Nicholas Carter

“ The promise of a tip has just as potent an effect in Porto Rico as it has in any other part of the world. They rowed with savage eagerness, and promised to get to shore in twelve minutes.
As the yawl cut its way through the heaving waters, John Garrison Rayne mused over his good luck. He hugged the suit case between his knees, and tried to decide on his next move.
“It was dead easy!” he muttered. “All I had to do was to get rid of that gray wig, put on the mustache, and buy the clothes I wanted out of the captain’s six hundred. ”

“ Van Cross, who had been enjoying a quiet cigar, looked down from the bridge, and, in a surly tone, asked what was wanted.
“Line up the whole crew and find out first who it was that went overboard,” growled Captain Lawton.
“I can tell you that,” put in Nick Carter, in his character of Sykes, the boatswain.
“Whoever he is, he got six hundred dollars out of my cabin!” roared the skipper. “I’ll skin him alive when I get my hands on him. Who is he?”
“The passenger you shut up for’ard for trying to steal the property of the passenger you call Mr. Miles,” replied Nick. ”

“ Nick Carter—known to the captain and crew of the tramp steamer Cherokee as Sykes, the bos’n—heard this shout, taken up by man after man, as he lay stretched out on the foc’s’le head, in the early morning, just as the ship nosed her way into San Juan harbor, on the northern coast of Porto Rico.
The thrilling warning that somebody has fallen into the sea, which always sends a shock through both crew and passengers whenever heard, does not permit any ordinary person to remain quietly dozing. ”

“ Paul Clayton turned back into his little cabin, and cast a rather anxious glance at the suit case on a chair at the back.
“Very well!” he said, at last. “I’ll stay right here till he comes.”
Captain Bill Lawton went to the companionway, and, as he ascended, he whispered to the officer from police headquarters:
“There’s your man. I’m going on deck.”
“All right!”
For a minute—or a fraction of one—during which the still-puzzled skipper ascended to the deck, Sawyer stood behind the sailcloth portière. Then he swung out and strode down the saloon with an official step that no one could mistake. ”

“ Grail assented, with a smile. “Still you know how it is, Mr. Krause; every one wants to hear a story at firsthand; and, as I was, perhaps, better acquainted with poor Sasaku than any of the other officers at the mess, there is just a possibility that I may be able to throw some light on the tragedy.”
As a matter of fact, the detective required very little urging. He had come to such an absolute halt in the investigation that he was only too willing to repeat the story to any one who offered even the faintest show of providing a solution. ”

“ Captain Bill Lawton had his own little vanities. One of them was to go ashore in a strange port in state, with four oarsmen to propel him from his ship to the landing stage.
As the captain prepared to descend to his boat, he turned to Van Cross and shook his fist at the town across the harbor.
“What are you going to do, cap?” asked Cross carelessly. “What have the people of San Juan done to you?”
“Done? Some of them have got my six hundred dollars.”
“You mean that high-toned passenger of ours has it?” grinned the mate. “You can’t blame the people of Porto Rico for that.” ”

“ Nick had removed the heavy beard he had worn as Joe Sykes, the boatswain, and there was little in his face to remind one of the sailor except his penetrating dark eyes.
Patsy and Chick, too, had changed their faces, so that no one on board the steamer would be likely to suspect that they ever had been members of the crew, taking the hard work, and the equally hard language of the bullying mate, all as part of the day’s work. ”

“ How the scoundrel had contrived to get hold of the semiofficial uniform he wore in so short a time was his own secret.
It need only be said that when a man has six hundred dollars in cash in his pocket, he can get most things he wants, up to the value of his pile, in San Juan, just as he can in any other busy center.
At all events, here was John Garrison Rayne on the Cherokee, in the guise of a detective, seemingly carrying everything before him.
He had completely fooled Captain Bill Lawton, and Paul Clayton had not the least suspicion that he was anything but what he pretended to be. ”

