ction!"

"I can sympathize with you," muttered Ned. "Mr. Leatherby used to be a
director in the bank where I worked before Tom made me his business
manager, and I've often thought he was a bit fossilized himself!"

[Illustration: "I'll See What Can Be Done."]

"Well, Mr. Damon, I'll see what can be done," promised Tom.

"Good!" came an enthusiastic exclamation. "Bless my cup of tea, I'm
counting on you!"

"In the meantime, why don't you go up to the house and have our
housekeeper, Mrs. Baggert, make you a cup of tea? Stop in the library
and see Dad. He's been working too hard lately on his electrical book
and he needs company."

[Illustration: "Stop in and See Dad."]

"I will, Tom. Your father is a mighty fine man. Oh, my goodness! Bless
my poor memory, Tom, but I had some news for you. Good or bad I don't
know, but I feel uneasy about it."

"Tell us what it is," suggested the young inventor.

[Illustration: "Two Men Called on Me."]

"It's a rather odd thing. You see, last evening I was reading my paper
on the porch when two men called on me. Said they were long-lost
relatives--cousins, or something of the sort--just back from a stay in
South Africa. They seemed nice enough fellows, but bless my family tree,
I had never heard of 'em! At any rate, they seemed to know a good deal
about the Damon family and so I asked them to dinner. What got me
thinking something might not be right was the way those chaps tried to
pump me about you, Tom."

"Pump you?" asked young Swift, a puzzled look on his face. "About what?"

"Glass," said the eccentric character promptly. "Some kind of glass.
Bless my windshield-wiper, what was it? Oh, yes! Flexible glass, that
was it."

[Illustration: "They Tried to Pump Me."]

Tom and Ned exchanged startled glances. For many months experiments
directed toward the production of a glass as bendable as rubber had been
going forward in the Swift plant. Every possible precaution had been
taken to cloak the work in deepest secrecy, yet somewhere evidently a
leak had developed among Tom's employees.

[Illustration: Tom and Ned Exchanged Glances]

"Are these men still at your home, Mr. Damon?" asked Ned, a worried look
on his face.

"No, they left after dinner. Mr. Brown said they had some important
business up state. Is this glass business some new invention, Tom?"

"I hope it will be. So far my experiments haven't turned out
successfully. But I can't understand how anyone outside ou