That evening Guy and his mother went aboard the liner. Early next morning the steamer floated from the harbor with the tide and stood out to sea.
Little of more than ordinary tourist’s interest occurred in the course of the voyage, which was completed on schedule time, in spite of two days and one night of very rough weather. The first stop was at Queenstown. The steamer did not go up into Cork Harbor, but lay out in the offing, having signaled by wireless for a lighter. After disembarking a number of passengers and delivering and receiving several bags of mail, the liner continued on toward Fishguard and Liverpool.
The vessel finally anchored near the mouth of the River Mersey and the passengers were transferred to Liverpool by lighter. Their baggage was “examined” by inspectors in a most ridiculously indifferent manner, it seemed to Guy, and then they were hustled aboard a fast express train for London.
Talk about speed! The train, with its odd compartments and widely-separated coaches, flew over that 175 miles to the metropolis of the world in two-and-a-half hours.
“I can’t see that we’ve got so much on the English,” observed Guy as the train sped on like a Chicago-New York Century Flyer. “I don’t see why we should call the English slow.”
CHAPTER III
The Mysterious Man Again
Walter Burton missed his brother for many reasons during the latter’s absence. Guy was always a good companion. Out of school, Walter scarcely knew what to do with himself. Heretofore all his pleasures and all his labors had been shared by the other twin. They had always gone to school together, shoveled snow together, worked in the shop together, and studied wireless together.
In this occupation, or amusement, Walter was now almost lost. He called “V T” and informed the latter of Guy’s plan and was waiting with receivers at his ears when his brother’s call came from New York. But for several days thereafter he neglected his hobby entirely, not even caring to amuse himself by catching messages from any commercial or amateur source.
Nevertheless, Walter was deeply interested in everything wireless. The thrill and excitement of “talking” electric waves, impelled with air-splitting leaps of the current across the spark-gap, had often enlivened his daydreams with radio visions, and it was hardly to be expected that he would long remain idle, in view of the allurements and possibilities at hand.
A quarter of a mile from the Burton home lived another boy, Anthony Lane, who chummed a good deal with the “wireless twins.” Anthony, or Tony, as he was familiarly called, was a poor boy, but this fact made no difference with Walter or Guy; “he was the right kind of stuff,” and that was all they cared for. He was one of the best ball players at school, could row and swim like a sailor and a fish, and, although strong and clever, was never known to act the bully.