Patsy had arrived right in the nick of time.
He had not tried to get to the saloon before ten o’clock, and he showed up there in the guise of a Swede sailor, “three sheets in the wind.”
Ramsay was not there, and neither was Gillman, nor Starlick—the man in the brown derby hat.
Patsy, of course, knew only Ramsay by sight, but he felt sure that he could recognize the others by their voices.
Failing to find all or either of the three, he caught a low-pitched conversation coming from two longshoremen in one corner.
One remark, which he caught in passing, electrified him.
“It was that prize landlubber, Nick Carter, and his mate, that’s who it was.”
Feigning drunkenness, Patsy flopped into a chair and sprawled out on a table, his head in his arms.
“Was the pickin’s good?” asked one of the men.
“And what was done with ’em?”
“They’re down below.”
“Will they ever show above the hatches ag’in?”
“Not this v’yage?”
Marking the first speaker well, Patsy got up and staggered out.
His manner changed when he got clear of the dive, and he rushed away in the direction of the corner.
He was not long in finding an officer, and, after showing his badge and telling who he was, he informed the policeman that Nick Carter was in a bad way at Boucicault’s.
The officer gave a low whistle, a couple of patrolmen were picked up, and the four of them returned to the dive.
To arrest the man whom Patsy had heard telling about Nick to his companion was the work of only a few moments.
The fellow resisted and denied strenuously having raised a hand against the detective.
A search of his clothes, however, developed Nick’s watch and one of his revolvers.
Patsy recognized the articles, and the longshoreman was scared into leading the officers to the place where the two detectives had been confined.
They came up under the chamber and effected an entrance by means of a rusty old lever which worked the movable stone slab.
Nick and Chick were dragged out into the fresher air.
While Patsy was busying himself with them, the officers went upstairs and began a hunt for Boucicault and for any other men connected with the outrage.
Boucicault had vanished—a habit he had when any particularly murderous bit of work had been “pulled off” in his den.
When he appeared in court he usually proved an “alibi,” and—some said—a political pull did the rest for him.
Boucicault could not be found, but three ruffians were discovered with incriminating evidence concealed in their clothes.
Two of them had a pair of nickel-plated handcuffs, one the mate to Nick’s revolver found on the first man, and one had Chick’s revolvers and his watch.
The articles were all identified, the prisoners were taken to headquarters in a patrol wagon, and Nick, Chick and Patsy started for home.
There was nothing more to be done that night, Nick said, and they might as well go home and catch forty winks of sleep before morning.
In truth, Nick and Chick were both in need of a quiet time, for they were still weak from the rough treatment they had received, and dizzy from the effects of the gas.
A few hours’ rest put them in shape, and next morning at nine, Nick started Chick and Patsy off for Forty-fourth Street, suitably disguised.
Chick was to post himself at the front of the Montgomery House, and Patsy at the rear.
When they had been gone a half-hour, Nick left the house in his make-up of “Jones of Albany.”
He hired a cab, and was driven to the Montgomery House.
A man in a white suit was working in the street in front of the house, and this man was Chick.
Nick told the cabby not to wait, paid him and ascended the steps and pushed the electric bell.
A housemaid came to the door.
“I would like to see Mr. Montgomery,” said Nick.
“He’s not at home, sir.”
“Then I would like to speak with Miss Louise Lansing.”
“She is not well this morning.”
“I think she will see me. I wish to talk with her about her brother.”
A voice from the second floor came down the stairway behind the maid.
“Have the gentleman come in, Mary. Show him up to uncle’s study—I will see him there.”
Nick was admitted and ushered up the broad stairs into a large room, lined with books and comfortably furnished.
An open desk, strewed with papers, was at one end of the room.
A young lady of eighteen or nineteen, very pretty but very much depressed, as Nick could see, met him as he came in.
Her eyes were red, and it was evident that she had been weeping.
“Miss Lansing?” the detective asked.
“That is my name, sir.”
“My name is Jones; I’m from Albany, and——”
“I heard you tell the servant that you wished to speak with me about my brother,” broke in the girl, eagerly. “Do you know anything about him? He has been gone since Monday night, and the suspense of not knowing whether he is living or dead is more than I can bear. He disappeared from Boston, as perhaps you know.”
“I will tell you about your brother in a few moments, Miss Lansing. First, however, I would like to ask about your uncle, Mr. Montgomery.”
“Do you know whether John is alive? Oh, tell me that before anything else!”
“Is your uncle in the house?” asked Nick.
“Did not the servant tell you he was gone?”
“When a servant tells a caller that her master is out, it does not always follow that he is.”
“My uncle is not in the house, Mr. Jones.”
Nick passed to the study door and closed it.
Then he came back and took a chair by the desk.
“Your brother, Miss Lansing, is alive and well.”
Louise clasped her hands, and a sigh of intense relief escaped her lips.
“Oh, I am so happy!” she murmured. “You cannot tell, Mr. Jones, what a relief it is to me to know that. I will tell uncle just as soon as he comes.”
