The chums were joined outside the hotel by Herb and Jimmy, who had waited for them during their interview. To them they narrated what they had learned of Miss Berwick's story. Their friends shared their own indignation and were quite as keen as themselves to hear the end of the story.
"What did you say the fellow's name was?" asked Herb, as the quartette walked along Main Street.
"Cassey, she said it was—Dan Cassey," replied Bob. "Ever hear of any one by that name?"
"It sounds rather familiar," replied Herb, knitting his brows as he tried to remember.
"Wait!" he said suddenly. "I've almost got it—Cassey! Cassey! Does the man stutter, do you know?"
"She didn't say anything about that," replied Joe. "Why do you ask that question?"
"Because," answered Herb, "I remember a man of that name a few weeks ago calling at dad's store to get a bill of goods. The reason I remember was the way he stuttered when dad was making out the bill. He tried and tried to say something, and his eyes bulged out and his cheeks got all puffed and red while he was trying to get it out. Then he stopped and whistled, and that seemed to help him, for then he went right on talking, only stopping once in a while to whistle again and get a fresh start. I had to get out of the store to keep from bursting out laughing. I remember I felt rather sorry for the fellow at the time, but if he's the fellow who's trying to do Miss Berwick out of her money, nothing's too bad for him."
"Suppose you ask your father what he knows about him," suggested Bob eagerly. "He may know something that may prove of some help to the girl, either in getting her money back or putting the fellow in jail."
"I'll do it," agreed Herb. "By the way, fellows, I dropped into Dave Slocum's place yesterday afternoon and found out that he had a whole stock of material for making wireless telephone sets. Said a salesman from New York talked him into it, and he was wondering how he was going to get rid of them. Thought he'd been stocked up with more than he could sell, all through the salesman's slick tongue. I told him not to worry, that the boys would be standing in line before long and would clean him out of stock. He seemed to think I was kidding him, but he brightened up just the same."
"Dave's got a pleasant surprise coming to him," grinned Joe. "Just our bunch alone will make quite a hole in his stock."
"You bet," agreed Bob, as, having reached his gate, he said good-bye to his mates and went in. "Don't forget to ask your dad about that Cassey fellow," he called out after Herb.
That Herb did not forget was proved when he overtook his friends the next morning on the way to school.
"I asked dad about Cassey," were his first words, after greetings had been exchanged. "He said he thought very likely the man was the one you had in mind, for this stuttering fellow came from Elwood and his first name was Daniel. It's hardly likely there'd be two men of the same name in that little town."
"Did your father know anything about what kind of fellow he was?" asked Joe.
"Dad said that he had the reputation of being tricky and hard-fisted," answered Herb. "But as far as he knew he hadn't been caught in anything yet that could put him in jail. He went up in the air when I told him about Miss Berwick, and said he'd like to get hold of the fellow and break his neck. He thinks Miss Berwick ought to get a good lawyer and bring the rascal into court. But at the same time he thinks she may have a hard time proving her case, as she hasn't any receipt or any witnesses. She could simply say she'd paid him and he could say she hadn't. All he'd have to do would be to stand pat and put it up to her to prove her case. And how is she going to do it?"
"Do you mean to say that he could get away with a thing as raw as that?" asked Joe, in a white heat.
"He might," declared Bob. "Things just as rank have been pulled off again and again. But at any rate she ought to get after him right away. She's a dead loser as things stand, and if she can only get the rascal in court she may have a chance. Perhaps he hasn't covered his trail as well as he thinks he has, and when a good lawyer gets to questioning him the truth may come out. In any case it's the only way that will give her a ghost of a chance."
The days passed by swiftly until Saturday came and with it the opportunity the boys had looked forward to of going to Dr. Dale's workshop and getting a few practical points on the making of a wireless telephone set.
They found the doctor at a bench that he had rigged up in his barn. On the wall was arranged a large variety of tools and on the bench were strewn several coils of wire and a number of objects the name and use of which the boys did not know.
The doctor, who was in his shirt sleeves, extended a hearty welcome to the boys, who ranged themselves about him, and whose numbers were constantly augmented by newcomers until the barn was well filled.
"What I want to do to-day, boys," he said, "is to show you how easy and simple it is to put up a wireless telephone receiving set without having to spend very much money.
"Now the first thing you have to get and put up is the aerial," he remarked, as he unwound a large coil of copper wire. "You want about a hundred or a hundred and twenty feet of that. You can extend it horizontally for about fifty feet, say, for instance, from the side or back of your house to the barn or the garage, and then have it go up as high as it can go. The upper end doesn't have to be in the outer air, for the sound will come along it if it's in the attic. Still it's better to have it outside if possible. The lower end of the wire has to be connected with the ground in some way, and you can fix that by attaching it to a water pipe or any other pipe that runs into the ground. A good way is to let it down the side of the house and put it through the cellar window and fasten it to a pipe.
"After you have your aerial you want to get the rest of the apparatus together. The first thing to do is to get a baseboard which will serve as the bottom of the receiving box. Something like this," and he put his hand on a board about eighteen inches long, twelve inches wide, and about an inch thick. "This is the platform, as it were, on which the different parts of the apparatus are to rest.
"Now since your ear alone can't detect the waves that are coming to and along your aerial, you have to have a sort of electrical ear that will do this for you. Here it is," and he picked up a piece of crystal and a wire of phosphor bronze. "When this wire comes in contact with this bit of crystal the mysterious waves become audible vibrations.
"But this isn't enough. You've got to get in tune with the sending station in order to understand the sounds you hear. When your vibration frequency is the same as that from which the message is sent, you can hear as clearly as though the voice or instrument were in the next room. Now here's a piece of a curtain pole that's about a foot and a half long. You see that I've wound around its entire length, except for about a half inch at either end, a coil of wire. This is called the inductance coil. You will notice that the wire is covered with cotton except for this little strip of wire extending lengthwise where I've scraped the cotton off with sandpaper so as to accommodate the sliding contacts. These sliding contacts can be made from curtain rings with holes punched in them, through which are passed copper rivets. These rivets press against the bare path of the coil and can be moved to and fro until you find the exact point where your set is in tune with the sending station."
