“Got it figured out?” asked the machinist, as he transferred, a generous helping of bacon, eggs and fried potatoes, to his plate.

“For myself,” put in Hal, “I’d suspect that fellow Gaston, in an instant, if he had only been at liberty.  That fellow has an eye that looks like all the letters in the word ‘r-e-v-e-n-g-e.’”

“That’s so,” nodded Jack, thoughtfully, as he ate.  “But we happen to know that Gaston is very safe under lock and key.  By the way, fellows, I don’t suppose Mr. Farnum and Mr. Pollard have heard the news yet, or they’d be out here on the double quick.”

After breakfast Jack went ashore alone, to carry the exciting news to his employers.  He found Messrs. Farnum and Pollard in the breakfast room at the Clayton.  Both were astounded when they heard the news of the night’s doings.

“Who on earth could have put up such a job against the submarine?” gasped David Pollard.

“I don’t know, sir,” Captain Jack replied.  “But I’ve left Hal on board, in command, and I mean to find out something about this business, if there is any way to do it.”

With that he excused himself, rising and leaving the table at which his employers were seated.

Jacob Farnum gazed after his young submarine captain, then whispered to the inventor: 

“That youngster has some notion in his head of where to look for the infernal criminals.  And, ten to one, his idea is a good one that will bear fruit!”

CHAPTER XX

A BRIGHT LOOK AND A DEADLY WARNING

Jack’s employer gave him rather too much credit in supposing that the boy had already worked out the problem of finding those who had made the attack on the “Benson.”

As the submarine boy left the breakfast room he felt as much in the dark as ever.  The only known spies who were still at large, for some reason known only to the Secret Service men, were M. Lemaire, Mlle. Nadiboff and Kamanako.

“This is rather earlier than either of that pair in the habit of showing themselves,” muttered Benson, as the first two names crossed his thoughts.  “I wonder whether I could get the least bit of an inkling by going to the jail and talking with Gaston?  If I could bluff him into telling me anything, it might be so much gained.  I might catch him off his guard, if I could get him angry enough.”

Full of this interesting idea, the submarine boy strolled slowly along to the little jail, forming his plans as he went.

Arrived at the jail, Captain Jack found the keeper, as yet, in ignorance of the dastardly attempt that had been made on the submarine boat the night before.  He listened, aghast, as Benson told him the whole story.

“Now, I’ve got a notion that Gaston’s crowd are very likely at the bottom of this whole deal,” continued the submarine boy, in a low tone.  “For one thing, while perhaps nothing much can be done to the other spies, this fellow, Gaston, is in here for a crime which, under the Florida laws, will go hard with him.  It means that he’ll be locked up for a few years.  That may make both him and Lemaire ugly enough to put them up to almost any mischief.  Was M. Lemaire here to see the fellow yesterday?”