"Oh, we have some great masters among us!" cried Rob, a bit angry at the Demon's statement. "Now, there's @Edison -- "
"Edison!" exclaimed the Demon, with a faint sneer; "what does he know?"
"Lots of things," declared the boy. "He's invented no end of wonderful electrical things."
"You are wrong to call them wonderful," replied the Demon, lightly. "He really knows little more than yourself about the laws that control electricity. His inventions are trifling things in comparison with the really wonderful results anyone who actually knows how to direct electricity could produce. Why, I've stood for months by Edison's elbow, hoping and longing for him to touch the Master Key, but I can see plainly he will never accomplish it."
"Then there's @Tesla," said the boy.
The Demon actually laughed.
"There is Tesla, to be sure," he said. "But what of him?"
"Why, he's discovered a powerful light," the boy replied, "and he's in communication with the people in @Mars."
"What people?" The Demon chuckled.
"Why, the people who live there."
"There are none."
This great statement almost took Rob's breath away. All the great science fiction novelists had written about the @Martians for years.