"Now," continued Dr. Dale, as he glanced round the circle of eager faces, alight with interest in the subject, "we're getting pretty close to the time when one picks up the receiver and begins to listen in.
"But as the electric vibrations, if left alone, would have a good deal of trouble in passing through the telephone receiver, we must have a condenser to help them out. This is very easily made by gluing a piece of tinfoil about one and a half inches square to each side of a sheet of mica. Then you must have two strips of tinfoil, one extending from each side of the mica. If you haven't any mica, a sheet of ordinary writing paper will do, though the mica is better.
"The telephone receiver you will have to buy, as a satisfactory one can't very well be made by an amateur. The receiver ought to have a high resistance to get the best results.
"There," he said, as he laid the telephone receiver on the bench, "those are the essential things you have to have in order to make a set of your own. With these things only, it will of course be a simple set and have a limited range. There are a hundred improvements of one kind or another that you'll learn about as you get more expert, and these can be added from time to time. But the special thing I wanted to prove to you to-day was that it would take only a very small expenditure of money to get this material together. You see how many things I've used that any one of you can find about the house, such as tinfoil, curtain poles, curtain rings, wood for the box, and so on. The wire needed for your tuning coil and your aerial can be obtained for less than a dollar. The detector, including the crystal, can be got for another dollar. An excellent receiver can be bought for two dollars. A few minor things will be needed at perhaps five or ten cents each. Altogether the cost of the set can be brought within five dollars."
This was good news to the boys, many of whom began at once a mental calculation as to the amount of their pocket money, while others began to figure on odd jobs that might bring them in the required amount, in the event that their parents would not supply the money.
With a few deft movements the doctor attached the various parts of the apparatus to their proper places on the baseboard. There was not time that day to put up the aerial, but he gave them practical illustrations of how to use the detector by pressing the point of the wire firmly against the crystal, how to slide the rings back and forth until they found the point of greatest loudness and clearness, and all other points essential to using the set successfully. Not all the boys caught on to all that was involved, but to the majority it was made reasonably clear. To Bob and Joe, who had followed every point of the demonstration with the keenest attention, the operation of the receiving set was made as clear as crystal, and they had no doubt of their ability to construct a set for themselves. Herb's attention had wandered somewhat, because in the back of his mind there still lurked the idea of buying a set ready made. Jimmy had been somewhat distracted by looking about in various parts of the barn to see if he could detect the presence of any "eats," and his ideas were somewhat hazy in consequence.
"Well, boys," at last said the doctor, with a smile, "I guess we'll call it a day. But remember that if at any time you are puzzled and want more information all you have to do is to come and ask me. I'll gladly lay aside my work any time to help you youngsters out."
The boys thoroughly appreciated the doctor's cordiality and the demonstration that he had given them, and most of them took occasion to tell him so as they said good-bye to him and filed out of the extemporized workshop.
"He certainly does make things clear," said Bob enthusiastically, as he and his friends made their way toward their homes.
"Not only that, but he makes you want to do them," said Joe. "After seeing and hearing him this afternoon, I'd ten times rather make a set than buy one."
Jimmy agreed with them, and even Herb seemed ready to reconsider the idea of getting one ready made, though he was not yet quite prepared to surrender.
"All of you come over to my house to-night," said Bob, as they neared their homes. "We haven't got the materials yet, but we can go over again what the doctor told us to-day and make sure that we've got it all straight in our minds. What one forgets, the other may remember. Then when we do get the stuff we can put a little snap and speed into making the set."
"That will be bully," replied Joe, and the others agreed with him. "For my part," Joe continued, "I count every day lost that we have to go without it. I sure am becoming a radio fan."
It turned out that Herb was prevented from coming by unexpected company but the others were there. Their talk that night was animated and enthusiastic, so much so in fact that the time passed more quickly than they imagined, and they were surprised when the clock struck eleven.
"By the way," said Jimmy, as he was preparing to leave with the rest, "I had a run in with Buck Looker when I was coming here to-night, and he said he was going to lay for me and do me up."
"He did, did he?" asked Bob. "What was he sore about?"
"Oh, he's had a grouch ever since the day of the fire," replied Jimmy. "You remember that when he spoke of the work he'd been doing to help put out the fire, I spoke up and said that he hadn't done a thing. He's had it in for me ever since. He bumped against me on purpose to-night just as I was coming in the gate, and when I called him down for it he said he was going to lay for me and change my face."
"The big bully!" exclaimed Bob. "Just wait here a minute while I go into the next room."
The adjoining room was dark and commanded a view of the street in front, while Bob himself could look out of the window without being seen. Some large shade trees were on the other side of the street, and as Bob's eyes became accustomed to the darkness, he could dimly descry three forms lurking in the shadows. One of them he felt sure was Buck, and he felt reasonably certain that the others were Carl Lutz and Terrence Mooney, Buck's boon companions.
"I guess Buck and his gang are hanging around all right," he announced, as he returned to the other room and reported his discovery. "But he's going to get a little surprise party. I tell you what we'll do. You go out of the front door alone, Jimmy. Joe and I will stand there in the light from the hall lamp and say good-night. Then we'll close the door, and you stand on the stoop a minute, buttoning your coat, and then go slowly down the walk. That will give Joe and me a chance to slip around through the back in the darkness and get behind the bushes near the gate. Leave the rest to us."
"And what we'll do will be a plenty," added Joe.
Jimmy thought well of this plan, and agreed to do his part.
They followed out this program to the letter. As Jimmy came down the walk, the lurking figures across the street came out from the shadow of the trees and over toward him.
"I've got you now, Jimmy Plummer," snarled the voice of Buck Looker. "I told you I was going to take some of the freshness out of you, and now I'm going to tan your hide."
"Does it take three of you to do it?" asked Jimmy.
"None of your lip now," growled Buck, as he clenched his fist."I'm going to have the fun of doing it myself."
