They had reached their capacity; the spigot was wide open.
Percy Darrow showed Jack the head-lines to this effect.
"Cheerful thought," he suggested. "Suppose the whole four million should
want to get out at the same time!"
Eldridge had come back to the wireless office thoroughly bewildered. It is
a well-known fact that the exact scientist is the hardest man to fool, but
the most fooled if fooled at all. Witness the extent to which noted
scientists have been taken in by faking spiritualist mediums. So with
Eldridge. His hypothesis had been so carefully worked out that the failure
of its logic threw his mind into confusion. Until he could discover the
weak link in his chain of reasoning, that confusion must continue.
An hour and a half after the bulletin announcing the failure of the search
had been posted, Eldridge rushed into the wireless office. The plague of
darkness had lifted after fifteen minutes' duration.
"Call Monsieur X," he gasped to the day operator. In fifteen minutes, by
rapid substitutions of batteries to weaken or strengthen the sending
current, he had redetermined his previous data. Apparently, without the
shadow of a doubt, Monsieur X was within the circle.
"He may be at sea," suggested the operator.
But Eldridge shook his head. The circle of the sea had been well
patrolled, and for days.
"Begin over again," drawled Darrow. "I told you that you were on the wrong
track.
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