooooooo| a |. Mould Park o| |......o...... oooooo oooooo| |ooooooooooooo | b |o Invalid | |oooooo.oooooo . | |.............oooooo oooooo............. | c |. Glass .. Carriage oo Train .. | |.............ooooooooooooo............. | | . o . | d | | | | +----------------------------------------------------+ >twist kd You set the threefold arm spinning, but the motion soon dies away here. >footnote a1 [ Footnote a1: ] Sir Alexander Fleming deserves some of the credit for discovering penicillin: for untidiness, habitual good observation and enormous luck. A petri dish he left in the lab while on holiday in 1928 became contaminated by spores of penicillium, a mould common in most London gardens. (Fleming's highly unreliable official biography claims - as he did - that this blew in through the windows, but actually it was due to sloppy conditions at St Mary's.) The freak combination that year of a cold spell followed by warmth was the only possible way the mould could have killed the bacteria. In fact, John Tyndall had noticed this property in 1875: but Fleming identified a chemical cause, and investigated. He collected moulds from everything and everyone he met for a while (even in the Chelsea Art Club, of which he was a keen member). Fleming's laboratory has been restored and is now open to the public. Having made the medical breakthrough of the century, he lost interest. He decided it was unstable and useless, inexplicably missed the obvious experiments and largely forgot the matter. Not until 1940 did the brilliant work of Chain and Florey lead to medical triumph. The three men shared the 1945 Nobel Prize. >save Ok. >