Authors: Margery Allingham
âThis is the headline given to the letter by Yates Braithwaite:
Seven Pounds for Your Thoughts but Worth It, says Edward
. And this is the letter. I have seldom read a more meat-filled document and I hope you will give it the attention it deserves. Here it is:
âSir,
âIt may not be generally known that it is now quite possible to pick up the thoughts of other people in signals which are strong enough for the weakest of intellects to detect.
âThe study of E.S.P. has become respectable now, whereas in the past, when it was called Telepathy, it was not. Yet it is only very recently, and at this school, that the scientific instrument which makes reception absolutely fool-proofâexcept for those who are too oldâhas been made to function.
âA group of boys, all connected with Science in some form, have banded together to do this in the following way:
(1) It was discovered by research that the new element Nipponanium was the vital ingredient in any such instrument. Note:âNipponanium as you are probably aware, was not known before, since there was none on Earth until some was produced and discovered in some radioactive carbon taken out of a Dead Reactor.
(2) The same researcher also discovered that the
Iris Transistor Semi-Silent
which is made by the
No-moto Company of Japan
had already incorporated a minute quantity of this new substance in the amplifying element of their product. It was their belief that the sound volume could be made less penetrating in this way whilst the tone remained true and audible, thereby making the transistor sets suitable for school dormitories, etc. where quiet reception is so important.
(3) From another source (also Japanese) it was learned that the
Iris Semi-Silent
had gone out of production because the sound results were not much good, and difficulties were experienced by the manufacturer since the workpeople handling the Nipponanium showed signs of a mystery neurosis and would not touch it after a bit. (These would all be adults, I expect.)
(4) Realising I would have to act quickly as more Iris Transistors might not come over to England, I approached my friend Henri Rubari, who put up the money (in the end) to buy no less than four of these sets which are only obtainable from Messrs. Blank, Blank & Blank, of Blank in Holborn, who are the sole importers.'
Rafael paused and removed his spectacles: âThe suppression of the name of the firm was made in compliance with a house rule of the Thousand and One Nights Press but
The Daily Paper
ascertained the facts and has taken appropriate action,' he said without a tremor and, resuming his black-sided goggles, went smoothly on.
âThese sets cost no less than seven pounds each and so we began with one only, which Henri Rubari donated free because of his faith in the idea which, I would like to say, I appreciate. Armed with it, and with the information which my researcher had given me, I set to work, helped by the rest of my Team.
(5) Since it was realised that the human body itself would naturally have to take the place of the rest of the transistor set, including its battery, my first task was to find the correct point of contact. Really exhaustive experiments were made by us all with at first most disappointingly slight results. However, as I believe is usual in these major discoveries, success occurred by means of a sort of accident. It was found that most people got their best results when an amplifier was stuck across the main artery in their necks and various adhesives were tried. (It was very easy to be silly over this and a lot of time was wasted.) Finally I decided that an ordinary piece of surgical plaster was the most practical as well as being the least noticeable and one day, when our precious amplifier had been returned to me in a slightly damaged condition, I rolled it in the zinc adhesive, really just hoping to keep the thing together. My spirits certainly were at a low ebb. Then, like a thunderbolt! Victory!
(6) âI could not put it on until the next evening because of boxing practice so it had some hours to soak. It was also very hot weather which probably helped, but this is still subject to investigation and must be tested again and again.
âAt any rate, as soon as I put it in position and settled down in peace to make my mind the necessary blank, I got, among a lot of confusing other material, a definite, recognisable, clear flash from Rubari, who was down in the Day Room. It was about fishing, which I am not interested in. He was tying flies and getting exasperated as people do. I was able to check with him at once and then he checked me. I was annoyed with him for doubting my word and he received what I thought about
that
but not quite the message I sent. After that, work went on with great seriousness and the other transistors were purchased. Unfortunately the shop would not sell the amplifiers separately.
(7) I do not want to make any claim for the zinc until proper chemical and, I hope, radiation tests have been made. Without proper laboratory facilities, which I hope to get in France through a friend of Rubari's whom we have got interested, it is not possible to tell how such a trace of zinc would affect the minute amount of Nipponanium contained in one small amplifier or
how it could get at it.
