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Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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"IT can be done, Jim."
"The risk is too great, Nell."
"Nothing risked, nothing gained, will answer for the old motto you used to read to me from the back part of the spelling-book."
"If I had a pal I might whirl in and give it a trial; but alone—no, thank you, Nell. Not to-day. Some other day."
"I'll be your pal, Jim."
"You be my pal—you, a woman, a little hop o' my thumb that would run from a mouse. Give us a rest on such guff. You make me tired."
The woman—she was not over four feet five, and weighed under a hundred pounds—tossed her shapely little head scornfully as she replied:
"The boys I used to run with said I was worth two of any of the men when it came to clean work and clean grit. I've been there, Jim Dutry, and I've seen things, and been through experiences that would make your hair curl."
Jim Dutry, big, brawny, and deep-voiced, regarded her with a look of amusement out of his cold, blue eyes.
"You're worth your weight in wild cats, I will admit, Nell, when it comes to fighting in a corner; but this bank racket is too strong a medicine for your delicate constitution."
"Bah! It isn't muscle which tells in our business. It's a combination of brains and steel, or brains and lead. See?"
Jim Dutry's look of amusement changed to one of admiration, deep and sincere. "Maybe you're right, Nell, old girl."
"Stow that, I'm young—seventeen—"
"Was, used to be."
"Dry up. I'm seventeen now, and I won't be called old."
"All right, Mrs. Dutry," as he put his lips to hers. "I'll never call you old again, unless it be old pal—"
"That'll do."
"I hope it will. And if you did train with the Joe Howard gang, you must have learned a trick or two, and that's a fact."
He gazed thoughtfully at the floor a moment, and then resumed:
"When I married you I had just got out of the cage, where I had been singing small for ten years. I met you in a variety joint, where you were doing a neat song and dance turn, and put the wedding-ring on your finger after an acquaintance of two days."
"Short courtship, Jim. We must have been made for one another."
Her black eyes softened as they met his, and for the nonce the bold, reckless child of crime was exhibited in a new and tender aspect.
"I reckon we were, Nell. You had been knocked about a bit by this cruel world, and so had I. But what did you learn, while with Joe Howard and his gang, about the cracking of safes?" he asked, as he glanced at her curiously.
Before she answers the question it will be as well for the reader to understand that the scene of the conversation is an apartment in the Sherman House, Chicago. Time, the spring of 1892.
"It was just before Joe Howard and his quartet of world-beaters robbed the Coldwater bank of twenty thousand dollars worth of jewels, that I fell in with them through my sister Claudia."
"I've heard of her."
"She could beat Big Bertha, Rondelle, Madame Norman, or any of them of any country, bar none, at the confidence lay. Talk about bunco, and the skill and talent it takes to enable a steerer to work his points properly," she went on, with a countenance beaming with enthusiastic appreciation, "why Claudia could take the starch out of the best bunco sharp that ever fought shy of Inspector Byrnes or Nick Carter at his own game. Oh, she was a daisy with a big D, she was, and I am proud to be her sister."
"I wish you hadn't mentioned the name of Nick Carter, Nell, for it gives me a fit of the shivers whenever I think of that fellow."
"I see the big 'uns in the New York government have made Byrnes superintendent. I wonder why they didn't give Nick Carter Byrnes' old place as inspector?"
"Well, I don't wonder, for I can guess how Nick Carter feels on the subject. He doesn't need that or any other position in the public service, on account of the money there may be in it, for he is well fixed as it is; and besides he earns more in fees than the salaries of half a dozen such offices as inspector amounts to. And Nick wouldn't look at a stall at the public crib anyhow. He wants to be foot-loose, to be his own master, and to occupy his mind with the great cases of the country as they come up. No chance for idleness in the layout he has fixed for himself, for he gets the cream of everything criminal that turns up. Curse him for his luck, for his talent—genius is a better word—and for his courage, for it was owing to him that I got jugged for ten years. There, say no more about him."
"I am not saying anything about him, Jim; you are doing all the talking. One would think you were a friend of his from the way you puff him up."
"Friend!"
The expression of Jim Dutry's face when he uttered the word was simply fiendish.
"Friend!" he repeated. "I am so much his friend that I could see him slowly roast to death, and never move a finger to save him."
A shiver ran through Nell's petite frame as she looked at her ferocious husband.
"I would not like to be in Nick Carter's shoes," she said, with an attempt at a smile.
"Hang Nick Carter. Let's talk of something else, before I get so rattled that I can't. This Coldwater business. You were saying that I would not need the services of a masculine pal so long as I had you."
"Yes."
"What can you do? And what do you know?"
"I can do this. I can follow you into the jaws of death, if need be; and can any pal you may pick up do more for you?"
"No, but skill and experience are of more importance in the game we play with the police and society, than mere courage or self-sacrifice."
"What kind of skill do you require?" she asked, coolly, lighting a cigarette as she did so.
"The skill that can break into a brick building, open a vault and a safe, both warranted to be burglar-proof, and get away with the swag without making the disagreeable acquaintance of a copper or a detective."
"Didn't I tell you that I was with Joe Howard?"
"Yes."
"Before I say anything more about my ability to aid you, I want to tell you that the job of cracking the bank at Coldwater was first suggested not by me, but by Joe Howard himself."
"Joe Howard is in the Pennsylvania State prison."
"Of course he is."
"How could he have suggested the Coldwater scheme, then?"
"What's the matter with his seeing Claudia once in a while?"
"Ah!"
"And what's to prevent Claudia from writing me a letter once in a while?"
"She's written you lately, has she? And why haven't you said anything about it before?"
"Look here, Jim Dutry, don't you go in for suspecting me of any funny dealings with you," she retorted, with a dangerous flash of her black eyes, "or it will be quits between us in a minute. I haven't said anything about Claudia's letter before because I wasn't ready to speak about it. Time for everything, and everything at its right time, is my motto."
"I don't see—"
"That's the trouble, Jim Dutry, you never do see beyond the end of your nose. Now," she went on, while the expression of her countenance changed from stern gravity to playfulness, "just look me in the eye while you answer one or two questions I am about to put to you."
"Go ahead." half surlily.
"When did I first mention this Coldwater scheme?"
"About an hour ago."
"Very well. Now when did I return from my trip down town?"
"About an hour and a quarter ago."
"Good again. And it was while I was out that I got Claudia's letter. I had just finished reading it when you came in and threw it up to me that I had spent all your money on feminine fineries and fol-de-rols, and that starvation stared us in the face."
"I beg your pardon, Nell," the big fellow contritely murmured.
"That's right. Now you're pardoned, and we'll proceed to business. First, I'll read Claudia's letter to you, which will explain why I know a thing or two, and how Joe Howard came to suggest the robbery of the Coldwater bank, up in Michigan."
The pretty young wife of Jim Dutry took an envelope from her pocket, which had two inclosures. She slowly opened one, and with a preliminary cough, read as follows:
" Allegheny, Feb. —, 1892.
"My Dear Wife:—
"After you left me yesterday, I began to think of this Jim Dutry, who has married Nell. The pair of 'em ought to make the slickest team in America, if what report says about Dutry is half true.
"I know Nell so well that I am willing to bet a cartwheel against a nickel that she will be putting him up to some rich job before the honeymoon is a month old. And he'll be the biggest kind of a jay if he doesn't take her advice; for she's been with us; she knows the ins and outs of the business, from swiping cold chuck up to cracking a safe, and she's got the nerve of a thoroughbred.
"Remember the way in which she worked for us when we blew up the bank safe in Wichita; how she went into the vault alone, put the dynamite cartridge in the right place, and was twenty feet nearer the big metal door than any of us when the explosion came.
"Why am I writing this about Nell, and, incidentally, about Dutry? I'll tell you. I owe the directors of the Coldwater Bank a grudge, and as I see no present chance of paying it, I want somebody to act as my substitute. When they prosecuted me for the jewel robbery, the bank directors came down on me hard. Some cursed detective - I'll bet it was Nick Carter - had posted them on my past record, and they pulled it on me, and I went up for ten years!
"Here is Nell's chance. And here is the chance for this husband of hers to get in and show his mettle. By tackling the Coldwater Bank they will be doing me a big favor, and at the same time be making the richest kind of haul.
"If I hadn't other work for you, Claudia, I would ask you to stand in on the scheme. All you can do is to see Nell, or send this letter to her. She will understand the job in an instant, for she knows Coldwater like a book, has got the plan of the bank, knows what's to be done and how to do it, and can be upon to furnish Jim Dutry with better assistance than the average male crook could give him, in case he consents to go in and give the scheme a trial. No more at present from your husband,
"Joe Howard."
A short note from Claudia Howard urged Nell to go into the affair, and promised to send a protege of hers, a boy of fourteen, known as Kid Kent, to help out in the preliminaries.
"The Kid is a whole team, Nell," the letter concluded, "and you may find him an invaluable ally. He will report to you in Chicago the day you receive this note."
"Correct for a million ducats," said a light, fresh voice, and Jim Dutry turning quickly, saw that the door opening into the corridor was ajar sufficiently to disclose the handsome but impudent face of a lad of fourteen.
"Who in blazes are you?" roughly demanded the big desperado, as he quickly arose to his feet.
"Me? Oh, I'm der kid—Kid Kent—dat youse was—er—reading about. I'm ther party that youse advertised fer. See?"
"Come in, Mr. Kent," said Nell, sweetly, and with one of her most bewitching glances. "Come right in and take a seat."
The lad, disregarding Dutry's scowling looks, came forward upon the invitation, and sat down on the lounge near the window.
This placed him face to face with husband and wife.
He eyed them critically for a moment, and then coolly remarked:
"Youse'll do, I reckon. Trot out de booze, den, and we'll talk biz. See?"
"SAY, young fellow, who was your servant last month," demanded Jim Dutry, after he had stared hard at the cool kid for a moment.
"Had tirty-won servants—changed 'em every day. See? But where's de booze? I'm so tirsty, ole man, dat I could even trow meself on de outside of a slammonade if I had der chance."
Nell, who had risen to her feet to busy herself at the bureau, when the Kid first spoke, now turned around with a glass half filled with some dark colored liquid in her hand.
"Drink that," she said to the boy, "and then tell us what brought you here."
