"I'm hoping the government will buy the machine, but I don't feel like leaving it in storage while we're waiting for the war department to make up its mind."
"Why don't you go hunting for Murgatroyd?" inquired Cameron. "The government has offered a reward of one thousand dollars for his capture."
Murgatroyd had not only tried to wreck the first Traquair aëroplane at the time of the government trials at Fort Totten, but he had also resorted to crime in an attempt to secure, from Mrs. Traquair, a quarter section of land in Wells County, which, for some mysterious reason of his own, he was eager to get hold of. A deserter from the army, Cant Phillips by name, had assisted Murgatroyd in his nefarious work; and, for that, Phillips was now on his way to Fort Leavenworth to serve out a long sentence in a government prison, and Amos Murgatroyd was a fugitive.
Matt and his friends had been drawn into these lawless plots of the broker's, and Cameron supposed that, apart from the reward offered for the broker's capture, the young motorist would be eager to see him brought to book.
"I've lost interest in Murgatroyd," said Matt. "He's a scoundrel, and the government is dealing with him. What I want to do is to put the aëroplane to some profitable use. It was damaged considerably, when Murgatroyd brought it down with that rifle shot, and Joe and I have had to put up about three hundred more good dollars for repairs. Now that it's all shipshape and ready to fly once more, I feel as though we ought to make it earn something for us, instead of leaving it here at Fort Totten in storage."
"Aëroplanes are built to sell, aren't they?" asked the lieutenant quizzically. "How can you make any profit off them if you don't sell them?"
"Well, for one thing," replied Matt, "aëro clubs, in different parts of the world, are offering prizes for flights in flying machines. This machine of Traquair's, as you know, Cameron, is the best one yet invented. It can go farther and do more than any other aëroplane on the market."
"I guess that's right," agreed Cameron.
"However, I'm not thinking of flying for a prize. We'd have to go to Europe in order to get busy with a project of that sort, and I don't want to leave the United States—at least, not for a while yet."