ather.

"I'm getting there, ain't I?" snarled the dutiful son. "Well, Roy, you're
in pretty tight straits. We can foreclose on that mortgage any day we
want to. But we won't do it if you give us a square deal. Forget the
government. Make a deal with us consigning to me the right to manufacture
and exhibit those aeroplanes and I'll set aside that mortgage and give
you a thousand dollars to boot."

"And suppose I won't accept that offer?" asked Roy, slowly.

"Then we shall have to go ahead and foreclose. We want that land anyhow,
but I am even more anxious to set up my son in a paying business,"
exclaimed old Harding. "Our offer is a fair one. It amounts to giving you
six thousand dollars for a thing of canvas, wire and clockwork."

"Rather more than that, sir," said Roy, in a steady voice, although he
was inwardly blazing.

"Well, what do you say?" asked Fanning, eagerly. "We'll draw up the
papers right now if you say so."

But Roy was learning fast. He knew that the offer just made him had been
an inadequate one.

"I'd like to have time to think it over," he said, hesitatingly.

"Take all the time you want," said old Harding, with a wave of his
shrivelled, claw-like hand.

But Fanning did not seem so pleased. It flashed across his mind that Roy
wanted to consult with Peggy, and somehow Fanning felt that in that case
his offer would meet with refusal. He therefore resolved to put in a
heavy blow.

"But I want to start at once," he said. "I can't wait any length of time.
When you think that if you don't accept my offer you'll all be without a
roof over your heads I should think that for the sake of your sister and
your aunt you'd accept."

"They'll never be in that position while I can work," rejoined Roy, with
a flushed face. He rose and picked up his hat. Somehow he felt that he
could not stand Fanning very many minutes more.

"Yes, very fine talk, but what can you do?" snarled Simon Harding.

CHAPTER IV.

JESS AND ROY.

Roy flung back some sort of answer and hastened out of the office. As he
made his way up the sunny street outside, however, he could not get out
of his mind the words of Simon Harding. After all, they were true; "what
could he do?" Mentally, as he walked along, Roy ran over the list of his
accomplishments. He came to the conclusion that aeroplane building and
flying was where his greatest strength lay. But how was he to proceed to
make money with his knowledge?

At this poin