The Four-Fingered Glove; Or, The Cost of a Lie

“‘What are you doing here?’ again growled the other.

“‘On the same lay as you, Dan, only you got here first. I needed the thousand, but it’s all off now, and we’d better mosey.’

“‘And not swipe the stuff while we are here?’

“At this point old Mr. Peters took a hand in the game. He touched a button that had been conveniently arranged in the head-board of his bed, and the room was instantly flooded with light.

“‘You fool,’ said the second man, ‘don’t you see that the game is up, and we will have the household down on us in a moment?’

“They evidently had not informed themselves of the strength, or, rather, weakness, of the household. I can hear old man Peters chuckle now as he told me of the incident.

“‘If you hadn’t interfered the old man would have been a dead one now, and we could have lifted the stuff without a kick,’ said Dan, in deep disgust. He glanced scornfully at the figure on the bed, but started back in dismay.

“Mr. Peters, lying flat on his back with a grin on his drawn face, had the man covered with a revolver, which he also kept under his pillow.

“‘We will dispense with your company,’ he said to Dan. ‘By the window, if you please, so as not to arouse the household. And you,’ he said to the other, ‘will remain.’

“Dan lost no time in making his escape, while the other man sat nonchalantly down on the edge of the bed and lighted a cigarette.

“‘Well, Mr. Peters, what can I do for you—call the servants?’ he asked coolly, as he looked down the barrel of the gun.

“‘Close the window,’ chuckled Mr. Peters; ‘it is chilly here.’

“The man calmly did as directed, and then turned again to the old man, who lowered his pistol as he said:

“‘You seem to have some scruples against murder.’

“‘I have.’

“‘Sit down.’

“The burglar resumed his place on the edge of the bed.

“‘You saved my life at the possible risk of discovery as a burglar. I am not ungrateful. Here.’

“As he spoke, Mr. Peters put his hand under his pillow and drew out the little key to the safe, which he held out to the man.

“‘There’s the safe—here’s the key. There is one thousand and two dollars and thirty cents there. Take the bills and leave me the change. I shall probably feel like it in the morning,’ and the old man chuckled at his joke.

“That the burglar was astounded is drawing it lightly. He took the key, however, with alacrity, and, unlocking the safe, quickly transferred the money to his pocket.

“‘Now, sit down again,’ said Mr. Peters. ‘I think I have earned a few minutes of your valuable time.’ The man again resumed his seat without protest, although Peters had now tucked the pistol back under his pillow.

“‘Your profession is a precarious one. Why did you take it up? You were not born to be a burglar, even of the considerate class. Come, tell me all about yourself, and who you are. I have paid well for a little entertainment.’

“Then the man told him the usual story of the gentleman burglar, and with dramatic force whispered his alleged real name in the ear of old man Peters.”

Nick had listened to the story with intense interest. It fitted well into a little niche in his mind.

“And what have you done toward finding this burglar?” he asked the lawyer.

“Nothing yet. The will, as I tell you, has disappeared.”

“What were the conditions of the will to which you referred?”

“Mr. Peters had an idea that nothing would shake that this man would reform and lead an honest life. I was to locate him, and, if he had mended his ways, or if I could induce him to do so without offering the tempting bait of the fortune, I was to pay over to him the money left by old man Peters. Now I have no legal authority to act on, even if I should find the man. It is possible, of course, that Peters destroyed the will in the short time between its execution and his death, but I do not believe it.”

“Nor do I,” said Nick emphatically.

“And, certainly, no one had any interest in stealing it, even if its contents were known.”

“Can we get into the house?”

“When?”

“Now—to-night.”

“To-night?” repeated the lawyer, in surprise.

“Yes.”

“I have a key, if the old servant is not still there. But what can be done there to-night?”

“Find the will.”

Smart looked at Nick in astonishment, and then turned to Northrup with a glance that seemed to ask: “Who’s your friend?” Northrup, enjoying the situation, said with a laugh:

“I did not mention Mr. Carter’s full name, I believe, Smart. Mr. Nicholas Carter, I should have said.”

“What, the detective?”

“The same,” said Nick, with a smile.

CHAPTER XXII.

DISCOVERY OF THE WILL.

The host gave the necessary orders, and in a few minutes they were speeding over the fine roads in the direction of old man Peters’ house.

As there was no response to their rings and repeated knocking at the door, the lawyer admitted the party with his key.

“Tell me briefly what were the old man’s habits just before he died,” said Nick. “Was he able to get around himself after his stroke?”

“He was not exactly helpless, but had to be assisted in walking—in fact, practically carried. He would put his arms around his servant’s neck, and, in a sort of a pig-a-back fashion, he was moved around the house.”

“Had he any favorite place where he used to spend the days?”

“Almost invariably he would pass the day in his study, reading or writing. His mind was very active.”

“In what room was the will drawn?”

“In his study.”

“Did you leave him there when you left the house?”

“Yes. I simply notified the old servant that I was going, so that he might know that his master was alone again.”

“The will is in the study. Let us go there. It is a waste of time to look elsewhere.”

“But I have searched the study and every nook and cranny where he might have hidden the document,” said the lawyer, showing some annoyance.

“Why should he hide the will?” asked Nick coolly.

“I am sure I do not know, but it is gone.”

“That’s just it. There can be no reason for his secreting the will, but you did not, perhaps, look in the obvious places where he might have laid it away temporarily. Let us try the library.”

