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178 he had struck a situation with the H. Y. Smith Co., and expected to remain there for some time. Of his private business, he said nothing, not that he fancied Walter Robinson would fail to keep his secret, but because such had been Belden Brice's orders, which the young electrician intended to carry out without deviation.

"I know something of that company," said Walter Robinson. "They manufacture their batteries under a patent which was granted to a distant relative of mine, Wilbur Bliss."

"Is that so?" exclaimed Franklin, for he remembered that this was the very patent in which Belden Brice was interested.

"Yes. Poor Wilbur went crazy sometime after the patent was granted. He sold it for a nice sum of money, and that got him in the idea that he could make any number of inventions and patent them. He spent all of his money in experimenting, and finally became a regular beggar and disappeared, no one knew where."

"They never found out what became of him?"

"No. Some said he went east, while others think he traveled west. I, being only a distant relative was not much interested. There was another feature about it, though, which made the case worse than ordinary."

"And what was that?"

"Wilbur was a widower and had one child, a