"I remember that one," laughed Freeman lightly. "Our class named it 'sticky fly paper.'"
"It was rightly named," grumbled Farley.
"None of you four youngsters see through it?" demanded Midshipman Freeman.
"Do you mean to claim, sir, that you ever did?" insisted Dan Dalzell.
"Not only once, but now," grinned Mr. Freeman. "You haven't been looking at this torturing proposition from the right angle—that's all. Now, listen, while I read it."
"Oh, we all know how it runs, Mr. Freeman," protested Page.
"Nevertheless, listen, while I read it."
As the first classman read through the proposition that was torturing them he threw an emphasis upon certain words that opened their eyes better as to the meaning.
"Now, it works out this way," continued the first classman, bending over the disk and drawing paper and pencil toward him. "In the first place."
Freeman seemed to these youngsters like a born demonstrator. Within five minutes he had made the "sticky fly paper" problem so plain to them all that they glanced from one to another in astonishment.