With one spring Bob vaulted over the low fence.
"You've got another guess coming, Buck Looker," he said coolly.
The bully started back in surprise and consternation, which was not diminished when Joe followed his friend's example and stood at his side.
"What are you butting in for?" Buck snapped, as soon as he recovered his breath.
"Because I choose to," answered Bob. "Because I won't stand by and see you hit a fellow half your size. If it's fighting you're looking for, I'll give you all the fighting you want right here and now. If your gang want to mix in, Joe will take care of Lutz and Jimmy can look after Mooney. But I'll take you on myself. How about it? Is it a go?"
He advanced on Buck, and before his flashing eyes those of the bully wavered and fell.
"I—I'll settle with you some other time," he stammered, retreating toward the middle of the street.
"No time like the present," challenged Bob, but as Buck, muttering threats, still continued to retreat, while his cronies slunk away with him, Bob gave a little laugh and came back to his friends.
"All right, Jimmy," he chuckled. "I guess your face won't be changed to-night. Buck seems to have changed his mind."
The idea of having their own radio outfit and being able to hear all the wonderful things going on in the air about them so fascinated the boys that they could talk or think of little else. Even Jimmy Plummer became so excited that his mother declared he was actually forgetting to eat, a statement that his father flatly refused to believe at first, until he escorted his rotund son to the nearest scale and discovered the astonishing fact that he had really lost two pounds.
"You see how it is, Dad," said Jimmy, mournfully. "If you don't give me the money to get some wireless stuff I'll just pine away and die."
"It wouldn't hurt you to pine away about twenty pounds, anyway," said his father, with a twinkle in his eye. "But I suppose if you've set your heart on it I might as well come across now as later and save myself from being pestered to death. How much do you suppose you'll need to get started?"
"The other fellows are figuring that about five dollars apiece will buy most of the things we'll need—at first, anyway," he added, with a careful eye to the future.
"All right, here it is," said Mr. Plummer. "And I suppose the next thing we know you'll be breaking your neck falling off the roof while you're trying to put up aerials, or whatever it is they call the contraptions."
"Leave that to me," said Jimmy. "And I'll bet you'll get lots of fun out of this too, Dad, when we get it going."
"Well, maybe so," said his father. "But I don't take much stock in the whole business. Some wonderful things happen these days, though, and you may be able to change my mind."
"I'm sure I will," said Jimmy, with conviction. "And if you had heard what I did at Doctor Dale's house, I'll bet you'd want a radio outfit as much as I do."
"Well, go ahead and see what you can do, Son. If you can really get the thing working, so much the better."
The next day Jimmy lost no time in hunting up his friends and telling them of his good fortune. He found that the others had not been far behind him in procuring the necessary cash. That afternoon they all descended on the hardware store, whose proprietor had laid in a stock of the materials that would be likely to be needed in the construction of simple radio outfits. The hardware merchant was glad to see them, but somewhat surprised also.
"Gosh!" he exclaimed, when he learned what the boys had come for. "When that salesman from New York talked me into stocking up with all that stuff, I never thought I'd get a sale for it in the next ten years. And now here's all you youngsters coming in here after it with money in your fists."
"Yes, and you'd better lay in a whole lot more of it, Dave," said Bob Layton. "It won't be long before everybody in this town will be wanting a wireless radio outfit."
"Well, I guess I've got enough in the store now to start you fellows on your way," said Dave Slocum, the proprietor. "Now, what all do you need?"
There followed a time of much consultation and anxious questioning before all the enthusiastic young experimenters were satisfied that they were getting the most useful things their limited amount of capital would buy. Dave Slocum sold more feet of copper wire in that one afternoon than he had in the previous five years, not to mention insulators, resistance wire, detectors, head sets, and all the other paraphernalia necessary to the beginner. At last all the various purchases were tied into neat bundles, and the excited boys swarmed out into the street.
"Let's go to my house and get started right away," proposed Bob. "It will be quite a job to get the aerial strung, and the sooner we do it the better it will suit me."
The others were of the same mind, and they made the distance to the Layton home "on the jump" with Jimmy puffing valiantly in the rear in a desperate endeavor to keep up with his more active comrades.
"Gee!" he exclaimed, staggering up the steps to the cool veranda, "you fellows must think I'm a candidate for Marathon runner at the next Olympic games, the way you hit it up coming here."
"I don't know about the Marathon race," said Joe, "but I do think we could enter you in the long distance pie-eating contest, without having any doubts of your winning away out in front of the field."
"Well, I don't want to boast, but I think I could do myself proud," admitted Jimmy. "I don't think I ever really got enough pie to satisfy me yet."
"Never mind about pies now," said Herb. "The question before the house is to get an aerial strung from Bob's house to the barn. What's the best way to get up on the roof, Bob?"
"There's a trap door in the roof not far from the chimney," replied Bob. "I was thinking that we could make a mast and lash it to the chimney. That would give us one secure anchorage for the aerial, and the other we can fasten to the roof of the barn easily enough."
"What are we going to make the mast out of?" inquired Joe.
"There's a nice piece of four by four lumber out in the barn," replied Bob. "I was thinking that we could leave it square at the bottom and plane it off round at the top, so as to look better. I don't see why that won't fill the bill all right."
"Sounds all right," said Herb, and, with Bob leading, all four boys piled out to the big barn back of the house. Bob produced his scantling and hunted up a big plane. Then the boys set to with a will, and in a short time had the rough timber nicely smoothed off, with a slight taper toward the top. Then they screwed in a large hook, bought for the purpose, and after providing themselves with a generous length of rope, repaired to the roof of the house.
As Bob had told them, there was a large scuttle leading from the attic onto the roof, and one after another they clambered out through this. The roof sloped gently at this point, and while they found it necessary to be careful, they had little difficulty in reaching the chimney. Before erecting the mast they fastened one end of the aerial over the hook in it. The aerial consisted of a single, number fourteen, hard drawn copper wire, insulated at each end by an earthenware insulator having two hooks embedded in it. One of these hooks went over the hook in the mast, while the other had the end of the wire attached to it. A similar insulator was provided at the other end of the wire, thus preventing its becoming grounded to the house or barn.
