“She’s like that sometimes, but she means well, Melissa does,” explained the professor, with a rather sheepish look as he stood in the midst of a puddle that was rapidly converting him into an isolated island in the midst of Miss Melissa’s immaculate hall carpet.  Suddenly, with one of his impulsive movements, he darted off into a room opening off the hall and came back with a dollar bill he had unearthed from a desk.  He handed it to Jack, and then, raising his finger to his lips, he said: 

“Don’t let Melissa see it.  She’s the best of women, is Melissa, but peculiar about some things—­er—­very peculiar.”

“Je-ru-shah!” came Miss Melissa’s voice.

“Yes, my dear, coming,” said the professor, and shouldering his bag of specimens he shook hands with the boys and hastened off to answer his sister’s dictatorial call.

“I guess we’d better be going,” said Jack, with a smile that he could not repress.

The others agreed, and they were soon speeding back to High Towers, as the estate of Jack’s father, also a noted inventor, was called, with plenty to talk about as a result of the events of the day.

CHAPTER V.

Chester Chadwick—­inventor.

As readers of the preceding volumes of this series, know, Jack Chadwick and Tom Jesson, his cousin, had won the titles of Boy Inventors through their ingenuity and mechanical genius.  Jack’s father, Chester Chadwick, was an inventor of note, and unlike the majority of inventors, he had turned his devices to such good account that he had accumulated a substantial fortune and was able to maintain a fine estate, already referred to as High Towers where, with splendidly equipped workshops and a miniature lake, he could experiment and work out his ideas.

In the first book of this series it was related how Tom Jesson, Jack’s cousin, came to make his home at High Towers.  Tom’s father, an explorer of international fame, had departed on an expedition to Yucatan and had not been heard from since that time.  This volume, which was called the Boy Inventors’ Wireless Triumph, told of the boys’ exploits in the radio-telegraphic field and the uses to which they were able to turn them.  In a flying machine, the invention of Mr. Chadwick, they discovered Tom’s father, under remarkable circumstances, a prisoner of a tribe of savages, and also found a fortune in precious stones.

In the succeeding story of their adventures, the boys helped an inventor in trouble.  The Boy Inventors’ Vanishing Gun, as this volume was entitled, set forth in a graphic way the triumph of the boys over the machinations of a gang of rascals intent on stealing the plans of the wonderful implement of warfare which they had helped bring to successful completion.

We next encountered the lads in the Boy Inventors’ Diving Torpedo Boat.  Here they were placed in a new environment on the surface and in the depths of the ocean.  The way in which the wonderful diving craft aided Uncle Sam in a crisis with enemies of the United States was told, and their ingenuity and bravery played no small part in the affair.