The Radio Boys' First Wireless Part 9

"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 Ca.s.sey. 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 Ca.s.sey 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 Ca.s.sey'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."

CHAPTER XI

CLEVER THINKING

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 a.s.sistance," 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," said Bob. "Let's go downstairs and see what we can do."

They all made their way to Bob's workroom in the bas.e.m.e.nt, 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 bra.s.s 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 bra.s.s rods securely in place, the coil was ready for use, except that the boys had first to sc.r.a.pe 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 putting Mr. 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," answered Herb. "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.