Having hooked up one end of their aerial, the boys erected the mast against the chimney, and lashed it firmly in position with the rope they had brought up.
"There!" exclaimed Bob, when everything was fixed to his liking, "that mast looks as though it might stay put a while. Now let's rig up one on the barn, and we'll have the first part of our job done, anyway."
Clambering back to the scuttle, the boys dropped through to the attic floor and hurried downstairs. It was beginning to get dark, and as they wanted to get the aerial up while daylight lasted, everything went with a rush. Poor Jimmy thought more than once of his father's prophecy that he would lose weight in such strenuous activities, but he was as anxious to receive the first radio signals as any of the others, so he followed the headlong pace the others set without a murmur.
Of course there was no convenient chimney on the barn to act as a support for the mast, but they finally rigged up a mast at one end of the barn, nailing it securely to the siding boards. Then they drew the copper wire through the hook in the insulator until there was just a little slack, cut off the wire, and wound it securely. Then they all gazed with pride at their handiwork, and had the comfortable feeling that comes of work well done.
"Hooray!" shouted Jimmy. "That's what I call a good job, and it didn't take us such a long time, either."
"Yes, but that's only the beginning," said Joe. "I only wish we had more time to-night. I feel as though I'd like to keep right on now and not stop until we're actually receiving."
"You'd be pretty hungry if you tried to do it," remarked Jimmy. "To hear you talk, you'd think making a receiving set was about as hard as taking a run around the block."
"It isn't much harder than for you to take a run around the block," laughed Herb. "You were puffing like a steam engine while we were coming up from the store this afternoon. If you don't cut down on the eats, Doughnuts, you'll have to get around in a wheel chair. You won't even be able to walk, let alone run."
"There you go," complained Jimmy, in an aggrieved tone. "Just because I'm not as skinny as you fellows, you think that I eat more than you do. Nobody could eat more than you do, Herb, and live to tell the story."
"I don't have to tell any stories along that line," retorted Herb, with a laugh. "My friends do that for me."
"I'll bet they do," grumbled Jimmy. "I get some result out of whatI eat, anyway, and that's more than you can say."
"Oh, I can say it, all right, but probably nobody would believe me," admitted Herb.
"Right you are, Herb, old boy!"
"When you two fellows are all through arguing, maybe we can go up and hook on our leading-in wire to the aerial," said Joe, impatiently. "We ought to get that much done before dark, anyway."
"I don't know about that, Joe," objected Bob. "It's almost dark now, and we could do it better and easier in the daylight. What do you say if you all come around after supper and we'll dope out a wiring diagram and maybe make a start on building the tuning coil."
Joe reluctantly consented to this, and the four companions separated for the time being, after promising to return to Bob's house that evening. And true to their promise, the boys had all returned to the Layton home by eight o'clock that evening, full of enthusiasm for the task that lay before them. Mr. Layton was mildly interested in the radiophone project, but after a few questions he retired to the library with the evening paper, leaving the boys to their own devices.
"Well, fellows," said Bob, "here we are, all set for a busy evening.What shall we do first?"
"What I'd suggest," said Jimmy, "would be for everybody to have a little milk chocolate, just to start things off right," and he produced a huge bar of that toothsome confection and passed it around, with an earnest invitation to everybody to "help himself."
"It isn't such a bad idea, at that," admitted Bob, breaking off a chunk that made Jimmy gasp. The others imitated his example, and by the time the bar of chocolate got back to Jimmy it had shrunken so greatly that the last named individual gazed at it mournfully.
"Gee whillikins!" he exclaimed, "you fellows certainly do like chocolate, though, don't you?"
"I do, anyway," said Herb, laughing at the rueful expression on his friend's face. "Have you got any more when that's gone, Doughnuts?"
"No, I haven't. But if I had you can bet I'd hold on to it," said Jimmy. "How do you expect me to work if I don't have anything to keep my strength up?"
"Who said we expected you to work?" demanded Joe. "I'm sure we wouldn't be so foolish, would we, fellows?"
"Oh, I don't know," retorted Jimmy. "You're foolish enough for anything else, so why not that?"
"Well, if you say so, I suppose that settles it," said Joe. "But, anyway, as long as Jimmy was so careless as not to bring more candy along, I suppose we'd better get to work."
"Shall we get the tuning coil started?" suggested Bob. "It will take us quite some time to do that, but we might get the core wound to-night, anyway."
As there was no objection to this, they all went down to the cellar, where Bob had rigged up a work bench and had a pretty complete stock of tools. Jimmy's father had made them a wooden form on which to wind the wire. This core was nothing but a plain cylinder of wood, about three inches in diameter and ten inches long. For Christmas, the year before, Mr. Layton had given Bob a small but accurately made bench lathe, operated by a foot pedal, and Bob mounted the roller between the lathe centers, holding one end in the chuck jaws. Then he produced a narrow roll of stout wrapping paper, such as is used for winding around automobile tires, and a bottle of shellac, together with a small, fine-haired brush.
"First thing," he said, "we want to wind a few layers of shellacked paper on this core. Suppose I turn the core, you let the paper unwind onto it, Joe, and you can shellac the paper as it unrolls, Herb."
"That leaves me with nothing to do but boss the job," said Jimmy, "and I don't see why I can't do that as well lying down as standing up, so here goes," and he stretched out luxuriously on an old sofa. "This must have been put here just for me, I guess," he continued, with a sigh of perfect contentment. "Get busy, you laborers, and flash a little speed."
"We haven't got time to come and throw you off that sofa just now," said Bob. "But as soon as we get through with this job you'll vacate pretty quick. Are you fellows ready to start now?"
"I've been ready for the last half hour," said Joe. "Start that jigger of yours going, and let's see what happens."
