TESTS

"I suppose now we'll all get blown up, or poisoned, or something," Bill
said to Tony, after telling of the eclipse of Luigi Malatesta.

"Oh, no; the Malatesta are foemen worthy of our steel, to agree by an
English poet; is it not?"

"'Foeman worthy of a steal,' I guess you mean," laughed Gus.

"Yes, that's more like it. I wouldn't trust that pig-faced villain
across a ten-acre lot with a ten-cent piece!" declared Bill.

"The soul of honor doesn't dwell in a husky guy who'd strike a cripple,"
said Gus. "And I bet a cow he's going to stir up more trouble around
here before he quits maneuvering."

Tony made no reply, but stood for a long time, gazing at the floor.
Presently only the sound of tools and machines was heard in the shop.

It is not probable that Luigi told of the precise outcome of his clash
with Bill and Gus, though he may have said enough to influence sophomore
sentiment against Bill's standing in the school. At any rate, the
feeling grew in strength and spread until it became a subject of comment
among freshmen and seniors who were inclined to sympathize with the
brainy and keen-witted lame boy. At least he had many friends, both high
and low, and most of the teachers admired him openly.

So far the sentiment had been rather more doubtful and erratic than
determined. There had been nothing to warrant the assumption that Bill
thought himself more intelligent than the sophomores, or members of his
own class. His radio knowledge was somewhat a thing apart and in that he
shared with the less obtrusive Gus.

And then the lightning struck, suddenly and hard. Once each week an
outsider from the engineering department of some big industrial plant,
or large university, lectured to the entire student body of the
Marshallton Tech in the assembly-room, and there were some of these
talkers who got much pleasure out of it. Not only was it interesting to
hold forth to a lot of eager, responsive boys on subjects that elicited
their curiosity, as the building of great dams and bridges, the
tunneling under mountains, the erection of mighty machines, but it was
also diverting to hear their various comments which also led to a
comparative estimate of their understanding.

Davidson, chief mechanical engineer of a great mill building
corporation, was especially interested in the personal equation
concerning the students, particularly after Bill Brown bad asked him a
lot of questions, some of which he had re