CHAPTER XVIII--IN THE WIRELESS ROOM

"SAY, Bob," said Joe, as the four radio boys were walking briskly in the direction of the wireless station the following morning, "we must get Mr. Harvey to give us lessons in sending. That must be half the fun of radiophony, and we might as well do all there is to do. What do you say?"

"I think you're dead right," said Bob heartily. "We'll speak to him about it to-day, and I guess he'll show us how all right. In fact, he offered to do that very thing the first time we were there, if you remember."

"I know he did," said Joe. "And I'm going to remind him of it as soon as I get a chance."

The chance was not long in coming, for that was one of the first things Mr. Harvey spoke of after their arrival at the station.

"You fellows ought to practice up on receiving and sending," he said. "You can't really claim to be full-fledged radio fans until you can do that."

"That's just what we were speaking of on our way here," said Bob. "If it wouldn't be asking too much of you, we'd like nothing better than to have you show us how."

"Well, of course, it doesn't take very long to learn the international code, and after that it's chiefly a matter of practice," said the radio man. "I have a practice sending set here now, and if you like I'll give you your first lesson."

The boys were only too glad to take advantage of this friendly offer. Harvey had a simple telegraph key, connected up to a buzzer and a couple of dry cells. The buzzer was tuned to give a sound very much like an actual buzz in an ear-phone. In addition he had a metal plate on which all the letters of the alphabet were represented by raised surfaces, a short surface for a dot, and a long one for a dash. The low spaces in between were insulated with enamel. In this way, if one wire was attached to the brass plate and the other brushed over the raised contact surfaces, each letter would be reproduced in the buzzer with the proper dots and dashes.

The boys found this device a big help, as they could memorize the proper dots and dashes for each letter, and then by moving the wire along the plate could hear the letter in the buzzer just as it should sound.

"But with this thing, it seems to me you don't need to take the trouble to memorize the code," said Herb. "Why, I could send a message with it right now."

"You could, but it would be a mighty slow one," replied Brandon Harvey. "That thing is useful to a beginner, but it wouldn't work out very well for actual sending. It's too clumsy."

"Yes, I suppose that's so," admitted Herb.

"You fellows can take that along with you when you go," said the radio man. "You can dope out the code from that, but you'll need a key to practice with, too. If you like, I'll lend you this whole practice set until you get a chance to buy one yourselves."

"You bet we'll take it, and many thanks!" exclaimed Bob. "We should have brought something of the kind down with us, but we didn't, so your set will be just the thing for us."

"It's been some time since I've had any use for it," said Harvey. "But I came across it the other day, and it occurred to me that maybe you fellows could use it, as you told me the first time you were here that you intended to take up sending."

"It was mighty nice of you to think of us," said Joe, his face beaming.

"Oh, well, we radio fans have to stick together," returned Harvey, with a smile. "There's some extra head sets lying around here somewhere, and, if you like, you can listen in on some of the messages coming in. Things were pretty lively just before you fellows came in."

The boys lost no time in taking advantage of this offer, and were soon absorbed in listening to the reports of shipping, weather conditions, and occasional snatches of conversation that came drifting in over the antenna. Harvey's pencil was busy as he jotted down reports and memoranda. The boys felt that they were in intimate touch with the whole wide world, and the morning flew by so fast that they were all astonished when Harvey announced that it was lunch time.

"Say, but you certainly have an interesting job, Mr. Harvey," said Bob. "I only wish I were a regular radio man, too."

"So do I," said Joe. "It's about the most fascinating work I can think of."

"You might not like it so much if you were doing it every day," said Brandon Harvey. "But it's a big field, and getting bigger every day, so maybe a few years from now you may join the brotherhood. If you ever do, why, all the experience you're getting now will come in mighty handy."

"Yes, but I know something else that might come in pretty handy, too," put in Jimmy, "and that's a little lunch. I think we'd better make tracks toward home mighty soon."

"Nothing doing!" protested Harvey. "You're going to stay here and have lunch with me. I can't give you much, but it will probably enable you to totter along until this evening, anyway."

The boys protested against putting the radio man to so much trouble, but he would not take no for an answer, so they allowed themselves to be persuaded, gladly enough, in truth.

It did not take the radio man long to prepare a simple but nourishing meal, all the cooking being done on an electric stove he had rigged up himself. While they ate they talked, and Brandon Harvey told them something about himself. It seemed that he had formerly been an accountant, having taken up radio as a hobby at first, but then, finding himself deeply interested in it, had resolved to make it his life work.

"I still do a little at my old trade, though," Harvey told them. "I'm treasurer of the Ocean Point Building and Loan Association, and that sometimes keeps me pretty busy in the evenings after I'm off duty here."

"I should think it would," commented Bob. "What do you have to do, anyway?"

"Oh, I keep the books straightened out, and occasionally I make collections of cash," answered Harvey. "I'll probably get knocked on the head sometime when I'm carrying the money around with me. I always feel rather uneasy when I have any large sum about, there seem to be so many holdups these days."

"Have you a good safe place here to keep the money?" asked Joe.

"Yes, fairly safe," responded Harvey. "I put it in the Company's safe here, and I don't suppose anybody would bother about it. But just the same, I don't leave it here unless I simply haven't had time to deposit it in the bank."

The talk drifted into other channels, and the boys thought little more of what he had told them at that time. After lunch they practiced sending with the buzzer set, and got so that they could recognize some of the letters when they were sent very slowly.

"Huh," said Jimmy, elated at his success in making out two letters in succession, "I'll be sending and receiving thirty words a minute in a little while."

"How little?" grinned Bob.

"Just about a hundred years or so," put in Herb, before Jimmy could answer.

"Hundred nothing!" said Jimmy indignantly. "Don't think because it will take you that long that I'll be just as slow. I'm going to show you some speed."

"Go on!" chaffed Herb. "Who ever heard of anybody as fat as you showing speed? You don't know what that word means."

"Just the same, I haven't seen you read _any_ words yet," retorted Jimmy. "About the only one you know is E, and that's because it's only one dot."

"Well, I'll know the whole blamed thing pretty soon," said Herb. "You see if I don't."

"I've no doubt you'll all be experts in a little while," laughed Harvey. "'Practice makes perfect' in that as in most other things."

The boys remained at the big station until late in the afternoon, and then, with many thanks to their friend for his assistance, they started back home.

"Mr. Harvey is one of the finest men I've ever met," said Bob, as they walked briskly along. "He and his cousin are a good deal alike. They both know a lot, and they're both willing to help other people understand the things they're interested in."

"Yes, we couldn't have made a better friend," said Joe. "I only hope we have the chance to do something for him some day. I feel as though I'd learned a lot about radio just since we came to Ocean Point."

Jimmy and Herb warmly indorsed this statement, and had the radio man been able to hear them, he would probably have felt fully repaid for his efforts in their behalf.

He, for his part, felt indebted to the boys. Their eager enthusiasm had stirred him deeply, and their laughter and good fellowship had come like a fresh breeze into the routine of his daily life. He was still young enough himself to feel in perfect touch with them, and he welcomed their coming and regretted their departure.

He sat for some time musing, with a smile on his lips after they had left him. Then the conversation he had with them about the money he held in trust recurred to him, and he stepped over to the safe, took out the funds and counted them.

He gave a whistle of surprise when he realized how much had accumulated.

"Too much to have on hand at one time," he said to himself, as he closed the safe. "I must get that over to the bank!"