Mr. Smart led the way to a large handsomely furnished room on the lower floor, and, turning on the lights, Nick cast a quick glance around the apartment.

“This was his seat?” asked Nick, as he took the big revolving-chair in front of a roll-top desk.

“Yes,” answered the lawyer, “that is where he spent his days.”

Nick stepped to the chair and sat down as if he were about to go to work at the desk. He glanced quickly over the top of the desk, into the pigeonholes in the back, and then sat for a moment thinking.

“Have you asked the servant if he saw anything of the document in the hands of Mr. Peters?” he inquired finally.

“Yes. The man had seen nothing of it, and I think if the old gentleman had had it exposed to view in his presence he would have noticed it. He is a very observant person, and had the interests of his master at heart. In fact, he aided him in much of his clerical work.”

“If Mr. Peters had had the will in his hand when the servant helped him up or down-stairs, you think the man would have noticed it?”

“Undoubtedly.”

“Then the will is in this desk.”

Nick spoke with the utmost confidence, and again the lawyer showed some irritation.

“But I tell you I have searched the desk throughout,” he said.

“Yes,” replied Nick, “but you must remember that you were looking for a place where he might have hidden it. He did not hide it. He simply put it one side, and, as it was a document that he did not mean should be read by any chance caller, he simply placed it under his blotting-pad.”

As Nick spoke with that confidence for which he was noted when he believed he had solved a problem, he removed a large dictionary that lay on one side of the large blotting-pad, and, lifting the blotters from the leather corners, disclosed a paper which had been pushed under them.

“I think you will find that that is the will for which you are looking,” said the detective calmly, rising and pointing to the desk.

In amazement the lawyer dropped into the chair which Nick vacated, and, seizing the paper, glanced hurriedly at it.

“It is the lost will,” he cried. “Mr. Carter, you are a wonder. Your detective instincts are simply remarkable.”

“Not at all,” replied Nick modestly. “Most apparently tough problems are simple when they are solved. The obvious is almost always to be depended on to clear up nine mysteries out of ten. Some gentlemen of my craft are too prone to look at the involved and most unlikely side of a case as a means for discovering a solution.”

“Is there any way in which I can recompense you for your trouble, Mr. Carter?” asked the lawyer, in some embarrassment, as he felt that as a friend of Northrup and while a guest in his home the detective would not consider that he had been acting professionally, so far as reward went. And yet, the finding of the will was an important matter to the estate, which was amply able to pay well.

“Yes, you can,” was Nick’s unexpected reply. “Let me look over the will.”

“With pleasure,” said the lawyer, handing the document to Nick.

The detective glanced through the paper quickly.

“I see that the beneficiary figures in the document under his professional name of ‘Red Morgan.’ Do you object to telling me the family name which you say he whispered to Mr. Peters? I suppose he confided that to you.”

“Yes, to be sure, but to tell the truth I paid little attention to it, as I did not believe the man’s story. Criminals are all liars.”

“Have you forgotten the name?” asked Nick, in surprise.

“In fact I have, but I made a memorandum of it at the time, and perhaps I have it here.”

The lawyer dug into his pockets, and, after a time, exclaimed:

“Ah! yes, here it is.”

“What is the name?” asked Nick, with some excitement.

With some difficulty the lawyer read the blurred paper:

“Thomas Danton.”

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE MURDERER ESCAPES.

But fate, and the careful plotting and planning of numerous friends of Rogers, had already determined that he was not, on this particular occasion, to arrive at the selected destination. Fate, assisted and directed somewhat by the aforesaid friends, had arranged a most dramatic rescue, which, by reason of its boldness and originality, was destined to succeed.

And this is how it happened:

When the hack drew up against the curb inside the station, the officer on the box leaped down and opened the door.

As he did so, he made a signal which, although almost imperceptible to many who were spectators of the scene, was yet visible to the police officers who were near, and they gathered closely around the hack.

In the meantime, the spectators, many of them ignorant of the identity of the passenger in the hack, but, nevertheless, attracted by an indefinable feeling that was in the air, suggestive of the presence of a convicted criminal, and many of whom—as it appeared later—who were thoroughly posted regarding that trifling circumstance, gathered closely around the hack, and the two men who presently descended from it.

It was somewhat remarkable how quickly that crowd gathered, seemingly from nowhere, but which, almost in a moment, became absolutely dense.

To the three policemen in uniform and the two officers who were not in uniform, in the center of the crowd, it never occurred that the throng of men who were crushing slowly but surely forward were acting in concert, and upon a perfectly defined schedule.

There was no noise—no violence—no disturbance of any sort—nothing, in fact, to give the officers in charge on the occasion the idea that a rescue was in progress.

Each one of those officers had had experience with rescues before that; each one of them would have known how to meet an emergency of that sort with a front that would have disabled its intentions then and there, had they or any one of them realized that an emergency existed.

And that was the point of the whole rescue.

That was the very thing which rendered it a success.

The very unostentatiousness of it! The utter and entire absence of noise or excitement! The steady and unrelenting pressure which the officers strove so quietly and so vainly to thrust back again! The quiet which the officers themselves maintained, fearing that any noise might reveal the identity of their prisoner!

Remember, it never once occurred to them that a rescue was in progress! Had one of them suspected that, revolvers would have been drawn, clubs would have been in evidence, an alarm would have been sounded and the attempt at rescue would have been defeated almost as soon as it began.

