There was no time to pursue these speculations. “Certainly,” agreed Mr. Edwards promptly, leading the way.
Kennedy seemed keenly interested in inspecting the little wireless plant, which was of a curious type and not exactly like any that I had seen before.
“Wireless apparatus,” he remarked, as he looked it over, “is divided into three parts, the source of power whether battery or dynamo, the making and sending of wireless waves, including the key, spark, condenser and tuning coil, and the receiving apparatus, head telephones, antennae, ground and detector.”
Pedersen, the engineer, came in while we were looking the plant over, but seemed uncommunicative to all Kennedy’s efforts to engage him in conversation.
“I see,” remarked Kennedy, “that it is a very compact system with facilities for a quick change from one wave length to another.”
“Yes,” grunted Pedersen, as averse to talking, evidently, as others on the Lucie.
“Spark gap, quenched type,” I heard Kennedy mutter almost to himself, with a view to showing Pedersen that he knew something about it. “Break system relay—operator can overhear any interference while transmitting—transformation by a single throw of a six-point switch which tunes the oscillating and open circuits to resonance. Very clever—very efficient. By the way, Pedersen, are you the only person aboard who can operate this?”
“How should I know?” he answered almost surlily.
“You ought to know, if anybody,” answered Kennedy unruffled. “I know that it has been operated within the past few days.”
Pedersen shrugged his shoulders. “You might ask the others aboard,” was all he said. “Mr. Edwards pays me to operate it only for himself, when he has no other operator.”