Bob put a dab of shellac on one end of the paper to get it started, stuck the end on the wooden core, and then started winding the paper onto it at a slow speed. Joe moved the roll of paper back and forth to wind it smoothly and evenly, while Herb shellacked for all he was worth, giving himself almost as liberal a dose of the sticky gum as he gave the paper. It was not long before the core was neatly wrapped, and Bob stopped his lathe.
"That looks fine," he said, eyeing the job critically. "Now, while that shellac is drying out a bit, let's see if we can't coax Doughnuts to get up off that couch."
All three boys made a dive for their luckless companion, but he was up and off before they could reach him, with a nimbleness that would not have disgraced a jack rabbit.
"No, you don't!" he exclaimed. "I beat you to it. I suppose it makes you feel jealous to see me resting once in a while, instead of slaving my head off as usual. If you Indians had your way I'd be worn to a shadow in no time."
"It's easy to see we don't have our way much, then," laughed Herb."You've got a long way to go before you get in the shadow class, Jim."
"It can't be too far to suit me," responded that youth. "But what I want to know is, is that tuning coil wound yet? Seems to me you take a lot of time to do a simple thing like that."
"You'd better sing small, or first thing you know you'll find yourself in the coal bin," threatened Joe. "How about throwing him in just for luck, fellows?"
"You've got a funny idea of what luck is," said Jimmy. "I never did care much for coal bins. Thank you just the same."
"You're welcome," retorted Joe. Then to Bob: "Do you think we can wind the wire on now, Bob?"
"Why, I guess so," said Bob, testing the shellac with his finger. "It's getting pretty tacky now; so if we wind the wire on right away the shellac will help to hold it in place when it dries."
"Well, start up the old coffee mill, then," said Herb. "If we can get the wire on as slick as we did the paper, it won't be half bad."
But the wire was a more difficult thing to work, as they soon found. It required the greatest care to get the wire to lie smooth and close without any space between coils. More than once they had to unwind several coils and rewind them before they finally got the whole core wound in a satisfactory manner. But at last it was finished, all coils wound smooth and close, and the boys gazed at it with pardonable pride.
"That doesn't look as bad as it might, does it?" said Bob.
"I should say not!" exclaimed Joe. "The last time I was in New York I saw a coil like that in an electrical store window. I didn't know then what it was for, but as far as I can remember, it didn't look much better than this one."
"We probably couldn't have made as good a job of it if Bob hadn't had that lathe," said Herb.
"Well, I don't know," said Bob. "It would have taken us longer, but I think we could have done it about as well in the end. Now that we've got the core wound, we'll have to mount it with a couple of sliding contacts, but I guess we'd better not try to do anything more to-night. It's getting pretty late. And, besides, mother said she'd leave an apple pie and some milk in the ice box, and I'm beginning to feel as though that would taste pretty good."
"Did you really say pie, Bob?" asked Jimmy in a rapturous voice."And apple pie at that? Or was it all only a beautiful dream?"
"There's only one way to find out, and that's to go and see," said Bob. "Last man up gets the smallest piece," and he made a dash for the stairs, closely followed by the others. Poor Jimmy, in spite of a surprising burst of speed on his part, was the last one up, and arrived out of breath, but ready to argue against Bob's dictum.
"Don't you know that if there's a small piece it's up to the host to take it?" he asked Bob, who by that time had secured the pie and was cutting it. "If you were really polite you wouldn't eat any of that pie at all. You'd give all your time to seeing that we had plenty."
"Yes, but I'm not that polite," said Bob. "I think I deserve credit for not waiting till you had all gone home and then eating the whole thing myself. That's probably what you'd do, Doughnuts, if you were in my place."
"I wouldn't either," disclaimed Jimmy indignantly.
"Of course he wouldn't eat it after we'd gone," grinned Herb."And if you coax me real hard, I'll tell you why."
"All right, I'll bite," said Joe. "Why wouldn't Doughnuts eat the pie after we'd gone home?"
"Because he would have eaten it all before we even got here," repliedHerb, with a shout of laughter. "Ask me a harder one next time."
"I suppose you think that's real smart, don't you?" remarked Jimmy sarcastically. "But I don't care what you say, as long as there is pie like this in the world," and he bit off a huge mouthful with an expression of perfect ecstasy on his round countenance.
"It is pretty easy to take," admitted Herb, as he proceeded to dispose of his share in a workmanlike manner. "This is regular angel's food, Bob."
"Yes, it was made especially for me," said Bob, trying to look like an angel, but falling considerably short of the mark. It is hard for any one to look very angelic with a big piece of apple pie in one hand and a glass of milk in the other.
"Suppose you cut out the angel business and hand me over another piece of that pie," suggested Jimmy. "If you're an angel, Bob, I hope to die a horrible death from slow starvation, and I can't say any more than that, can I?"
"You'd better speak nicely to me, or you won't get another piece," threatened Bob, holding a wedge of pie temptingly in Jimmy's direction. "Am I an angel, Doughnuts, or not? Yes—pie. No—no pie."
"Of course you are, Bob, and you know I always loved you." Bob passed him the pie, and Jimmy clutched it securely.
"Thanks, you big hobo," he grinned.
"There's gratitude for you," said Bob, appealing to the others. "He knows the pie is all gone now, so he thinks he can insult me and get away with it."
"So I can," said Jimmy complacently. "You know you could never get along without my advice and help, Bob. You need somebody around you with brains, to make up for Joe and Herb."
"That pie must have gone to your head," said Joe. "We'd better try to get him home where they can take care of him, Herb. He'll probably be telling us he's Napoleon, if we let him get a little crazier."
"I'm going right away, anyway," said Jimmy, hunting back of the door for his cap. "I worked so hard making that tuning coil that I'm all in. I'll need a good night's sleep to set me on my feet again. So long, fellows," and he went away whistling.
The others followed soon after, after agreeing to meet the next afternoon to mount the tuning coil.
As Bob and Joe were on their way home from school the following day they caught sight of Miss Berwick sitting on the porch of the hotel, enjoying the bright spring sunshine. She nodded to them brightly and invited them to come up on the porch. They were quick to accept the invitation, and as they dropped into seats beside her they were glad to note that there was more color in her cheeks than when they had seen her last.