But there was nothing in the action of that crowd which so steadily pressed forward to indicate even that they knew who the prisoner was. There was nothing about the personnel of the crowd to suggest that it was not the ordinary miscellaneous collection of humanity which gathers at and departs from the Grand Central Station a hundred times every day of the year.

There was, in fact, nothing about the incident which was observable to the officers, which was at all out of the ordinary, save that the crowd was more dense than usual, and that the men who composed it seemed to be more than ordinarily determined to see for themselves what was going on.

Later, when explanations were demanded, there was really not one that was worthy of the name of explanation that could be offered.

There was the crowd, steadily and relentlessly pressing forward. There were big men—well-dressed men—business men, from their appearance, in the van of the crowd; and in the center of it all there were the two officers with their prisoner, who was handcuffed to one of them, and the three policemen in uniform.

Five officers of the law, surrounded by two hundred and fifty determined rescuers.

Just at the instant when the officers became convinced that assistance was necessary—just at the moment, in fact, when one of them was on the point of calling for it, somebody in the distance, and from a point higher up, as if its owner was so situated that he could overlook the conditions, whistled shrilly and peculiarly.

It was evident that the crowd was awaiting that signal, for with almost the mechanical precision of machinery, it acted.

The five officers were seized as one man might have been—and they were seized by many pairs of hands at once.

It was the same with each of the five, so we need only know the experience of one of them, as he afterward described it at the investigation that was ordered.

“Two hands, bigger than my own, went across my mouth, and the fingers locked together so that I couldn’t have opened my jaws to utter a word if my life had depended upon it. My head was pulled back with a jerk by those same two hands, for their owner was directly behind me, and I am willing to swear that he was a giant, although I did not see him. Then, at the same second, two more hands grabbed me by the throat and squeezed, not hard enough to choke me exactly, but near enough to that to keep my attention fixed for the moment on the desire to get my breath. Then, and also at the same instant, each one of my legs was seized by more hands, and I was lifted off my feet, and laid, face down, on the pavement. Then, a moment later there wasn’t a hand touching me, and I leaped to my feet ready for fight, only to find myself facing a crowd of a hundred or more innocent-looking men who were vieing with each other in asking what had happened and offering their assistance.

“Sure, I couldn’t arrest the whole crowd of them for attacking me, for I was not certain that a single one of them had been concerned in the attack.”

That finished his testimony, and that was, in fact, all that he or any one of the officers of the law knew about the occurrence—save, perhaps, one other—the officer to whom the prisoner was handcuffed.

His story given at the investigation was almost the same.

“I had two hands over my mouth, two more at my throat, and I don’t know how many more at my legs,” he said. “I could not call out, and I couldn’t do a thing to defend myself. When I got on my feet again the chain between the two nippers had been cut and my prisoner was gone. That’s all I know about it. I didn’t hear a word said—not one. There wasn’t a blow struck. Nobody was hurt that I have heard about. They didn’t even choke me hard enough to hurt.”

And the fact, so far as Paul Rogers was concerned, was this:

When the crowd became dense around him and the officer to whom he was handcuffed was dragged down beside him, a pair of steel nippers quickly severed the chain between the manacles, and then the manacle itself, that surrounded his own wrist.

He was a free man, and before him there was a niche in the crowd into which he stepped; and as he pressed forward the niche proceeded in front of him and as rapidly closed up behind him, something after the manner in which a ripple will travel across a stretch of smooth water when a pebble has disturbed it.

It is all smooth and clear in front of the ripple, and all smooth and clear behind it, but the ripple goes on continuously and regularly, until it strikes against the shore and disappears.

And so, Paul Rogers went ahead, slowly, continuously and regularly, until he struck against the pavement of Forty-second Street, when he, too, disappeared—was swallowed up in the ebbing and flowing of that sea of humanity which sucks through Forty-second Street, between the hours of four and six o’clock, almost every week-day in the year.

He had disappeared from Forty-second Street before it was known inside the station that a prisoner had escaped. He was gone before it was known on the outskirts of the crowd that had surrounded him that he was there at all.

The death chair at Sing Sing was cheated of its prey—or, at least, the journey to Sing Sing was indefinitely postponed.

Paul Rogers, conspirator, murderer, but more than all, a mystery, had made good his escape and was again at large—and he was at large for a well-defined and dastardly purpose.

CHAPTER XXIV.

NICK ON DECK AGAIN.

It was about half-past nine when Nick Carter reached his house that night, and as he was in the act of ascending the steps to his front door he heard his name called from the street, and, turning, observed, shambling toward him, a man who at first glance appeared to be a genuine specimen of the genus hobo.

He was certainly as repulsive a looking tramp as Nick Carter had ever beheld, to judge from his general appearance, and Nick somewhat impatiently asked him what he wanted.

“I want a word with you, sir, if I may have it,” was the reply. “My name is Tom Morgan. You’ll remember me best as ‘Red’ Morgan, I think. The last time you saw me was when you testified against me in court when the judge sent me away for five years for burglary.”

Nick suppressed a cry of amazement as he recognized Morgan, for he was still revolving in his mind the strange story of old Peter’s will. He controlled himself quickly as he said:

“You must have been having a hard time of it, to judge by your looks. Aren’t there any cribs left for you to crack? Out of prison three months and still broke is an unusual circumstance for you, isn’t it?”

“Oh, I’m not broke by a long shot, Carter.”

“Mr. Carter, if you please, Morgan. I can’t permit familiarity from people in your profession, no matter how much I may happen to admire their skill.”

