KOKU IS DRUGGED
THE young inventor, hastening along the corridor between his
broadcasting studio and the laboratory where the new machine was set up,
passed the giant Koku who sat on a stool not far from Tom’s door. Here
the big man had taken his place each night while the testing was going
on. With him on guard, Tom felt secure against intrusion by any of the
plotters.
“Getting tired, Koku?” asked Tom, pausing on the threshold of his
laboratory. “It isn’t much fun for you to be sitting there.”
“Not much tired. Master,” was the reply, “But Koku like do
something—smash somebody—fight. No fun sit here nodding do.”
“No, it isn’t much fun doing nothing, I’ll admit,” said Tom. “And if it
ever comes to a fight, Koku, you shall have a share in it. But it looks
now as though the rascals would leave us alone. It won’t be much longer
now, I think, I’m on the verge of success.”
“That good,” Koku answered. He did not, perhaps, understand all Tom had
said, but he had been associated with the young inventor long enough to
know when Tom spoke of success that it meant pleasure for the “Master.”
For this Koku was glad. “Maybe you make new airship go back Koku’s
country?” the giant asked.
“No, this isn’t an airship I’m working on now,” Tom said, knowing it
would be of no use to explain to the simple mind of the giant what the
invention really was. “But would you like to go back to your own land of
giants, Koku?”
“Sometimes Koku think maybe he like to go,” was the slow answer. “But
Koku like it here, too. Sometimes get hungry for fash,” and he named a
peculiar fruit that the giants of his land were especially fond of. Tom
and Ned, on their voyage which had resulted in the capture of Koku, had
seen how passionately eager the big men were for this fruit. They would
go to almost any length to get it. And Tom had an idea how Koku must
long for some now and then in a land where no fash was to be had. It Was
a species of melon with a peculiar taste and odor. Neither Tom nor Ned
had any liking for fash, but the giants seemed to thrive upon it.
“Some day, Koku,” the young inventor half promised as he stepped into
his laboratory to start anew the test, this time under different
circumstances, “I may take another airship trip to your country and let
you have all the fash you want.”
“By golly, Master, that be good time for me!” cried the giant with a
happy laugh.
As Tom walked over to the apparatus by which he hoped to produce such
startling results, the telephone bell on the instrument that connected
the laboratory with the broadcasting studio rang hard.
“Hello! What’s the matter?” Tom asked, over the wire.
“How long do you want us to keep at this thing?” asked the laughing
voice of Ned Newton. “I—oh, dear—whew—I can’t stand this much longer,
Tom!” and he went off into another fit of merriment.
“Why, what’s the matter?” asked the wondering inventor.
“Oh, it’s my partner in the red suit!” chuckled Ned. “He’s cutting up
such funny antics that I can’t dance or sing for laughing. How is it
coming through?”
“I haven’t connected up yet,” Tom answered. “I will in a minute. I was
talking to Koku. He’s hungry for fash.”
“For fash!” exclaimed Ned wonderingly.
“Yes. Don’t you remember those peculiar melons that had such a funny
smell and taste? The giants were crazy about them.”
“Oh, yes,” Ned answered. “I’d forgotten all about them. But get on with
the show. I happen to have a date with Helen to-night.”
“I’ll soon release you,” promised Tom. “So Mr. Damon is cutting loose,
is he?”
“You ought to see him!” chuckled the other performer, and even then Tom
caught, over the telephone, snatches of comic songs Mr. Damon was
practicing—recollections of his amateur minstrel days.
“All right—get set!” advised the inventor. “I’m going to turn on the
power now. Keep toward the middle of the stage, for I haven’t got a very
wide screen and the focus is narrow. If you get too far to either side I
may lose the image and can’t tell whether I’m getting you or not.”
“Sure!” was the succinct answer of Ned. Then Tom made the adjustments,
turned on the power, and waited.
A moment later there came from his loud speaker the tones of Ned and Mr.
Damon singing a selection from one of the latest comic operas. The
musical accompaniment came from an electrical piano in the studio.
“That’s the best and clearest broadcasting I’ve gotten yet!” said Tom,
with satisfaction.
