he explained. “I’m getting the same pay as I would on a liner and then, too, that check for that South American business came in mighty handy, so that, financially, I’m not kicking. But I do want to get ahead in my work.”

“Well, old Jukes ought to shove you right along,” declared Raynor, coming in and planting his overalled form in a chair by the desk. “You’ve sure done a lot for him, starting in by saving his daughter, and——”

“Say, shut up, will you!” sputtered Jack, turning red. “I don’t want any favoritism for anything I may or may not have done. That isn’t it. I just want to get right ahead in the wireless game.”

“And so you are, so far as I can see,” replied Raynor. “Incidentally, how’s the portable set coming along?”

He referred to Jack’s pet hobby, an invention over which he had worked during all his spare time, afloat and ashore, for months. It was a portable wireless set in which weight and complexity had been cut to the bone. Jack had managed to reduce the weight by degrees till at last he had produced what he believed would prove a practicable device for use in the field, which weighed a trifle under fifty pounds, and could be carried over the operator’s shoulder in a satchel.

In reply to young Raynor’s question, Jack opened a closet and produced a set of instruments of exquisite finish. Attached to them was a neat coil of copper wire and, strapped to the base that supported the whole, was a flat package of cloth and bamboo sticks.

“What’s that jigger underneath?” asked Raynor, referring to the latter bit of apparatus.

“That’s a box kite,” explained Jack.

“A box kite? What in the world do you want with that?”

“Well, you can’t send out or receive messages without aërials, can you?” parried Jack.

“No, but you could hitch your aërial wires to a tree or——”

“All right, Mr. Smarty, but just suppose that you are in a country where there are no trees.”

“Oh, I see,” exclaimed Raynor, “in that case you’d do a little kite flying.”

“That’s the idea exactly,” responded Jack.

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