“All right, Mr. Carter. No offense,” and the burglar laughed. “I’m not broke. This rig I’ve got on is a disguise. I can look the hobo, and play the part, too, to beat the band, when it happens to be of advantage for me to do so. I picked up the fact that you were out of town and were expected to arrive home yesterday or to-day, and so, as I wanted to catch you as soon as you appeared, and to do that had to hang around the vicinity of your doorstep until you came, I just adopted the hobo rig; see?”

“Yes; I see. But what for? Why did you wish to see me? I should suppose that I would be about the last person on top of earth whom you would wish to see.”

Morgan grinned.

“Well, Mr. Carter,” he said, “ordinarily that is the case; but there happened to be a reason or two why I thought you would appreciate my society just now.”

“How is that, Morgan? You haven’t turned stool-pigeon since your imprisonment, have you? You are the last crook in the city whom I would pick out for an informer against his kind.”

“Well, sir, I’m much obliged to you for that opinion—and it’s a correct one, too. Nobody ever accused Red Morgan of being a squealer—bet your life on that. All the same, that is about the size of my present contract.”

“Do you mean that you have come here to betray——”

“Hold on, please. That is a hard word for me to swallow, even though it does amount to a betrayal in one way. But, on the other hand, it isn’t a betrayal at all, for the guns I’m going to peach about are not pals of mine and never could be. It isn’t my fault that they made a lay for me and wanted me to get on board their machine with them. Can’t you take me inside, Mr. Carter? I’ve got a lot to tell you.”

Nick hesitated and Morgan continued:

“These clothes aren’t as bad as they look. You know that I’m rather a clean sort of a chap, and this rig is one I fixed up myself. There’s a lot about it that looks like filth, but it’s really good, clean dirt, gathered from a country roadside—and I won’t ask you to let me sit down. I didn’t come for that, and I probably won’t stay half an hour.”

“All right. Come in,” replied Nick.

A few moments later he had provided Morgan with a chair, and they were seated together in the reception-room.

“Now what is it all about?” asked Nick. “I know you well enough, Morgan, to believe that you would not take the risk of coming to see me unless you had something of importance on your mind. Let’s get down to business.”

“Well, it is important. I’m sorry, sir, that you did not get home about six hours sooner.”

“Indeed! Why?”

“Well, if you had, you could have prevented the whole thing that I have come to warn you about. You see, when you did not get here soon enough to prevent it, I was for going away and leaving the rest of it to take its own course; but when I thought it over I couldn’t do that, for when you came to find it all out later you would say that Red Morgan was a coward, and I’ve never been called that in my life.”

“No,” replied Nick. “I would not say that you are a coward, except on the general principle that any man who will steal must be a coward. However, we won’t discuss that. What was it that I did not get here soon enough to prevent?”

“The escape of Paul Rogers.”

“Eh? What is that? Has Paul Rogers escaped?”

“Well, I didn’t see him escape, and I haven’t been told that he has escaped, but I wouldn’t be afraid to bet a thousand to one that he has.”

“When?”

“At four o’clock this afternoon.”

“Where?”

“While they were taking him to the train at the Grand Central. I wasn’t there, and I haven’t heard anything about it since; but the plans were too well laid to have failed, and so you can bank on it that he is at liberty at this moment.”

“H’m! And you came here to warn me of it so that I could prevent it? Is that it?”

“That was my original intention; and I didn’t expect to tell you any more—then. But now I expect I’ll have to do so.”

“Tell me first why, when you found out that I would not get here in time to prevent it, you did not give the information to some other person who could have prevented it?”

“For the very simple reason, Mr. Carter, that while there may be a million coppers and police officers higher up on the fence who would keep faith with me in a matter of that kind, I never yet happened to make the acquaintance of any of them. Nick Carter was the only man I wanted to trust, for I knew that Nick Carter would keep his word with me with the same absolute certainty that he would keep faith with the President of the United States.”

“That is true, of course. But what do you want me to promise? I may not feel inclined to give promises, you know.”

“I don’t want you to promise anything, save that you will forget where you get the information I’m going to give you. Just for the sake of my own personal feelings in the matter, I don’t care to have it known ever, that I—well, that I peached.”

“I can promise you that nobody will ever get that information from me,” replied Nick. “But is that all you are going to ask? Aren’t you going to say, when you have told me all, that because you have done me a favor, you expect me to be a little light on you the next time my duty requires me to nail you?”

“Not on your life, Mr. Carter. A fair field and no favors is all I shall ask or expect at your hands, and I know that I’ll always get that,” replied Morgan.

CHAPTER XXV.

THE UNFOLDING OF ROGERS’ PLOT.

“I know all that, sir, and I appreciate your kindness in saying it, too. I know, moreover, that you are just the man who would hold out a helping hand to a chap like me who made a break to get up onto the brighter and better side of life. But I didn’t come here to discuss that with you, and if you don’t mind we won’t do it.”

“All right, Morgan. Go ahead; only, I would like to add just one word on the present topic before we leave it.”

“What is that?”

“This: If there should ever come a time when you want to play square, come straight to me and say so. I’ll promise to believe you—to take your word for it, and to stand for you in the fight that is bound to follow.”

“Thank you, Mr. Carter. I won’t forget; and who knows? There may come a time when I’ll call that hand of yours.”

“Good,” said Nick. “I hope there will.”

