A large shed on the Hardy property had always been a home workshop for the master machinist. It was well stored with tools, and it was here that Mr. Hardy had produced many of his automobile inventions. During the absence of Ben at the aero meet, he had fenced in with a screen wire a space over fifty feet wide adjoining the shed. Here a scaffolding, a light lifting crane, and work horses had been set to accommodate the worker. Ben started in at his experimental task with all necessary accessories for prosecuting his labors.
The Saturday afternoon of that week his father had come home from work at one o’clock. He looked and felt as brisk and lively as a boy just out of school as he joined Ben in the work yard.
Ben’s airship had begun to assume definite form and substance. The motor part of the machine did not trouble our hero at all. He knew that appurtenance when it was needed would be the latest and best devised that his father could select. The framework of wood and canvas was what tested Ben’s skill.
Mr. Hardy had helped him in making the drawings of the machine before he had commenced work on it. Every morning he laid out specific work for the day and every evening he critically inspected it.
“Well, father,” observed Ben, after studying over the new drawings, “the Dart begins to look like something, doesn’t it?”
“The Dart, eh?” smiled Mr. Hardy, “so you have chosen that name?”
“Yes, I thought it quite appropriate. My first ambition is high sailing. Mr. Davis won on that, and even the Flyer did not make such a very high flight. I believe with a fair machine specially built I can beat his record.”
“All right, Ben,” remarked Mr. Hardy, “we will continue on our model. If I had foreseen how this line of work was going to interest me, however, and had realized the practical possibilities of the construction, I should have recommended a larger model.”
“We will try the Dart first. If she makes a go of it, we can try something more ambitious.”
Father and son were employed in the congenial work in a pleasant progressive way all the afternoon. Ben had never been so happy in his life, and the novel labor acted as a restful variation for his father.