"I think Jimmy would show up even better as a member of the Pie-eater's Union," said Joe. "He has such a special gift in that direction that he'd soon be champion of the whole outfit."

"Well, it's something to be a champion of anything in these days of compet.i.tion in sports," said Jimmy. "But here we are, Bob, and here's _your_ chance to demonstrate how to become a champion surfboard artist."

"All right, I'm game," said Bob. "Hand over that instrument of torture, and I'll be the goat and give you fellows a good chance to laugh at me."

The surfboard was about the shape and size of a small ironing board, although much lighter. Equipped with this device, Bob waded into the surf, holding the surfboard over his head until he got into water as deep as his shoulders. There was a fairly high surf running, in spite of his pessimistic prophecy to the contrary. Bob waited until an unusually high breaker came curling in, and then launched himself and the surfboard against the green wall of water.

More by good luck than anything else he caught it at the right angle, and went whirling toward the sh.o.r.e at breath-taking speed. For perhaps a hundred feet he held his position, but then tilted to one side, and in a moment he and the surfboard disappeared in a smother of foam and spray.

Tumbled over and over, he finally got to his feet, after the force of the wave had spent itself, and waded into sh.o.r.e, puffing and blowing.

"I got a good start, anyway," he panted. "I guess it takes practice to keep your balance and come all the way in, but it's a great sensation.

I'm going to try it again." Suiting the action to the word, Bob waded valiantly in again. After several attempts he finally caught a big wave just right, and by frantic balancing rode all the way in to shallow water. "There you are!" exclaimed Bob triumphantly. "Say, when we once get on to this, it ought to be barrels of fun. Who's going to be the next one to try it?"

"I'll take a whirl at it," said Joe. "It looked easy enough the way you rode in the last time."

"Sure it's easy," grinned Bob, shaking the water out of his ears. "Go to it, Joe. I'll stand by to rescue you if you need it."

Joe made several attempts, and received some rough handling from some big breakers before he finally contrived to make a fairly successful trip.

"Wow!" he exclaimed, scrambling to sh.o.r.e and throwing the surfboard at Jimmy. "It's fun if you have luck, but I thought I was going to drink the whole Atlantic Ocean once or twice. You try it, Jimmy. It's your board, anyway."

"Yes, I know it's my board," said Jimmy. "Don't you want to try it next, Herb?"

"Oh, I wouldn't think of using it before you," said Herb. "I want to have the fun of seeing you get drowned before me, Doughnuts."

"Well, I suppose I shouldn't refuse to give you that pleasure, so here goes," returned Jimmy, and he waded manfully into the surf, the board poised above his head.

He made a lunge at the first big breaker that came along, but instead of planting the board at an angle, he slapped it against the wave in a vertical position, and the next second he was underneath the board and was being ignominiously rolled and tumbled along the sandy bottom. When the wave finally left him, he staggered to his feet and found the treacherous surfboard floating within a yard of him.

His companions, seeing him safe, laughed heartily at his woebegone and bedraggled appearance.

"It's great sport, isn't it, Jimmy?" chaffed Bob.

"Sure it is, when you do it right," sputtered Jimmy. "I'm going to try it again, if it kills me," and he seized the recalcitrant surfboard and waded doggedly out again. This time his persistence met with a better reward, for, warned by his previous experience, he placed the board flatter this time, and rode in almost to sh.o.r.e before getting upset.

"That's enough for a starter," he gasped. "There certainly is plenty of excitement to it. Go ahead and try it, Herb, with my blessing."

Herb did not seem any too anxious to follow his friend's bidding, but nevertheless he took the board, and after several attempts got the hang of it well enough to get enthusiastic over it.

"It's simply great when you get started right!" he exclaimed. "We'll each have to get one, and we'll have more sport than a little with them."

For the rest of the morning the boys took turns with the contrivance, and by the time they stopped to go home for lunch had gotten quite expert. That afternoon they got their tools, and by evening had fashioned three duplicates of Jimmy's board. On following days they used them to good effect, and before they left Ocean Point that summer they were all adepts at this new form of sport.