"No need of asking whether you are feeling better," remarked Bob."One can tell that by just looking at you."
"Oh yes," replied Miss Berwick with a smile. "I'll soon be as well as ever, thanks to the good doctoring and nursing I've had."
"It was too bad that the doctor came in just when he did the other day," said Joe. "We were keen to hear the rest of your story about that fellow Cassey. Has anything turned up to tell you where he is and what he is doing?"
"Not a thing," replied the girl, with a tinge of sadness in her tone. "From the moment I paid him that money, I've never laid eyes on him. For some days after he was said to have left for Chicago, I haunted his office, hoping that with every mail there might be a letter either to me or his stenographer explaining the matter and setting it right. I tried to get his Chicago address, but his stenographer said she didn't know it, and I think it likely enough she was telling the truth. I've looked through the records here to see if he had transferred the mortgage, but it still stands in his name, as far as the records go. I have clung to the hope that possibly he had written to me and that the letter had gone astray. But I guess I'm just fooling myself. I'm going to put the whole thing in the hands of a lawyer and have Cassey brought to justice if I can. But I'm afraid it'll be a case of locking the stable door after the horse is stolen."
"Don't get downhearted," urged Bob. "I have an idea that you'll get your money or the mortgage. Slicker rascals than he have been caught, no matter how carefully they covered their tracks. There's usually one little thing they've forgotten that leads to their getting nabbed at last."
"Let's hope so," replied Miss Berwick, but none too confidently. "But now tell me something about yourselves. It isn't fair that my troubles should take up all the conversation."
The boys told her of their radio experiments, and she listened with the keenest interest.
"That reminds me," she said. "I noticed a radio telephone set in this man Cassey's office. His stenographer told me that that was his one recreation."
"You find them everywhere," replied Bob. "They'll soon be a feature in almost every home and business office. But we'll have to go now," he said, as he rose to his feet, while Joe followed his example. "Good afternoon. And don't forget what I said. I feel you'll get your money or you'll get your mortgage."
The radio boys were at Bob's house on the dot, all but Jimmy, who to his great disgust had to do some work for his father, and so could not come.
"I suppose we'll have to try to get along someway without his valuable assistance," said Herb. "When he told me he couldn't get here this afternoon he certainly felt sore about it."
"I guess I know how he feels, all right," said Joe. "It would pretty near break his heart not to be able to work on this radio stuff now. I'm crazy for the time to come when we can pick our first message or music out of the air."
"I guess you're no more anxious for that to happen than we are," saidBob. "Let's go downstairs and see what we can do."
They all made their way to Bob's workroom in the basement, where they found the core well dried and the wire as firmly set on it as the most particular workman could desire.
"Good enough!" exclaimed Bob, examining the core with loving pride. "We'll get this set up in a jiffy, and then we can make the condenser."
Working together, the boys soon had two square blocks sawn out as end pieces, and they centered the core on these and screwed it fast. Then they drilled holes in the two upper corners of the square end pieces to fit two brass rods they had bought at the hardware store. These rods carried each a small sliding spring, or contact, which rubbed along the length of the tuning coil, one on each side. After they had bolted the brass rods securely in place, the coil was ready for use, except that the boys had first to scrape off the insulating enamel in the path of the sliding contacts, so that they could reach the copper coils. A sharp pen knife soon effected this, and the boys found themselves possessed of a neat, substantial tuning coil, at a cost of only a fraction of what it would have been if they had had to buy a coil already made. And in addition they had the satisfaction that comes of a good job well done, which more than compensated them for the labor involved.
"That begins to look like business," exulted Joe. "We'll be puttingMr. Edison out of business pretty soon."
"Yes, it's lucky he can't see that tuning coil," laughed Bob, "he'd be looking up the want ads in the papers, sure."
"Oh, that coil won't be a patch on the condenser we're going to make," declared Herb.
"I know we've got to have a condenser, but I'm blessed if I really understand what it is for," said Joe. "I know the doctor told us about it, but I guess I didn't get a very clear idea of what it was all about."
"I'm not very clear on it either," admitted Bob. "But from what he said and what I've read, it seems to be a sort of equalizer, for the electric current, storing it up when it's strong and giving it out when it's weak. It prevents the current getting too strong at times and burning something out."
"That's the way I understood it, too," said Herb. "And Dr. Dale said that in the larger sets they have what they call a variable condenser, so that they can get more or less damping action according to the strength of the incoming current waves."
"I guess I get the idea," said Joe. "But it's a pretty complicated thing when you first tackle it, isn't it?"
"Yes, but it's just like almost anything else, probably—it's easy when you know how," said Bob.
"It tells here how to make the condenser," said Herb, who had been looking over an instruction book that the boys had bought. "But it says the best thing to use for the plates is tinfoil. Now, where are we going to get the tinfoil from, I'd like to know!"
"If you want to know real badly, I'll tell you," said Bob. "Right out of that box over in the corner. Just wait a minute and I'll show you."
Bob stepped swiftly over to the box in question and produced a big ball of tinfoil, composed of separate sheets tightly packed together.
"When I was a kid I used to collect this stuff and sell it to the junkman," he said. "This ball never got big enough for that, and I forgot all about it until a few days ago when I happened to come across it and thought that it would be just the thing for us to use now. We can easily peel off all the sheets we need, I guess. Some of them are damaged, but there are enough whole ones to do our trick."
"Gee, that's fine!" said Joe. "Pry off some, Bob, and let's see if it will serve."
With his knife Bob pried away at likely looking places, and soon had several large sheets off. These, when smoothed out, looked good enough for any purpose.
"How many does the book say we'll need, Herb?" asked Bob.
"It says eight or ten, each one about four inches square," answeredHerb. "And it says they have to be separated by paraffined paper.How are we going to get hold of some of that?"
"Paraffine wax is what they use to seal fruit jars," said Joe."We ought to be able to get some of that easy enough."
