etary smiled at the youth.

"No. I'm through for to-day," replied Tom. "I'm glad to see you. I
thought at first it was my chum, Ned Newton. He generally runs over in
the evening."

"Our society, as I wrote you, Mr. Swift, is planning to hold a very
large and important aviation meet at Eagle Park, which is a suburb of
Westville, New York State. We expect to have all the prominent
'bird-men' there, to compete for prizes, and your name was mentioned. I
wrote to you, as you doubtless recall, asking if you did not care to
enter."

"And I think I wrote you that my big aeroplane-dirigible, the Red
Cloud, was destroyed in Alaska, during a recent trip we made to the
caves of ice there, after gold," replied Tom.

"Yes, you did," admitted Mr. Gunmore, "and while our committee was very
sorry to hear that, we hoped you might have some other air craft that
you could enter at our meet. We want to make it as complete as
possible, and we all feel that it would not be so unless we had a Swift
aeroplane there."

"It's very kind of you to say so," remarked Tom, "but since my big
craft was destroyed I really have nothing I could enter."

"Haven't you an aeroplane of any kind? I made this trip especially to
get you to enter. Haven't you anything in which you could compete for
the prizes? There are several to be offered, some for distance flights,
some for altitude, and the largest, ten thousand dollars, for the
speediest craft. Ten thousand dollars is the grand prize, to be awarded
for the quickest flight on record."

"I surely would like to try for that," said Tim, "but the only craft I
have is a small monoplane, the Butterfly, I call it, and while it is
very speedy, there have been such advances made in aeroplane
construction since I made mine that I fear I would be distanced if I
raced in her. And I wouldn't like that."

"No," agreed Mr. Gunmore. "I suppose not. Still, I do wish we could
induce you to enter. I don't mind telling you that we consider you a
drawing-card. Can't we induce you, some way?"

"I'm afraid not. I haven't any machine which--"

"Look here!" exclaimed the secretary eagerly. "Why can't you build a
special aeroplane to enter in the next meet? You'll have plenty of
time, as it doesn't come off for three months yet. We are only making
the preliminary arrangements. It is now June, and the meet is scheduled
for early in September. Couldn't you build a new and speedy aeroplane
in that time?"

Eagerly Mr. Gunmo