Kid tossed off the fiery stuff as if it were so much water.
"What brings me here? Me trotters of course."
He looked down at his dusty shoes and grinned.
"You came on the train, you know you did," said Nell, sharply.
"On de brake beam ter Valparaiso, and from dere in de Pullman."
"In the Pullman with the first-class passengers?"
"Yep."
"How did you make the riffle? You did not pay your fare, did you?"
"Nary a fare."
"Then how did you work it, youngster?" queried Dutry, whose good humor had returned.
"In dis way. At Valparaiso de train waited fer half an hour on account of er smash-up someware or udder. See? Well, I improved me opportunity to give one of the high toners in der Pullman a neat game erbout a sick mudder in Chicago, who was waiting for her little Dicky Wicky ter come ter her lovin' arms, an' that Dicky Wicky was side-tracked in Valparaiso without a penny to his name.
"The gent took it all in at won swally, an' said that he'd see that I got to my ole mudder if he had to pony up fer a ticket.
"But first he tried to work his points fer me wid de conduck, but it was no go. Der conduck tried ter queer me game all he could, but der gent wouldn't have that.
"So me noble bennyfactor took me in der Pullman an' paid de bullion fer me passage to Chicago. Wen we got here, he asked me address, an' said he'd look me up in a day or two."
The Kid paused, and Jim Dutry smiled patronizingly at him.
"Is that all?" asked Nell.
"All? No, not kevvite all, as the Dutchman says. Wen he was bidding me good-by, he slipped a tenner inter me hand. And here it is. See?"
He put his hand into his vest-pocket and drew out a crumpled bank-note.
Nell snatched it, and excitedly smoothed it out, the Kid regarding her with some amazement as she did so.
"Sugar must be scarce in dis crib o' yourn!" he remarked to Dutry. "Must ha' been goin' der pace lately, eh?"
An exclamation from Nell made her husband suddenly turn his attention from the lad to her.
"A tenner did you say? Why, bless your heart, Kid, it is a hundred-dollar note that he gave you."
"A hundred dollars!" ejaculated Jim. "Pass it over here, quick. Nell handed the note to her husband, who looked at it carefully for some time, and then, with an oath, declared that it was a counterfeit.
Nell's face, a moment before all smiles, became clouded.
"That's too bad," she said, disappointedly.
Kid Kent's face showed neither surprise nor disappointment.
Jim Dutry, looking at him half suspiciously, saw that he was enjoying the situation.
"What are you grinning at?" demanded the big desperado, roughly.
"At youse people. Counterfeit is it? Dat's all right, cully, dat's all right."
"All right! Why is it all right?"
"Cos de beef steak can be rectified immejetly, if not sooner."
"How?"
"De gent wat gimme der note is down stairs in de office."
"What!"
Jim Dutry sprang to his feet, the note still in his hand, and made for the door.
"Hol' on, boss, hol' on a minute," urged the Kid, soothingly. "Don't go off half-cock an' spoil der whole business. Der gent won't run away, fer I heard him say to a party wat met him in de office dat he'd wait an hour dere fer him."
"Does the fellow know that you are in the hotel?" questioned Dutry, as he stood irresolutely between the boy and the door.
"No. I follyed de gent to de hotel fer I wanted to get onto his name, an' I would a follyed him furder if he hadn't stopped wair I was goin' to stop. As soon as I heard him say ter de party what met him in de office dat he was good fer an hour, I slipped up de stairs, met a chambermaid an' got de number of yer room, an' there you are."
"Describe the man who gave you the note," said Nell, eagerly.
He's a sporty-lookin' duffer, smoof face, light suit, made in de style, plug hat an' cane, black hair an' eyes like gimlets."
He can see through things, can he?" sneered Dutry.
"I bet he can, mister."
"Then why did he not see through you—tumble to your sick mother game, and give you a cold deal!"
"Perhaps he did see through the Kid," put in Nell, quietly. "There is a mystery about the man, anyhow, and I must know who he is, and what his business is be-fore we take another step in our own game."
"Then the description doesn't help you any," growled her husband.
"No. He may be in disguise, though."
"What do you think?"
"My opinion is that he is a crook, and that he has come up to Chicago to dispose of a lot of the queer of which he is either the agent or the manufacturer."
"I must see him and talk to him before I can give my opinion," said Dutry, as he opened the door.
"Don't be gone long, Jim," entreated his wife, "and don't make a bad break. Unless you are sure that he is one of us, don't give yourself away."
"Don't you fear for me, Nell," was the confident response.
When he had gone Nell turn to Kid Kent.
"And what's your opinion, my dear boy?" she said, in some anxiety.
"My opinion? Oh, I'm er kid an' my opinion doesn't count."
"Yes, it does. You're a sharp lad, and after what you have seen and heard, you must have made up your mind as to the profession and character of the man who was kind enough to pay your fare from Valparaiso to this city."
"Well, den, my opinion is dat de bloke is a detective."
Pretty Nell Dutry turned as pale as death.
"A detective!" she gasped. "What makes you think so?"
"I didn't think so at de time, but now dat me mind has taken in de situation, I'm er bettin' de whole hog dat he's eider one o' Pinkerton's sleuts or Nick Carter."
"Nick Carter! My God! I hope not," the woman ejaculated.
Kid Kent noted the look of terror on her face, and wondered greatly thereat.
"Is youse afraid of er detective?" he asked, in a tone of disgust.
"I am afraid of Nick Carter."
Then, with a strong effort of the will, she controlled herself and went on more calmly: "Tell me what induces you to think the man is a detective."
"Principally from de way dat he piped me off in de Pullman."
"He tried to find out who you were, did he?"
"He ast me all sorts o' questions, an' I gib de bloke all sorts of answers."
"Did he mention Joe Howard's name, or the name of any member of the old gang?"
"No."
"Didn't he say anything that tended to show his detective knowledge?"
"No. If he had done so on a quiet pipe like mine was, he wouldn't have been a detec as is a detec. He would have been a snide."
"And because he acted just as a man who isn't a detective might act, you have made up your mind that he's either Pinkerton's man or Nick Carter. Pshaw, my boy, you have let your fears lead you astray."
"It wasn't the questions he ast," persisted the Kid; "but it was the easy, off-hand way he ast them, an' the look he gave me now an' ag'in out o' them gimlet eyes o' his. Oh, he's a corker, that bloke is, an' if he isn't a detec then I'm a son of a sea cook, and my first name is Dennis."
"But why should a detective give a boy a hundred-dollar counterfeit bill?"
"You're not pretty good at guessin'," returned the Kid, half-contemptuously.
"I can't guess this riddle."
"Den let me have a whack at it."
"Whack away, boy."
"Before I whack I want to ask a question like a lawyer or a detec would. See?"
"Ask it."
"Wot detective in de country is de best poste on de Howard gang's doin's?"
"Nick Carter."
All right. Now den, let's suppose, for de sake of de argument, dat Nick Carter is de detec what took me in at Valparaiso, an' played me for a-bloomin' sucker."
"It's a wild supposition, but let it go."
"Supposin' furder dat Nick Carter has got on to some snap of Howard's or yourn; see? An' that he's been baiting me wid a Pullman passage and a hundred-dollar bill dats off color to gadder youse folks in; see?"
"It's improbable that he could have had either the knowledge or the penetration to work such a game as that."
"Have youse two been workin' any game, lately?"
Nell started and looked keenly at the boy.
Kid Kent's face was impassive.
"Say, have you?" he repeated.
"Yes."
"What was it?"
"We worked an old gentleman, a senator or governor or something in Pennsylvania, out of a thousand dollars and a gold watch."
"Spent de sugar and hocked the chronom', eh?"
"Yes, and no. We've got the watch yet, but not the money."
"Wot was de old party's cognomen?"
"Fulda."
"Wot! Fulda, de big iron manufacturer and politician—de feller wot's been in Congress?"
"The same."
"Den I'll bet a big cartwheel dat Nick Carter's got dat case and is dead onto youse folks."
"If he is," exclaimed Nell, trembling with alarm, "then he is down stairs and Jim is with him—Jim who doesn't suspect, and will be but a plaything in his hands. I must warn him of the danger he is running at once."
"Don't," spoke the Kid, in a masterful voice, "Let me do de warnin'; I'm fly, I am, and I can waltz in and save de day, because—" he paused and regarded her with a quizzical smile.
"Because what?"
"Because I'm going to see de World's Fair, and I've got a scheme—"
"You'll do," interrupted Dutry's pretty wife.
"Do, do, my huckleberry do, de do—do—do—do—do," softly hummed the Kid, as he left the apartment.
A FEW days previous to the events narrated in the foregoing chapters, an old gentleman of corpulent build, strongly marked features—indicative of energy, firmness, and deep intelligence—was in private consultation with the chief of police of the City of Brotherly Love.
"I can't get any trace of the criminals," the chief was saying, "and it's my opinion, Mr. Fulda, that they have covered up their tracks so well that their arrest may be put down as one of the improbabilities."
"I am sorry for that, chief. I don't care a button for the money they robbed me of. They are welcome to it. But to think that I, Jonathan Fulda, a man of the world, and if I do say it, an educated man; one who has represented his State in Congress, who has seen life in the Old World as well as the New; who has always prided himself on his rare knowledge of human nature, his astuteness and penetration—that I, the man who has made puppets of other men, should be led by the nose and bamboozled out of a thousand dollars and the gold watch my grandfather brought from Switzerland, is enough to make me want to tear my hair out by the roots, or jump into the Susquehanna."
"They did play you in a slick manner, and that's a fact, Mr. Fulda."
"Confound the pair of 'em! I'd like to see 'em caught and sent up for life, for playing me as they did," returned the old gentleman, wrathfully. "And yet you say their arrest is the next thing to an impossibility."
"As matters stand with me, yes. I cannot leave Philadelphia, Mr. Fulda, or I might do better by you. Why don't you put the case in the hands of some good detective? You say you don't care what the expense may—"
"I'd spend fifty thousand dollars, if need be, to jail those people," interrupted Mr. Fulda, with emphatic earnestness.
"Then employ some detective with a reputation, one who can travel anywhere, to Mexico, if the clue leads him there; and give him a free hand in the matter of expense."
"Do you know any man who would be likely to fill the bill as to honesty, shrewdness, tenacity, and courage?"