CHAPTER XVIII-IN THE WIRELESS ROOM

"SAY, Bob," said Joe, as the four radio boys were walking briskly in the direction of the wireless station the following morning, "we must get Mr. Harvey to give us lessons in sending. That must be half the fun of radiophony, and we might as well do all there is to do. What do you say?"

"I think you're dead right," said Bob heartily. "We'll speak to him about it to-day, and I guess he'll show us how all right. In fact, he offered to do that very thing the first time we were there, if you remember."

"I know he did," said Joe. "And I'm going to remind him of it as soon as I get a chance."

The chance was not long in coming, for that was one of the first things Mr. Harvey spoke of after their arrival at the station.

"You fellows ought to practice up on receiving and sending," he said.

"You can't really claim to be full-fledged radio fans until you can do that."

"That's just what we were speaking of on our way here," said Bob. "If it wouldn't be asking too much of you, we'd like nothing better than to have you show us how."

"Well, of course, it doesn't take very long to learn the international code, and after that it's chiefly a matter of practice," said the radio man. "I have a practice sending set here now, and if you like I'll give you your first lesson."

The boys were only too glad to take advantage of this friendly offer.

Harvey had a simple telegraph key, connected up to a buzzer and a couple of dry cells. The buzzer was tuned to give a sound very much like an actual buzz in an ear-phone. In addition he had a metal plate on which all the letters of the alphabet were represented by raised surfaces, a short surface for a dot, and a long one for a dash. The low s.p.a.ces in between were insulated with enamel. In this way, if one wire was attached to the bra.s.s plate and the other brushed over the raised contact surfaces, each letter would be reproduced in the buzzer with the proper dots and dashes.

The boys found this device a big help, as they could memorize the proper dots and dashes for each letter, and then by moving the wire along the plate could hear the letter in the buzzer just as it should sound.

"But with this thing, it seems to me you don't need to take the trouble to memorize the code," said Herb. "Why, I could send a message with it right now."

"You could, but it would be a mighty slow one," replied Brandon Harvey.

"That thing is useful to a beginner, but it wouldn't work out very well for actual sending. It's too clumsy."

"Yes, I suppose that's so," admitted Herb.

"You fellows can take that along with you when you go," said the radio man. "You can dope out the code from that, but you'll need a key to practice with, too. If you like, I'll lend you this whole practice set until you get a chance to buy one yourselves."

"You bet we'll take it, and many thanks!" exclaimed Bob. "We should have brought something of the kind down with us, but we didn't, so your set will be just the thing for us."

"It's been some time since I've had any use for it," said Harvey. "But I came across it the other day, and it occurred to me that maybe you fellows could use it, as you told me the first time you were here that you intended to take up sending."

"It was mighty nice of you to think of us," said Joe, his face beaming.

"Oh, well, we radio fans have to stick together," returned Harvey, with a smile. "There's some extra head sets lying around here somewhere, and, if you like, you can listen in on some of the messages coming in. Things were pretty lively just before you fellows came in."

The boys lost no time in taking advantage of this offer, and were soon absorbed in listening to the reports of shipping, weather conditions, and occasional s.n.a.t.c.hes of conversation that came drifting in over the antenna. Harvey's pencil was busy as he jotted down reports and memoranda. The boys felt that they were in intimate touch with the whole wide world, and the morning flew by so fast that they were all astonished when Harvey announced that it was lunch time.

"Say, but you certainly have an interesting job, Mr. Harvey," said Bob.

"I only wish I were a regular radio man, too."

"So do I," said Joe. "It's about the most fascinating work I can think of."

"You might not like it so much if you were doing it every day," said Brandon Harvey. "But it's a big field, and getting bigger every day, so maybe a few years from now you may join the brotherhood. If you ever do, why, all the experience you're getting now will come in mighty handy."

"Yes, but I know something else that might come in pretty handy, too,"

put in Jimmy, "and that's a little lunch. I think we'd better make tracks toward home mighty soon."