"Mother had a big cake of it last summer!" cried Bob. "Maybe she has some of it left. Wait here and I'll ask her," and he dashed up the stairs three steps at a time.
In a few minutes he returned, having obtained not only the wax but a small sauce pan in which to melt it.
"I thought I'd bring this along, so as to have it," he said; "but it's so near supper time that I don't think we'll have a chance to do much more—right now, anyway. What do you say if we knock off now and do some more work this evening after supper?"
"Gee, I never thought it was that late," said Herb. "If Jimmy had been here, I suppose he would have been talking about supper for the last hour or so, and we'd have known what time it was."
"Well, I'll be here for one," said Joe, "and I'll stop at Jimmy's house on the way home and tell him to get around, too."
"I'll come too," said Herb. "And, Joe, while you're about it, tell Jimmy to be sure and bring another chunk of chocolate, only bigger than the one he had last night."
"I'll be sure to mention that," grinned Joe. "But I don't think he'll do it, just the same."
Bob went upstairs with them, and Herb and Joe went away together, after promising to come back as soon after supper as possible. After they had gone, Bob could not resist the temptation to go down and gaze with an approving eye on the shiny new tuner they had made, and dream of the many wonderful sounds that would soon come drifting in through that gleaming bit of mechanism.
The Laytons had hardly finished supper that evening before Jimmy's cheery whistle was heard outside, and Bob jumped up to let him in.
"Come in, old timer," Bob called to him. "Where's the rest of the bunch?"
"Oh, I guess they'll be along pretty soon," said Jimmy. "I guess I'm a bit early, but I was so anxious to get around that I couldn't wait to come at a respectable time. I suppose I should be boning down for to-morrow's lessons, but I'd never be able to get my mind on them until we get our outfit going."
"I feel the same way," said Bob. "But at the rate we're going now it won't be very long."
"Joe told me you finished the tuning coil this afternoon," said Jimmy. "I don't understand how you ever did it without my being here to tell you how, though."
"Oh, we managed to patch it up some way," laughed Bob. "Come on down and look at it, and see if it's good enough to suit you."
"Lead me to it," said Jimmy, and the two boys went downstairs.
"Say, that's a pippin," said Jimmy, as Bob switched on the light and he caught sight of the finished tuner. "I couldn't have done it better myself. You've certainly made a first class job of it."
"We thought it wasn't so bad," admitted Bob modestly. "Especially when one stops to think that you weren't here to give us the benefit of your advice."
"That's the most surprising thing about it," said Jimmy. "But now that I'm here to-night, why, we can go right ahead and get a lot done. Seems to me it must be about time for Joe and Herb to show up."
As though in answer to this thought, they heard a tuneful duet, and a moment later came a vigorous ring on the doorbell.
"You go up and let them in, will you, Doughnuts?" said Bob. "I want to melt this paraffine and get things started right away."
"Sure I will!" And Jimmy hastened off, returning a few minutes later with the missing members of the quartette.
"It's about time you got here," said Jimmy. "Bob and I were wondering if we'd have to do all the work by our lonesome, as usual."
"Gee, you don't know what work means," returned Joe scornfully. "Last evening you pretty near wore a hole in that old couch resting on it, and this afternoon you were enjoying yourself, helping your father instead of coming here and doing a little honest work for a change."
"Oh, yes, I enjoyed myself a lot!" exclaimed Jimmy. "I sawed enough one inch planks this afternoon to make either one of you loafers cry for help! And then you talk about my having enjoyed myself!"
"Well, if you worked so hard, maybe your dad gave you enough money for it to buy a respectable piece of chocolate with instead of that measly little sample you brought around last night," said Herb.
"You're right he did, and here it is," said Jimmy. And from under his coat he produced an immense slab of delicious looking chocolate that must have weighed all of a pound.
The shout that went up from his three friends might well have startled the family upstairs.
"Jimmy, we've got to hand it to you; you're a good sport," cried Bob, laughing. "I never really thought you'd ever bring any more, after the way we ate what you had last night."
"I'm glad that you admit that you ate more than your share," said Jimmy, severely. "But I thought I'd bring enough around to-night, hoping there might be a little piece left over for me."
"I think that since he's so generous we ought to let him have a real big piece," said Joe.
"Yes," grinned Herb. "But remember that chocolate candy is about the worst thing a fat person can eat. It might be better for Doughnuts, after all, if we took this away from him right away. I'd rather get sick myself eating it than see him get any fatter."
"Say, how do you get that way?" demanded Jimmy in an aggrieved tone. "I've never been able yet to get hold of enough candy to make me too fat, and if I should, I'm the one that ought to worry about it."
"It looks to me as though there's enough there for all of us for a week," said Bob. "Let's break it up and put it in this box over here, and then anybody who wants any can help himself."
"That's fair enough," said Jimmy. "But I'll bet anything it won't last this bunch any week. If you were all like me it might, but I suppose that's too much to ask."
"I don't think that's asking very much, do you, fellows?" said Joe, with an exasperating grin.
"Wow!" exclaimed Herb, laughing. "That has all the appearance of a dirty dig, Joe. If I were you I wouldn't let him have a scrap of that chocolate, Jimmy."
"I suppose I shouldn't. I ought to let him chew on a piece of that paraffine that Bob's melting. He's so foolish sometimes that I don't think he'd ever know the difference."
"Well, we can't all of us be wise," said Joe. "But I've got a hunch that I'd rather have the chocolate, so here goes," and he helped himself to a generous piece. "When are you going to have that wax cooked good and tender, Bob?"
"Suppose you leave the wax to me, and you get busy cutting out some squares of tinfoil and paper," suggested Bob. "This wax will be done a long time before you're ready for it."
"All right, I'll do it," said Joe. "I don't suppose there's anybody in the world can beat me at cutting out squares of paper. There may be some things I can't do, but I sure shine at that."
"Yes, I guess you can do that all right," admitted Bob. "But I can't be real sure until you give us a demonstration."
"Here goes, then," replied Joe. "How big do they want to be?"
