THE HOME OF THE ECCENTRIC EXPERIMENTER
Any lingering interest that Andy might have had in his uncle’s place
disappeared, temporarily, on the spot. He had figured that he might
have trouble in arranging things so that he could help about the place
and yet find time to help build an aeroplane. To be sentenced to “paint
the house” was more than he had bargained for. The boy was in despair.
But as they approached the house, his interest began to revive. When
he saw that his uncle’s home was a substantial little building, backed
by a grove of golden-studded orange trees, he began to forget his new
trouble.
The house, two stories high, with a porch or gallery on two sides,
stood on open ground.
“From the second story,” explained Captain Anderson, “it looks out over
the river. You can even see the spray of the ocean breakers on the
other side of the peninsula, sometimes.”
“The sea?” exclaimed Andy.
“And miles up and down the river,” replied the captain, nodding his
head.
The place contained about twenty acres, of which five in the rear were
in oranges and one in pineapples. On the slope in front was a garden
patch, while the low ground near the creek was a swamp.
“It is so much more than I expected,” exclaimed Mrs. Leighton at once,
“that I almost wish we could keep it and live here.”
“Do you think we could afford it, mother?” Andy began. “I don’t think
father will come down here.”
“What is it worth, Captain?” asked Mrs. Leighton.
“About two thousand dollars――maybe a little less.”
“Mother,” said Andy, “of course, we ought to clean up around here a
little, but I don’t think we should spend any money on paint or repairs
until father knows all about it. Let’s write to him.”
That meant perhaps a week’s reprieve. In that time considerable might
be done on the projected flying machine.
“We’ll see,” answered his mother.
Mrs. Leighton and Andy entered the place with great curiosity. The
front of the house was one living room of undecorated pine. There
was a stove standing in a box of sand, and a long table, a couch, and
bookshelves built in the end of the room. A chair at the table and
a handmade lounging chair with a canvas back were the only seating
accommodations.
The table bore a big green-shaded student lamp, and was laden with
books, pamphlets, magazines――all in order in little racks――and, in the
center, a heap of blank books, scratch paper pads, dry ink bottles,
pens, tobacco jars, pipes, matches, and newspaper clippings. On the
walls, here and there, were attractive colored prints.
On the table Andy noticed several foreign magazines and reviews. A
large portion of the contents of the bookcases were European scientific
magazines. One of these, turned over on the table, was a German
periodical devoted to chemistry.
On the far side of the room a steep stairway led to the second floor.
While his elders ascended to the rooms above the boy opened a door
in the rear. The scientific publications had instantly revived his
curiosity concerning the shop or workroom. The door led into a small,
bare room with a door opening on the side gallery――evidently a dining
room. Beyond this, was a kitchen and a door leading out on the orange
grove.
A few yards within the grove, the boy found, in a clearing, the
building that his uncle had used as a shop. It was of weather-worn
boards, and had a tar-paper roof. The windows, on two sides of the
shed, were almost continuous, and protected by shutters. The door,
on a windowless side, was fastened with a padlock. But this did not
long deter the curious Andy. Many kinds of pipe, bars of iron, empty
carboys, boards, boxes, and barrels of hard and soft coal were about
the shed. Catching up a piece of bar iron, Andy demolished the lock
staple with a blow.
The spaces between the board siding had been filled in with laths and,
as the shutters were closed, it was a moment or two before the prying
visitor could make out his surroundings. As he began to do so he knew
that Captain Anderson’s suggestions were more than justified. He was
plainly in the workroom of an experimenter of wide scope.
The intruder’s first work was to throw open the wooden shutters. Then,
despite the dust-covered windows, he began a quick inventory of the
place. The side where there were no windows looked like the disordered
shelves of a country drug store. Glass bottles and smaller vials,
wicker demijohns, and labeled boxes were jammed together in confusion.
There was an acid, mouldy smell about the place, as if sunshine and air
had not entered for a long time.
Beneath the windows on the long side of the room was a little workbench
such as watchmakers use. It was littered with tools looking much like
a watchmaker’s outfit. In a cleared place on it was tacked a sheet of
paper, now brown with dust. In lead pencil, on this, were chemical
formulae and algebraical equations. By its side was a box of drawing
instruments, steel rules, drawing curves and dividers, with pens and
drawing inks.
“Nothing much doing!” chuckled Andy to himself, smacking his lips. He
reveled in places of this character. It meant many possible hours of
prolonged examination and the joy of almost any kind of discovery.
On the right of this bench was a heavier one for metal working, with
two vises and a lathe operated by shaft and pulley. The shaft extended
through the side of the room and connected with a small gasoline engine
outside.
[Illustration: “NOTHING MUCH DOING!”]
Continuing his hasty survey of the curious laboratory, Andy faced the
other windowed side of the room. Crowded into a corner, he made out
a portable forge. Next to it, was an anvil with hammers, tongs, and
bending blocks. Next to this was another and still heavier bench.
It was the first close view of this that made Andy spring forward
as if he had caught sight of a bed of gold nuggets. Hereon, plainly
enough, were the physical expressions of the eccentric experimenter’s
peculiar ideas. Metal wheels, shafts, springs, cylinders, and pistons
were heaped together. In front of them was a wooden, soot-smeared
and oil-begrimed miniature model of something. The little model had
somewhat the appearance of a mechanical fan. As Andy picked it up, a
voice from behind him exclaimed:
“Couldn’t wait, eh?”
