glad of
the chance that had made him acquainted with the veteran hunter.

"Will you go with me?" asked Mr. Durban. "You and your electric gun
and your airship? Will you come to Africa to hunt elephants, and
help me get the big tusks I'm after?"

"I will!" exclaimed Tom.

"Then we'll start at once. There's no need of delaying here any
longer."

"Oh, but I haven't an airship ready," said the young inventor. The
face of the old hunter expressed his disappointment.

"Then we'll have to give up the scheme," he said ruefully.

"Not at all," Tom told him. "I have all the material on hand for
building a new airship. I have had it in mind for some time, and I
have done some work on it. I stopped it to perfect my electric
rifle, but, now that is done, I'll tackle the Black Hawk again, and
rush that to completion."

"The Black Hawk?" repeated Mr. Durban, wonderingly.

"Yes, that's what I will name my new craft. The RED CLOUD was
destroyed, and so I thought I'd change the color this time, and
avoid bad luck."

"Good!" exclaimed the hunter. "When do you think you can have it
finished?"

"Oh, possibly in a month--perhaps sooner, and then we will go to
Africa and hunt elephants!"

"Bless my ivory paper cutter!" exclaimed a voice in the hall just
outside the library. "Bless my fingernails! But who's talking about
going to Africa?"

The old hunter looked at Tom and his father in surprise, but the
young inventor laughing and going to the door, called out:

"Come on in, Mr. Damon. I didn't hear you ring. There is some one
here from your town."

"Is it my wife?" asked the odd gentleman who was always blessing
something. "She said she was going to her mother's to spend a few
weeks, and so I thought I'd come over here and see if you had
anything new on the program. The first thing I hear is that you are
going to Africa. And so there's some one from Waterford in there,
eh? Is it my wife?"

"No," answered Tom with another laugh. "Come on in Mr. Damon."

"Bless my toothpick!" exclaimed the odd gentleman, as he saw the
grizzled elephant hunter sitting between Tom and Mr. Swift. "I have
seen you somewhere before, my dear sir."

"Yes," admitted Mr. Durban, "if you're from Waterford you have
probably seen me traveling about the streets there. I'm stopping
with my sister, Mrs. Douglass, but I can't stand it to be in the
house much, so I'm out of doors, wandering about a good bit of the
time. I miss my jungle. But we'll soon