“And now, before I get down to the business of my call here to-night, I want to say a word in explanation of my position.”

“Go ahead, Red.”

“I told you just now that my principle was a fair field and no favors. That expression means more with me than it does with some people.”

“I’ve no doubt of it, Morgan.”

“It means, for instance, that when I decide to crack a crib somewhere I know that in doing it I am more than likely to get you on my track, and that it is your duty to nail me if you can.”

“Exactly.”

“Well, if you do nail me, I do not cherish the least sort of hard feeling toward you for doing it. I am a professed enemy to society; you are its guardian. If I do wrong it is your duty to catch me and send me away, if you can—and I respect you rather than hate you for doing your duty, even though I may be the victim of your zeal.”

“I believe you, Morgan, although it is rather an unusual view for your class to take.”

“It is true in my case; but if I should try, I don’t think I could put my finger upon another crook who feels just as I do about it.”

“No; I do not think you could.”

“Ninety-nine out of a hundred of the crooks who have, sooner or later, felt the weight of your hand, want revenge.”

“That is only natural, I suppose.”

“Natural or not, it is true. Many a man is engaged this minute in keeping tabs on the days of the week and month by scratching on the walls of their cells, who are only waiting to get out in order to get square with you.”

“Sure thing, Red; but I’m not getting nervous about them.”

“Oh, I know that, and it isn’t what I’m driving at. Let me go on in my own way.”

“Correct. Go ahead.”

“Some of them want to murder you; some only want to punch you, and—well, there are all sorts of feelings among them, and out of the whole lot it is safe to say that not one out of a thousand would ever take definite shape if there was nobody to direct them.”

“Aha! I think I see your point.”

“Now, I’ll tell the story of my own experience, and you will see exactly what I mean.”

“Well?”

“I hadn’t been out of prison more than four or five weeks when an old pal of mine came to see me. The first thing he did was to ask questions until he found out that I owed the time I had just been doing up the State to you. Then he asked me to meet some of the gang he was training with, at a place down in East Houston Street. I asked him what the lay was, and he told me that I would find out when I got there—and I did.

“In a few words, the lay had three prongs to it. One of them was for the rescue of a man named Paul Rogers, of whom I had never heard at all at the time. He was sure to be convicted of murder in the first degree, and a rescue was planned to take him away from his guard while he was on his way to Sing Sing.

“I saw no objection to that, inasmuch as we were to be well paid for the job. I did not know, and I do not know now, where the money came from to pay us; I only know that there was plenty of it. There wasn’t to be a blow struck—and, in short, the whole plan was so slick and comfortable, and there was such real genius in it that I rather enjoyed the thing, and went into it as much for the fun of it as for the money—although that was a consideration.

“I won’t stop to tell you about the plan now, for you will hear all about it in the morning. It is one of the things that can happen once, easily, and because of the very simplicity of it, can never occur again. I haven’t been told yet whether it succeeded or not, but I am sure it did, it was so slick.

“Well—things went along swimmingly until there came a new deal, all in the same game. I have told you there were three deals. The second one was a play against Nick Carter.

“I want you to understand in the beginning that there wasn’t a man in that outfit who had not suffered at some time or other at your hands. There wasn’t a man there who had not cried out from behind prison walls for vengeance against you. There wasn’t one who did not grasp eagerly at the thought of it—and right here, Mr. Carter, was where I bolted.”

“Do you mean that you defended me there among them?”

“Well, I wasn’t quite such a blooming fool as that, you know. Such a thing wouldn’t have done you any good, and it would have done me a lot of harm. No; I just kept my mouth shut and told them that I’d carry out the program I’d enlisted for, and that I’d see them later about the rest of it.

“Now, I told you at the start that I didn’t come here to do any peaching on my pals, and so you must not expect me to tell you any names. I couldn’t do that. Nor will I tell you all of the plot; but I will tell you this much:

“The main guy behind the whole outfit is that same Paul Rogers, and it would appear that he is some pumpkins in his own country, wherever that may be—England or France; I don’t know which. He’s either got a big wad of shekels, or he knows where to find one when he needs it.

“Now, Paul Rogers has got a wife, whom you also sent up. She was to get out of the pen to-day, her time being greatly shortened for good behavior, and all that. Maybe you know who she is, Mr. Carter?”

“Yes; Isabel Benton, or Rogers; it is the same thing.”

“That’s right. Those are the only names I shall mention. You’ll have to guess the others as they appear.”

“I think I can do that.”

“All right. I hope you can. Please take notice that I am telling you only what I have picked up at the meetings of that mob, and I don’t vouch for the truth or the correctness of any of it. I never heard of any of the parties except yourself, until I trained with the crew I’m speaking about.”

“Go on. I understand.”

“Up the river somewhere, not as far as Sing-twice, I imagine, there is a beautiful country place where some people live whom you know. There is a very beautiful young lady in the family, and somehow the notion has gotten out among the crooks that you are very friendly with that family and especially with the daughter. This Isabel Benton and the daughter are as alike as two peas, it is said, and there was a plot to place Isabel in her place, once upon a time, which plot failed.”

“I know all about that,” said Nick.

“All the better if you do. The father of the young lady is a multi-millionaire. There is a brother, also, who is what the boys call a smart fool. You know what that means. He is money blind. He has abilities and won’t use them. He is smart, but too lazy to use his head. Gritty, but too easy to fight. A good fellow, but too much taken up with killing time to do anything else. A young chap, I imagine, who hasn’t been woke up yet, so to speak—a sort of an electric motor without any current to speak of.”

