CHAPTER VI.
HOW PATSY BROKE IN.
The blow on the head, suffered by the detective when he fell to the table, had been a severe one, and, aggravated by another tumble when the table crumpled up beneath him, it had inflicted worse injuries than might have been thought by any one who had seen the catastrophe.
It was hours before Nick Carter came to himself. When he did, he was in pitch-darkness, and he realized, from the peculiar, damp smell, that he was in a cellar.
Also, he caught a pungent odor, which he recognized, and which reminded him of the conversation he had heard just before he plunged through the broken banister.
“Ammonia, as sure as I am here,” he muttered. “I’ll have to move quickly, for it seems to me as if the stuff has been disturbed lately. If it has, probably it means——”
The thump of an engine made him pause.
“The fiends! They are generating the ammonia gas, and, of course, they will set it free by opening some of the valves, and then——”
The smell of ammonia waxed stronger, and his breath began to come with difficulty.
He fumbled along the rough stone wall, damp with the ooze of the marsh, until he came to an iron tank, from which the fumes were emerging so strongly that he reeled away, half suffocated.
“This won’t do. They’ll get me like a stray dog in a gas chamber if I don’t find my way out.”
The thumping of the engine continued, and his sense of direction told him that it was against the wall in which was a heavy door.
“There is a pump and it works underneath the tank in some way,” muttered Nick. “I can’t get at it on this side. The only chance would be to get to the other room, and the door is too heavy to be broken down in a hurry. I have no tools, and——”
“Gee! That’s a bum smell!”
It was Patsy Garvan’s voice, almost at his ear.
“Patsy!” he cried.
“Chief! Where are you?”
“In the cellar. Get in, quickly!”
“Hold on a moment!” came back the answer. “This is all fast water out here. I’m in the boat. Wait till I find the window.”
Nick Carter understood now that the front of the building was in the water and high grass, while at the back it looked upon a rushing stream.
He made a short survey of his quarters.
“I see some boards that look as if they are nailed on at one place on the wall. I can’t reach them, but I dare say you can kick them open. Try, at all events,” he directed.
“All right! Gee! This is a stunt for an orphan boy. It has me going, I’m telling you. Holy mackerel! If this boat would only behave a little. It’s swinging around like a skidding auto. I wish I’d put the chains on! Wow! There she goes!”
Patsy Garvan was uttering all these ejaculations in low tones, but they were none the less earnest on that account.
He had waited for what he considered a long enough time, and then had just been preparing to go up the chute, when he heard the crash as Nick Carter went through the banisters.
“Gee! Something’s broke loose!” exclaimed Patsy then. “Me for the high grass!”
He had dropped back into the boat and shot away into the tangle of rushes.
Nobody had appeared at the front of the building, and he could not see the back. So he kept in hiding for half an hour or so, and then ventured up the chute once more.
This time he crawled to the very top. But the rascals within had investigated to find out how Nick had got in, and when they found the door at the top of the chute a little way open, they had carefully bolted it within.
It required only this bolted door to assure Patsy that some trick had been played on his beloved chief, and he cautiously made his way around the large wooden building.
He noted that there was a strong stone wall foundation, and when he saw that there were three square openings, each secured by heavy boards within, he understood that a large and water-tight cellar was part of the equipment of the warehouse.
When he heard Nick Carter tell him to kick in the boards at one of the windows it was perfectly clear to him what he was to do.
Holding his boat firmly at the boarded window where he had first caught the fumes of ammonia, and which had called forth his ejaculation, he warned Nick by saying cautiously:
“Chief!”
“Well?”
“Look out! I’m going to stave in this board with the end of the boat. It may hurt you if you get in the way.”
“The boat is below the level of the window, isn’t it?” asked Nick.
“Just a little,” was Patsy’s reply. “If it wasn’t, the water would pour into the cellar.”
“Then, how are you going to get the end of the boat against the boards, Patsy?”
“I’ll tilt the end, and bring it up against the window with the bow for a battering-ram. Get me?”
Nick smiled in the darkness at the ingenuity of his assistant, but he merely told Patsy to go ahead, without any more comment.
There was a pause, as Patsy rowed his boat a few yards from the wall.
He had quite worked out in his own mind how he meant to force his way.
The boat was heavy and flat-bottomed. Any extra weight at one end would always cause the other to stand up clear of the water.
The wall of stone that formed the foundation of the big wooden building was only a few inches above the level of the still water.
It was safe to have it thus, because there were no tides, no disturbances of the surface at any time, or, at least, very few.
