EVEN UP FOR MR. KAMANAKO
"This is Mr. Hennessy, one of the newspaper men who visited our boat
yesterday afternoon," said Jack, on rejoining his companions. "Mr.
Hennessy has been returning good for evil. While I am unable to tell
him any of the things he wants most to know about our boat, he, on the
other hand, has been telling me much of interest about these ruins."
"There are a lot of legends about this old wreck of a castle," laughed
Hennessy. "Most of them are too silly to consider for a moment. One
of the old stories has to do with a secret passage. Some of the guides
hereabouts show what they solemnly explain was one of the outlets of
the secret passage in bygone days. Do you care to devote five minutes
to looking at the ridiculous thing?"
Mlle. Nadiboff smilingly accepted the suggestion, so Hal and Jack also
agreed. The reporter led the way across a field, pausing at last before
a fringe of weeds and low bushes.
"Now, just step through this wild hedge," Hennessy proposed, smilingly,
"and you'll see how little it takes to start a yarn. Look out, though,
that you don't fall down."
As they stepped through the fringe cautiously the members of the party
found themselves peering down the shaft of what appeared to be a very
ordinary well. It was circular, in shape, and had been laid, on the
inside, with a masonry of stones.
"There is water at the bottom, isn't there?" inquired the woman Spy.
"Yes," replied Hennessy. "It was never anything more than a well. Yet,
day before yesterday, one of the local guides brought me here and
insisted on telling me all about its having been an outlet of a famous
secret passage from the castle. I had some fishing tackle in my
pocket, so I rigged up a line and weight, and let it down. I satisfied
myself that there were about four feet of greenish, slimy water at
the bottom of a well. I wish you could have seen the guide's face!"
"Here come some visitors, now," nudged Hal.
Two men and four women, led by a guide, approached the place.
"This shaft looks dark and mysterious enough," began the guide, reeling
off a well learned lesson, "to be as full of historic interest and
mystery as it really is. This shaft is what is left of one of the
outlets of the famous secret passage to and from the castle."
While the new visitors crowded about, asking questions and offering
remarks, the party that Hennessy was guiding stepped into the background,
secretly enjoying the guide's buncombe.
"If people would only stop to use their good sense a bit," whispered
Hennessy, "they'd know, at once, that the shaft is only a long disused
well."
"Great Scott!" whispered Jack. "Here come Mr. Farnum and Eph with a
guide. Let's see if they will be buncoed."
Guide number two came up, with the shipbuilder and Somers in tow.
Greetings were exchanged. Then the last arrived pair stepped forward
in the guide's wake. Farnum listened with an amused smile.
"Oh, pshaw!" grunted Eph. "Is this the best you can show us? This is
nothing but an old well, with ten feet of malaria at the bottom. Show
us, for a change, something that we can believe."
Hal began to laugh quietly. Then all hands stepped forward for another
look down the shaft. As they stepped outside again Benson happened to
turn just in time to see a familiar figure coming along a path near by.
It was Kamanako, better dressed than he had been earlier in the morning,
and carrying a bulging dress suitcase.
"Hullo!" muttered Jack Benson, in a tone loud enough to carry to the
ears of the newcomer. "There's that infernal Jap spy--that scoundrelly
thief of other men's secrets!"
Kamanako halted as abruptly as though he had been challenged by a sentry.
As he saw the young captain a dark, red flush crept into the cheeks of
the little, brown man.
"You talk much," sneered the Japanese his anger rising.
"I say what I think about spies and fellows who would steal other men's
secrets," retorted the young submarine captain.
"You will hold tongue better, if you please," snapped Kamanako.
"I? Hold my tongue for any scamp like you?" taunted Jack Benson.
The taunt had the effect for which Jack wished. Kamanako, looking
furious, dropped his dress suit case and ran angrily forward.
Just in time, as the Japanese bounded through the fringe of weeds,
Captain Jack dodged adroitly to one side.
