"I can't tell you my sources, Mr. Skinner. Not yet, anyhow. But I have
enough information to tell me that you're the man. It wouldn't hold up
in court, but, with the additional information you can give me, I think
it will."
Skinner looked baffled, as if not knowing what to say next.
"Mr. Skinner," Elshawe went on, "a research reporter has to have a
little of the crusader in him, and maybe I've got more than most. You've
discovered one of the greatest things in history--or invented it,
whatever you want to call it. You deserve to go down in history along
with Newton, Watt, Roentgen, Edison, Einstein, Fermi, and all the rest.
"But somehow Malcom Porter stole your invention and he intends to take
full credit for it. Oh, I know he's paid you plenty of money not to make
any fuss, and he probably thinks you couldn't prove anything, anyway.
But you don't have to be satisfied with his conscience money any more.
With the backing of Magnum Telenews, you can blow Mister Glory-hound
Porter's phony setup wide open and take the credit you deserve."
Skinner didn't look at all the way Elshawe had expected. Instead, he
frowned a little and said: "I'm glad you came, Mr. Elshawe. I didn't
realize that there was enough evidence to connect me with his project."
But he didn't look exactly overjoyed.
"Well," Elshawe said tentatively, "if you'll just answer a few
questions--"
"Just a minute, Mr. Elshawe. Do you mind if I ask you a few questions
first?"
"Go ahead."
Skinner leaned forward earnestly. "Mr. Elshawe, who deserves credit for
an invention? Who deserves the money?"
"Why ... why, the inventor, of course."
"The inventor? Or the man who gives it to humanity?"
"I ... don't quite follow you."
He leaned back in his chair again. "Mr. Elshawe, when I invented the
Polarizer, I hadn't the remotest idea of what I'd invented. I taught
general science in the high school Malcom Porter went to, and I had a
lab in my basement. Porter was a pretty bright boy, and he liked to come
around to my lab and watch me putter around. I had made this gadget--it
was a toy for children as far as I was concerned. I didn't have any idea
of its worth. It was just a little gadget that hopped up into the air
and floated down again. Cute, but worthless, except as a novelty. And it
was too expensive to build it as a novelty. So I forgot about it.
"Years later, Porter came around to me and offered to buy it. I dug it
out of the junk that was in my little workshop and sold it to him.
"A couple of years after that, he came back. He said that he'd invented
something. After beating all around the bush, he finally admitted that
his invention was a development of my little toy. He offered me a
million dollars if I'd keep my mouth shut and forget all about the
thing."
"And you accepted?" Elshawe asked incredulously.
"Certainly! I made him buy me a tax-paid annuity that pays me more than
enough to get by on. I don't want wealth, Mr. Elshawe--just comfort. And
that's why I gave it to him."
* * * * *
"I don't follow you."
"Let me tell you about Malcom Porter. He is one of that vast horde of
people who want to be _someone_. They want to be respected and looked up
to. But they either can't, or won't, take the time to learn the basics
of the field they want to excel in. The beautiful girl who wants to be
an actress without bothering to learn to act; the young man who wants to
be a judge without going through law school, or be a general without
studying military tactics; and Malcom Porter, the boy who wanted to be
a great scientist--but didn't want to take the trouble to learn
science."
Elshawe nodded. He was thinking of the "artists" who splatter up clean
canvas and call it "artistic self-expression." And the clodheads who
write disconnected, meaningless prose and claim that it's free verse.
The muddleminds who forget that Picasso learned to paint within the
strict limits of classical art before he tried new methods, and that
James Joyce learned to handle the English language well before he wrote
"Finnegan's Wake."
"On the other hand," Skinner continued, "I am ... well, rather a shy
man. As soon as Malcom told me what the device would do when it was
properly powered, I knew that there would be trouble. I am not a
fighter, Mr. Elshawe. I have no desire to spend time in prison or be
vilified in the news or called a crackpot by orthodox scientists.
"I don't want to fight Malcom's claim, Mr. Elshawe. Don't you see, he
_deserves_ the credit! In the first place, he recognized it for what it
was. If he hadn't, Heaven only knows how long it would have been before
someone rediscovered it. In the second place, he has fought and fought
hard to give it to humanity. He has suffered in prison and spent
millions of dollars to get the Polarizer into the hands of the United
States Government. He has, in fact, worked harder and suffered more than
if he'd taken the time and trouble to get a proper education. And it got
him what he wanted; I doubt that he would have made a very good
scientist, anyway.
"Porter deserves every bit of credit for the Polarizer. I am perfectly
happy with the way things are working out."