“Pal, I’d say your new graphicopter is a terrific success,” Bud remarked with a grin, settling himself on a lab stool. “Tell me more about it.”
“My main reason for inventing the skywriting gear,” Tom explained, “was because I felt it would be useful in time of disaster. Messages could be sent to people in a disaster area, where no radio communication is available.”
Bud nodded. “The way you alerted those picnickers about the forest fire sure proves that.”
“I also have an idea,” Tom went on, “that it can be used for laying out luminous flight paths at airports during periods of poor visibility.”
“What if there’s a breeze?” Bud objected. “You said yourself the skywriting lines may waver or drift. If they went haywire, they might lead an incoming plane right into a bang-up crash.”
“True. But, you see, the ionized gas could be held rigidly in line by a magnetic beam projected from the airport.”
There was a knock at the door and two pretty girls stepped into the laboratory.
“Hi, Phyl! Hi, Sandy!” Tom exclaimed. Bud echoed his greeting as the boys stood up.
“We came to make sure you two heroes were all right,” teased Sandra Swift, Tom’s blond seventeen-year-old sister, whom Bud often dated.
“And get, firsthand, your exciting story of the forest fire,” added Phyllis Newton.
Phyl, a brown-eyed brunette, the same age as Sandy, was the daughter of Ned Newton, Tom Sr.‘s old comrade-THE DEVIL
in-arms and now manager of the Swift Construction Company.
“We saw your new copter on TV when you two were putting out the fire,” Sandy said more seriously. “It was really thrilling!”