So Kamanako plunged past him--and, the next instant, there came a
smothered yell from the inside of the well shaft.
"Oh, that was a shame!" came indignantly, from one of the women in the
party of strangers.
But Jack, paying no heed to her, had stepped back to the edge of the
well shaft. Dimly, down at the bottom, he could make out Kamanako,
standing in slimy water that reached nearly up to his arm-pits.
"Is the water fine, eh?" Jack called down, laughingly.
"I show you--some time!" came the answer, in smothered rage.
"You showed me Japanese jiu-jitsu," mocked Benson "so I had to do
something to return your courtesy. What I have just shown you is
called--American strategy!"
By now Kamanako had succeeded in pulling himself part way out of the
water, using his hands and feet on projecting bits of the old masonry.
"You'll get out, in time, for you're a patient fellow," Jack called
down, in a tantalizing kind of encouragement. "Don't forget the name
that I have just given you--American strategy. And, the next time a
fellow tries to make you mad, don't let him do it until you've looked
the ground over. American strategy--yes, that's the name."
Laughing, as he straightened up, Jack turned away from the shaft
"And aren't you going to throw him down a rope, or do something to help
the poor fellow out?" demanded the same indignant woman.
"Not in view of his line of offense, madame," Benson replied, raising
his cap.
"Offense? What did he do?"
To the whole party Jack explained how Kamanako, that same morning, had
been caught spying upon the controlling mechanisms of the submarine boat.
All the young skipper's hearers were satisfied, then, to leave the
Japanese there to work his own way out, since no one feels any sorrow
over the punishment of a spy.
"Gunpowder and doughnuts! But you did get square," chuckled Eph, as the
submarine party turned back to the automobiles.
"So that Japanese was a spy, you said?" murmured Mlle. Nadiboff, in a
low tone, as they walked along.
"Yes, beyond a doubt," Jack assured her.
"It must seem strange to be a spy," murmured the young woman. "It must
give one a strange feeling."
"Yes, and a mighty mean feeling," agreed Jack, coolly.
As he spoke he raised his eyes carelessly to her face. He did not make
the glance so significant as to betray his real thoughts.
Mlle. Nadiboff did not flinch nor change color under that brief scrutiny.
Instead, she appeared to be almost lost in thought as she walked along.
Suddenly she clutched at the young captain's arm.
"I wonder if you would do something very great, to please me?" she
murmured, questioningly.
"I'd certainly like to have you try me," responded Jack Benson, in an
equally low tone. He spoke the truth, too, for he believed that this
charming but dangerous companion was scheming some sudden move in her
plans as, a spy. He wanted to find out what that move would be. Above
all, if it were possible, he wanted to get knowledge of which foreign
country she represented.
"Won't you contrive to drive alone with me in my car, when we reach
it?" she whispered, coaxingly.
"And leave your chauffeur behind, also?" asked Jack, smiling.
"That will not be necessary. I do not mind him. But I have much that
I wish to say to you, my Captain. As for your friend--pardon me, but he
is dull, and--"
"Quiet, I think you mean, Mademoiselle," interposed Jack. "Hal's
worst enemy, if he had one, would hardly call him dull."
"Anyway, my Captain," murmured the young woman, "he does not interest me,
and I do want a few words with you."
"This charming young spy," muttered Benson quickly, to himself, "is
beginning to feel that I'm not enough interested to be coaxed away from
my duty by flatteries. I take it she means to show her real hand, and
try to play it in earnest. If that's the case, I want to know what she
is going to say."
Aloud he replied:
"It will be easy enough to send my friend away with the others,
Mademoiselle. When we reach the automobile all I shall have to do will
be to look straight at him."
"Ah! You have a code of signals--you two?" Mlle. Nadiboff laughed,
delightedly.
"A code?" repeated Jack. "No; we have never needed one. But my chum is
an unusually bright and quick young man."