Then, as though to punish Jack, Mlle. Nadiboff asked:
"You will hand me into the car, Mr. Hastings?"
Hal did so, taking the seat beside her in the tonneau. Jack Benson, suppressing a twinkle that struggled to his eyes, closed the tonneau door, then stepped in on the front seat beside the chauffeur.
Despite her own cleverness, the young woman gave a slight gasp of astonishment over this swift arrangement.
"Decidedly, my young captain is not wholly, a fool," she told herself.
"When I seek to snub him, he puts it past my power. However, it may be that this young engineer will be better suited to my purpose. I will study him."
"Toot! toot!" The Farnum auto, getting away first, went past them, sounding its whistle while Mr. Farnum and Eph lifted their hats.
"Our gallant friend, the captain, must feel out of conceit with me,"
laughed Mlle. Nadiboff to Hal. "He prefers the chauffeur"s company to mine. So we must console ourselves."
Though he had not been able to hear any of the conversation, M. Lemaire, looking out from behind the lace curtains of a parlor window, had seen what had happened.
"Sara is doing better this morning," he muttered to himself. "Though why should she take two of the young men with her? Ah, I see that she has the engineer at her side, while young Benson rides on the front seat. Clever little woman! She is going to make the young captain jealous! Well enough does she know how to do that!"
Not quite so well pleased was the young woman herself, as the drive proceeded. Though she did all in her power to charm Hal, and though she did succeed in interesting him, she could not draw the boy out into much conversation. Hal usually had little to say. Though he answered Mlle.
Nadiboff courteously from time to time, he did not utter many words.
Indeed, he appeared to be thinking of something far remote from the present scene.
"Are you bored, Mr. Hastings? Does the sound of my voice annoy you?"
asked Mlle. Nadiboff, as the auto flew over the quiet country roads inland from Spruce Beach.
"Good gracious, no!" replied Hal.
"Then why do you say so little?"
"Because you say it so much better, Mademoiselle."
"But flattery will never take the place of interested conversation."
"Engineers don"t talk much," protested Hal.
"So they think a great deal. Of what were you thinking?"
"Oh?" murmured Hal. "Oh, I was thinking of my engine, I guess."
Mlle. Nadiboff bit her lips in secret rage. If she had felt that she was doing poorly with Captain Jack Benson, evidently she was now seated beside an absent-minded sphinx.
"What place is that over there?" inquired Hal, coming out of a brown study as he felt some reproach in the stiffening att.i.tude of his companion.
Hal"s eye had been caught by what looked like the ruins of an old castle.
Such sights are at least rare in the United States.
"That ruin, do you mean?" asked Mlle. Nadiboff. "Oh, it is a quaint bit of a castle, only some three hundred years old, though long past in ruins. I believe it was erected as a stronghold by some wealthy man, in the old days when the pirates from Havana now and then swept along the coast on their raids. Would you like to see the place, Mr.
Hastings?"
"Very much indeed," Hal admitted, "if you have the time."
"The time?" Mlle. Nadiboff"s laughter rippled out merrily. "Why, I have all the time in the world, Mr. Hastings. I live only to enjoy myself."
"That must be rather a dull existence, then," thought Hal, while his pretty companion leaned forward to give the order to the chauffeur, who turned up a road leading to the ruined castle of the old piratical days.
Jack had heard the conversation, and so knew, without asking, for what they were now heading.
As they drew closer they discovered other automobiles near the old castle.
"The place has several visitors to-day?" hinted Hal.
"Oh, yes; it is one of the show spots of this section," replied Mlle.
Nadiboff. "It does well enough to look about there for a few minutes.
But a ruin like that suggests death and decay, and I--I love life."
"Still, that castle is now a part of history," suggested Hal, "and history, it seems to me, should always be interesting."
"This stupid young engineer!" fumed Mlle. Nadiboff, to herself. "He would drive me wild, if I saw much of him. I think even my slow little captain will prove more romantic."
Though neither of the submarine boys could yet suspect it, they were soon to stumble into much more than relics of the past.
They were destined to find themselves exposed to one of the greatest surprises of their already eventful lives.
"Here we are," cried Mlle. Nadiboff, as the auto stopped near the north end of the castle. "May you discover something to interest you!"
The submarine boys certainly did!
CHAPTER VII
A POINTER "JOLTS" THE SUBMARINE CAPTAIN
There was not much left of the old castle, save the walls, and some badly crumbled ruins of inner buildings.
"The Florida climate doesn"t seem to agree with castles," suggested Jack.
"I have, an idea that, in Europe, a castle only three hundred years old would last much longer and keep much better."
"In Europe?" repeated Mlle. Nadiboff. "Oh, yes; much better. But then, perhaps in Europe there would be a feeling of veneration for the old that would lead the people to take much better care of their castles.
It would be so in my country, I know."
"May I ask what is your country, Mademoiselle?" asked Jack, looking up and into her face.
"Guess, Mr. Yankee!"