It was in that frame of mind, Carton perceived when his story appeared that afternoon, that it was read by most. The thing was accorded very considerable space by most of the metropolitan newspapers, but all of them were one with the Inquirer in presenting Dr. Grantham's claim and describing his demonstration of it without taking any responsibility as to its truth. Too many times in the past had the newspapers been duped by clever scientific hoaxes.
All had more or less accurate statements of Dr. Grantham's principle of light-bending as a means of invisibility, and some had additional statements from noted physicists and astro-physicists. These, respectful for the most part of Dr. Grantham's huge reputation, ventured no criticism or support of his theory, but corroborated his statements as to the curving of light-rays in passing the sun. It was assumed by all of them, and by the greater part of those who read the articles, that even if true Dr. Grantham's discovery was a mere laboratory triumph without possibility of any practical application.
Carton saw, with some exasperation, that the thing was being treated only as another of the lurid pseudo-scientific sensations which had long ceased to astound the public. Dr. Grantham himself had made no statements other than to affirm quietly the fact of his discovery, and Carton would have given much to have been able to spring the sensation of the physicist's larger projector that would make a man invisible. Without it, he saw, the thing as a news sensation was doomed to wither and die quickly. But in this, for once, he was wrong.
For a few hours before the next morning his phone jangled and when he answered sleepily the voice of the Inquirer's night-editor jolted him to attention.
"Carton? You handled that Grantham thing yesterday, didn't you? Then pile out to America at once—Dr. Grantham's been attacked by someone there, and there's a rumor of an invisibility apparatus of his being stolen!"
CHAPTER II
The Machine
When Carton hurried a little later for the second time down the long hall of the physics building of America University, his steps were quickened by the sight of a little knot of men outside the door of the rooms he had visited on the preceding day. There was Burns, his fellow-reporter of the Courier, two blue-clad policemen, and another man in plain clothes. All turned as he approached.
"Carton here saw it the same as I!" Burns was declaring. "He can tell you, Sergeant Wade!"