"I do. He stands alone at the top-notch of the profession."
"Can I engage him?"
"If he is not otherwise employed at this moment."
"How may he be communicated with?"
"Let me see. Yes, he's in Chicago now, or was yesterday. I'll wire Chief McClaughrey and will find out all we want to know."
In half an hour the following dispatch was received at the Philadelphia office:
"Nick Carter gone to Allegheny. He will remain there over night.
McCLAUGHREY."
"Well?" said the chief, when he had read the telegram to Mr. Fulda.
"I'm off for Allegheny by the next train."
"If Nick Carter will take your case, he'll run the pair of fakirs down, if he has to follow them around the world."
The great detective was seated in his room at the leading hotel of Allegheny that evening when Mr. Fulda was announced.
Nick knew the ex-Congressmen by reputation.
He smiled slightly when he learned how the millionaire manufacturer and politician had been cleverly buncoed by a man and a woman.
"You are not the first man of intelligence and experience, who has had to knuckle down to a confidence sharp," Nick remarked, consolingly, when the story had been told. "Charles Francis Adams, Sr., Oscar Wilde, and scores of others of the world's noted men have been victims to bunco like yourself."
"Yes, yes," returned the victim, testily; "but that's no satisfaction to me. I was taken in—I, the invulnerable. But to business. Will you take my case? Fix your own price, and take your own time."
Nick thought a moment.
"As it will not probably occupy more than a fortnight of my time, I will say yes, Mr. Fulda," he answered.
The next morning Nick started for Chicago.
He had left the Lake City the day before to finish up a Government case at Allegheny.
His labors had been completed but an hour before the appearance of Mr. Fulda.
The description of the pair of swindlers had convinced the great detective that Jim Dutry and Nell, his wife, were the culprits.
He knew that Dutry had been released from prison, and he knew that he had married Nell Jolly, a former member of the notorious Joe Howard gang of bank burglars, train robbers, and confidence operators.
And he also carried the further knowledge within his breast that big Jim Dutry had sworn to have his life.
"And so I'm glad I've got this case," he said to himself, as the train bore him onward, "for something tells me that when I get through with Jim Dutry this time, he won't be in a condition to threaten honest people any more."
At Valparaiso, Ind., the train halted long enough to allow some repairs to be made on the road beyond, a collision having happened a short time before.
It was while he was walking up and down the station platform that Nick was accosted by Kid Kent.
The great detective had heard of the boy through Chick, who had spoken of him as one not inherently bad, but rather the victim of circumstances; the associations from his earliest childhood having been of the lowest and vilest character.
Determined to learn what business it was that took Kid Kent to Chicago, Nick played the part of the passenger with the kind heart, and took the lad into the Pullman and treated him to a nice cold lunch and a couple of hours of entertaining conversation.
Kid Kent did not know it, but during the ride he so betrayed himself that Nick knew he was on his way to Claudia Howard's sister.
And Claudia Howard's sister was Nell Dutry, one of the parties who had fleeced Fulda, the millionaire.
In the pursuit of criminals, and in the work of ferreting out the hidden secrets of crime, Nick always carried certain articles with him which he regarded as essentials.
He had found it greatly to his advantage on more than one occasion to have had upon his person a number of counterfeit notes.
"In Rome do as the Romans do."
Following this axiom Nick in associating with criminals, as one of them, for the purpose of gaining important information, invariably carried along with his glib tongue and mobile face, a number of the tools of the trade.
When posing as a shover of the queer—a passer of counterfeit notes—he was ready at an instant's notice to produce his credentials.
When he gave the bogus one hundred-dollar note to Kid Kent, he was, as the juvenile rascal afterward shrewdly concluded, but baiting the hook which should catch the fish he was after.
Nick, out of the corner of his eye, and by a slight turn of his head—too slight to attract notice—saw that the Kid began to shadow him from the moment they parted at the Pittsburgh and Fort Wayne Depot.
And he was perfectly satisfied in his mind that should the Kid find Nell Dutry and show her the note, she or her husband would at once detect its spurious character, and immediately upon the discovery would look him up in the belief that he was a genuine crook.
Nick's calculations were based on the presumption that Kid Kent, though smart, was no smarter than the pair of crooks who had swindled Mr. Fulda.
The great detectives proper appreciation of the youngster's wit and cunning was to come later.
When Jim Dutry approached him in the reading-room, whither he had gone upon parting with the friend the Kid had spoken of—who, by the way, was none other than Chick—he knew that his first move in the game had been well played.
The man who had sworn to kill him did not know him in his disguise.
But it would never do to have the conference take place in the hotel.
It was too public a place.
He was casting about in his mind for a suitable locality to which an adjournment might be taken, when the big desperado accosted him:
"Excuse me, sir, but my son commissioned me to return the note which you gave him by mistake at the depot, you remember. Here it is. You thought it was a ten-dollar note, whereas it is for ten times that sum."
"How is your wife?" asked Nick, with an expression of sympathetic concern and without looking at the note.
"My wife? Er—what do you mean?"
Dutry lost his mental balance when the question was asked.
"Yes," returned Nick, coolly, "your wife, the boy's mother. He told me she was very sick."
"Ah! Yes, yes."
The desperado gave a sigh of relief.
"And how is she?"
"She is better, much better."
"I'm very glad to hear it, for your son's sake. He's a very bright lad."
"And an honest lad, too, sir."
"Of course."
Dutry eyed Nick, and Nick eyed Dutry.
"How long," thought the latter, "is this game of false pretense to be kept up."
"You were speaking about a small sum of money I gave him," said Nick, suavely.
"Yes."
The great detective now looked at the bill, and as he noted its denomination, he exclaimed in surprise:
"Why, bless me, if I didn't give him the wrong one. And he returns it. That boy, sir, will be President of the United States some day, if he doesn't—"
He paused and looked smilingly at Dutry.
The latter finished the sentence.
"If he doesn't get hanged."
Nick laughed.
"He might be on the road to the gallows, according to the way the church folks put it up, if he should go into the business of passing such notes as the one you gave him by mistake."
"Why?"
"Because it's a counterfeit."
Nick put on an expression of mingled amazement and fear.
"Good gracious, you don't tell me! Why, I thought it was so cleverly—that is—"
Jim Dutry cut him short.
"Never mind the 'that is.' You've given yourself dead away. But don't be alarmed. If I'm onto you, I don't mean any harm."
"You—you insult me, sir."
Nick spoke in a tone of indignation, but he winked one eye when he finished.
Dutry winked also. "Let's go somewhere and have a talk," Nell's husband said.
"Where shall we go?"
"I know a quiet place down the street near the river."
"All right."
As they went out of the hotel, Kid Kent came down the stairs and into the office.
He saw the two men—the spider and the fly—but they did not see him.
For one moment he paused near the door-way, with an irresolute look on his precocious face.
Then, with a compression of the lips, he walked quickly to the counter, and called for a sheet of paper and an envelope.
Given him, he wrote these words on the paper:
"They're off, and I'm after them. Don't go out, but wait for me. I'll return soon. THE KID."
Inclosing the note in the envelope, he sealed and directed it, and requested its immediate delivery into Mrs. Dutry's hands.
As he reached the sidewalk the detective and Jim Dutry were just turning the corner at South Clark street and heading toward the river.
The Kid followed at a discreet distance, and saw them enter a large warehouse looking building on one of the streets that lined the stream.
A door on the ground floor had no sooner closed upon them, then he darted up the stair-way nearest to it.
The Kid evidently knew the ins and outs of the great structure.
It had once been used as a meeting-place of doubtful characters.
On the first floor were a number of rooms, large and small, all in sore need of repair, and unfurnished.
Above were both furnished and unfurnished apartments in charge of the lessee, an Irish woman, of massive build and a fondness for liquid refreshment.
The building was old, and the lower portion had not been in use for a long time.
The Kid reached the second-story landing, hurried along a corridor to an elevator shaft, without meeting any one, and was preparing to slide down the rope—for the elevator was below in the basement and out of repair—when a harsh feminine voice smote upon his ear:
"Here now, an' phat in the divil are yez doin' there, ye spalpane?"
The Kid turned around with a bright smile upon his not unhandsome face.
"And are you forgetting me, Mrs. Noonan," he said, with just a touch of the brogue as a sort of compliment, "when it's only a year ago you said that Kid Kent was the likeliest gossoon in the Lake City!"
The proprietress of the lodging-house placed her arms akimbo, and nodding her frowsy head and blinking her bleary eyes, said warily:
"Gimme the thrue Oirish varshun av 'Shule Agrah', an' I'll know yer the Kid. Faix, an' I'd not know it be ukin' at yez noo, me bouchal, seein' how you've growed."
The Kid turned up his eyes, and began to hum the following lines softly, Mrs. Noonan meanwhile nodding her head to keep time:
"Shule, shule, shule a-grah,
Time can only ease my wa',
Batter shin a bocklish a hullo monyow,
Oh, Johnny has gone for a so'ger."
"That's thim, that's thim," cried the woman, in an ecstasy of delight, "and noo coom to me arrums, ye swate tafe av the wurruld."
The Kid made a wry face, but was forced to submit to an embrace that left him with a flavor of sour beer and onions.
"An' phair waz ye goin', noo?" Mrs. Noonan asked, as she held him at arm's length, and looked at him with maudlin affection.
"Down below—I'm in a hurry. I'll come and have a talk with you by and by," answered the Kid, in nervous impatience.
"Don't forget yer ould frind, noo, Kiddy."
"I'll not forget you. Good-by."
He tore himself away from her, and seizing one of the ropes of the shaft, which had sufficient slack for his purpose, was half-way down before Mrs. Noonan realized that he was gone. it
"Luk out, noo, Kiddy," she called out in a hoarse whisper, "fer there's a big hool an the flare av the room that opens out av the shaft, d'ye moind? An' if ye slips doon tru that hool, Kiddy, ye'll nade to be fished out be the crowner,"
"That's all right," he whispered back. "I'll look out for number one."
"Sure ye allus did that same darlint," she murmured to herself, and then returned to her duties.
What his errand was gave her little concern.
She was not one of those who trouble themselves much about the affairs of other people.
Of an easy conscience and an accommodating disposition, she could shut her eyes to the most questionable doings of her fellow-creatures, provided her own comfort was not disturbed.
