“You have justified my belief in you,” was part of what Miss Pangloss said to the happy inventor, as he stepped from the boat that brought them back.
“I’ll believe in that boat when she does something worth while,” were Mr. Pangloss’s words. How strangely this was to be brought about not one of them dreamed, although Lockyer answered with a new confidence:
“She will, Mr. Pangloss, and when she does I’m going to ask you for something.”
“I can guess what it is,” was the grim rejoinder; “but you are a young man still, and do not come to me till you have ‘made good.’ But you must not mind if I am rather savage to-day, Lockyer,” he went on more kindly. “I’ve just had bad news. While we were down this way I visited my summer residence at Sandbeach, ten miles from here. In the absence of my caretaker it has been robbed by Sound pirates of every stick of furniture.”
“You amaze me!” exclaimed Mr. Lockyer. The naval officers who had heard this last also expressed their sympathy.
“Just when I am getting ready to start on a yachting trip, too,” went on the old man; “most annoying, most annoying. Now Lockyer, if your submarine could catch those pirates, I’d say she was worth while.”
“I sincerely wish that she could, sir,” was the rejoinder. And Lockyer meant it, too. In fact, there was nobody on earth whom he more ardently desired to please than the peppery, irritable old apostle of peace.
Soon after, the old millionaire and his daughter left. But what a change had come over Lockyer! All the doubt and uncertainty of the past anxious months had left him. He could hardly keep his eyes off the visualized realization of his dream. At the hotel where they had lunch quite a crowd had gathered. Every one was eager to shake his hand and tell the inventor how they had always believed in him,—even those who had been most confident that the Lockyer would only take one dive, and that would be to the bottom.
The first thing the shore party did was to don dry clothing, which, it may be said, was also done by those on board the craft. The platform deck would be awash in bad weather, and, as the Lockyer lay at anchor, it was not more than two feet above the gently lapping waves. The warm sun, however, soon dried off the plates.