have to see the object you aim at. In fact you can fire through a house, and kill something on the other side.”

“I should think that would be dangerous.”

“It would be, only I can calculate exactly, by means of an automatic arrangement, just how far the charge of electricity will go. It stops short just at the limit of the range, and is not effective beyond that. Otherwise, if I did not limit it and if I fired at the scarecrow, through the piece of steel, and the bullet hit the figure, it would go on, passing through whatever else was in the way, until its power was lost. I use the term ‘bullet,’ though as I said, it isn’t properly one.”

“By Jove, Tom, it certainly is a dangerous weapon!”

“Yes, the range-limit idea is a new one. That’s what I’ve been working on lately. There are other features of the gun which I’ll explain later, particularly the power it has to shoot out luminous bars of light. But now we’ll see what it will do to the image.”

Tom took his place at the end of the range, and began to adjust some valves and levers. In spite of the fact that the gun was larger than an ordinary rifle, it was not as heavy as the United States Army weapon.

Tom aimed at the armor-plate, and, by means of an arrangement on the rifle, he could tell exactly when he was pointing at the scarecrow, even though he could not see it.

“Here she goes!” he suddenly exclaimed.

Ned watched his chum. The young inventor pressed a small button at the side of the rifle barrel, about where the trigger should have been. There was no sound, no smoke, no flame and not the slightest jar.

Yet as Ned watched he saw the steel plate move slightly. The next instant the scarecrow figure seemed to fly all to pieces. There was a shower of straw, rags and old clothes, which fell in a shapeless heap at the end of the range.

“Say. I guess you did for that fellow, all right!” exclaimed Ned.

“It looks so,” admitted Tom, with a note of pride in his voice. “Now we’ll try another test.”

As he laid aside his rifle in order to help Mr. Jackson shift the steel plate there was a series of yells outside the shed.

“What’s that?” asked Tom, in some alarm.

“Sounds like some one calling,” answered Ned.

“It is,” agreed Mr. Jackson. “Perhaps Eradicate’s mule has gotten loose. I guess we’d better—”

He did not finish, for the shouts increased in volume, and Tom and Ned could hear some one yelling:

“I’ll have the law on you for this! I’ll have you arrested, Tom Swift! What do you mean by trying to kill me? Where are you? Don’t try to hide away, now. You were trying to shoot me, and I’m not going to have it!”

Some one pounded on the door of the shed.

“It’s Barney Moker!” exclaimed Tom. “I wonder what can have happened?”

CHAPTER III

A DIFFICULT TEST

Return to Table of Contents

Tom Swift opened the door of the improvised rifle gallery and looked out. By the light of a full moon, which shone down from a cloudless sky, he saw a man standing at the portal. The man’s face was distorted with rage, and he shook his fist at the young inventor.

“What do you mean by shooting at me?” he demanded. “What do you mean, I say? The idea of scaring honest folks out of their wits, and making ’em think the end of the world has come! What do you mean by it? Why don’t you answer me? I say, Tom Swift, why don’t you answer me?”

“Because you don’t give me a chance, Mr. Moker,” replied our hero.

“I want to know why you shot at me? I demand to know!” and Mr. Moker, who was a sort of miserly town character, living all alone in a small house, just beyond Tom’s home, again shook his fist almost in the lad’s face. “Why don’t you tell me? Why don’t you tell me?” he shouted.

“I will, if you give me a chance!” fairly exploded Tom. “If you can be cool for five minutes, and come inside and tell me what happened I’ll be glad to answer any of your questions, Mr. Moker. I didn’t shoot at you.”

“Yes, you did! You tried to shoot a hole through me!”

“Tell me about it?” suggested Tom, as the excited man calmed down somewhat. “Are you hurt?”

“No, but it isn’t your fault that I’m not. You tried hard enough to hurt me. Here I am, sitting at my table reading, and, all at once something goes through the side of the house, whizzes past my ear, makes my hair fairly stand up on end, and goes outside the other side of the house. What kind of bullets do you use, Tom Swift? that’s what I want to know. They went through the side of my house, and never left a mark. I demand to know what kind they are.”

“I’ll tell you, if you’ll only give me a chance,” went on Tom wearily. “How do you know it was me shooting?”

“How do I know? Why, doesn’t the end of this shooting gallery of yours point right at my house? Of course it does; you can’t deny it!”

Tom did not attempt to, and Mr. Moker went on:

“Now what do you mean by it?”

“If any of the bullets from my electric gun went near you, it was a mistake, and I’m sorry for it,” said Tom.

“Well, they did, all right,” declared the excited man. “They went right past my ear.”

“I don’t see how they could,” declared Tom. “I was trying my new electric rifle, but I had the limit set for two hundred feet, the length of the gallery. That is, the electrical discharge couldn’t go beyond that distance.”

“I don’t know what it was, but it went through the side of my house all the same,” insisted Mr. Moker. “It didn’t make a hole, but it scorched the wall paper a little.”

“I don’t see how it could,” declared Tom. “It couldn’t possibly have gone over two hundred feet with the gage set for that distance.” He paused suddenly, and hurried over to where he had placed his gun. Catching up the weapon he looked at the gage dial. Then he uttered an exclamation.

“I’m sorry to admit that you are right, Mr. Moker!” he said finally. “I made a mistake. The gage is set for a thousand feet instead of two hundred. I forgot to change it. The charge, after passing through the steel plate, and the scarecrow figure, destroying the latter, went on, and shot through the side of your house.”

“Ha! I knew you were trying to shoot me!” exclaimed the still angry man. “I’ll have the law on you for this!”

“Oh, that’s all nonsense!” broke in Ned Newton “Everybody knows Tom Swift wouldn’t try to shoot you, or any one else, Mr. Moker.”

“Then why did he shoot at me?”

“That was a mistake,” explained Tom, “and I apologize to you for it.”

“Humph! A lot of good that would do me, if I’d been killed!” muttered the miser. “I’m going to sue you for this. You might have put me in my grave.”

“Impossible!” exclaimed Tom.

“Why impossible?” demanded the visitor.

“Because I had so set the rifle that almost the entire force of the electrical bullet was expended in blowing apart the scarecrow figure I made for a test,” explained Tom. “All that passed through your house was a small charge, and, if it HAD hit you there would have been no more than a little shock, such as you would feel in taking hold of an electric battery.”

“How do I know this?” asked the man cunningly. “You say so, but for all I know you may have wanted to kill me.”

“Why?” asked Tom, trying not to laugh.

“Oh, so you might get some of my money. Of course I ain’t got none,” the miser went on quickly, “but folks thinks I’ve got a lot, and I have to be on the lookout all the while, or they’d murder me for it.”