Nicholas Carter

“ It was this miscreant who had informed Badger of Nick’s intended visit the same morning, and who had made possible the hold-up which to Nick had appeared so like a coincidence.
It was this miscreant, too, whose treachery now bid fair to cost Nick Carter his life, yet whom the latter, with all his keenness, was far from suspecting.
For who looks for treachery in high places, or in those from whom only loyalty is most naturally expected? ”

“ Young Sanderson Hyde looked up with raised brows.
“Nothing of consequence, chief,” he respectfully answered. “Only a few words about sending in his card.”
“Do you know the man?”
“No, sir. I don’t recall ever having seen him.”
“Well, the next time you see him take a good look at him, for that man is Nick Carter, the greatest detective that ever stood in leather.”
“The dickens!” gasped Hyde, with manifest astonishment. “You don’t mean it, chief! Not Nick Carter himself?”
“I always say what I mean,” growled Weston. “Hereafter, show him into my office without delay.” ”

“ Nick Carter laughed again, with a glance at the eager eyes of the youthful detective.
“That one word, really, is quite important, Patsy,” said he. “It is barely possible that we are mistaken, at least in part, if not entirely so. Circumstantial evidence is never wholly trustworthy.”
“I’ll bet you are right, sir, for all that,” insisted Patsy, with abiding faith in Nick’s shrewdness.
“I shall first make sure that I am,” said Nick, “by taking some step to confirm my theory. As for securing the evidence with which to convict these rascals, Patsy, that may not be done as easily as you think. ”

“ The sound was the sudden threatening barking of a dog, then confined in this basement garage.
“By thunder! it’s that Cuban bloodhound!” was Patsy’s mental exclamation.
He felt a thrill of dismay when he now recalled the huge beast, which he had not once thought of since undertaking the hazardous venture in which he was at present helplessly launched.
“If I escape detection by his ugly nostrils I shall be lucky,” he said to himself. “If he scents me before I can make some kind of a move to escape from this basket, I shall be a gone goose for sure.” ”

“ His aim was ruined by Grady, however, who excitedly began backing the runabout into the road, and Nick’s bullets went wide of their mark.
In ten seconds the touring-car was vanishing in a cloud of dust around a distant curve of the road.
“Hold on!” roared Grady, thinking Nick was about to alight in the road. “I’ll follow them divils, sir, tires or no tires!”
“Follow nothing!” growled Nick, thrusting his revolver back into his pocket. “You might as well try to follow a streak of lightning.”
“Will you let that blackguard escape?”
“Let him escape!” exclaimed Nick derisively. ”

“ Then came a furious sniffing about the wickerwork of the hamper.
It was followed immediately by a long, low, threatening growl, enough to have sent a chill through a brass image.
“That infernal bloodhound again!” thought Patsy, with an ugly creeping of his every nerve. “By thunder! this is worse than being headed off by a man—or by half a dozen men! What’s the cursed brute about to do?” ”

“ It came to light in a moment—his trusty revolver.
“Aha! what’s this?” cried Conley, as he yanked the weapon from Patsy’s hip pocket. “So you carry a gun, do you?”
“Sure I do,” asserted Patsy coolly. “You’d carry a gun, too, if there were as many rats in your cellar as there are in mine.”
“It’s you who are the rat,” Badger angrily growled, as his confederate displayed the weapon.
“You’re wrong, mister,” insisted Patsy. “I’m a ratter, but no rat.”
“What d’ye mean by that?” snarled Conley fiercely. ”

“ Badger, this question of sex,” replied Nick, with a quiet laugh.
“Why so?”
“Because I shall be able to proceed much more intelligently, sooner or later, if I know positively that this gang of crooks consists only of men, one or more of whom is masquerading at times as a woman.”
“There is something in that,” admitted Badger.
“Female highwaymen are not common in these days,” added Nick pointedly; “and I find it hard to credit the evidence presented in this photograph, despite your wife’s very natural confidence in the reliability of her own eyes.” ”

“ In so doing, he had a double object, however; that of first getting an insight into Madame Victoria’s business and her alleged occult endowments, merely to satisfy his own curiosity; and, second, that of afterward being able to return and question her about the robbery without her suspecting his first visit.
“I’ll have this much the best of her, at all events,” he said to himself, while adjusting his disguise. “If she is as clever as she claims to be, however, she should be able to see right through it. Yet I wager that she does nothing of the kind.” ”

