"How'd you mean?"
"I mean that reed-disk and Ruhmkorff coil transmitter you see there. That's the work I want to get at."
"But what is it?" was the other's half-diffident inquiry. His lack of interest in no way seemed to depress the younger man.
"It's my wireless telephony scheme for pilot-boats and fleet manœuvres and yacht races and ten-mile work in general. For instance, there's a battle going on, and the whole top hamper of a cruiser gets blown away; all we'd have to do, with this, would be to run a wire up on an oar and call on the flagship for orders."
"But aren't other folks for getting in ahead of you on this?"
"Well, I can still use my outfit to smash their monopoly and stop royalty overcharges. You see, it's only an arrangement of steel reeds connected with a receiver, or say to a responder like this one on the table. These reeds are tuned in unison with the transmitter-reeds—it works on what we call the law of syntonic synchronism."
He noticed, as he went on, the other's companionable grimace at the polysyllables.
"But this is all Greek to you," he said, with a shoulder movement of humorous resignation.
"No, it ain't," protested the other. "Go on."