The Kid reached the basement, stepped out upon the landing, and softly opened the first door in the direction of the river.
The room into which he looked was unoccupied, but not entirely unfurnished.
The floor was carpeted with some cheap material, and in the center was a rug some three feet square.
The Kid looked at the rug for a moment with a curious expression of face, and then walked slowly up to it, and lifted one corner so that he could see what was under it.
A hole two feet square.
Through it he could see dimly the muddy waters of the Chicago River.
While he gazed into the hole there came the low sound of voices and the movement of feet in the room beyond.
The Kid dropped the rug, and advanced with noiseless feet to the door which opened into the next apartment, and applied his eye to the keyhole.
He saw two men seated at a small wooden table.
The men were Nick Carter and Jim Dutry.
The first words spoken convinced the listener that no previous conversation of a business or personal nature had taken place between them since their entrance into the building.
They had probably occupied the time since the Kid had last seen them, in exploring the many rooms and passages of the lower floor and the basement.
The room in which they now sat was the one nearest the river, and the most remote from the street.
It was also the only one below the second story which was provided with a table and chairs.
The Kid could hear distinctly every word that was uttered, for the men sat within a few feet of the door at which he listened.
"Well?" said Jim Dutry, when he had taken a seat so as to face his companion.
"Well to you, sir."
"What's your lay?" demanded the desperado, bluntly.
Nick smiled serenely.
"Show me what right you have to ask the question, and perhaps I'll answer it."
Dutry frowned.
Nick retained his serene smile.
"Come, sir, be open with me," the detective continued,
"what's your lay?"
The way in which this question was asked had the effect intended.
It made Dutry confident, and at the same time careless.
Confident in the belief that the man before him was a crook, and careless as to what he might say in regard to himself. "I'm sound on the jimmy."
"How are you at a brace game?"
"I'm good at it a little bit."
"Ever do any monkey business?"
"It wrenches my heart to say that I do."
"You've done time, then?"
"What job?"
"Burlington."
"Ah! Then you're Jim Dutry."
"You've struck it. And you are—"
"Ned Narrit."
From New Orleans?"
"Yes."
"The King of the Queer men?"
"That's what they call me."
"I'm proud to make your acquaintance."
Jim Dutry extended his hand, which the disguised detective warmly grasped.
At that moment a slight scratching noise made the big desperado prick up his ears.
He sat facing the door opening into the room with the hole in the floor, and as the noise proceeded from that direction his eyes were at once turned toward it.
Nick Carter also heard the scratching, and his quick intelligence told him that it meant danger to his plans.
But he never moved from his position, or gave any sign that he was aware that any new element had entered into the game that was being played between them.
Jim Dutry made some remark about the good fortune that had brought about his meeting with the distinguished crook from New Orleans, but his eyes quickly traveled from the detectives face to the door in front of him.
Suddenly a quick gleam of understanding shot forth from their depths.
A narrow piece of paper was being slowly pushed under the door by some hand on the other side.
Nick Carter watching Dutry's face, read in its expression a warning that the danger of discovery was near.
Dutry glanced from the bit of paper to the face of his companion.
Reassured by what he saw there, he drew a cigar-case from his pocket.
"Have a cigar?"
"Don't care if I do."
Nick selected a weed, and put it between his lips.
Dutry followed suit, and then arose to his feet, and took one step toward the door.
This brought him so close to the paper that he had merely to stoop down and pick it up.
One glance showed him that it contained a few words of penciled writing in a large hand.
How could he obtain possession of it without attracting his companion's attention?
This question he put to himself without considering that it implied a distrust of the man he had but a moment before enthusiastically greeted as a noted crook from the Crescent City.
The moment the scratching noise was heard this distrust of the smiling man before him was unconsciously awakened.
He said to himself that he must read that paper without his companion's knowledge.
He suddenly resolved on a bold move.
With an exclamation of vexation, he threw away the match which he had tried to light from the wrong end.
"The brimstone on this lumber of mine won't burn," he said, as he turned his face to Nick. "Got a good match in your pocket?"
"Yes!"
At the moment the detective put his thumb and forefinger into his vest-pocket, to draw out his match-safe, Jim Dutry stooped and picked up the paper that had been thrust under the door.
One quick glance and the words it contained were burned into his brain.
"The man you are talking with is Nick Carter."
The burly husband of pretty scheming Nell was a fair actor, but he could not prevent his emotions from being expressed in his countenance, when he read the startling announcement of the detective's presence.
He did have the presence of mind, however, to partially turn his head away for a moment.
But Nick, whose eyes had never left the desperado's face, though he had seemingly been paying no more than ordinary attention to him, saw the sudden and terrible change that came over his features as he raised up from his stooping position.
Upon those features, but a moment ago expressive of happy confidence and good fellowship, was written the fierce joy of the murderer when he at last has his bitterest enemy in his power.
And still the smile never left the great detective's face.
He was puffing lazily at his cigar when Dutry took the match handed to him, and with trembling fingers lit the piece of paper with it.
When he tried to light his cigar with the burning paper he made such a mess of it, through rage and nervousness, that he threw the cigar away with an oath.
"Try another and let me hold the light for you?" suggested Nick, in a pleasant voice.
Dutry growled something about not caring to smoke, and then walked toward the door which they had entered.
The key was on the inside.
He turned it quickly, and then as quickly withdrew it from the lock, and put it in his pocket.
Had he been in a calmer mood, he might not have acted so precipitately.
But the knowledge brought suddenly home to him that the man he had sworn to kill was within a few feet of him, filled him with the murderous desire of settling matters at once, and without further beating about the bush.
Nick Carter quietly drew a revolver, cocked it, and held it concealed under his coat, while his enemy was busy at the door.
He realized that his position was a perilous one, for he had two enemies to contend with—the party from the outside who had revealed the detective's identity and the vengeful desperado within the room.
Jim Dutry stepped from the door and faced his companion with a brow as black as night, and with yellow teeth that gleamed like those of some savage wolf.
"I know you—"
He got no further with his denunciation for a revolver came out like a flash, and covered his heart.
"Not a movement, then, or I'll send a bullet through you."
Dutry stared at his foe in speechless amazement and fear.
All his rage oozed out at his finger tips in the rush of the subsequent emotions.
Before another word could be spoken or further movements by either party be made, the door, under which the paper had been thrust, was quickly " opened, and Kid Kent, pistol in hand, appeared in the room.
Nick Carter saw the youngster, and then acted with the quickness of thought.
He did not wish to shoot the boy, so flung his cocked pistol with all his might at the Kid's head, and then sprang upon Jim Dutry before that worthy could make a movement in his own defense.
NICK CARTER'S pistol caught the Kid in the side of the head, and then exploded, the bullet entering the wall.
The Kid measured his length on the floor, with the blood streaming from his scalp and his brain in a confused whirl.
As he went down the detective and Jim Dutry became locked in a deadly embrace.
Nick's first blow had been a staggerer, but Jim Dutry was a man of massive frame, and could stand as much physical punishment as an ordinary ox.
His strong arms grasped the detective about the waist before Nick could follow up his advantage.
Their bodies swayed in the terrific struggle each was making. and finally came down on the floor with a thump that shook the building.
Jim Dutry was underneath.
His head struck the floor with such force that he became temporarily insensible.
Nick was astride of his big body when his eyes next lighted on the Kid.
That precocious child of sin was sitting up on the floor and composedly tying a handkerchief about his head as a bandage.
In his lap were two revolvers—his own and the one Nick had thrown at him.
The moment his eyes met those of the great detective he ceased operations about his bleeding head, and grasped one of the pistols.
Before Nick had time even to think what the Kid meant a bullet whizzed past his head.
In the presence of the new danger Nick lost all interest for the moment in the old.
He jumped front Jim Dutry's body and sprang for the boy.
Before he reached him the Kid fired again.
This time Nick felt a twinge of pain in the fleshy part of the left arm where the bullet had pinked it.
His right arm shot forth almost on the instant of the explosion, and the Kid flattened out on the floor again.
Nick grabbed the pistols when the Kid toppled over, and was about to turn and pay his further respects to the big desperado when a blow that would have felled a bullock caught him behind the ear and knocked him senseless.
Jim Dutry had recovered his senses in time to save the evil fortunes of the day. He tore off his suspenders to make cords for the detective's wrists and ankles, and after he had securely bound his victim he fashioned a rude gag and placed it in Nick's mouth.
This done he turned his attention to the Kid, who was still lying prostrate upon the floor, and apparently without life.
A vigorous shaking and the pouring of a little whisky down his throat brought the lad around.
After Dutry had properly bandaged his head the Kid stood up and said he felt well enough to tackle another detective if the big desperado would bring him in.
"How did you know he was Nick Carter?" he was asked.
"Didn't know—guessed he was de fly detec. See?"
"Well, you guessed right, I reckon."
"What are youse goin' ter do wid him?" eying the body of Nick Carter seriously.
"Put him in the hole."
"In de nex' room?"
"Yes."
"Poor time ter give him de douse, ain't it?"
"Why?"
"'Cos tain't afternoon yet, and de stiff'll float out and be picked up.
"Picked up nothing."
"Why not?"
"Because I'll put a sinker on him that will keep him under water till he rots."
The kid shuddered and turned his face away.
He was not yet utterly case hardened.
"I tort yer had it in for de bloke," he said after a pause.
"So I have," with a fierce imprecation, "and nothing will delight me so much as to put him down that hole with the knowledge that he will never come out of it alive.
"If I had it in fer a detec like youse I'd do de finishin' act up in high up style."
"Explain, will you?"
"I wouldn't sock him inter a hole and let him croak in a minute like youse a goin' ter; no, I wouldn't, mister."
"You wouldn't, eh?" sneeringly, "and what would your royal big head do if he had the say so here?"
"I'd fix de biz so dat he'd die by inches. See?"
"No, I don't see."
"Well, den, I'd lower him in dat hole so dat his feet would just reach de water. See?"
"I am beginning to see."
"It's low tide now, cos I looked fore I waltzed in."
"Good."
"Lower him wid his feet to de water, and let him be hours a croakin'."
"W'en de tide comes up ter flood it'll cover his head and put him ter sleep."