Nick laughed aloud.

“That is a first-class description of a person whom you never saw,” he said.

“Well, it is the impression I received from what I heard about him. That boy—he’s about twenty-four, I think—is very much in the way of Paul Rogers, and Paul Rogers proposes to put him out of it. The old man is still more so, and Paul Rogers has sworn away his life. The old lady—the mother—is a sort of supernumerary, but when the time comes she is billed to shuffle off in some way or other—I don’t know what.”

“And the young lady?” asked Nick.

“I was getting down to her. I couldn’t find out much about the plot against her, save that the woman Isabel is to take her place, somehow and somewhere, and the thing is to be done so slick that nobody will suspect that it is done.”

“Do you mean that you do not know the particulars, or that you are keeping them back?”

“I mean that I don’t know them, only to the extent that if you don’t keep a mighty close watch over her she will disappear off the face of the earth in such a way that you won’t have any idea that she is gone until it is too late to help her; and that because you are the only factor in the plan which can interfere with their success, you are to be gotten rid of in the most approved fashion—and that, Mr. Carter, is what I came here to tell you about. Paul Rogers was set free this afternoon, and I happen to know that there is a bet on, with the odds against you, that you will be a dead one inside of forty-eight hours after he is at liberty.”

“In that case, Morgan,” said Nick coolly, “you won’t mind answering me a few questions, will you?”

“I don’t think so. Ask ’em, and I’ll tell you.”

CHAPTER XXVI.

BURGLAR MORGAN’S BIGGEST HAUL.

“I tell you, it is a serious matter; so serious that I felt it a duty which I owed to my own manhood to warn you. I’m a burglar, Mr. Carter, but I’ve kept some of my manhood tucked away in a dark corner where I can call upon it for use when it is needed. This was a case where I felt that it would come into play.”

“Just why did you feel that way?”

“Because I think they mean business. Because this gang, which has been formed at the suggestion of Rogers, under his orders and with his money, is composed of between fifty and sixty members, and—here is the point—because there is a separate and distinct method for getting rid of you, for each and every member of the gang.”

“They propose to attack me in fifty or sixty different ways, then? Is that it?”

“That’s about the size of it.”

“How do you know that?”

“Simply by the methods that were employed in my own particular case.”

“Can you tell me about that?”

“That’s what I came here to tell you.”

“Then let me hear it.”

“Remember, please, that I am relating only my own experience.”

“Sure.”

“I don’t know a thing about what was said to the others. I can only surmise, because of what was said to me.”

“Yes.”

“I was called into a room where the gun who acts as the main guy in the absence of the real chief, Rogers, received us, one by one, and each one alone. I don’t know just how far down the list my name was, but I was pretty close to the last that was called in. You see, the outfit hasn’t got on to my curves yet. They don’t know whether they can quite trust me or not.”

“I see. Go on.”

“Well, when he got me in there he looked me over with a sort of quizzical expression which I didn’t like, and presently I told him so. ‘If you’re looking for a continuous performance show,’ I said to him, ‘it wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to mosey down to Keith’s. I’m not supplying any star attractions just now.’

“I won’t try to quote him; I’ll just tell what happened. He told me that he thought I had been pretty well informed as to the purpose of the organization, but for my especial benefit he’d go over the ground a little. Then he opened with an account of the desire to liberate Rogers and expatiated on all that Rogers could and would do for the gang when once he was at liberty; and then he said this:

“‘Primarily, this is a play for a hundred million dollars’ haul—the biggest that was ever made in the open in the history of the world. There have been hauls quite as big made by a class of men who pose as philanthropists, but there was never such a one by thieves pure and simple. This is a play for a hundred millions, and it’s dead easy if we follow the lead of Paul Rogers without question. In order to make it a success, there are three men and two women to be put out of existence.’

“I stopped him right there with the remark that I would not consent to take part in one murder for a billion, to say nothing of a million. That I wouldn’t even consent to be an accessory, and that if he had anything of that kind on the paper he had better count me out of it on the start, before he told me any more about their plans.

“‘Well,’ said he, ‘we have counted you out of that. Your friends who brought you here told us that much on the start; but there is one thing which we want you to do which will make you solid with the gang, and that is to help us to get rid of the detective, Nick Carter.’

“Then he reminded me that I had been up the State doing a term of five years because you had sent me there, and he told me that every member of the gang had some complaint to make against you and some grudge to make good. He said the whole bunch had sworn away your life, one by one, each in his own particular way, and that he wanted to find out just what my method would be.

“That was when I got wise, Mr. Carter. I figured around a little so as to see his hand, if possible, only I didn’t succeed in seeing much, for all that. But I gave him the bluff that a man who handed out a proposition like he wanted me to do was a fool to start with. That if I made up my mind to put Nick Carter or anybody else to sleep, I certainly wouldn’t start in by giving my hand away before I made a play. Nit.

“‘I’ve thought a good deal about Nick Carter since I’ve been recuperating up the river,’ I said to him, ‘and I’m not going to put you wise about those thinks. Nit. I know the game,’ I said, ‘and all I want is to be left alone to play my hand in my own fashion. If I should want any help, I’ll call on you, but I don’t think I shall need any.’

“Well, he was satisfied. That ended our conversation on that topic, so you see I don’t really know so darn much after all—only by implication.”

