y, and
gazing searchingly into the boy's eyes. "Do you mean to tell me that
Don--that Mr. Millard would be engaged in any work hostile to his
own country?"

"Is the one we call Millard an American citizen?" asked Benson.

"Yes."

"Then--"

Jack came to an abrupt stop after that one word. He would not tell the
dreadful news to this spirited young woman. It was not necessary.

But she became insistent

"Mr. Benson," she cried, "this has gone too far not to have a full
explanation. Has--has Mr. Millard done aught to betray the United
States? For that matter, how could he?"

"Madam," Benson replied, gravely, "no Central American republic would
want charts of our fortified harbors, or notes concerning the
fortifications, the harbor mines, and so on, for the very simple reason
that no Central American republic would ever be equal to the task of
attempting to invade the United States."

"Did Mr. Millard steal such plans--make such notes?"

She hissed the question sharply, her face now deathly white.

"That is the charge against him," Jack nodded.

"Did he do it?"

"I caught him at it, opposite Fort Craven," young Benson answered.

A low, smothered cry escaped the girl. Her head rested against the side
of the carriage as though her brain were reeling. But at length she
spoke.

"You--you would not deceive me," she faltered. "Yet tell me more."

"I can't;" answered Jack, with a shake of his head. "Further than
that, I cannot go."

"Oh, I see," she nodded, "and I do not blame you. You feel that,
whatever you told me, I would tell him. But I wouldn't!"

Though the girl's face was still fearfully pallid, her eyes, as she
turned to gaze into the submarine boy's face, flashed with a new fire.

Then, after a brief pause:

"Whatever he is, or has done, I am an American," she added, quietly.

"This has been a miserable fifteen minutes for me." responded Jack
Benson. "I have been torn between the impulse to mind my own business,
and the fear that you may be throwing yourself away on a man whom you
would promptly learn to despise."

"I shall never give Donald Graves another thought as a lover," the girl
rejoined, promptly. "Nor shall I shelter him. I am going to him now!"

"Then you have an appointment with him? You know where to find him?"

"Yes," replied the girl, looking at the submarine boy rather queerly.
"Do you care to go with me to meet Donald Graves--the one you knew
as Millard? But I