“ Nick Carter was unable to ward off the blow entirely, but it only cut a long slit in his sleeve. The next moment he had seized the rascal around the waist and slammed him down upon the table by his side.
The table never was meant to stand such a shock. Down it went, in a muddle of broken legs and splintered top, with the Cuban and Nick in the ruins, for the Cuban had pulled his assailant down with him.
“Thieves!” roared the Cuban. “Look out! Grab him before he can get away!” ”

“ He ain’t nothing of the kind. You say you’re a detective. Well, you’re a little late. Another detective, from New York, has been here and arrested him. So he isn’t a passenger. He’s a prisoner.”
“Impossible!” ejaculated Nick Carter.
“Nothing impossible about it,” sneered the captain. “He’s down in the cabin he’s had since we left New York. Only now it’s a cell, instead of a stateroom, and I have two of my men watching to see that he doesn’t get away. That’s all there is to it.”
“How do you know this man who arrested Paul Clayton—or Miles—is a detective?” ”

“ Meredith realized now, with a sick feeling, what she had begun to suspect for an hour or more past—that she was being deliberately thwarted and baffled in her attempts to communicate with Grail, probably under instructions from Mrs. Schilder herself.
The incident of the dress, the palpable falsehood in regard to the coming of the messenger boy; more than all, the constant if unobtrusive surveillance exercised by Marie, all assured her that she was making no mistake. ”

“ Washington, D.C.
The Nick Carter Stories
When it comes to detective stories worth while, the Nick Carter Stories contain the only ones that should be considered. They are not overdrawn tales of bloodshed. They rather show the working of one of the finest minds ever conceived by a writer. The name of Nick Carter is familiar all over the world, for the stories of his adventures may be read in twenty languages. No other stories have withstood the severe test of time so well as those contained in the Nick Carter Stories. It proves conclusively that they are the best. ”

“ Everybody outside would wonder what was going on,” objected Nick Carter. “We don’t want to call general attention to this trouble. Eh, captain?”
“Certainly not,” was Douglas’ hurried response.
“I should like to shin up to that window,” put in Patsy.
“Well, you can’t,” said Chick. “I’ll do it, if it were to be done at all. You can’t have all the fun.”
“It’s mighty little fun I’ve had since I’ve been down here,” grumbled Patsy. “It’s the dullest place I ever was in.”
“It wouldn’t be hard to force the door, would it?” asked Paul Clayton. “We can all tackle it together.” ”

“ Captain Lawton shook his head with an air of ponderous wisdom that tried Nick Carter’s patience sorely.
“You have my word that he’s a fraud,” the detective reminded him sternly. “I thought that would be enough. If you like, I’ll sign a paper taking all the responsibility. Only, let’s have that boat!”
“Well, all right! Let it go at that!” grumbled the captain; “I guess I’m going to get the worst of it. I always do. ”

“ The detective put them down as storekeepers, mechanics—cigarmakers, probably—and men connected with the shipping of the harbor.
Next to him was a dark-complexioned individual, who looked like a Cuban, with a mixture of West Indian negro blood. Such persons are rather frequent in Porto Rico.
He was dressed in a linen suit, with a panama hat and white shoes. There was a diamond ring on one of his brown fingers, and another diamond sparkled in the bosom of his narrow-plaited, soft, white shirt bosom. Prosperity oozed from him.
He had just lighted a long cigar as Nick Carter sat down by his side. ”

“ Also, he had stowed it away in the engine room. But, unless he got it off the ship, of what use could it ever have been to him?”
Chick shook his head dubiously.
“He’s as cunning as any old-time Indian, and you can’t tell what he might have done. No wonder they call him the Apache.”
“He is called the Apache partly because he is so ruthless when pursuing any object,” said Nick. “Remember that. I don’t believe I ever knew another white man with quite so cruel a disposition. He neither asks nor gives quarter. I give him credit for being a fighter. ”