“And by implication, will you tell me just what you make out the whole game to be?” asked Nick.

“Sure thing. By implication I make out this: That old Peter Danton will begin, before long, to act sort of queer. His friends and relatives won’t know what is the matter with him until it suddenly dawns upon them that he has a sort of softening of the brain. I suppose there is a drug that will produce that effect; anyhow, that is the racket. After he has had softening of the brain for a while, he’ll die—quite sudden. In the meantime, of course, the youngster will have succeeded his father. Now, the youngster has a decided weakness for good-looking women, and he is to be lured into a place where a row will be started and in the mêlée he will get a rap on the head, which will settle his hash. In the meantime the old lady is to be cared for by a trained nurse, or a maid, or somebody who is to be introduced into the house through the instrumentality of Rogers. She has got a year or two, perhaps more, to live. In short, she can live as long as she is of any use to the conspirators, for Rogers proposes to force the world to recognize the substituted heiress for the real one, through the mother. Catch on?”

“Not quite. State it.”

“Well, if the old lady is kept alive, but in the meantime her brain is sufficiently clouded so that she does not know the difference between Isabel Benton and her own daughter, and if it is Isabel Benton instead of her own daughter who lives with her the last two or three years of her life, it will be pretty hard to convince the world after that that the young woman is not the real daughter of the house; don’t you think so?”

“Yes; I do think so.”

“Well, that’s the game. By implication, remember, I’ve built all this up by the operation which you detective chaps call deduction.”

The burglar stopped abruptly and rose to his feet.

“That, Mr. Carter,” he said, “is all that I have got to say; and now, if you don’t mind, I will slip back into my own world again.”

“Morgan,” said Nick, rising also, “I wish you would make up your mind to remain on this side of the dividing line between those two worlds.”

The burglar shook his head.

“No,” he replied. “It’s no use. I can’t. I wouldn’t shine along the respectable highways of life.”

“There is a mighty good man in you, Morgan, if you would only consent to let him get on top.”

“He’s been the under dog too long a time for that, sir.”

“It is never too late.”

“Bah! Don’t preach.”

“I’m not preaching. Here!”

Nick held out his right hand, and Morgan gazed at it dumbly for a moment and then into the detective’s face again.

“Well? What about it?” he asked roughly.

“I want to shake hands with you, Morgan,” said Nick. “I want to shake hands with the man who came into my house and who is on the point of going out of it now—the real man, you know.”

“Nit!” said Morgan. “Your hand is an honest hand; mine is not. They are no more fit to mate together than a negro and a white. Nit. I’m obliged to you all the same. Good-night.”

“Wait, Morgan.”

“Well?”

“I am a fairly good reader of character.”

“I suppose you are. What of it?”

“I want you to tell me just why you have taken all this trouble to save Mercedes Danton from the conspiracy which overshadows her life—for I know that you came here for that purpose and not for the one you have given—to warn me.”

“Tell me why you think that,” said Morgan hoarsely.

“I don’t think it; I know it. I knew it by the sound of your voice and by the look in your eyes when you spoke of her.”

“All right, I’ll tell you, and that will end our conversation for the day. Once upon a time I worked six months on plans and preparations to rob Linden Fells. That was six years ago, when Mercedes Danton was only a girl of thirteen or fourteen, I think. My plans worked all right and I had the whole layout ready to my hand—I would have got away with a cool forty thousand, sure; but—well, that little girl woke up and sat up in her bed when I entered her room. It was a clear night and the moon was full. It shone straight in at the windows of her room and upon her white frightened face—no, not frightened, just startled. I stood a little back in the shadow, but she was in the full light, and there wasn’t shadow enough so but what she saw me very plainly.”

He paused, and Nick waited silently for him to continue.

“Just a year before that time, Mr. Carter, I had gone home to see my own people—my father, mother, and sister. They thought I was dead, and they think so still, for I didn’t put them wise. I sneaked into the house just the same as if I was going to rob it, knowing well that the old man would put a bullet through me if he discovered me there; but I had a good look at him and at my mother, asleep in their bed, and then I went up-stairs to see my sister in the same way. I have always been told that children sleep soundly, and I had no idea that I would disturb her, so I went into the room and stood beside the bed, looking down at her.”

Again he paused, and again Nick waited without speaking.

“It was just that same sort of a moonlight night, Mr. Carter, and while I stood there, looking down upon my sister, she opened her eyes and raised herself in the bed, just as I have said that Mercedes Danton did.

“She looked startled, too; not a whit frightened. I was the one who was frightened.

“As I took a step backward, she held out her arms toward me and spoke my name.

“‘You have come back,’ she said.

“I did not speak, Mr. Carter. I didn’t let the sound of my voice disturb the quiet and peace of that room; but I stooped down and touched my lips to her forehead, and then I turned away and fled out into the night as if I was pursued. I know that my sister has never told a soul that she saw me that night.”

“Well?” said Nick.

“Well,” repeated Morgan, “when I stood at the bedside of Mercedes Danton, who was the same age as my sister, and she rose up and faced me in just the same way, I—I——”

“You kissed her on the forehead and fled in precisely the same manner,” interrupted the detective slowly and impressively. And the burglar, in a burst of vehemence, replied:

“By Heaven, I did that very thing, and it was the biggest haul I ever made in my life.”

Without another word he wheeled on his heel and went out of the house.

CHAPTER XXVII.

GETTING IN ONE DEAL AHEAD.

