M. LEMAIRE PROVES HIS TRAINING
"You insult me!" screamed M. Lemaire, halting right under the face of
Captain Jack Benson, who looked at him undaunted.
"I didn't," denied Jack. "I let you do that yourself. My
congratulations, sir. You certainly know how to insult your own
manhood as well as the most confirmed scoundrel could wish!"
"You insult again!" quivered M. Lemaire, his French accent asserting
itself. "I s'all make you pay for zat!"
He struck wildly, badly, as a Frenchman does who has no knowledge of
boxing. Benson merely warded off the blow, at the same time brushing
M. Lemaire back a couple of steps.
"Now, you keep away--Gaston, or whatever your name is!" warned Jack,
wheeling upon the chauffeur. "If I lose my temper, some one is going
to be hurt."
But that defiance served only to draw the chauffeur on. Raising the
wrench, he rushed swiftly at the young submarine captain, aiming a blow
at his head.
Just as might have been expected, Jack Benson wasn't there at that
instant.
Instead, he dodged nimbly to one side, at the same time driving in a
blow that landed under one of the chauffeur's ears. The fellow went
to the ground. Swift as a flash Jack bent over him, and snatched up
the wrench, hurling it off among the trees.
Then Jack wheeled around to face Mlle. Nadiboff, bowing.
"Don't you attempt to do anything, I beg of you, Mademoiselle," Jack
urged. "It would come fearfully hard to have to make even the signs
of striking at a woman."
Though she did not fear physical violence from him, there was something
in Benson's eyes, at just that moment, which caused the Russian woman
to retreat three or four steps.
Now Jack drew himself up, for he was becoming master of himself. He at
once resolved to play this game, if there was to be more of it, with
greater coolness.
"I think you see, Monsieur, that I am not be frightened by your childish
gymnastics," Benson uttered.
M. Lemaire, too, had forced himself to greater coolness.
"Why, Captain Benson, I might even kill, if I found it necessary,"
replied the Frenchman.
"Then don't get any notion that it's necessary," frowned the young
submarine captain. "It would get you into a fearful lot of trouble,
and could do you no possible good."
"But you called me a 'dog,'" pursued M. Lemaire, plaintively. "To a
Frenchman that is the gr-r-r-rand insult!"
"Let it go at that, then," proposed Benson, with a pretense at
amiability.
"Ah! Then you will forget what has just happened, if I will?" cried the
Frenchman, eagerly. "That is admir-r-r-rable! Now, then, ten
thousand dollars I have said you shall be paid for what you will furnish
me. Ah, even in this rich country, one can do much with ten dollars!"
"It wouldn't be much, I'm afraid, as compared with my prospects with the
Pollard Company," replied Captain Jack, with his most thoughtful air.
"Your prospects with the company?" echoed M. Lemaire. "Why, my bright
young captain, your prospects with the company will continue just the
same. They will never know that you have taken this little fortune
from me. Ten thousand dollars! Think of that!"
"And you'd turn around and sell what I'd, give you for a half a million,
very likely."
"Oh, no, no, no!" disclaimed the Frenchman, solemnly. "There would be
nothing like that in it for me."
"Then no foreign government wants very badly to know about the Pollard
plans," inquired Jack.
"There is no government that would pay a really great fortune for such
information,". M. Lemaire assured the submarine boy.
"There is one," retorted Captain Jack, with a cunning smile.
"Which one?" demanded the Frenchman, doubtingly.
"One that you don't happen to represent," laughed Jack, quietly.
"Ah, I much doubt it, though I beg you to pardon me for saying so,
Captain Benson."
"Why man alive," grumbled Jack, "are you running away with the notion that
you're the only one who ever approached me with a view to finding out
how the Pollard boat runs? You claim, to be a spy for some other
government, M. Lemaire. Are you such an infant as to think yourself
the only spy in the field?"
"You would have to tell me about the others. Name them, or describe
them to me," urged the Frenchman. "Then I would know, if they are real
agents of any foreign government."
"I would tell you nothing of the sort," muttered Captain Jack. "I am
young, perhaps, yet I'm old enough to keep my own secrets."
"Then it is agreed, anyway," hastened on the Frenchman, "that, in three
days, you will have ready the plans and descriptions, and that I, after
I have looked them over and have found them satisfactory, will hand you
ten thousand dollars."
"If you've made any such agreement," laughed Benson, "then you've made
it with yourself only. You certainly haven't made it with me."
"Don't you agree, then?" asked M. Lemaire.