The tall reeds and grass made such a protection that the water was practically stagnant most of the time.
Patsy made his way to the stern, and also carried there the oars, a can of bait, a landing net, boat hook, and other things in the boat, as well as the two guns belonging to himself and Nick Carter.
“I’ll weight it down all I can,” he said to himself.
The bow of the boat shot up in the air so that it would easily clear the top of the stone foundation. It was pointing directly at the boards Patsy was prepared to attack.
The water was not deep at this point—in fact, at one time, there had been ground, more or less solid, above the surface—so Patsy dug the end of an oar into the bottom and, with a hard shove, sent the boat full tilt against the boards.
There was a crash as the end of the boat tore its way through. At the same time the fumes of ammonia gushed forth so fiercely that they tainted all the outside atmosphere.
Patsy was hurled flat upon his back, and the oar broke in two and floated slowly away.
The bow of the boat remained on the edge of the stone wall, poking a little way into the cellar.
“Chief!” cried Patsy. “Are you there?”
“Of course I am,” was the reply. “Can’t you get that boat out of the way, so that I can crawl out?”
“Sure! Just hold your mules a minute! She’s in pretty tight—as the butcher said to the pound of sausage meat—but I can pry her out, I guess. In fact, I have to. Gee! She went in for keeps, but her little cousin, Patsy, wants her outside!”
Chattering thus, hardly knowing what he said, Patsy stood in the bow and shoved against the wall with all his strength.
The result was what he might have expected, although, perhaps, he had not thought of it. The boat slipped away from him, and he found himself clinging to the stone wall, his head in the cellar—where the fumes of ammonia made him cough—and a large expanse of empty water under his legs and feet.
“Holy Samuel!” he gasped. “Here’s more of it!”
He got to one side of the ledge, so that Nick Carter had room to crawl out, and looked in dismay at the boat slowly drifting away.
“There’s only one thing to be done, Patsy!” observed Nick.
“I know it. But I ain’t going to get wetter than I’m obliged,” was Patsy’s prompt response. “I’ll leave my duds behind me.”
The opening of the window had allowed so much of the ammonia to escape that it was possible to remain on the ledge without suffering very much. So Patsy dropped inside the cellar, with his face to the air, and divested himself of his garments.
“I’ll bring the boat back in a jiffy!” he announced. “Stay here till I get back, chief!”
With much cheerfulness, Patsy let himself down into the water, and swam over to the boat. Then he climbed in and rowed back to the window.
While Nick Carter got in, his good-tempered young assistant retrieved his clothing, and in a few minutes was dressed again.
“That’s better than getting everything soaked with water!” observed Patsy. “It didn’t take long, and it wasn’t any worse than going in swimming with the boys the way I used to do.”
“I’m glad I’m out of that place, Patsy!” said Nick Carter, with a smile of gratitude. “But we’ve still got to get after Chick and Prince Marcos.”
“You bet!” agreed Patsy earnestly. “Think they are in this place somewhere?”
“You haven’t seen anybody come out, have you?”
“No. I’ll take my solemn oatmeal nobody came out while you were inside. I’ve been going around this shanty steadily.”
“Then the gang must be inside still,” declared Nick Carter. “My belief is that they have some other office room beside the one I saw them in, and that they are there now.”
Patsy looked at his chief with a puzzled expression. Nick Carter had not told him anything about his adventures in the warehouse, and he did not understand in the least how Nick had come into the cellar.
Patsy Garvan could guess, though. He was as skillful at putting two and two together and getting at the result, as anybody in Nick Carter’s circle of acquaintance—and that is saying a great deal.
“How many are there in the gang?” asked Patsy.
“Only two, that I know of for certain. But I am inclined to think there must be some more. Larry Dugan——”
“What?” broke in Patsy. “Is that murdering skunk in it?”
“I believe so,” returned Nick seriously. “But I don’t believe he is in this house at present.”
“You don’t? Why?”
“Because I heard the people inside say that he was coming at dark, to take Marcos away.”
Patsy turned quickly to his chief, his face twitching with anxiety.
“And Chick? He’s the boy I’m interested in. Dear old Chick!”
“That’s right. We have to look after Chick,” was Nick Carter’s response.
Patsy Garvan involuntarily pulled back his coat cuffs, as if getting ready for action.
“Let’s get busy!” he said. “If Chick’s in this place, we’re going to have him out. And if Larry Dugan and his crowd are coming to-night, we have no time to lose. It’s getting dark now.”
“We’ll row around to that back door, Patsy,” was the quiet way Nick Carter issued his order.