A Bright Bouncing Boy

In Western Saint Denis, Arthur Morgan finds Professor Marko Dragic raging beside a pond over the failure of his latest invention. Dragic is preparing a demonstration for prospective investors and recruits Arthur to operate a radio-controlled boat, assuming that an uneducated operator will prove the device is genuine. Arthur guides the craft through a pond scattered with mines, firing its torpedoes at model warships and then at moving sailboats. The investors admire the display but refuse Dragic's proposal, and he hurls the control apparatus into the water in anger.

Some nights later, Arthur reaches Dragic's workshop at Doverhill during a thunderstorm. Dragic initially mistakes him for a thief and speaks from hiding through a microphone, then admits his experiment needs help. He hands Arthur three metal conductors and an electrostatic detector, sending him onto the hillside to place the rods where electricity gathers. When the equipment fails to collect a charge, Dragic directs Arthur up the metal tower outside, where he resets the switches at its summit.

Arthur returns to the workshop after more time has passed. Inside, he finds Marko Dragic dead on the laboratory floor, lying in a pool of blood among the remains of his work.