"Kid," exclaimed Dutry, in devilish glee, "you've got a big head on your shoulders sure enough. It's a good thing Claudia sent you down here to help us."
"Claudy knows wat I kin do, bet yer boots."
"Have you ever officiated at a send off like this before?"
"No."
"Never killed a man, have you?"
"No."
"Been wasting away for a chance, haven't you?"
"I reckon," said the Kid, nonchalantly.
"All right, your chance has come at last. By to-day's action you burn your bridges behind you."
"W'at bridges?"
"The bridges, however slight they may be, that connect you with honest society."
"Yes."
"Then let's hurry and get the biz over wid. I'm t'irsty for a booze."
"Have a drink of whisky?"
"No."
"What—not whisky, good old whisky?"
Dutry regarded the Kid in astonishment.
"Nop—don't like yer whisk. I'm drinkin' beer to-day."
"Well, you are a curio, Kid, or I'm a liar. First you guzzle whisky as if it were so much water, and the next minute you've got no use for the stuff."
The Kid smiled, though his face was very pale, and as he smiled he looked from Jim Dutry to Nick Carter.
The detective was lying on the flat of his back, and his eyes, as they turned toward the lad were wide open, serious, and reproachful.
"Bother the drink," said the Kid. "Let's end the racket quick, and get out of this."
"All right, my bantam."
So saying Dutry lifted the body of the detective in his powerful arms, and bore it into the room with the hole in the floor.
"Blast the luck!" he exclaimed as he laid the body down and lifted the rug from the hole, "but your plan won't work, sonny."
"Why not?"
"Where's the rope?"
"Hol' on a jiffy, and I'll swipe one."
"Outside?"
"Yes,"
"No, no, it's too risky."
The Kid stopped with his hand on the door opening on the elevator landing.
An idea struck him as soon as Dutry had spoken.
"The rope's all right, boss," said he, quietly, "so keep yer shirt on for about three shakes of a cow's tail, w'ile I get it."
"Where is it?"
"In de elevator shaft."
"Well, that'll do."
The Kid opened the door, and took out his knife.
Two minutes later he stood before the detective's remorseless enemy, with a long section of stout rope in his hand.
Dutry passed it under Nick's arms, and tied it firmly across the breast.
On one side of the hole and close to it was a large iron staple.
Once upon a time the trap had been provided with a door, and this staple had been used in the fastening of the door when closed.
The detective's enemy passed the free end of the rope through the staple, and then drew it tight against the knot on Nick's breast.
"Now, Kid," he said, in a voice of satanic joy, "poke the bloke's legs into the hole, and I'll let him down."
The order was obeyed, and the bound and gagged detective was lowered slowly until the Kid announced that his feet touched the water.
Dutry then had but a lit his hand.
With the assistance of the Kid a double knot in the end of the rope was made, which prevented it from slipping through the staple.
When the work was over Nick Carter's ankles were under water.
At that moment if the victim's lips had opened to give expression to the agony and terror that must have oppressed his heart, Jim Dutry would have been better satisfied with his fiendish work.
But Nick Carter's throat gave forth no sound.
And all was silence save the swish of the waters about him as his vengeful enemy peered down through the trap.
"If you can't speak you can hear, curse you," shouted the villain, and upon the words the body of the victim as if impelled by some magnetic force, and the eyes, stern and menacing, looked up into his.
Something like a shock passed through Dutry's huge frame, and he turned away from the sight with a shiver.
"If I looked into those eyes a minute longer I believe I'd be mesmerized," he muttered. "Say," to the Kid, do you want to take a last squint at him?"
"Yes." eagerly.
"Then hurry up with you."
Kid Kent got down on his hands and knees, and projected his head into the hole so that his face was hidden from the view of Dutry.
When he arose to his feet he gave a deep sigh.
"It's tough on de detec, ain't it?"
"He deserves a worse fate. I'd like to roast him before a slow fire."
The Kid said nothing to this outburst.
When the rug had been replaced over the trap, so as to cover not only the hole but the staple and the rope's end, the two companions in crime left the room.
It was Jim Dutry's intention to visit the place again when the shadows of night had fallen, to see if the rising tide had performed its work of death.
The Kid saw the big desperado enter his wife's room, and then excused himself for an hour or two.
"I haven't been in the burg for more'n a year," he said to Dutry, "and I'd like ter take a spin eround and see w'at's new and sassy. See?"
His first move, after regaining the sidewalk, was to take out a cigar and light it.
"No hurry," he said to himself, as he walked down Randolph street with his head in the air.
At the corner of South Clark street he stopped and looked back toward the Sherman House.
"I've seed dat young feller in a gray suit before," he said to himself, "an' I didn't like de looks of him w'en he passed me comin' out of der hotel. Bet a dollar he's onto me for somfin. Who is he? And what's his little game?"
The young man he alluded to was then a few feet behind him.
The Kid waited until he came up, and then gave him the benefit of a searching scrutiny.
The other returned the gaze with interest.
He was a well made, good-looking young fellow, with a face expressive of grit and intelligence.
The Kid waited until the stranger had crossed the street and was making for the Illinois Central depot, and then he turned and pursued the route he had taken earlier in the day with Jim Dutry.
Arrived at the junction of Lake street he again turned his head and looked back.
The young man in the gray suit was but a half block away, and coming in his direction.
"The depot move was a blind," thought the Kid. "He's follyin' me sure. Suppose I fool him a bunch, then give him the go by, an' slip down to de river."
Confident of his ability to throw dust in the eyes of his shadower, the Kid started down the street at a five mile an hour pace.
He crossed the bridge, and was making good time in a westerly direction, his intention being to keep on walking until he reached Milwaukee avenue, and then take a car for Jefferson, when a shout from behind made him change his gait from a walk to a run.
The cry was, "Stop, thief!"
Certain in his mind that the stranger in the gray suit had uttered the cry the Kid ran as if his very life hung in the balance.
Stop, thief! meant him, for he had picked a pocket at the depot after he had parted with his benefactor, the disguised Nick Carter.
Had he looked around, as he had on other occasions of real or imaginary danger, he would have seen that the cry came from the throat of a drayman, and that the thief, who had stolen a small box from the dray, was running in a direction opposite to that taken by himself, and with a patrolman close upon his heels.
But the Kid did not look back, nor did he stop running until he reached Milwaukee avenue.
He had just boarded a car when a cab drove up to the curb close by, and a passenger hastily alighted.
It was the young man in the gray suit.
The Kid trembled when the stranger looked in his direction.
Of course he would get aboard the car and take him in charge, as of course he was an officer.
Thus the Kid reasoned, and he was surprised as well as overjoyed when the car rattled onward, leaving the young man standing on the sidewalk.
The Kid watched him until he turned down a cross street and disappeared from sight.
After riding half a dozen blocks the youngster left the car and waited for one south bound to come along.
Fifteen minutes later he was standing in front of the building which had witnessed the discomfiture of the great detective.
Opening the door on the lower floor he passed in, and quickly made his way to the room which had been the scene of the conversation between Nick and Dutry.
Once within the apartment he paused and looked apprehensively at the half open door beyond.
Was Nick Carter still alive?
Before taking another step he bent his head forward and listened intently for the slightest sound from the apartment of murder.
All was still, save for the occasional splash of the waves as they dashed against the piles under the flooring.
He looked at his watch—it had been somebody else's watch a few days before—and saw that it was one o'clock in the afternoon.
Nearly two hours had elapsed since the detective, bound and gagged, had been lowered into that darksome hole of death.
What if some terrible accident had happened in the meantime?
The bare thought of such a direful possibility made the cold sweat start from the Kid's brow.
He put up his watch, and started for the half open door.
Throwing it wide open he looked forward with blood-shot eyes, fearful that he might behold something ghastly and gruesome to affright his soul.
But nothing met his gaze but the rug in its accustomed place over the trap in the middle of the floor.
His fears partially allayed, he moved toward the rug, and lifted it up with shaking fingers.
"My God!" burst from his lips in a paroxysm of amazement and terror, "but der rope's bu'sted!"
And so it was.
Only a short section remained attached to the iron staple.
It had not been as strong as had been supposed, and it had probably parted just below the flooring from the severe tension that the detective's weight must have given it.
The Kid wrung his hands in agony.
"I didn't go fer ter have Him croak," he wailed, "I tried ter save him. See? Yes, I did. 'Twas me wat got Dutry to lower him to de water's edge instead o' dumpin' him in fer good. An' wat did I do it fer? Ter pervent a murder—that's wat. I had never killed no one yet, an' I wasn't a-goin' ter. But now I'm in fer it. The detec's gone up der flume, and I'm his murderer. I've a good mind to jump in after him."
"Don't."
The voice was clear and pleasant, and sounded close to the Kid's ear.
He turned with a violent start.
Before him stood the young man with the gray suit.
"Don't," repeated the stranger, as he stepped forward and placed his hand on the boy's shoulder.
In a moment the Kid's fit of trembling ceased.
The touch of the young man's hand had a soothing effect.
He looked up into the kind face, and his fear at once left him.
"I didn't want him sent off," he said, earnestly.
"I know you didn't."
"Who told yer?"
"My eyes, and my ears, and something else."
"Who are you?"
"Your friend."
"Rats."
The Kid, with recovered confidence, was becoming himself again as far as apt expression went.
"Yes, I am."
"Are you on de turf yerself?"
"No, I am a working man," smilingly.
"Who does yer work fer?"
"My employer."
"H'm. Is he a good man?"
"None better lives in the world."
The Kid suddenly began to cry.
"What's the matter?" said the stranger, in a soothing voice. "Tell me all about it, for, as I said before, I am your friend."
"He's dead, and his ghos' will haunt me."
"Whose ghost?"
"Der detec w'at went down dat hole."
"Tell me all about it."
The Kid, over whom a revulsion of feeling had come—he was not wholly bad, as has been before remarked—truthfully told the story of the day's happenings.
"And you think the man who was lowered into that hole was Nick Carter, eh?"
"Yes."
"You are right. Nick Carter was the man."
The Kid gave evidence of the most acute distress.
"Cheer up, my little man," said the stranger, encouragingly. "for no murder has been committed."
"No"
The Kid's face flushed with joy unspeakable.
"No. Nick Carter is alive."
"Then—then you must have saved him,"
"Yes."
