"I have been here for three months," explained Jetson, smiling, "doing some work to assist the naval attaché of this Embassy, Commander Tupper. I have had three months of the hardest work in this old capital, but now, confound it, my work here has ended and I'm ordered to join my ship. The bridge and the quarter-deck are places of boredom to a fellow who has seen what I've seen here. Why, I've even made two trips up to the front—one of them to Verdun."
"Lucky dog!" cried Danny Grin, with feeling. "So you've seen some of the big fighting!"
"It may be well to state that I know fully the business on which you are ordered here," Jetson continued, "so you may mention it freely before me if you are so inclined."
"Then can you tell me," Dave asked, "if it is known how our enemies propose to sink a British warship and make it appear to be the work of someone in the American Navy?"
"I cannot," Jetson replied. "In fact, it was only on receipt of a wireless from near Monte Carlo that the Ambassador had any knowledge that the international plotters intended to attempt the destruction of a British warship as a means for creating bad feeling between the two countries. The whole plot seems foolishly improbable to me."
"It doesn't seem so to me, any longer," rejoined Dave.
"Then you must know some thing that I haven't heard about," murmured Jetson curiously.
"Mr. Darrin," broke in Mr. Lupton, "I will be the Ambassador's authority for you to speak as freely of the matter as you choose."
Dave and Dan thereupon told all that had befallen them at Monte Carlo and at Naples.
"But still," Jetson broke in perplexedly, "how is the sinking of a British warship to be brought about with safety to the plotters, and how is the crime to be laid at the door of the American Navy?"