fers being declined, he felt that it was
useless to insist further.

He remounted his motor-cycle, and rode off, the last view he had of the
trio being one where they were at the edge of the brook, trying to
remove the worst traces of the black fluid. As Tom turned around for a
final glimpse, Andy shook his fist at him, and called out something.

"I guess Andy'll have it in for me," mused Tom. "Well, I can't help it.
I owed him something on account, but I didn't figure on paying it in
just this way," and he thought of the time the bully had locked him in
the ballast tanks of the submarine, thereby nearly smothering him to
death.

That night Andy Foger told his father what had happened, for Mr. Foger
inquired the reason for the black stains on his son's face and hands.
But Andy did not give the true version. He said Tom had purposely
thrown the bottle of blacking at him.

"So that's the kind of a lad Tom Swift is, eh?" remarked Andy's father.
"Well, Andy, I think you will soon have a chance to get even with him."

"How, pop?"

"I can't tell you now, but I have a plan for making Tom sorry he ever
did anything to you, and I will also pay back some old scores to Mr.
Swift and Mr. Damon. I'll ruin their bank for them, that's what I'll
do."

"Ruin their bank, pop? How?"

"You wait and see. The Swift crowd will get off their high horse soon,
or I'm mistaken. My plans are nearly completed, but I can't tell you
about them. I'll ruin Mr. Swift, though, that's what I'll do," and Mr.
Foger shook his head determinedly.

Tom was soon at his home, and Mrs. Baggert, hearing the noise of his
machine, as it entered the front yard, came to the side door.

"Where's my blacking?" she asked, as our hero dismounted and untied the
bundle of steel tubes he had purchased.

"I--I used it," he answered, laughing.

"Tom Swift! You don't mean to say you took my stove polish to use in
your battery, do you?"

"No, I used it to polish off Andy Foger and some of his cronies," and
the young inventor told, with much gusto, what had happened. Mrs.
Baggert could not help joining in the laugh, and when Tom offered to
ride back and purchase some more of the polish for her, she said it did
not matter, as she could wait until the next day.

The lad was soon busy in his machine shop, making several larger cells
for the new storage battery. He wanted to give it a more severe test.
He worked for several days on this, and when he had one unit of c