Roger laughed ruefully. "I thought," he confessed, "that I'd have the thing marketed in a couple of months."
"Listen," said the old man. "On the average the man who has an invention that is of fundamental significance gives his life to perfecting and marketing it, then dies hungry. Do you get me?"
"But there are exceptions, aren't there?" insisted Roger.
"Yes, but no such pipe dream as you have there," pointing to the drawings, "could be an exception."
"Would you advise me to give it up?" Roger asked curiously.
"I would not. That's your job. Civilization owes its existence to chaps like you."
Roger, face flushed, black hair rumpled, blue eyes glowing, rose to go.
"I can't exactly thank you," he mumbled. "Only," his voice strengthening, "if I hadn't met you, I'd have gone back home discouraged and almost as ignorant as I left. As it is, I feel in bully fighting trim."
Old John McGinnis got to his feet. "God bless you, my lad. When I'm twanging a harp, up above, I'll be having an interested eye on you."
Roger started back to Eagle's Wing that evening. Ernest and Dean Erskine were both deeply interested in Roger's report, which he gave in the Dean's library the night he reached home.