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“Yes, but what is induction?”

“That’s rather hard to explain untechnically. But the long and the short of it is that when a current of electricity passes through a wire there’s a lot of magnetism present round that wire; and if you put another wire parallel to, and within what we call its magnetic field–why then, the second wire will also become charged with electricity.”

“On its own account?”

“On its own account.”

“Then let’s see if I’ve got it correctly. Miles off, at Poole, or wherever it is—-“

“It will be anywhere in ten years.”

“You’ve got a charged wire—-“

“Charged with Hertzian waves which vibrate, say, two hundred and thirty million times a second.” Mr. Cashell snaked his forefinger rapidly through the air.

“All right–a charged wire at Poole, giving out these waves into space. Then this wire of yours sticking out into space–on the roof of the house –in some mysterious way gets charged with those waves from Poole—-“

“Or anywhere–it only happens to be Poole tonight.”

“And those waves set the coherer at work, just like an ordinary telegraph- office ticker?”

“No! That’s where so many people make the mistake. The Hertzian waves wouldn’t be strong enough to work a great heavy Morse instrument like ours. They can only just make that dust cohere, and while it coheres (a little while for a dot and a longer while for a dash) the current from this battery–the home battery”–he laid his hand on the thing–“can get through to the Morse printing-machine to record the dot or dash. Let me make it clearer. Do you know anything about steam?”

“Very little. But go on.”

“Well, the coherer is like a steam-valve. Any child can open a valve and start a steamer’s engines, because a turn of the hand lets in the main steam, doesn’t it? Now, this home battery here ready to print is the main steam. The coherer is the valve, always ready to be turned on. The Hertzian wave is the child’s hand that turns it.”

“I see. That’s marvellous.”

“Marvellous, isn’t it? And, remember, we’re only at the beginning. There’s nothing we sha’n’t be able to do in ten years. I want to live–my God, how I want to live, and see it develop!” He looked through the door at Shaynor breathing lightly in his chair. “Poor beast! And he wants to keep company with Fanny Brand.”

“Fanny who?” I said, for the name struck an obscurely familiar chord in my brain–something connected with a stained handkerchief, and the word “arterial.”

“Fanny Brand–the girl you kept shop for.” He laughed, “That’s all I know about her, and for the life of me I can’t see what Shaynor sees in her, or she in him.”

“Can’t you see what he sees in her?” I insisted.

“Oh, yes, if that’s what you mean. She’s a great, big, fat lump of a girl, and so on. I suppose that’s why he’s so crazy after her. She isn’t his sort. Well, it doesn’t matter. My uncle says he’s bound to die before the year’s out. Your drink’s given him a good sleep, at any rate.” Young Mr. Cashell could not catch Mr. Shaynor’s face, which was half turned to the advertisement.

I stoked the stove anew, for the room was growing cold, and lighted another pastille. Mr. Shaynor in his chair, never moving, looked through and over me with eyes as wide and lustreless as those of a dead hare.

“Poole’s late,” said young Mr. Cashell, when I stepped back. “I’ll just send them a call.”

He pressed a key in the semi-darkness, and with a rending crackle there leaped between two brass knobs a spark, streams of sparks, and sparks again.

“Grand, isn’t it? That’s the Power–our unknown Power–kicking and fighting to be let loose,” said young Mr. Cashell. “There she goes–kick– kick–kick into space. I never get over the strangeness of it when I work a sending-machine–waves going into space, you know. T.R. is our call. Poole ought to answer with L.L.L.”