That is
enough to break the platinum market completely."

"That's exactly what I'm going to do," returned Seaton, with a gleam in
his gray eyes. "I'm going to burst this unjustifiable fad for platinum
jewelry so wide open that it'll never recover, and make platinum again
available for its proper uses, in laboratories and in the industries.

"You know yourself," he rushed on hotly, "that the only reason platinum
is used at all for jewelry is that it is expensive. It isn't nearly so
handsome as either gold or silver, and if it wasn't the most costly
common metal we have, the jewelry-wearing crowd wouldn't touch it with a
ten-foot pole. Useless as an ornament, it is the one absolutely
indispensable laboratory metal, and literally hundreds of laboratories
that need it can't have it because over half the world's supply is tied
up in jeweler's windows and in useless baubles. Then, too, it is the
best thing known for contact points in electrical machinery. When the
Government and all the scientific societies were abjectly begging the
jewelers to let loose a little of it they refused--they were selling it
to profiteering spendthrifts at a hundred and fifty dollars an ounce.
The condition isn't much better right now; it's a vicious circle. As
long as the price stays high it will be used for jewelry, and as long as
it is used for jewelry the price will stay high, and scientists will
have to fight the jewelers for what little they get."

"While somewhat exaggerated, that is about the way matters stand. I will
admit that I, too, am rather bitter on the subject," said Crane.

"Bitter? Of course you're bitter. Everybody is who knows anything about
science and who has a brain in his head. Anybody who claims to be a
scientist and yet stands for any of his folks buying platinum jewelry
ought to be shot. But they'll get theirs as soon as we get back. They
wouldn't let go of it before, they had too good a thing, but they'll let
go now, and get their fingers burned besides. I'm going to dump this
whole shipment at fifty cents a pound, and we'll take mighty good care
that jewelers don't corner the supply."

"I'm with you, Dick, as usual."

Soon the storage room was filled to the ceiling with closely-stacked
ingots of the precious metal, and the Skylark was driven back to the
landing dock. She alighted beside Dunark's vessel, the _Kondal_, whose
gorgeously-decorated crew of high officers sprang to attention as the
four men stepped out.