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Page 28
"I should say I did!" exclaimed Ned with a shudder. "I don't
want any more of that. But as between being blown through a roof
and held at the bottom of the sea, I don't know that there's much
choice."
"Well, perhaps not," agreed Tom. "But as for ending my
experiments, I wouldn't dream of such a thing! Why, I've only
just begun! I'll have a silent motor yet!"
"And a non-explosive one, I hope," added Mr. Damon dryly.
"Bless my shoe buttons, Tom, but if my wife knew what danger I'd
been in she'd never let me come over to see you any more."
"Well, the next time I invite you to a test I'll be more
careful," promised the young inventor.
"There isn't going to be any next time as far as I'm
concerned!" laughed Ned. "I think it's safer to sell Liberty
Bonds."
And, though they joked about it, they all realized the narrow
escape they had had. As for Eradicate, once he knew he had not
been the one who caused the damage, he felt rather proud of the
part he had taken in the mishap, and for many days he boasted
about it to Koku.
True to his determination, Tom Swift did not give up his
experimental work on the silent motor. The machine that had been
blown through the roof was useless now, and it was sent to the
scrap heap, after as much of it as possible had been salvaged.
Then Tom got another piece of apparatus out of his store room and
began all over again.
He worked along the same lines as at first--providing a chamber
for the escaping gases of the exhaust to expend their noise and
energy in, at the same time laboring to cut down the concussion
of the explosions in the cylinder without reducing their force
any. And that it was no easy problem to do either of these, Tom
had to admit as he progressed. All previous types of mufflers or
silencers had to be discarded and a new one evolved.
"Jackson, I need some one to help me," said Tom to his chief
mechanician one day. "Haven't you a good man who is used to
experimental work that you can let me take from the works?"
"Why, yes," was the answer. "Let me see. Roberts is busy on the
new bomb you got up, but I could take him off that--"
"No, don't!" interposed Tom. "I want that work to go on. Isn't
there some one else you can let me have?"
"Well, there's a new man who came to me well recommended. I
took him on last week, and he's a wonderful mechanic. Knows a lot
about gas engines. I could let you have him--Bower his name is.
The only thing about it, though, is that I don't like to give you
a man of whom I am not dead certain, when you're working on a new
device."
"Oh, that will be all right," said Tom. "There won't be any
secrets he can get, if you mean you think he might be up to spy
work."
"That's what I did mean, Tom. You never can tell, you know, and
you have some bitter enemies."
"Yes, but I'll take care this man doesn't see the plans, or any
of my drawings. I only want some one to do the heavy assembling
work on the experimental muffler I'm getting up. We can let him
think it's for a new kind of automobile."
"Oh, then I guess it will be all right. I'll send Bower to
you."
Tom rather liked the new workman, who seemed quiet and
efficient. He did not ask questions, either, about the machine on
which he was engaged, but did as he was told. As Tom had said, he
kept his plans and drawing under lock and key--in a safe to be
exact--and he did not think they were in any danger from his new
helper.
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