Query: Is it a question not of chemistry but radiation? When one thinks how a trace of Germanium too small even to be detected chemically can affect the atomic pattern of Aluminium, one cannot but wonder.
(8) I wish to say that I am publishing this interesting news now, before it leaks out any further, for a good reason. In our tests on this instrument we have naturally picked up many outside thoughts, mostly from strangers or people only known slightly. Some of these have been about E.S.P. and even our own part in it and some have been against and even dangerous, and so I have decided not to wait but to take action now. My father, who was a very famous man, told me when I was quite young, that an invention belongs to the country of its inventor but that a breakthrough belongs to the world. Having thought it out very carefully I have decided that this is a breakthrough. So the world must take it and get on with it as fast as possible, for it is not a thing for one lot of people to know more about than another, if it is not to add to their serious irritations instead of clearing them up. I also feel that it will give men and boys in Science a great deal of work of a useful kind and so lessen their interest in explosions and a blasted world and all that waffle. Once this is in general use no one could even think of pressing a button for a bomb, without those affected being warned. But I must repeat that there is a lot to be done before that happy day. Sending is erratic and receiving is not yet really practical by adults, which is greatly against it at present.
(9) The only thing I would like to ask for myself is that the amplifier, when it is perfected, shall be called Longfox's Instant Gen after my father. Also, my researcher belongs to the famous Blank team and he says, quite rightly, that the credit for the first idea of the Nipponanium being useful must go to them.
I send this to
The Boy's Technician
because I think it is a very good paper which should be in most homes.
Yours very truly,
Edward Longfox.
Aged 12 (nearly).
P.S. I spoke this letter on to tape and Rubari's mother's secretary typed it for us.
AS MR CAMPION
and Luke exchanged glances up in their fastness, Rafael closed the journal and laid his spectacles down beside it. He was unsmiling.
âThat was the letter,' he said. âYates Braithwaite felt he should publish it. I should have felt the same, but with
The Daily Paper's
great resources perhaps I should have made a few investigations first. You didn't even buy a set, did you?' he added, swinging round on the younger man, whose blush and shy grin put a nation on his side.
âSeven pounds!' he murmured and his gasping laugh conveyed a journalistic world which Rafael had forgotten.
The senior man laughed briefly. âAnyway, you didn't take it seriously and who shall blame you? But you did recognise a genuine scientific approach and you sent the author a charming letter which he has lent me and which, with your permission, I'm going to read.' He did not wait but shook out a tattered and creased piece of paper.
âAs you see he treasured it,' he said, holding it up and beaming upon them as they exchanged the wistful but on the whole happy glance of those who note they are to enjoy their triumphs at second hand. âHere it is:
Dear Edward, That was a fine letter and I enjoyed it. It will appear in our issue of the 12th of next month. Mind you look out for it. One of these days you must show me your Instant Gen Amplifier. Perhaps I am rather too old for it to be quite the boon to me that it well might be in my professional life but I should certainly enjoy having a yarn about it. If you should come to London in the holidays look in and see me. Give your name to the man on the doorâhis own is Mr Cachouâand come on up to the fifth floor.
âYour guinea for the letter will be sent to you by our accounts' department, probably in about three weeks.
  Â
Your very good friend, believe me,
      Â
Reginald Yates Braithwaite,
          Â
Editor.
He was folding away the letter when Edward put up his hand for it and stowed it carefully in his notebook. Giles Jury laughed and swung back into his accustomed place in the centre of the screen.
âHe's met grown-ups before,' he said easily, and was about to round up his flock for the next phase when Rafael over-rode him blandly and the camera, like a faithless cur, followed the stronger man.
