Matt introduced himself to the young man, who was a draughtsman for Lafitte, and who immediately laid aside his compasses and pencil, and climbed down from his high stool to grasp the caller’s hand.
“Mr. Lafitte has heard a good deal about you,” said he, “and has followed your work pretty closely. He’ll be sorry not to have seen you, Motor Matt. Can’t you come in again? Better still, can’t you run out to his workshop and see him?”
“I don’t know,” Matt answered. “I’m in the city with a friend, and he has a little business to attend to which will probably take up some of our time.”
“I think,” went on the other, “that you won’t regret taking the time to talk with Mr. Lafitte. He’s working on something, out there at his Long Island place, which is going to make a big stir, one of these days.”
“Something on the aëroplane order?”
The draughtsman looked thoughtful for a moment.
“Suppose,” said he, “that something was discovered which had fifty times the buoyancy of hydrogen gas, that the buoyancy could be regulated at will by electrically heated platinum wires—would that revolutionize this flying proposition?”
Matt was struck at once with the far-reaching influence of the novel proposition.
“It would, certainly,” he declared. “Is that what——”
“I’m not saying any more than that, Motor Matt,” broke in the young man; “in fact, I can’t say anything more, but you take the trouble to talk with Mr. Lafitte. It may be worth something to you.”