"
The people in the room crowded close about the table to examine the map
upon which Professor Eldridge had drawn the circles.
"There's an awful lot of country--some of it pretty wild," objected the
_Bulletin_ man. "It will be a long job to hunt a man down in that
territory."
"Even if it were as extensive a task as a hasty review of the facts might
indicate," stated Eldridge, "I venture to assert that enough men would be
forthcoming to expedite such a search. But modifying circumstances will
lighten the task."
"How's that?" asked the _Banner_ man, speaking for the others' evident
interest.
"We have no means of surmising the method by which this man succeeds in
arresting vibratory motions of certain wave-lengths," said Eldridge
didactically, "any more than we are able to define the precise nature of
electricity. But, as in the case of electricity, we can observe the action
of its phenomena. Two salient features leap out at us: one is that these
phenomena are limited in time; the other that they are limited in space.
The latter aspect we will examine, if you please, gentlemen.
"The phenomena have been directed with great accuracy (a) at the Atlas
Building; (b) at this city and some of its immediate suburbs. The
peculiarity of this can not but strike an observant mind. How is this man
able, at forty or fifty miles distance, to concentrate his efforts on one
comparatively small objective? We can only surmise some system of
insulating screens or focal mirrors.
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