Charley Thomas said: "Wes, have you tried your tube-amplifier system ahead of it?"
"Yes, and nothing at all happens then. I don't understand that one, because we know that any kind of input power will be re-beamed as similar power. I should think that the thing would amplify the same kind of stuff. I've used a solar beam miniature with a driver-alloy dynode in it, but that doesn't work either."
"Shucks," said Charley.
Don stood up and picked up the coil. "Fellows, I'm going to make a grand, old college try!"
"Yes?" asked Walt.
"I've got a grand idea, here. One, I'm still remembering that business of making the receptor dynode of the same alloy as the transmitter cathode. I've a hunch that this thing is not so much an inductor, but something sour in the way of alloy-selectivity. If I'm right, I may cut this in half, and make two detectors, each of similar characteristics. Shall I?"
"Go ahead. We've established the fact that it is not the physico-electrical characteristics of that coil," said Wes. "I, too, took my chances and rewound that same wire on a couple of other forms. So it doesn't count as far as an inductance goes. So we can't ruin anything but the total make-up of the wire. I think we may be able to re-establish the wire by self-welding if your idea doesn't work. Now, unless we want to search the three planets for another hunk of wire to work like this one did, without knowing what to look for and therefore trying every foot of wire on three planets—"
"I'll cut it," said Channing with a smile. His cutters snipped, and then fastened one end of the wire to the coil, stripping the other portion off and handing it to Charley Thomas, who rewound it on another form.
"Now," said Don, "crank up your outfit and we'll try this hunk."