"Four inches square, the book says, and I suppose the man that wrote it knew what he was talking about," said Bob. "That will do to start on, anyway."
Joe carefully measured a square of paper to the required dimensions, and then used it as a pattern in cutting out the others. He soon had a number of neat squares ready, which he handed to Bob, who immersed them in the melted wax.
While the paper was soaking this up, Joe cut out a corresponding number of tinfoil squares, leaving a projecting tongue on each one to serve as a terminal.
"You're an expert at carpenter work, Doughnuts," said Bob. "If you feel as ambitious as usual you can cut a couple of squares out of that oak plank over in the corner. We'll need them for end pieces to this condenser."
"Oh, that will be lots of fun," said Jimmy, who had been casting longing glances toward the old sofa. "I'd a good deal rather saw some more wood than take it easy. How big shall I make them?"
"About five inches each way, I should say," answered Bob, reflectively. "That will give us room to drill holes in each corner to put the clamping bolts through. In that drawer under the table you'll find some drills. I think a three-sixteenth drill ought to be all right. There are four brass bolts in that bag on the table, and you can measure them and see what size drill you'll need. I bought them for three-sixteenth, anyway."
"You go ahead and cut out the pieces, Jimmy," said Herb. "I'll do the real hard work, like measuring the bolts and picking out the drill. Then when you get the end pieces cut out, the drill will be all ready for you to put the holes through."
Jimmy gave him a withering glance, but rolled up his sleeves and set to work. Once started he made the sawdust fly, and before very long had two stout looking pieces of solid oak cut out.
"Where's your drill, Herb?" he inquired then. "Don't tell me you haven't got that ready yet!"
"All ready and waiting," was the reply, and Herb handed over the required tool. "Go to it, and see that you make a first class job of it."
Clamping both pieces of wood in the vise, Jimmy ran the sharp hand drill through in a workmanlike manner, and then viewed his work with pardonable pride.
"There you are," he said. "If this condenser doesn't condense, it won't be because it hasn't got two good end pieces, anyway."
"It's funny that you should have to condense electricity," said Herb, with a twinkle in his eye. "It's just the same as milk, isn't it?"
"Yes, it isn't," said Bob. "Another wise remark like that, and you'll find yourself out in the wide, wide world, young fellow."
"I should say so," said Joe. "That was a fierce one, Herb."
"Well, I'll promise to be good," returned Herb. "But I still think that was a pretty fine joke, only you fellows haven't got enough sense of humor to appreciate it."
"We've got sense enough not to appreciate it, anyway," said Jimmy. "It's weakened me so that I'll have to have another piece of chocolate to brace me up," and he suited the action to the word.
"When you've all had all the candy you want, we can go ahead and make this condenser," said Bob. "Don't let me hurry you, though."
"No chance of your hurrying me," replied Jimmy. "I'm so all in now I can hardly move. But Herb and Joe will do anything you want them to. They've been taking it easy, right along, so they shouldn't mind working a little now."
"Jimmy has done more work to-night than I've seen him do altogether in the last six months," said Joe. "So we'd better let him rest himself awhile now. He's apt to get sick if we don't."
"Well, I guess this paper has soaked up all the wax it's going to, so we can go ahead with the rest of it," said Bob, as he started fishing squares of impregnated paper out of the saucepan.
He laid one sheet on one of the blocks that Jimmy had cut out, and on top of that laid a sheet of tinfoil, then another sheet of paper and one of tinfoil, alternating in this way until he had a number of sheets lined up. The little tabs or projections on each sheet of tinfoil he arranged in opposite directions, so that half of them could be attached to a wire on one side of the condenser and half to a wire on the other side. Then he placed the other wooden block on top of the whole thing, passed the four screws through, one at each corner, and tightened them up evenly. This squeezed all superfluous paraffine from between the plates, and held the whole assembly very securely and neatly.
"That looks fine so far," said Jimmy, critically. "But how do you mean to connect up all those tabs on the plates?"
"I guess about the only way will be to solder them," replied Bob. "I used to have a soldering iron around here somewhere." He rummaged in the big drawer under the bench and soon produced the iron, which he then proceeded to heat over a gas flame.
"While that iron's heating, I might as well follow Jimmy's example and rest," said Bob, throwing himself down on the sofa. "I've been thinking we haven't heard much lately of Buck Looker or any of his gang. Has anybody heard what he's up to now?"
"I saw him only this afternoon," said Joe. "He had Lutz and Mooney with him, of course, and they all looked at me as though they'd like nothing better than to heave a brick at me when I wasn't looking. Buck asked me how the wireless 'phone was coming along, and when I told him that we had our aerial up and expected to be receiving stuff within a few days, he seemed surprised."
"What did he say?" asked Herb.
"Oh, he just predicted that we'd never get it working, and as I didn't feel like arguing with him, I started on. I hadn't gone far though when that little sneak, Terry, yelled after me: 'Hey, Atwood, don't forget that all that goes up must come down.' The others snickered, and I had half a mind to go back and make him tell me what he meant. But then I thought he wasn't worth bothering with, and I went on home. What do you suppose he meant, anyway?"
Bob thought a moment before replying.
"You say you told him that we had our aerial up?" he asked, at length.
"Yes, I did tell him that."
"Well, it would be just like them to try to pull down our wires, if they thought they could get away with it. Maybe that's what Terry meant about 'all that goes up must come down.' What do you think?"
"Say!" exclaimed Joe, leaping to his feet, "I'll bet that was just what he meant, the little sneak. But he'd never have nerve enough to try anything like that himself."
"Maybe not. But I think Buck Looker might," said Bob. "If he does,I only hope I'll have the luck to catch him at it."
"Those fellows need a good licking, and it's up to us to give it to them," said Herb indignantly. "I'm game to do my share any time."
"Oh, well, it may have been just some nonsense of Terry's. But we'd better be on our guard, anyway," said Bob, rising to get the soldering iron. "Whew! but this is hot now, all right. I'll let it cool a bit, and get the condenser ready for soldering."