ir
original plan, but Gus, ever hopeful, believed that something might turn
up to carry out their first ideas.

The afternoon that they had everything in normal condition again, Mr.
Hooper came down to see them; he knew nothing of the tampering with the
work, but it became evident at once that his nephew had slyly and
forcibly put it into his head that amateur radio construction was
largely newspaper bunk, without any real foundation of fact. Thad may
have had some new scheme, but at any rate the unlettered old man would
swallow pretty nearly everything Thad said, even though he often
repudiated Thad's acts. Again Mr. Hooper, Bill and Gus got on the
subject of radio and the old gentleman repeated his convictions:

"I ain't sayin' you boys can't do wonders, an' I'm fer you all the time,
but I'm not goin' t' b'lieve you kin do what's pretty nigh out o'
reason. Listen to me, now, fer a minute: If you fellers kin rig up a
machine to fetch old man Eddy's son's talk right here about two hundred
an' fifty mile, I'll hand out to each o' you a good hundred dollars;
yes, b'jinks. I'll make it a couple a hun--"

"No, Mr. Hooper, we value your friendship altogether too much to take
your money and that's too much like a wager, anyway." Bill was most
earnest. "But you must take our word for it that it can be done."

"Fetch old man Eddy's son's voice--!"

"Just that exactly--similar things have been done a-plenty. People are
talking into the radio broadcasters and their voices are heard
distinctly thousands of miles. But, Mr. Hooper, you wouldn't know Mr.
Edison's voice if you heard it, would you?"

"N--no, can't say as how I would--but listen here. I do know a feller
what works with him--they say he's close to the ol' man. Bill Medders.
Knowed Bill when he was a little cack, knee-high to a grasshopper. They
say he wrote a book about Eddy's son. I'd know Bill Medder's voice if I
heard it in a b'iler factory."

Bill Brown could hardly repress a smile. "I guess you must mean William
H. Meadowcroft. His 'Boys' Life of Edison' sure is a dandy book. I liked
it best of all. Sometimes no one can see Mr. Edison for weeks at a time,
when he's buried in one of his 'world-beaters.' But I reckon we can let
you hear Mr. Meadowcroft's voice. He wrote me a pippin of a letter once
about the Chief."

"All righty. I'll take Medders's. I know Bill, an' you can't fool me on
that voice."

"Mr. Hooper, I'll tell you what," said the all-practical