ph!"

The financier drummed reflectively on the arm of his chair.

"How did you happen to go into that?" he asked presently.

"I have been studying it at school. My father is letting me go through
the high school--at least he hopes to let me finish my course there. I
have been two years already. That is why I am working during the
summer."

"I see. And so you have been taking up electricity at school, eh?"

"Yes, sir. I really am taking a business course. The science work in
the laboratory is an extra that I just run in because I like it. My
father wanted me to fit myself for business. He thought it would be
better for me," explained Ted.

"But you prefer the science?"

"I am afraid I do, sir," smiled Ted, with ingratiating honesty. "But I
don't mean to let it interfere with my regular work. I try to remember
it is only a side issue."

Mr. Clarence Fernald did not answer and during his interval of silence
Ted fell to speculating on what he was thinking. Probably the magnate
was disapproving of his still going to school and was saying to himself
how much better it would have been had he been put into the mill and
trained up there instead of having his head stuffed with stenography
and electrical knowledge.

"What did you do in electricity?" the elder man asked at length.

"Oh, I fussed around some with telephones, wireless, and telegraph
instruments."

Mr. Fernald smiled.

"Did you get where you could take messages?" inquired he with real
interest.

"By telegraph?"

The financier nodded.

"I did a little at it," replied Ted. "Of course I was slow."

"And what about wireless?"

"I got on better with that. I rigged up a small receiving station at
home but when the war came I had to take it down."

"So that outfit was yours, was it?" commented Mr. Fernald. "I noticed
it one day when I was in the village. What luck did you have with it?"

"Oh, I contrived to pick up messages within a short radius. My outfit
wasn't very powerful."

"I suppose not. And the telephone?"

They saw an eager light leap into the lad's eyes.

"I've worked more at that than anything else," replied he. "You see one
of the instruments at the school gave out and they set me to tinkering
at it. In that way I got tremendously interested in it. Afterward some
of us fellows did some experimenting and managed to concoct a crude one
in the laboratory. It wasn't much of a telephone but we finally got it
to work."

"They tell me y