I told him glumly, "I wish the nearest I'd ever come to radio was playin' that kid's game with beans. This time the audio's gone haywire and I can't even find out what the hell ails it."
He came over beside me and looked. He jiggled a few wires, snapped switches and succeeded in bunting the button of the feed line cable. At last he said, "The trouble's in the plate, isn't it, Sparks?"
"Looks as if. It's gone cold and I can't raise a signal out of it."
"These plates you use," he frowned, "are made of a seleno-aluminum alloy, aren't they?"
"Right," I told him, "as rain. However right that is. And they're as dependable as a spacecomber's promises. Always going on the blink just when you need 'em most."
"That's what I thought." Biggs shifted his gawky length from one foot to the other, a sign of deep cogitation I'd seen before. Then, suddenly, "Listen, Sparks," he blurted, "I've been thinking over that problem—"
I rose hastily.
"Look, Mr. Biggs, if you've been thinking, this is where I get off. Don't tell me or I'll catch the contagion. I'm just a hard-working bug pounder—"
"—and I think I know a way," he continued eagerly, "to put an end to space radio transmission difficulties. They're using the wrong metal in the audio plates, that's the trouble! The seleno-aluminum alloy was all right for radio in the early days of television, but space-flight demands a sturdier, and at the same time more sensitive receptor."
"Like," I demanded, "what? Comet-tails, maybe?"