"How did you do it?"
"I followed him to this place."
"Did you see me go up der stairs"
"Yes."
Intense admiration was reflected in the Kid's sparkling eyes.
"Did you go down de elevator, too?"
"Yes."
"Didn't Mrs. Noonan pipe yer off?"
"Yes, and it was on account of her appearance when I was preparing to descend the elevator shaft that I lost much valuable time. If it had not been for her I would have come to Nick Carter's assistance when the attack was made upon him in the adjoining room."
"Dat was w'en I shot at him."
"But you didn't shoot to kill?"
"No, I didn't shoot ter hit neither. It was all accident dat I pinked him in der arm."
"I'm glad to hear you say so."
"Dat's all right. Now tell me about de detec. You got ter him in time?"
"I got to him in less than five minutes after you and Dutry had gone."
"Ware is he now?"
"Here," said a voice, and Nick Carter stepped out from his place of concealment behind the door opening onto the elevator landing.
He shook hands with the boy. "You must become one of us," he said, in a magnetic voice.
"W'at—a detec?"
"Yes."
"Is he," pointing to the young man in the gray suit, "a detec, too?"
"Yes."
'W'at's his name?"
"Chick."
"W'y, I've heard of him," cried the Kid, enthusiastically, "and I allus felt I'd like ter be same's him, only I couldn't, 'cos I was trainin' wid de wrong gang."
"You must not train with the wrong gang any longer."
"I won't if you say so?"
The Kid spoke with earnest sincerity.
He was a bright lad, and he had taken a sudden resolution to forsake his evil course at a most critical period in his life's history.
To be a detective had been his ambition more than once, though he had often found it a pleasant pastime to throw dust in the eyes of these man-hunters.
"I want to get a hold on Jim Dutry," said Nick, after some further talk had been indulged in, "and I think you can help me."
"I'll do de best I can."
"Do you know whether he carries an open-faced gold watch, or has one among his traps?"
"Yes."
Nick described the time-piece which the millionaire politician, Fulda, had been swindled out of.
"She was carrying it w'en I left de hotel," said the Kid.
"Mrs. Dutry?"
"Yes."
"Better make the arrests at once, eh?" said Chick.
"There's no use in waiting, if the watch is in their possession, for it will be all the evidence that will be required outside of the matter of personal identification."
After reflecting a moment Nick said to the Kid:
"Go on to the hotel quick, and find out without exciting suspicion if the watch is still with them. It may have been pawned since you saw it last."
"All right, sir."
"Let us know as soon as you can."
"Ware kin I find youse?"
"Here."
"Yes," explained Chick, "we intend to remain here until Dutry comes to see whether or not the tide has completed his murderous work. In that way we can take him completely by surprise."
The Kid was off before Chick had finished.
In half an hour he returned with the startling information that Mr. and Mrs. Dutry had left the hotel, taking their baggage with them, and had gone nobody at the hotel knew where.
Nick and Chick looked at each other in dismay.
"How did they go?" asked the former.
"In a cab."
"Without giving any directions to the driver?"
"None that the clerk heard."
"Too bad. What do you think, Chick?"
"Mrs. Noonan is at the bottom of it."
"The woman up stairs?"
"Yes."
"That's it. Dutry came to the place on the heels of the Kid—perhaps he was suspicious of the boy, and followed him up—and learned from Mrs. Noonan that you had gone down the elevator shaft."
"And he must have piped off the conversation between me and the Kid, Nick, for the door you just entered a while ago was partly open, and he could have heard well enough from the top of the shaft."
"Yes, that must be the explanation of his unexpected action."
Nick was right.
Jim Dutry had become suspicious of the Kid on account of the latter's leaving the hotel so suddenly.
"He had shadowed the boy to Mrs. Noonan's lodging-house, and had also seen Chick go up the staircase a moment after the Kid had disappeared through the lower door beyond.
Mrs. Noonan and Chick had furnished him with all the further information he required by their second talk at the mouth of the elevator shaft.
Dutry had followed close behind the young detective, and had heard every word that had been spoken both by him and the woman.
"Phwat the divil do yez be doin' in my house again?" she said, angrily, when she came forward and arrested Chick's descent. "Maybe yez do be wan av thim b'ys that me darlint wuz lukkin' afther," she added, in a pleasanter tone.
"Your darlint is the boy who was here this forenoon, is he not?" asked Chick.
"Sure an' how do the loikes av yez know whether he wuz here this forenoon or lasht year, I dunno. And who do yez be onnyways? Ayeh?"
"I am a friend of the boy you were speaking of."
"I wasn't sp'akin' av no b'y at all, at all," gazing at him suspiciously out of her red and watery eyes. "And how do I know that you know my b'y onnyways? Projuce your papers. Who are yez?"
"I am working a job with Jim Dutry."
"Aha, now. Thin go 'long wid yez. Yer wilcome to go phair yez loikes, only don't fall in the hool down beyant."
"I'll be very careful."
When she had gone Chick found that he could not descend to the basement by means of the rope, for the greater part of it had been cut away by the Kid at the forenoon visit.
So he was forced to slide down the smooth upright, bringing his knees as well as his hands into play to make the operation a safe one.
Jim Dutry, with his head craned over the shaft, heard most of the conversation that took place between Chick and the Kid.
When Nick Carter stepped forth the big desperado waited for no further developments.
He hurried back to the hotel as fast as his legs could carry him, and in ten minutes he had got all his belongings into a cab, and with his wife by his side was being rapidly driven toward the north side.
The two detectives lost the trail at Lakeview.
Here also they lost sight of the Kid.
They had furnished him with money before starting out on their quest for the fugitive crooks, and his absence, therefore, was looked upon by them as a favorable indication.
The next morning, while Nick and Chick were in Chief McClaughrey's private office discussing the matter of the Dutrys' disappearance, a telegram was placed in the great detective's hands.
It was from Niles, Michigan, and was from a stranger.
But it contained information of an important as well as a sorrowful character.
Nick read it aloud:
"A boy of fourteen or thereabout," it ran, "was pitched off a train of the Michigan Central a few miles out last evening by some villain who sought his life. He is in a dying condition, and may not live through the night.
"His name is Kent. He says he is in your employ as a detective, and he wants to see you before he dies. A. G. BANEY, M.D."
ON the afternoon of the day that brought Nick the telegram he was standing by the Kid's bedside in the hospital at Niles, Michigan.
There was little hope for the boy's recovery.
Jim Dutry's murderous hands had thrust him from the train while it had been going at full speed, and he now lay upon a white cot in a cool room, a mass of broken bones.
Chick was there with Nick, and the Kid talked while they fanned his fevered face.
"I got onto der pair of em near de Humboldt Boulevard, and I shadowed 'em to der first station beyond.
"W'en dey got aboard de train I knew dat I had to folly 'em, er else I couldn't find out ware dey was lightin' out fer. See?"
"Yes, Kid, yes."
"It was a Mick's train, I t'ink dey call it—freight an' passenger—an' I got into der caboose wid de conduc.
"Jim Dutry an' Nell was in de first car in front, but I didn't find dat out till I went on de platform outside an' seen 'em tru de winder.
"Wile I was a-lookin' at 'em an' dey wid dere backs turned ter me, Jim Dutry su'nly turned his head an' put his lamps on me.
"He 'peared s'prised ter see me, but not mad nor 'fraid."
"All pretense, my poor boy. He meant to deceive you."
"I know dat now, but I didn't w'en I looked at him. He actually smiled at me, See? An' I like a big stan' up an' take salts, tort he hadn't got onto me, and dat it was all right atwixt him an' me.
"So w'en he come out to w'are I was I didn't run away from him, I just stood dere, an' played innocent on him.
"He came over to me, an' put his han's on my arms. 'I'm so glad ter see yer, Kiddy,' says he, 'dat I could almost cry out wid joy. You came near bein' lost to us, Kiddy,' he went on, 'come blame near never seein' us again.'
"I didn't have a show ter say nothin' back, ter give him a neat piece of my chin, for w'en he said wot I've told yer he give me a shove an' over I went. Nobody seen him, and nobody found out dat I was off de train till a special came along a w'ile afterward."
The Kid paused, and Chick gave him some water to drink.
"Think youse can collar him?" he inquired, faintly, as he turned his burning eyes to the great detective's face.
"I hope so. I have sent telegrams along the line, and it will be a surprise to me if he is not caught.
When Nick and Chick left the Kid after an hour's further stay the doctor talked more encouragingly than when they had entered the hospital.
"Your presence has had a good effect, gentlemen, and he may pull through. The chances are still against him, mind, but he may possibly recover."
The two detectives were much relieved at these words, for they had taken a great liking for the lad.
There was the stuff in him for the making of a good man.
No responses of the character desired were made to Nick's telegrams.
Before twenty-four hours had gone by he had come to the conclusion that the Dutrys had disguised themselves beyond the possibility of detection.
Before the detectives had parted with the Kid in Chicago he had informed them that the big desperado and his petite wife had on hand a gigantic scheme of robbery.
He had not been informed as to the details, nor as to the locality in which it was to be perpetrated.
The only statement that could possibly throw any light on the projected crime was that of Joe Howard's connection with it.
"I heard der last part of de letter Claudia Howard sent to Nell to read in de hotel, but I didn't catch de name of de town. All I heard was dat Nell had got de plan of somethin', and that she could help Jim out better'n a man."
Plan of something!
What did that mean?
Plan of a bank, most probably.
What bank would Joe Howard have a criminal interest in?
Nick cudgeled his brains for half an hour before the name came to him.
"The Coldwater bank for a thousand dollars."
"Howard made a big haul of jewelry there, didn't he?" inquired Chick.
"Yes."
"That's the place, then."
"I am sure of it, and the next train must see us on our way to Coldwater."
The afternoon papers came out before the two detectives left Niles.
Nick purchased one while waiting at the railway station, and glanced carelessly at the head-lines.
Suddenly he crushed the paper in his hand and gave utterance to a fierce exclamation.
"What's the matter, Nick?" asked his able assistant.
"Matter enough, Chick. The bank has been robbed."
"What, the Coldwater bank!"
"Last night."
"By whom?"
"It is not known who the operators were, so the paper says. But I know and you know."
"Jim and Nell."
"Certainly."
