Page:Arthur Stringer - Gun Runner.djvu/56

 "Queer, isn't it, getting words on a tape that way, four hundred miles off?" said the stranger. He scratched his huge head in a sort of mute astonishment, as he surveyed the cabinful of apparatus.

"We don't use a tape," the other corrected, waving a preoccupied hand toward the inscription on the condenser case. "We're De Forest! And we don't claim to talk around the world yet."

The stranger was peering contentedly and aimlessly about the crowded little cabin. "Where the devil d'you suppose that cruiser was off to?" he next inquired.

"That's what I've been trying to find out."

"They all carry wireless?" asked the other as he sent an exhalation of pungent cigar smoke ceilingward.

"Yes; but they're not aching to talk just yet. Wait till they've been lying down there in the heat for three months. They'll be calling all night, just for the sake of seeing something doing with a coherer again. They'll kai-tow to a coal-tug, just to pick up a scrap of outside news."

The stranger, who seemed well satisfied with what he had learned, remained silent for a moment or two.