"Golly," said Ben Ruby, seizing a fire extinguisher from the wall and turning it on the blaze. "That's even more than we expected. Look, it made a hole right through the wall! We'll have to keep that thing tied up."
"I'll say you will," said Murray, helping Gloria up. "It's as bad for the guy that's using it as the one at the other end. But seriously, you've got something good there. What happened to the iron plate?"
"Disintegrated. Let's see, where does iron come in the periodic table, Ben? Twenty-six? Then you'll probably find small quantities of all the chemical elements from twenty-five down in that heap of ashes. Phooey, what a rotten smell! That must be the action of the beam on the nitrogen in the air."
"There's a lot to be worked out in this thing, yet, though," declared Ben, "and if you're right about the Lassans making a comeback, precious little time in which to work it out. For one thing, we've got to get a searchlight that will throw a narrow pencil of light for a long distance. I don't think those elephant-men are going to let us poke this thing under their noses. And for another we've got to dope out something to keep it in and some way to furnish current for it...."
"Can't you work it from a tank?" asked Murray, "and rig up a friction accumulator to work from the tracks?"
"I can, but I don't like the idea," Sherman replied. "From the way those Lassans took to our airplanes, I could make a guess that when they come, they're going to come in some kind of flying machine. The dodos are no good in modern war. We'd never catch any kind of an airplane with a tank."
"How about an airplane for yourselves?"
"Too unsteady and too frail. I want something that will take a few pokes and not fold up."
"Say, you guys have less ingenuity for a couple of inventors than anyone I ever heard of," Gloria put in. "Why don't you get one of these Australian rocket-planes and fix it up. It's big enough to hold all your foolishness, and if this thing is half as powerful as it looks, you ought to be able to harness it some way for a power-plant. Then you can plaster your rocket all over with armor. I think—"
Sherman interrupted her by bringing his fist down on the table with a bang that made the glasses rattle.