"How much plunder did they carry off?"
"Twenty-four thousand dollars in cash, bonds and jewelry."
"Great Scott!"
"We've got to collar these robbers, Chick."
"We'll run 'em down or emigrate to Mexico, and bury ourselves in some cave."
"All aboard!" shouted the conductor.
Nick and Chick sprang up the steps of the car in front of them, and were whirled off to Coldwater.
JIM DUTRY and his wife reached Coldwater on the evening of the first of March, several hours after the Kid had been thrown from the train.
At Niles they alighted with their baggage—it could be carried in the hand—and in the ladies' waiting-room, after the train had gone on, Nell made a change in her personal appearance.
It was as a bright-eyed, curly headed telegraph boy, off for a holiday that she reappeared before her husband.
In the meantime he had not been idle.
A long-haired wig and false whiskers, added to a change in hat and coat, made him look like some resident of the Territories come to Michigan to sell cattle or boom a mine.
They took passage on the next train going east, and arrived at their destination shortly after dark.
With never a thought of the poor maimed lad they had left behind them, they at once prepared for the shady business that had brought them to Coldwater.
Nell knew the small city well, and she piloted her husband to a lodging-house in the suburbs, kept by an ex-fence, who was known to be a loyal friend of Joe Howard and his gang.
After supper the woman, still disguised, set out on a voyage of discovery.
She returned before midnight with the following information:
The Coldwater National Bank was unprotected at night.
No one slept within the building, and no regular watchman was employed without.
She had before this furnished Dutry with a plan of the bank.
It was resolved to do the job on the following night.
Alf Gerdoy, the ex-fence, a little old man with a rheumatic leg, was taken into their confidence, and agreed to furnish certain needed articles in consideration of a share in the plunder.
He found dynamite bombs and a number of burglars' tools.
Not enough of the latter, however, to answer all probable requirements.
But Dutry did not despair, for Nell had informed him that in the near vicinity of the bank was a blacksmith shop.
All was in readiness for the expedition of robbery when the stars came out on the evening of the second of March.
Gerdoy could not go with them on account of his weak physical condition, but he promised to perform a certain act which might assist their nefarious purpose.
This act was to be done when the city clock struck the hour of one in the morning.
At midnight the three sallied forth from the suburban lodging-house.
Nell, still dressed as a boy, but in a suit of coarser material than had been worn during the day, walked by the side of her big husband, under whose light overcoat was concealed the tools which Gerdoy had furnished him.
In his outside pocket, carefully wrapped in oil-skin, were the dynamite bombs. small affairs, but capable of exerting a tremendous force when exploded.
When within a couple of blocks of the bank Gerdoy left his companions and took his way toward an unoccupied house of large size in the residence portion of the city.
The first move of the Dutrys was in the direction of the blacksmith shop.
Entrance was effected by means of a rear window.
A sledge-hammer, chisels, monkey-wrenches, punches, a crowbar, and other tools, were gathered up in the strong arms of Nell's husband and carried outside.
In the shadow of a wooden awning, where there were a number of wagons, they waited for the signal to attack the bank.
From where they rested they could see the outlines of the brick building whose vaults held the treasures they were risking so much to obtain.
After an age, as it seemed to them, the city clock struck the hour of one.
Five minutes passed, and then from several directions came the cry of "fire."
Soon the sky became brilliantly lighted up.
The fire was only a few blocks away.
But while the street in front and one side of the bank—it stood on a corner—was as light as day, the rear, against which was a large open shed, was in shadow.
While the fire was at its height Dutry and Nell glided from the shelter of the blacksmith shop, opened a gate close by, and stepped into the bank inclosure.
They might safely have taken the street to gain the point at which they intended to begin operations, for the conflagration had attracted the entire population of the place, even the night guardians of the peace, the patrolmen and the watchman having hurried thither to assist in preserving order and in protecting and saving property.
Alf Gerdoy had done his work well.
It had been his hand which had applied the match to the unoccupied building.
Under cover of the excitement and its attendant conditions of safety from observation and molestation, Jim Dutry forced off the outside bars of the window with the crowbar, and then easily pried the window open.
Nell was hoisted in first.
Dutry quickly followed, displaying extraordinary agility for so heavy a man.
Once in the bank the bold operators took their own time.
First Dutry examined the vault door.
It was a heavy affair, and was supposed to be burglar proof.
But it wasn't.
With a drill the muscular and resolute crook went to work, nor ceased his labors until a hole had been made sufficient to admit a punch with which the inner lock was knocked off.
The heavy door was then swung open, and Nell and Dutry stepped inside the vault.
While the big desperado had worked with a drill, Nell had held a bull's-eye lantern provided by Gerdoy, so that he could see what he was doing.
In the vault she now flashed the rays of the lantern upon the doors of the two safes.
One was what is known as a burglar proof, combination lock safe.
The other was a steel safe with a time lock.
"The drill and the dynamite will do it, Jim," said Nell, with set lips and resolute voice.
"We'll try it a rattle, anyhow."
He began work with a will.
Ever and anon as he labored the woman of nerve and daring would walk softly from front to rear, and listen at the shuttered windows for suspicious sounds from the outside.
Every time she returned to Jim Dutry's side she had a smile of encouragement for him.
It was not likely that their work would be interfered with.
Before three o'clock came the two safes had been drilled and charged with dynamite.
Nell and Dutry, in the farthest corner of the bank, held their hands over their ears in readiness for the moment when the double explosion should come.
The concussion was terrific.
People heard it a mile away, and thought it was thunder.
But into no one's head—civilians or officers—did the idea enter that it was the crowning act in a daring criminal operation.
So great was the force of the agent of destruction that the doors of both safes were blown entirely off, exposing the contents of the cash-box and the depositories of the other valuables and securities.
A still better idea of the force of the explosion may be formed from the fact that the gold pieces, found on the vault floor afterward, were battered and bent out of shape as though a sledge-hammer had been used, and one piece of iron, two inches long, was found to have passed entirely through a book three inches in thickness. A long leather book containing notes and other valuable papers was torn out of all semblance of a book, and many of the papers were ruined.
As Jim Dutry and Nell went tremblingly into the vault, and gazed by the aid of the bull's-eye at the wreckage which the dynamite had made, and at the wealth which had been uncovered, they knew if they could escape with their booty, that the job would be heralded far and wide as the boldest and most complete of the kind ever undertaken in Michigan.
And Nell's courage—want of fear would better express it—was conspicuous throughout.
There was terrible danger to both of them when the bombs exploded.
But she never uttered a cry before or after the terrific report, which shook the building to its very foundations.
As the newspapers had stated, the plunder which the bold operators carried away amounted in round figures to twenty-five thousand dollars.
Besides the battered coins, a gold watch, open faced, and the fragments of a chain were found upon the floor of the vault.
This watch was shown to Nick Carter when he arrived on the scene several hours after the discovery of the robbery.
He recognized it instantly as the property of Mr. Fulda.
While he held it in his hands, Chick, who had been on a scout of his own since his arrival in town, put in an appearance.
"Alf Gerdoy is here—I saw him not ten minutes ago."
"The old fence, pal of Joe Howard, and the old time gang."
"Yes."
"Does he live here?"
"Yes, keeps a boarding joint in the outskirts."
"We'll visit the place to-night."
UPON the discovery of the bank robbery, a large reward was offered for the arrest of the burglars.
The sheriff and his deputies went at work on the case immediately, and every train during the day brought one or more detectives.
Nick and Chick did not fear this professional opposition.
"It's a fair field for all," said he, "and may the best man win."
Before nightfall the two detectives had satisfied themselves that the Dutrys had not left the city.
They were probably hiding at or near Gerdoy's place.
To find some evidence that the ex-fence was concerned in the robbery was the great detective's first concern.
If he could but stumble on some clue that would lead up to the discovery of Gerdoy's complicity before he started for the rheumatic rascal's house, he would be able to conduct his investigations then under most favorable conditions.
There was but one article left behind by the robbers which might serve as the clue he was seeking.
This was the sawed-off handle of a sledge.
It had been found under the back window, and had probably been cast aside when the Dutrys had left the building.
It had not been taken from the blacksmith shop, nor had any claimant appeared for it.
None of the local officers had attached any importance to this small unmarked piece of lumber.
The sheriff had passed it over to Nick, with the joking remark: "You may find it useful as a club, in case the burglars attack you while you are looking for them."
Nick smiled, and went his way, which was not the good sheriff's way.
It was close upon sundown when an itinerant peddler stepped up to the ex-fence's door.
The house Gerdoy lived in, and where he received lodgers, was of two stories.
On the first floor were the office and bar-room—where liquor was sold on the sly—and dining-room and kitchen.
There was no fence about the premises, and the large back-yard was filled with all sorts of refuse.
The peddler was Nick Carter.
He cast his eye toward the rear as he rapped at the door, which he had expected to find open.
Gerdoy appeared after a time in his shirt sleeves.
He looked at the false peddler suspiciously.
"I don's want to sell, I'm on the buy," said Nick, by way of introduction.
"I haven't got any thing to sell—" surlily.
"It's odds and ends I'm after."
"Rags, sacks, and bottles?"
"Yes, and broken stuff you've thrown away. You must have a lot of truck in your back-yard."
"I'm busy. Can't bother with you to-day."
"I'll go around and see what I can find. If I light on anything that is worth buying, I'll let you know."
Nick had a large oil-cloth traveling-bag on his arm.
"What have you got in this?" asked Gerdoy.
Nick opened it, and disclosed half a dozen small packages.
The ex-fence put his finger to his nose.
Nick did the same.
"The real stuff?" whispered Gerdoy.
"Bourbon," said Nick, as he looked furtively about.
"Will you trade?"
"Yes."
"What for?"
"Truck."
"Go in the back-yard and hunt among the rubbish, then, and—" he hesitated.
"What?"
"I'll take care of your bag until you come back."
"That's agreed."
Nick gave the bag into the hands of Gerdoy, whose lips had already begun to twitch in pleasant anticipation of along denied treat, and then walked with a business air toward the back-yard.
Odds and ends of every description were scattered indiscriminately about.
Broken utensils, old books, pieces of china, scraps of iron, old bottles, cast-off clothing, etc.
Nick's sharp eyes looked closely at each heap in succession.