"No," said Jack, shortly, turning on his heel.
"Where are you going, Captain?"
"Back to Spruce Beach."
"On foot?"
"Yes, for I know your kind too well to suppose that you'll offer me a
ride back."
"Wait!" cried M. Lemaire, persuasively, and Benson, halted, looking at
him. "Of course I cannot offer you a lift back to town," continued
the Frenchman, smilingly, "for that would be ungallant. But Mlle.
Nadiboff, who had the pleasure of your company out here will, I know,
be most delighted at having your company on the return."
"Assuredly," added the young Russian woman, with one of those charming
smiles that had failed so utterly with the submarine boy. "I shall
feel most offended if Captain Benson does penance by walking all the
miles back to Spruce Beach."
"I'd be a fool, then, to take that long walk back, when I can ride,"
thought Captain Jack.
So he turned, retracing his steps and bowing to the young woman.
"Yet, before we start," proposed M. Lemaire, anxiously, "let us see,
Captain, if we cannot yet come to some arrangement."
"Well?" demanded Jack, for boyish curiosity tempted him to find how
far this Frenchman was willing to go.
"Captain Benson," proposed Lemaire, "let us say that the price for what
I ask shall be fifteen thousand dollars."
"You're not getting anywhere near my price, M. lemaire," laughed the
submarine boy, derisively.
"You are playing with me--laughing at me!" cried the Frenchman, yet he
spoke cheerily, for now he began to hope that this American boy might
yet be induced to sell himself, body, soul and honor.
"We may as well drop this line of talk," hinted Jack Benson. "You were
good enough to offer me a ride back to town, I believe?"
"Yet the price? Let us settle that first," begged the Frenchman.
"Captain Benson, I will make you one more offer--but it must be the
last. Listen!"
Yet that word was followed by three or four utterly mysterious words,
uttered in a low voice in Arabic.
"Yes," nodded Mlle. Nadiboff, as Jack glanced from one to the other,
"but this must be the last offer."
"The last, the only, the highest offer," muttered Gaston, who had
recovered from the blow Captain Jack had given him.
"Well, then, Captain Benson, bring me your plans within three days, with
all the other data needed for the construction of one of your submarine
boats, and I will hand you, in exchange, the sum of twenty thousand
dollars. There you are, my good friend! Twenty thousand dollars. Now
you are ours, are you not?"
Disgusted, yet crafty, Jack Benson pretended to hesitate.
"You must give me your answer at once," demanded M. Lemaire. "I cannot
be played with any longer."
Captain Jack drew himself stiffly erect, looking the Frenchman full in
the eyes.
"M. Lemaire, you must have been a spy for a good many years. You have
been engaged so long in dishonest transactions that you are unable to
understand such a thing as common honesty."
"Do you call it honesty," demanded the Frenchman, with a bitter smile,
"to demand more than twenty thousand dollars for such an easily performed
service?"
"You idiot!" broke forth Jack, in sudden contempt. He was no longer
able even to play with this rascal. "Your offer is just as good as one
of a million dollars would be. I wouldn't take either!"
"What! You have been trifling with me?" demanded M. Lemaire, starting
forward.
Now the meaning of those few words in Arabic became plain enough. For
Mlle. Nadiboff, who had bent over, her hand toying with the sand,
suddenly clutched a handful of the fine grains and straightened up,
hurling the sand full in Benson's face.
In that same flashing instant Gaston darted behind the young American.
As the half-blinded young captain dodged back, the chauffeur caught him
around the neck, dragging him to the ground, while Lemaire sprang a-top
of the boy.
Jack fought desperately enough, but the two men rolled him over,
struggling to hold his hands. Then--
Click! Snap!
Jack Benson's wrists were handcuffed tightly together.
Now M. Lemaire leaped up, looking down gloatingly at the boy.
"Benson, you young fool," scoffed the Frenchman, "since you refuse to
be treated as a friend, you shall know what it is to have us for your
enemies. You deem it easy to laugh at us--to call us names! Bah!
You will soon be glad to beg from us! Your hours of misery are now
before you--perhaps days of torment that shall end in madness. Defy
us? Balk our plans? Pouf? How little you know of the people with
whom you have now to dealt."
Then, at a sign from Lemaire, Gaston threw himself upon Benson's legs,
swiftly binding the ankles together. This done, Lemaire himself added
a gag to Jack's mouth that shut off the last chance of making a sound.
This done, the two men bore Captain Jack to the larger auto, while
Mlle. Nadiboff, chuckling softly, covered him completely under robes.