“ His wife indulged in a laugh, a vicious little laugh, most unpleasant to honest ears.
“Yet the ruse worked well, Amos,” she cried exultantly.
“Yes, apparently.”
“Apparently?”
“That’s what I said,” growled Badger, as the runabout passed out of view.
“What do you mean?” demanded Claudia, with quickened apprehension.
“I mean that there never is any knowing what Nick Carter thinks and suspects, however he may carry himself,” Badger petulantly replied. “He is one thing on the surface, another under it. ”

“ Instead of making any inquiry concerning the inmates of the house, however, Nick abruptly demanded:
“Have you seen an automobile pass along Laurel Road, my man?”
My man was one Jerry Conley, chauffeur, hostler, and all-round workman out of doors for Mr. Amos Badger. He was a short, stocky man, of about thirty years, with a head nearly as round as a bullet. His face was smoothly [49] shaven, and was lighted by a pair of as shifty, crafty eyes as ever lighted a human countenance.
They came round with half a leer to meet those of the detective, while the man arose from his work on the car. ”

“ In this secret extension, which was so cleverly constructed as to defy detection either from within or without, Patsy now caught sight of half a score of motors lined up against one of the side walls, each of a different make from the others, and all apparently in first-class condition.
“By thunder! this does settle it, and Nick was right,” he mused. “Those are the different cars these knaves have used for their night hold-ups. This exterior basement is only a blind for concealing the other.” ”

“ No end of wealthy and fashionable people consult her, either for advice in business or love-affairs—or to get messages alleged to come from dead friends,” added Weston, laughing a bit derisively.
“I don’t take any stock in that stuff,” said Nick bluntly.
“Nor do I, Nick,” was the reply. “Yet the woman is certainly a character, and, if reports are true, has made very many remarkable predictions, and displays a most mysterious faculty for communicating with the unseen world.” ”

“ Nick heard, meantime, the tramp of men through a corridor adjoining the opposite side of the outer office, and he knew that Chief Weston had immediately dismissed them, to receive him in private.
“So, so; the business is important,” he rightly conjectured.
The door closed behind Nick of itself, but the snap of the catch-lock hung fire until after the hearty voice of the Boston chief of detectives, as he arose and gripped Nick by the hand, had sounded through the room. ”

“ Madame Victoria nodded and laughed, displaying her white teeth and calling up a charming dimple in each velvety cheek.
“As you probably know, Mr. Sibley,” said she, “people come here for various objects. Some call to have their horoscopes cast, others to have a mediumistic sitting with me in the hope of receiving communications from dead friends, while others call to consult me about business and love-affairs, or to have their fortunes told by the cards.”
“So I imagined,” bowed Nick. ”

“ I’ll tell you both, he’s a man to be feared, and we cannot be too careful in case he undertakes to round us up.”
“Faugh!” snarled Conley, with a scowl rising about his crafty eyes. “If he gets wise, and presses us too hard, there’s one thing we can do.”
“Put him out of the way?”
“Sure.”
“It will have to be done,” said Badger, with a nod. “Yet I don’t fancy running my neck into a noose if it can be avoided.”
“It can be done without that,” said Conley, with grim significance. ”

“ Nick forcibly declared. “I will land these crooks for you, every man and woman of them, or I’ll throw up my commission.”
The ear at the panel was strained at that moment, and the glow in the eyes of the listener became a threatening flame.
“Well, well, that ought to be good enough for anybody,” cried Weston, with much satisfaction. “I felt sure that you had run upon something worth knowing.” ”

“ Sanderson Hyde, perched upon a stool in the enclosure, appeared busy over his books, not so much as looking up at the intruders.
“Are you going out at once?” inquired Weston.
“Yes,” replied Nick, slipping the photograph into his pocket. “There are a few questions I wish to ask Mrs. Amos Badger. If I can find a public automobile, Weston, I think I will go out there in it. It’s the quickest conveyance, and this is a fine morning for a ride.”
“You’ll find what you want at the corner below,” replied [31] Weston. “The machine is all right, and so is the man. Grady is his name. ”