He was searching for a particular article.
With a long stick he began to poke among the debris.
Presently he gave utterance to a low exclamation of satisfaction.
He had found what he sought.
It was a handleless sledge.
The handle had been sawed off close to the iron.
After turning around carelessly to assure himself that he was not being observed, Nick stooped down over the sledge, and drawing from his pocket the handle the sheriff had given him, placed the sawed off ends together.
A perfect fit.
The proof was clear, then, that the handle used by the bank robbers had come from Gerdoy's place.
Knowing the ex-fence's character and associates, Nick was convinced that he was an accomplice, either active or passive, of the Dutrys.
With an old vest and a couple of bottles in his hand, he walked to the front door.
Gerdoy, with a flushed face, was awaiting him on the steps.
Nick held up the articles he had selected to purchase, and as soon as convenient to throw them away.
"Huh! What are they good for?"
"I'm a poor man, and the vest will serve me as well as a new one."
"And the bottles?"
Nick put his finger to his nose.
"For the stuff," he said.
Gerdoy coughed and shook his head.
What did he mean?
Had he experienced a change of heart in regard to the contents of Nick's bag since the false peddler had left it in his possession?
The disguised detective was puzzled at the ex-fence's reply, and looked about him to see if he could account for it.
The slight shuffle of a foot on the floor of the bar-room seemed to furnish an explanation.
Nick inclined his head in the direction of the sound, and tipped Gerdoy a sort of inquiring wink.
The ex-fence nodded his head.
"I'd like to rest a while," said the detective, "when I get ready to start we'll fix a price on these articles."
"Take 'em for nothing?"
"Thank you."
"Good-by."
The proprietor of the lodging-house wanted to be rid of him.
Nick did not purpose going yet a while.
He wanted to know something about the person who had shuffled his feet, and he wanted to make certain investigations in the house, besides holding an interesting conversation with the ex-fence.
"Where's my bag?" he said, as a starter in his crafty maneuver.
"In there," pointing to the bar-room.
"Go in and get it."
"'Tisn't safe. Go on. Come around to-morrow and I'll explain."
He spoke in a whisper, glanced uneasily toward the bar-room—the door of which was closed—and then motioned the detective away.
"Is the bag safe?" asked Nick.
"Yes."
"Then what's the matter with my going in the room and resting a while? I've got nothing about me that renders me liable to arrest."
Gerdoy looked at Nick a moment as if he were in doubt as to the false peddler's sanity.
And as he looked an idea struck the great detective with startling force.
Gerdoy was not playing him—he was sincere in his desire to get him away from the house.
But the ex-fence was not regarding him as either a genuine peddler, or a detective, but as a crook, one who had played fast and loose with the law.
And not an ordinary crook, either.
The ex-fence had taken him for some friend of Dutry's, some one who was momentarily expected.
And the party in the bar-room was a foe, an officer, probably.
All these reflections passed like a flash through Nick's mind.
Gerdoy's eyes were still fixed on him in perplexity, when Nick, with a quick change of manner, said hurriedly and in a whisper: "I tumble. I was only talking against time. Who is it—a copper?"
"I think so."
"Is he after Dutry?"
Nick uttered the name boldly.
His bold strokes often told.
This one did.
"Yes," whispered the ex-fence, "I think so."
"What makes you think he suspects me?"
"From a remark he made."
"What did he say?"
"That peddler will never get rich at his trade."
"That meant nothing."
"I think it did."
"What could it have meant?"
"That you were not a peddler."
"I see."
Nick paused a moment and looked at Gerdoy from head to foot.
"You're not much of a fighter, I take it?"
"No."
"Small things make you afraid sometimes, don't they?"
"What are you driving at?"
"This. Isn't it singular that the man inside, if he is a copper or a detective, hastn't come out to look at me, if as you suspect and fear, he has tumbled to my disguise, and knows who I am?"
"Yes—yes."
Gerdoy's face brightened.
"He's all alone, isn't he?"
"Yes."
"Big man?"
"About your size."
"Then I'll go in and take a look at him. If he tries to bounce me, I'll do him up."
"No, no; Mr. Jolly, there must be no bloodshed on my premises. I can't afford it."
Jolly!
Nick, at the mention of that name, knew for whom he had been taken.
Joe Jolly, a member of the Joe Howard gang, and Nell Dutry's brother.
It would never do to enter the house and confront Dutry or his wife, if they were there, in the character of Joe Jolly.
But, perhaps the robbers were not in the house.
Possessed of Gerdoy's confidence, as he now was, he could have that matter settled by asking one pertinent question.
"Are Jim and Nell in your crib?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"Up stairs."
"Good!"
"Why good?"
"Because so long as they stay there they are safe."
"How so?"
"I'll explain later. First, I'll look in at our man in the bar-room, and then I'll go up stairs and have a talk with the Dutrys, provided I find it safe to do so."
"Act as you think best."
Gerdoy had ceased to make objections.
He had quickly acquired confidence in the pseudo Joe Jolly, and thought him a man abundantly able to take care of himself.
"Better let me tackle the stranger alone," Nick remarked, in a whisper, as he put his hand on the knob of the bar-room door.
The ex-fence nodded his head.
"Go it," he said; "but mind no blood-letting."
The disguised detective opened the door boldly, and walked in.
In front of the open fire-place of the room sat a stalwart young man reading a newspaper.
His hair was red, his eyebrows were bushy and of the same hue, while a short reddish beard covered the greater part of his face.
But Nick knew him in an instant.
It was Chick.
CHICK had received instructions to come to the ex-fence's house at a later hour.
His arrival on the heels of Nick indicated that something unexpected by either of them had happened since his parting with his superior.
A few feet beyond the spot where Chick sat was the door opening into the stair-way, which led to the second story.
Nick, with a significant motion of his head, walked to the door, listened a moment, then softly opened it to assure himself that there were no eavesdroppers about.
No one was on the stair-way.
Closing the door as softly as he had opened it, Nick turned to Chick, and asked: "Well, what's happened? What brought you here so early?"
"I thought I might save you from running your neck into a noose, so to speak."
"Explain?"
"Joe Jolly was expected to visit the crib as a peddler."
"Well?"
"And if he didn't arrive and you did, you would be taken for Jolly."
"Certainly, as I have been."
"Taken for Jolly by Gerdoy and taken in and done for by the Dutrys."
"So I might have been, Chick, if I hadn't dropped to the game in time."
"Forgive me, , but in my fear for your safety, I didn't think of that dropping habit of yours. You are always prepared, it seems to me."
"Not always, for I am only a human being."
"Well, nearly always."
"Let it go at that. Now, tell me—how did you get onto this Jolly visit?"
"I got onto Jolly himself."
"Where is he now?"
"In jail."
"You arrested him?"
"Yes, for the Cincinnati mail-carrier job."
"Good for you, Chick. You've simplified matters. With Jolly out of the way we ought to experience no difficulty in closing in on the Dutrys."
Gerdoy entered the room at this juncture.
Nick walked up to him with a smile.
"It's all right," he said, in a low tone. "He doesn't suspect me."
"Who is he?"
"A commercial traveler."
"Not a detective"
"No."
Gerdoy drew a deep breath of relief.
"Have you any other lodgers but those we were talking about a while ago" asked Nick.
"No. My custom is transient.
"What rooms are the pair occupying"
"Directly overhead."
"Fronting the street?"
"Yes."
"Then they must have seen me when I came up to the door."
"Of course they saw you, and they are probably wondering now why you don't come up and see them."
"Call the drummer outside, and I'll go up now."
"What excuse shall I make?"
"Tell him you want his opinions about some improvements you are thinking of making. Your old shebang needs patching up, so you won't have to invent much."
"All right."
When Chick, in response to Gerdoy's invitation, had gone outside, Nick opened the stair-way door and ascended to the second story.
He counted upon Chick's assistance when the time to strike arrived, and he calculated that it would take his able assistant about five minutes to effectually settle matters with the rheumatic ex-fence.
There was no movement in the room supposed to contain the two robbers as he approached it.
What if they had smelled a rat, and taken sudden leave by means of the back stairs!
Nick reached the door, and gave a low rap.
"Who's there?" came a whisper from within.
"A friend of Joe Jolly."
Nick had decided upon his course of action while ascending the stairs.
It was not probable that either Nell or Dutry knew all of Jolly's friends, and he could invent a name for himself that ought to pass muster when backed by a plausible tongue.
When he made his response the door was quickly opened.
Instead of a pleasant invitation to walk in he met with a terrible surprise.
Two powerful hands grasped him by the throat, and he was dragged into the room and thrown down upon the floor before he could fairly realize that he had been tricked and trapped.
With his knees upon the detective's chest big Jim Dutry kept his tight grip about the windpipe, until Nell had handed him the gag which she had prepared but a few moments before, but before it could be used the door opened, and Chick, as he quickly crossed the threshold, laid out Dutry with one blow, releasing Nick, who in turn, soon recovering his breath, grasped Dutry in his powerful arms, while Chick turned his attention to the woman who was about to raise her pistol toward him.
He was too quick for her.
Anticipating the move he caught her arm and twisted it before her fingers could press the trigger.
When the report came her lips uttered a quick, gasping sound, and her head sank forward on her breast, and she would have fallen to the floor had not the young detective been ready with his support.
The muzzle of the pistol had been turned toward her own breast, and she was dead before Chick laid her body down on the floor.
Dutry was bound securely, and that night occupied a cell in the town jail with a life sentence staring him in the face.
He had Alf Gerdoy for a companion.
Chick had lured the latter to an out-house while Nick was operating up stairs, and had knocked him over and then secured him.
Then he rushed into the house, up the stairs, and into the room in time to save Nick from death.
Before leaving Gerdoy's a search of the house was made, and all the money and valuables stolen from the bank were recovered.
One of the bed-posts in the room which had been occupied by the Dutrys was hollowed out, and into this receptacle the stolen property had been placed.
Nick and Chick were complimented by the bank officials for their quick and efficient work.
Mr. Fulda also had something to say of a very flattering nature.
The rewards they received in both instances were handsome ones.
Before they left Coldwater a telegram from Niles was placed in Nick's hand.
It contained this bit of cheering information:
THE LAD KENT IS NOW OUT OF DANGER. BANEY, M.D.
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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