look in through this little window in
the case and see the flywheel inside revolving--ten thousand revolutions
a minute. Press down on the gyroscope," he shouted to me.

As I placed both hands on the case of the apparently frail little
instrument, he added, "You remember how easily you moved it just a
moment ago."

I pressed down with all my might. Then I literally raised myself off
my feet, and my whole weight was on the gyroscope. That uncanny little
instrument seemed to resent--yes, that's the word, resent--my touch.
It was almost human in the resentment, too. Far from yielding to me, it
actually rose on the side I was pressing down!

The men who were watching me laughed at the puzzled look on my face.

I took my hands off, and the gyroscope leisurely and nonchalantly went
back to its original position.

"That's the property we use, applied to the rudder and the
ailerons--those flat planes between the large main planes. That gives
automatic stability to the machine," continued Norton. "I'm not going
to explain how it is done--it is in the combination of the various parts
that I have discovered the basic principle, and I'm not going to talk
about it till the thing is settled by the courts. But it is there, and
the court will see it, and I'll prove that Delanne is a fraud--a fraud
when he says that my combination isn't patentable and isn't practicable
even at that. The truth is that his device as it stands isn't
practicable, and, besides, if he makes it so it infringes on mine. Would
you like to take a flight with me?"

I looked at Kennedy, and a vision of the wreckage of the two previous
accidents, as the Star photographer had snapped them, flashed across my
mind. But Kennedy was too quick for me.

"Yes," he answered. "A short flight. No stunts."

We took our seats by Norton, I, at least, with some misgiving. Gently
the machine rose into the air. The sensation was delightful. The fresh
air of the morning came with a stinging rush to my face. Below I could
see the earth sweeping past as if it were a moving-picture film. Above
the continuous roar of the engine and propeller Norton indicated
to Kennedy the automatic balancing of the gyroscope as it bent the
ailerons.

"Could you fly in this machine without the gyroscope at all?" yelled
Kennedy. The noise was deafening, conversation almost impossible. Though
sitting side by side he had to repeat his remark twice to Norton.

"Yes," called back Norton. Reaching