ANOTHER FELLOW
It was in and over the work of the boys' shop that Bill and Gus first
met the Italian student. Among the upper classmen they had noticed a
small, olive-skinned, black-eyed chap, with a rather solemn face, who
appeared to be very reticent. It was said that he was a close and a
bright student who, though not lacking for money, took little interest
in sports, belonging only to the "bruisers," as the boxing class was
called. One afternoon, with Gandy, who was getting a radio set made, the
stranger appeared and stood in the doorway, gazing at the busy workers.
At first neither of the radio experts saw him. Then he advanced.
"I have the desire very much to make for myself complete a radio
getter--ah--what you call? Yes, a receiver." He addressed Gus, who was
laying out the hook-up for a crystal set.
"There's nothing very hard about it," Gus replied, looking up with his
ready smile and scrutinizing the Italian boy.
"You pay the right here, the privilege; is that not so?"
"Yes, we rent the room," said Gus.
"Ah, so; but I mean--" The newcomer turned partly toward Bill who drew
near at the moment and had overheard the question.
"You mean we charge those who work here? Yes, for the use of our tools
and machines, but not for any hints and advice we can give. The school
shop is at your mercy, too, without charge, as you know." Bill also
sized up his questioner with a certain curiosity and was pleasantly
impressed.
"I do not like the school shop. There are so very many con--con--what
you call it? Yes, conflicting. I should like--prefer--choose to come
here, if I may do so."
"Come along. You keep account of your own time here, and you can pay us
when you like. You can get your own materials, or we can get them for
you at the prices we pay. We bought up some old pieces of furniture
cheap to cut up for bases and cabinets--enough walnut to make a hundred.
No charge for it. Help yourself."
"You are, I wish to say it, veree liber--kind--generous. It is too
little that you pay--charge, I mean it. I will ask for your materials
and I will commence--begin--start, eh? on to-morrow. Will that be
satisfy?"
"Any old time. If we are not here, walk in and go to it. Check your
hours up on this pad, see? What is your name?"
"Anthony Sabaste it is. I am called Tony by most. My country it is
Italy, but American I now am. My father is of the city--living there.
Here, now, I will pay you five dollars on acc----"
"No, you won't," said Bill. "We'd rather have you pay after a while and
you can see that the work goes all right. Here, I'll show you the
ropes."
"Ropes? But I care not to make--build a ship. It is a radio----"
"Oh, sure, I get you; but that's only slang. You have been here long
enough, I should guess from your talk, to get on to our American guff.
Well, we're glad to know you, Mr.----"
"Sabaste, but I best like--I prefer calling me Tony. It means in your
language, I get on to it, as fine, grand, fat--no--but swell
out--somebody much, eh?"
"It does, sure! I'll introduce my partner, Augustus Grier; Gus for
short, or he'll get mad. They call me Bill Brown, generally forgetting
the Brown, even here at school, where 'most everyone gets his last name.
First names are more friendly."
"I like it, too. In my native it is more mostly Signor, even to
young--what you call it? Kids, as us, eh?" Tony smiled genially, his
face lighting up most agreeably. "Some they call me 'Wop,' or
'Sphagetti'."
The boys learned that the intelligent young foreigner was in the
graduating class which had escaped a lot of practical radio work; that
he kept much to himself, either because of a real or fancied notion that
social lines might be drawn against him, or because he was naturally
unsocial. But after he began the making of a radio set and came in daily
contact with Bill and Gus, the young Italian seemed to grow a little out
of himself, becoming less reticent and secluded. The good fellowship of
two lads a little younger than he, both giving him friendship and
confidence, laughing at his errors of speech in perfect good nature and
without ridicule, and at their own foibles as well, compelled the
Italian boy to like the country of his adoption much better than he had
before. This he expressed to Gus:
"You like me--no, I mean I you like. Yes, that is making to laugh, eh?
Funny, very. Well, I mean to say it, you and Bill very much also. Why
not? You love the live. You love the study. You make the happiness. You
have the great--the large, eh? the big heart. All to you is nice and
fine and it is equal to the doing, but you say it, it is worth the
while. This makes good-will and kind thoughts to others, also by
others--no; from others. You are like one _dolce_ picture in my home. It
is by two little birds fabricating their nest and all the time thus they
are of song, singing, gay with living and working, helping so much
always also to make all the country, this old world happy and
satisfy--content. So, to my--to me, you are really it, eh? You are the
real thing."
"If Bill had heard you say all this, Tony, he'd declare you're both an
orator and a poet," said Gus, laughing.
"And neither am I. But of my country there are many of such, and of
learning also, science, the great learning. Many large men of the
yesterday and many of the to-day also. In this work, too, the first, for
is not Marconi----"
"Say that name to Bill and hear him shout some praises."
"So? And will Bill speak good--noble--high of Signor Marconi? Then I,
too, can speak noble of Signor Edison, the American. But what say now if
I can tell it to you that my father, he is one sure and big friend of
Signor Marconi. Our home, in Italia, what you call--the estate of us, it
is not much a great distance from Signor Marconi of his estate. Often I
have seen him. And so you understand?"
"By cracky! Radio must have been in the air over there and you caught
it!" declared Gus. "Nobody could have it down any more pat than you
have. Bill and I have got some dandy ideas from you."
"That we have," agreed Bill, thumping in. "What is it now, Gus, that our
friend----"
"Why, Bill, Tony knows Marconi! Just telling me about it." And Gus went
on briefly to repeat that which the Italian had related. Bill, to use a
terse but slangy term, proceeded to go up in the air.
"Why, holy cats, Tony, you are from henceforth the cheese! This school
has gone wireless mad,--you know that,--and the country is pretty much
in the same fix, and for the reason that radio is about the biggest
thing in the world. And, fellows, this just fits. We are doing
things--everybody is--in radio and now we are going--this school is
going--to honor the situation if we can start it that way. For, fellows,
Marconi's yacht, the _Elettra_, is in New York Harbor, with Marconi on
board most of the time. And Tony, we'll get Doctor Field to let us have
a whack at the transmitter and you can talk to your friend, or telegraph
your dad and have him come up and radiophone Marconi. And then we'll
listen in for his reply, for I've read he's awfully fine and
good-natured. Isn't that so?"
"It is so, sure and indeed!" declared the Italian youth. "I am
overenjoyed; you say so, eh? that we shall do this. Let us now go, upon
this moment, and talk to the good doctor. There will be no lecturing at
this time over the casting abroad----"
"The broadcasting transmitter? No, we can surely get a whack at it."