“Fire hazard. No parent is going to let his kid have something flying around the house with fire spitting out the end of it like that. What kind of fuel do you use, anyway? Whatever it is, the fire underwriters are going to clamp down on you quick.”
Sam Marvenstein shook his head sadly as the little rocket spun down to the floor with sparks pourly madly from its jets.
“Oh, that —” said Mart in relief. “That’s just for show. We borrowed it from the toy train people. By increasing the intensity we get a nice simulation of rocket fire.”
“Then how does it go? What kind of a trick are you selling, anyway?” said Sam almost belligerently.
Mart picked up a model lying on the counter and unscrewed the nose. A nest of three flashlight batteries could be seen side by side in the interior. “Battery power,” he said to Sam. “Three cells give approximately five hours of flying.”
“Yeah... but how does that —?”
“Antigravity,” said Mart. “A small antigravity unit is concealed in the tail under the batteries. The lever on the side of the ship is pre-set for the flight pattern desired. Very simple. Practically foolproof. We even guarantee them for three weeks.”
Sam Marvenstein replaced the cigar in his mouth slowly. He picked up one of the toys and turned it end for end, squinting into the dark interior.
“Antigravity. Whadya know? Now that’s really something. I used to read about that in the magazines my kid brings home, but I didn’t know they had it out yet.” He wandered away with the rocket in his hands to show his partners in his own booth. “Antigravity, that’s really something, now —”
It was really something, as things turned out. Sam’s comment was a feeble understatement, and the Nagle Rocket stole the show completely — along with quite a few thousands of dollars worth of orders that would have otherwise gone to the producers of more conventional toys.