He turned off the lights and ascended to his own room, where he found his assistants, who were waiting to welcome him home.

“I shall have use for all three of you in the morning,” he said. “I want all of you to remain in the house to-morrow until you hear from me, and then to report when, where and how I shall direct, with the least possible delay. Do you happen to know, Chick, if any of the Dantons are in town?”

“No; they are not. The Oceanic has passed Fire Island, and Miss Mercedes, with her father and mother, are passengers. She will dock at six in the morning.”

“Good. Where is Reginald Danton?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, it is more than likely that he will be home soon after the others arrive, so it is safe to suppose that he will show up some time to-morrow, also. I don’t suppose that it occurred to you to keep tabs on the fact that Isabel Benton was liberated from the island to-day, did it?”

“No.”

“Well, I let it slip my mind, also—and we haven’t any of us an idea where her trail might be struck. We’ll have to let her slide for the present. On second thought, my lads, I think, instead of asking you all to stay in to-morrow morning, I will ask that each of you make it a point to be on the pier when the Oceanic docks in the morning. You may select your own disguises so long as they are good ones. I only wish you to be there. If there is anything to do, I will tell you what it is when the time comes. The main point is to keep a watchful eye over the Dantons—father, mother and daughter—and to keep particular tabs upon everybody who addresses them or approaches them in any way. We are doing this, too, without their knowledge or consent. Now, good night. I’ll see you at the pier.”

But Nick Carter did not go to bed when he bade his assistants good night.

As soon as they had left the room he hurried with all speed into one of his favorite disguises—that of a respectable, well-to-do farmer, who was, nevertheless, so far as appearances went, thoroughly unaccustomed to the ways and manners of the city, and who carried with him an accentuated type of the peculiarities of speech and motion of a man whose life has been bounded by stone walls and rail fences.

As soon as he was dressed he hurriedly left the house, hastened to the elevated station, and in a surprisingly short time arrived at South Ferry.

He knew, without having to inquire, where he would be most likely to find a tugboat with steam up, at that hour in the morning, for it was then close upon two o’clock, and, without loss of time, he presented himself to the sleepy captain, who was dozing in his pilot-house.

“Say, yew,” he said; and the captain started into wakefulness. “Dew yew happen to know anything about a steamboat named the Oceanic, hey?”

“She ain’t no steamboat,” replied the captain. “She’s a tugboat, same as this, only bigger.”

“More’n ten times es big, ain’t she?” asked Nick.

“Ay, ay; more than twenty.”

“Well, that air is th’ Holstein heifer I’m a-lookin’ for.”

“She is, eh? What do you want of her? She ain’t no threshing machine. She couldn’t pull a plow or break a three-year-old steer.”

“Right you be, mister; right you be. She’s most broke me, just the same. Say!”

“Well?”

“Do yew happen to know where she is?”

“Ay, ay. Down at Quarantine.”

“Where’s that?”

“Down the bay.”

“Far?”

“Not very.”

“How much’ll yew take to git me there, hey?”

“What! Take you down on the tug?”

“Yep. That’s what I said.”

“More’n you’ve got in your clothes.”

“Mebby so. How much?”

“Fifty dollars.”

“Whe-e-w! Jeehosephat! Say, I’ll give you twenty-five.”

“You’re on.”

“Hey?”

“You’re on.”

“No I ain’t neither.”

“Well, get on then. I’ll take you there for the twenty-five, only I want to see the color of it before I cast off.”

“Yew just wait,” said Nick.

Then, deliberately he seated himself on a box on the pier, and, after removing one of his boots, took from the leg of it a roll of bills as big as his wrist.

“That’s where I carry it so’s the sharks won’t get onto my money,” he said confidentially, while he counted off one and two-dollar bills until he had enough to make up the sum of twenty-five dollars. “There yew be, capting. Now, how long will it take yeu tew git me down there?”

“About three-quarters of an hour.”

“All right. I’ll take a leetle nap. When yew git there, yew jest give this here letter over the side and say that it is to be delivered to the—now, who in blazes did he say to give the letter to? Blest ef I ain’t clean forgot.”

“Maybe it was the officer of the deck.”

“That’s it. The officer of the deck is the feller. I wasn’t told whether he was the right bower, ’r left bower, ’r only a king ’r a queen, ’r a common no account jack. Haw! haw! haw! That’s a joke, capting, an’ here’s a good cigar to pay yew for listenin’ to it so patiently. When you give that letter to the officer of the deck, yew kin jest call me from my beauty sleep ef yew don’t mind.”

The detective was sleepy as a matter of fact. He had just come down from the pure and bracing air of New Brunswick, and he had traveled all day in the cars, so that slumber was not long in coming to him, and he knew nothing more until the rough hands of the captain fell upon his shoulders.

Presently the letter was sent over the side, and then, after a wait of several moments, an officer appeared at the rail and called to the captain of the tugboat:

“Let the gentleman come aboard,” he said; whereupon the tugboat captain remarked, in an undertone to himself:

“Well, I’m——”

The last word could not be heard distinctly, but it was evidently intended to express surprise that such an out-and-out hayseed as his passenger should be received at all on board the great ship, and, particularly, that he should be referred to with so much respect. He could not know, of course, that the letter addressed to the captain was signed by Nick Carter, and was couched in such terms that the captain did not delay an instant in sending for the great detective.

“Here is where I get in one deal ahead of the conspirators,” said Nick to himself, as he mounted over the side of the ship.