âI wanted to read those letters to you,' he said simply, âbecause they explain what happened next. Last Saturday morning Edward, who was on half-term holiday in London, set out to visit his editor. He was worried because his two exhibition amplifiers had been confiscated. A deliberate attempt to take them from him, which he had frustrated, had been made in a London street in the morning. But, in the evening, most fortunately as it has turned out, they were sequestered by an elderly relative and given casually to an interested visitor. But in performing this seemingly high-handed and unsympathetic act, the unintentional benefactor did a service to the community which can hardly be over-estimated, for without his intervention
The Daily Paper
could not have made its present important disclosure. As it was, having lost his two amplifiers, Edward had to borrow the money and
buy another.
I stress this fact because it is vital for all who hear me to realise that this little device, to whose magical properties everybody seated round this table can subscribe, was actually
bought over the counter of a London store last Saturday morning.
The only two things which have been done to it since then are that it has been partially broken and that it has been wrapped in zinc plaster. Nothing else. Therefore, no one can lay any claim to it.
No one can declare that it is an infringement of any secret belonging to the British Defence Services nor to those of any other country.
It is a foreign commercial device, bought in the open market this very week, broken and wrapped in plaster but otherwise untampered with in any way, and each and every word of this claim can be proved, if necessary in a court of law.
âVery well, then. To return to Edward last Saturday morning: he made his purchase and he walked on down Fetter Lane. But the editorial staffs of The Thousand and One Nights Press do not come in on Saturdays and so, when he climbed up the marble steps of Scheherazade House, the man on the doorâis his name really Cachou?'
âYes,' exploded Mr Braithwaite Junior, in a gust of delight. âChristian name, Hector.'
Rafael, who had taken it for granted that the letter had been facetious, frowned at him. âAmazing,' he said coldly. âAnyhow, he seems an excellent doorman, for when he heard Edward's story and saw the letter he did not turn the boy away or tell him to come back on Monday but got on the telephone to Mr Yates Braithwaite's home. He was out, but Joan Yates Braithwaite was there and she, splendid pressman's wife that she is, kindly told him to send the distressed boy along. Unfortunately, there then began a game of hide-and-seek. When Edward was there the Braithwaites were not and so on, back and forth, but finally, quite late at night, they all met up and Edward produced his purchase. In a very short time Mr Yates Braithwaite made up his mind what to do. After getting in touch with a kindly neighbour of Edward's aunt, who otherwise could have been alarmed by his absence, he drove his wife and their young visitor to Chiswick where they awoke perhaps the one man in all England whose remarkable knowledge of the bye-ways of contemporary World Science enabled him to make a coherent picture of the evidence they set before him.' He wound up the peroration with a bow to the delighted Peggie and once again Giles Jury swanned forward.
âNot yet, I'm afraid, my dear chap.' Rafael was ruthless and some of the actual force of the man showed fleetingly through the woollen shadows of the medium. âUntil now I've been simply telling the story as it was presented to
The Daily Paper
; now I have to tell you what
The Daily Paper
has done about it in your own interests.
âI don't pretend to have Edward's scientific methods but I have listed my moves in the order in which I made them. Firstly, I made certain that I had acquired every Iris Transistor left on sale in this country, and I also bought the very few which had gone to the Duchy of Luxembourg, the only other European country to import them. Secondly, I got in touch with Mr Hyakawa, a senior director of the No-moto Company in Tokyo, and he was very helpful. He confirmed Edward's story about the curious nervous malaise which overcame his work-people when they handled Nipponanium, and agreed that it was one of the reasons why the company had ceased to use it. The story was told in a gossip paragraph in a sample copy of the Nipponese Commercial Bulletin which, in a translated version, was for a time distributed in this country. Mr Hyakawa also told me that the formula for the amplifiers used in the Iris Transistor was not patented. The concept was in the nature of a sales gimmick and was thought to have failed.
The Daily Paper
has a Scientific Correspondent in Japan and Mr Hyakawa has agreed to give him all technical data relevant to the composition and manufacture of the amplifiers. In fact, I believe he has done so already and that important information is being analysed in London now. Unluckily, he tells me, there were no stocks of the discontinued
Iris Semi-Silent
transistors left at the factory. The last small consignments may have been sold to Czechoslovakia, France or China, but this has not yet been confirmed.'