"What's that new-fangled thing on the blasted oak, Tom?""That, Ben, is a wireless.""Oh, you don't say so!""Or, rather the start of one.""Say, you aren't original or ambitious or anything like that, are you?"The speaker, Ben Dixon, bestowed a look of admiration and interest on the chum he liked best of all in the world, Tom Barnes.Tom was reckoned a genius in the little community in which he lived. He had the record of "always being up to something." In the present instance he had been up a tree, it seemed. From "the new-fangled thing" Ben had discovered in passing the familiar landmark, the blasted oak, wires and rods ran up to quite a height, showing that some one had done some climbing.Ben became instantly absorbed in an inspection of the contrivance before him. He himself had some mechanical talent. His father had been an inventor in a small way, and anything in which Tom had a part always attracted him."Tell me about it. What's that thing up there?" asked Ben, pointing directly at some metal rods attached to the broken-off top of the tree."Those are antennae."