“But that’s the easiest part of it. Now will the images of the
performers come on the screen clearly? That’s the decisive test.”
Anxiously, he turned the switch that controlled the projection of moving
objects. There was a hissing sound, a slight humming, and then a soft
glow illuminated the metallic glass screen in front of Tom Swift. It
suffused to a milky whiteness and then, as upon the silver screen in a
moving picture theater, but in miniature size, there was projected
before Tom’s eyes the figures of Ned and Mr. Damon going through the
movements of an eccentric dance as they sang.
For a moment Tom wanted to shout in delight, for, perhaps due to the
fact that the performers wore contrasting garments of red and violet,
the images projected were clearer than any Tom had yet succeeded in
getting through by means of his new wireless apparatus.
“I believe I’ve struck it!” he whispered.
Then he began to laugh, for Mr. Damon certainly was funny. He even
seemed to know that Tom, in a distant room, could see him, for the odd
man winked one eye and made gestures at Tom as though the young inventor
were personally before him.
“Ha! Ha!” chuckled Tom. “I must get dad in to see this. He’ll believe in
it now.” For, up to this time, Mr. Swift had been rather skeptical,
though he was fully in sympathy with Tom’s aims. “And I’d like to show
it to Mary,” mused the young inventor, as he sat there enjoying what
really was a team vaudeville sketch without either of the artists being
in the room with him. Their song, the music, and even the shuffling of
their feet came plainly to him through the loud speaker, while the image
was shimmering on the metallic glass screen almost as plainly as though
Tom had been in the studio. Of course the image was in reduced size. The
screen was about three feet square, and life-sized figures cannot be
shown on that.
“But in time I can get them full size,” Tom decided. “Oh, but this is
good! I can see success now, though it still must be a little clearer to
make it a positive thing and in natural colors.”
Then he bethought him that Ned and Mr. Damon must be tired, for they had
been keeping steadily at it for nearly an hour while Tom tried different
combinations of lights and currents of various intensities in order to
get the best effects.
“Guess I’ll ’phone them that they can let up now,” decided the young
inventor. “They must be tired. And Ned wants to go see Helen. By the
same token I’d better give Mary a call, I guess. I’ve been rather
neglecting her of late—too busy over this invention.”
Then another thought came to Tom—that he would have the girls and
perhaps their parents come to the studio to take a look at the result he
had accomplished. True, it was not yet perfected; but he knew his
friends would keep his secret until he could complete the patent
applications.
“Yes, I’ll give the girls a show,” decided Tom. “They sure will enjoy
Mr. Damon’s singing and dancing. Gosh, but he’s funny!”
Tom shut off the power. The image faded from the screen which turned
from milky whiteness to the blackness of pitch. Then the voices of the
performers died away as Tom cut off the radio.
He was about to step to the telephone to advise his friends of his
almost complete success and to tell them to cease their efforts when a
noise out in the corridor attracted his attention.
“Maybe they’ve decided to quit of their own accord,” mused Tom.
He opened the door of his laboratory and stepped into the hall. He saw
nothing of Ned or Mr. Damon approaching and at once became aware of a
peculiar odor. At first he could not account for it, thinking, for a
moment, that his father might be at work in the chemical laboratory
farther down the corridor. But after a second deep breath Tom knew it
was no chemical he smelled.
“It—it’s—fash!” he murmured. “The peculiar melon fruit that Koku was
wishing for. But how in the world could that smell get here? There isn’t
any fash within hundreds of miles—yes, even thousands! How Koku could
get any——”
He paused. There was a dark object on the floor near where the giant had
been sitting on guard. Tom switched on a brilliant overhead light. It
illuminated the place where Koku had been sitting, but the giant was no
longer in his chair. He was sprawled on the floor, an inert lump of
flesh, while, not far from him, was one of those peculiar melons, or
fash fruits, of which the giants of that far-off, strange land were so
fond.
“Can I be dreaming?” gasped Tom. “How did this happen? Koku must be
drugged! How did he get that fash? And what does it all mean?”
As he started forward a noise behind him attracted his attention.