It was Captain Anderson, and he was followed by Mrs. Leighton and Mrs.
Anderson.
“Where’s that power generator or transformer, or whatever it is?” was
Andy’s only answer as he replaced the model.
“Andrew!” exclaimed his mother, as she caught sight of the boy, whose
face was streaked with dust and perspiration, and whose coat was
already covered with cobwebs. “You’re ruining your best suit. Come out
of that dirty place.”
The boy did so, but it was partly because Captain Anderson had motioned
him around the shed. There, beneath a lean-to protection, was a fourth
bench. On this, even the untrained Andy instantly made out six small
cylinders connected by steel tubes, in the center of each of which was
an arrangement of valves and stop cocks. Attached to the first of the
cylinders was a compact device resembling a blower, operated by a hand
crank. From this, a steel tube led below the bench.
“Don’t ask me what it is,” exclaimed Captain Anderson. “All I know
about it is your uncle said that when he got those cylinders workin’
right, he’d have no more use for gasoline.”
“Looks like a new kind o’ compressor,” began Andy, his face beaming. “I
think I――”
“Andy, come right along up to the house and help us get things in
order,” commanded his mother. “Did you ever see so much rubbish?” she
added, turning to Mrs. Anderson and gathering up her skirts anew. “All
this stuff must have cost a lot of money. Is it worth anything now?”
she asked, peering timidly into the disorderly shop once more.
“The tools are worth something,” answered Captain Anderson. “As for the
other things, I guess they ain’t good for anything except junk.”
They were on their way back to the house, Andy tagging behind and
thinking. Finally he touched the captain on the arm.
“Don’t you be too sure about that ‘junk’ business.”
“Did you find anything?” asked the captain, with a smile.
“I didn’t,” answered the boy, “but my uncle didn’t keep that place
goin’ just to kill time. You can bet there are ideas buried somewhere
in that stuff.”
“And you are goin’ to dig ’em up?” laughed Captain Anderson.
“There ain’t any law against tryin’,” retorted Andy, red in the face,
“and if my mother tries to sell that shanty or the ‘junk’ in it before
I’m through with it, she’s agoin’ to strike a snag.”
The negro, Ba, had carried the trunks to the gallery, where a council
was now held. The only food in the house was a few tins of fruit and
vegetables and some ant-infested sugar. The entire place was much
in need of soap, water, and broom. The bedding did not meet Mrs.
Leighton’s approval. Besides, there was but one bed in the house.
The boy’s suggestion to his mother was to “camp out” in the house until
the next morning. There were preserved peaches and tinned baked beans
in the pantry, to say nothing of oranges and pineapples on the place,
and these Andy thought quite sufficient in the way of food. Then, on
the following day, they would borrow Captain Anderson’s sailboat and go
to Melbourne to lay in supplies.
This suggestion receiving no immediate objection, the boy began to
exercise his growing energy in his attack on the disorderly floor of
the big room. In the midst of this Captain Anderson stopped him.
“You can’t stay here,” explained the elder. “Your mother has agreed
with us, and you’re going back to our house.”
A look of disappointment spread over the boy’s face. Then this changed
as he turned to his mother.
“Then you ain’t goin’ to paint the house right away?”
“Not at once,” was the answer. “Captain Anderson has kindly offered to
let us board with him for a few days until we hear from your father.
Then, if he wants to sell the house, and we can’t do it at once, we may
make arrangements to come here and live.”
Although it had been decided to return to Captain Anderson’s home, and
the trunks were carried back to the boat at once, it was nearly noon
before the party prepared to leave. Two hours were spent in looking
over the grove and the pineapple field, and in a more careful survey of
the house and its contents. Then Captain Anderson prepared to lock the
house again.
“Don’t that road lead to your house?” asked Andy, who had been in new
thought for some time, addressing the captain.
“Sure,” laughed Captain Anderson, “want to walk? It’s two miles.”
“Mother,” asked Andy, “do you mind if I stay here awhile? I’ll walk
back.”
His mother eyed him suspiciously.
“What are you planning to do?” she asked.
“Just want to nose around――books and things,” he explained.
“Can he do any harm?” Mrs. Leighton asked, with a smile. “I guess it’s
‘things’ more than books.”
“Let him stay,” urged the captain. “The place needs all the airing it
can get.”
As soon as Andy saw that his request had been granted, he hurried to
the boats and opened his trunk. He soon extracted a little red volume.
As the returning party approached, he slipped the book to Captain
Anderson.
“Captain,” he said quietly, “here’s the book you wanted to see. I
thought you might look at it this afternoon. Things are workin’ all
right,” he added winking slyly. “I’m on the job to begin earning that
boat to-morrow――”
“What book is that?” interrupted Mrs. Leighton, who had her eyes on her
son.
Andy hesitated, but Captain Anderson volunteered:
“It’s a book about aeroplanes. He’s lending it to me.”
“Aeroplanes?” exclaimed Mrs. Leighton instantly, turning to her son.
Then, looking at the captain, she added: “I hope you’ll keep it,
Captain Anderson. Andy wasted one whole summer on an engine that won’t
work. We don’t need any aeroplanes of the same kind.” Turning to
Andy again, she said: “Be sure and be at Captain Anderson’s by five
o’clock――and take in all that bedding before you leave.”