The men who were watching me laughed at the puzzled look on my face.

I took my hands off, and the gyroscope leisurely and nonchalantly went back to its original position.

“That’s the property we use, applied to the rudder and the ailerons—­those flat planes between the large main planes.  That gives automatic stability to the machine,” continued Norton.  “I’m not going to explain how it is done—­it is in the combination of the various parts that I have discovered the basic principle, and I’m not going to talk about it till the thing is settled by the courts.  But it is there, and the court will see it, and I’ll prove that Delanne is a fraud—­a fraud when he says that my combination isn’t patentable and isn’t practicable even at that.  The truth is that his device as it stands isn’t practicable, and, besides, if he makes it so it infringes on mine.  Would you like to take a flight with me?”

I looked at Kennedy, and a vision of the wreckage of the two previous accidents, as the Star photographer had snapped them, flashed across my mind.  But Kennedy was too quick for me.

“Yes,” he answered.  “A short flight.  No stunts.”

We took our seats by Norton, I, at least, with some misgiving.  Gently the machine rose into the air.  The sensation was delightful.  The fresh air of the morning came with a stinging rush to my face.  Below I could see the earth sweeping past as if it were a moving-picture film.  Above the continuous roar of the engine and propeller Norton indicated to Kennedy the automatic balancing of the gyroscope as it bent the ailerons.

“Could you fly in this machine without the gyroscope at all?” yelled Kennedy.  The noise was deafening, conversation almost impossible.  Though sitting side by side he had to repeat his remark twice to Norton.

“Yes,” called back Norton.  Reaching back of him, he pointed out the way to detach the gyroscope and put a sort of brake on it that stopped its revolutions almost instantly.  “It’s a ticklish job to change in the air,” he shouted.  “It can be done, but it’s safer to land and do it.”

The flight was soon over, and we stood admiring the machine while Norton expatiated on the compactness of his little dynamo.

“What have you done with the wrecks of the other machines?” inquired Kennedy at length.

“They are stored in a shed down near the railroad station.  They are just a mass of junk, though there are some parts that I can use, so I’ll ship them back to the factory.”

“Might I have a look at them?”

“Surely.  I’ll give you the key.  Sorry I can’t go myself, but I want to be sure everything is all right for my flight this afternoon.”

It was a long walk over to the shed near the station, and, together with our examination of the wrecked machines, it took us the rest of the morning.  Craig carefully turned over the wreckage.  It seemed a hopeless quest to me, but I fancied that to him it merely presented new problems for his deductive and scientific mind.