“ Nick pricked up his ears, yet he could catch only a word now and then louder than others.
“To begin with,” argued Badger, “I’m not going to run my neck into a noose before I know just how we stand. We have no blood on our hands as yet, and before I take chances of that kind, Conley, I’m going to be dead sure that Carter has not reported his suspicions to Weston. What good will it do to put him out of the way, only to find that we have half a score of Boston detectives on our heels, to whom Carter’s discoveries have been imparted.” ”

“ In another half the car was speeding back over the woodland road at thirty miles an hour—heading for Badger’s place near Brookline.
Senseless, between the seats, out of view of any persons whom the speeding car might pass along the road, lay the man for whom failure only had been predicted by the desperate woman who had struck him down. ”

“ Nick Carter found Grady on the corner mentioned, a shrewd-looking young Irishman, seated in an excellent runabout, reading the morning newspaper.
“Do you know Laurel Road, Brookline, Mr. Grady?” asked Nick, halting beside the machine.
“I know pretty near where it is, sir,” said Grady, alert for business. “I can find it for you, all right.”
“Take me out there,” said Nick, mounting to the seat. “To the house of Mr. Amos Badger.”
“The broker, sir,” nodded Grady. “I know the man, sir. I’ll land you out there in thirty minutes, sir, or less, if you say the word.” ”

“ Carter, that I can discover,” replied Badger, with a scornful shrug of his shoulders. “Here is my wife, sir. Claudia, this is Detective Carter, of New York, sent out here by Chief Weston to inquire about the robbery. My wife, Mr. Carter.”
In the light of what Chief Weston had told him about her, Nick surveyed the woman with more than cursory interest.
Though now but thirty, she still retained in face and figure most of the beauty and freshness of youth. She was dark, like her husband, and rather above medium [55] height, with a figure at once noticeable for its grace and suppleness. ”

“ Claudia Badger was right in the last.
Madame Victoria now reported the second visit of Nick Carter, and all that had passed between them; also explained Nick’s simple object in first calling upon her in disguise, and stated that he came last only to ask about the woman in the photograph.
“I have him well muddled, Amos,” was Madame Victoria’s last declaration over the wire. “There is nothing to be feared from him at present.”
Badger’s dark countenance lighted while he listened, and he hastened to report the communication to his wife and Conley. ”

“ Patsy needed no further hint to the design in Chick’s mind, nor to the possibility it presented. With eyes quickly glowing with eagerness and excitement, he hurriedly replied:
“Get into it? Sure I can! The scheme is a corker! It’ll take me right into the midst of these rascals. Come on, Chick, and——”
“Stop a moment,” cautioned Chick. “Get that policeman to help you, explaining who you are, and have him take away any stuff that may be in the hamper.”
“And you?”
“I’ll rush up-stairs, and keep those two women engaged till I’m sure you are well under cover.” ”

“ Nick laughed at the glibness with which the last was said.
“It seems a bit odd to me, Weston, that none of your men have been able to get on the track of these desperadoes,” he presently rejoined. “It is not often that a gang of highwaymen can long escape detection and arrest, when at work in and about a city like Boston.”
“They are not ordinary knaves, Nick,” emphatically declared Chief Weston. “If they were, we should have landed them long ago.” ”

“ Badger, with an evil display of sisterly pride.
“She’s a keen one, all right,” grinned Conley.
“The picture is as good as a positive proof that we were robbed,” added Claudia; “and Weston never for a moment has doubted our story. The very fact, if it were a fact, that we were robbed, moreover, plainly shows that we cannot have been both the thieves and the victims, also. That would be absurd, you see, and as long as Carter credits the photograph, just so long we may be sure that he does not suspect us of being crooks.” ”

“ While removing the disguise, Nick noticed the carbuncle ring on his finger, and he immediately took it off and slipped it into the pocket of another suit he was then about putting on.
“I’ll have nothing about me that she may have seen this morning,” he said to himself. “There’s a deal of crafty keenness in those bright eyes of hers, and I’ll make sure that she discovers nothing to identify me with her visitor by the name of Sibley. If she succeeds in doing that, the witch, there will be something more than natural in it—or some sort of rascally cunning at work under the surface. ”