“I know how to solve part of the puzzle,” he said excitedly.
CHAPTER 12
DANGEROUS ACID
FAMILIAR with Tom’s sudden inspirations, Bud waited a full minute before interrupting his friend’s thoughts. Then he asked Tom how he intended to solve the mysterious space beings’ problem of penetrating the earth’s atmosphere.
“I’ll send them an explanation of how to build a degaussing shield to protect their bodies.”
“Good idea,” Bud said. “But how could you ever do that with geometric figures?”
“It’ll be a lot of work, but I’ll do it some day,” Tom declared. Then, talking more to himself than to Bud, he said, “I might use an arc to represent the shield-”
At this moment the loudspeaker system boomed out the message that Tom Swift was wanted at the communications office.
“Bud, you warm up the Flying Lab, will you, while I go see what’s wanted,” he requested.
“Righto,” Bud replied, and drove off in a jeep.
104
DANGEROUS ACID 105
When Tom reached the radio room, Billing and Ames were there reading a message.
“You must have news,” Tom remarked.
“We sure have,” Ames replied. “That first spy you caught-Drayton who turned out to be Gray-made a full confession to the FBI.”
“He squealed on Rotzog?” Tom cried unbelievingly.
“That’s right,” the security officer answered. “Billing just took the message.
Rotzog’s a crazy scientist, kind of a man without a country. Has a pile of money.
Nobody knows where it comes from and it’s always in cash. He pays his men well.”
“To spy and steal inventions?” Tom asked.
“That and much more. Gray declares Rotzog claims he’s going to rule the world from a space platform he’s building.”