“You must not tell your uncle, Miss Lansing,” said Nick, firmly.
“Not tell uncle Horace?” she cried. “Why, what can you mean?”
“Just what I say. In a little while your uncle will know everything, but just now he must know nothing. It is your brother’s wish as well as mine.”
“But I cannot see why you make such a request,” said the girl, perplexedly.
“Jones is not my real name, Miss Lansing,” said Nick.
He had been studying the girl and felt he could trust her.
“No?” she asked.
“I am Nicholas Carter.”
“You don’t tell me! John said he was going to secure your services to look into this mine matter.”
“That is what he did, and that is why I am here now. It is also the reason why I ask you to keep from your uncle the knowledge that your brother is alive and well.”
“Of course, Mr. Carter, if you desire it, I will say nothing.”
“I do desire it. Call me Jones, Miss Lansing, just as though you did not know my real name. If you could continue to act as though depressed and anxious about your brother, whenever you meet your uncle, it would be well.”
Her eyes opened very wide, but she did not ask Nick why he desired all this.
It was evident that she thought it was all in the line of his duty and that questioning would be out of place.
“I will do as you say, Mr. Car—Mr. Jones.”
Nick was about to speak on, but his eye caught a flash of something among the papers on the desk.
He picked up the object and found that it was a small, nickel-plated instrument used in manufacturing cigarettes.
“To whom does this belong?” he inquired.
“To uncle Horace. Do you know what it is, Mr. Jones?”
Nick ignored the question.
“How long has your uncle had it?”
“I do not know. I only remember seeing it here during the last two or three days.”
“You would have seen it if it had been here before?”
“I think so.”
“Does your uncle smoke cigarettes?”
“What a curious question, Mr. Jones,” smiled the girl. “No, he does not.”
“Does your brother John?”
“No.”
Nick laid the nickel-plated instrument back on the desk.
“Was your uncle home last night, Miss Lansing?”
“Yes.”
“All night?”
“He was at his club until midnight.”
“Ah! And at what time did he leave this morning?”
“About eight o’clock.”
Nick looked at his watch.
It was five minutes of ten.
“Did he say when he would return?”
“He said he would not return until late this afternoon. Two gentlemen were to call here this morning, he said, and I was to give them this letter.”
She picked up a sealed and addressed envelope that lay on a book on the library table.
Nick apparently gave little attention to the letter.
“Has your uncle a profession?” he asked, casually, settling back in the comfortable chair.
“Not now,” she answered.
“What did he do formerly?”
“He speculated.”
“On the stock market?”
“Yes, sir.”
“How long since he quit speculating?”
“Are you asking me all these questions because——”
“Just because I am curious,” Nick smiled. “Detectives are always curious, you know.”
“But has this anything to do with the Royal Ophir mine?”
“Indirectly.”
“Well, it was only a month ago that uncle stopped operating on the stock market.”
“Was he generally successful?”
“I do not know, Mr. Jones. I think he was.”
“Your uncle is wealthy?”
“I do not think he is so very wealthy.”
“Then he could not have been a very successful operator, do you think?”
“I never stopped to think of the matter in that way. Uncle has enough to keep him as long as he lives, I guess.”
The maid rapped at the door, just then, and summoned Miss Lansing away.
“You will excuse me, Mr. Jones?” she asked, before leaving.
“Certainly,” said Nick. “Gladly,” he added to himself.
The instant he was left alone, Nick picked up the letter that lay on the library table.
“J. Edward Bingham, Esq.,” ran the address.
Pulling out a leaf of the desk, Nick picked up a pearl paper cutter and ran the edge around under the flap.
Then he took out the folded sheet and read as follows:
“Dear Bingham: Called away and cannot meet you and Cooper at ten this morning. Yasmar found it impossible to come, but will meet you at another place to-night, and deal will then be consummated. Bring your certified checks to my house at eight this evening, and I will take you to the place where Yasmar is to be waiting.
“Montgomery.”
Picking up a blank sheet of paper, Nick took a pen and wrote another letter.
It was slightly different from Montgomery’s.
He made no attempt to imitate Montgomery’s handwriting, nor did he sign Montgomery’s name.
Experience assured him that receiving the communication from Miss Lansing, and in Montgomery’s house, would make the letter plausible enough for the purpose.
“Dear Bingham: Called away and cannot meet you and Cooper at ten this morning. Deal is off for to-day. Return by first train to Boston and wait there until Yasmar and I come.”
Nick put this in the envelope, sealed it with mucilage found on the desk, and laid the letter on the book on the library table, just as it was before.
In looking for the mucilage he had to disturb the papers a little, and he found something else which he considered of the utmost importance.
This something else was a cigarette box containing five cigarettes which fitted the cigarette machine and also bore a perfect resemblance to the cigarette Nick had smoked, the day before, in the assay office.
Nick sank back in the chair, his face extremely thoughtful.
“Well, well,” he muttered.
Just then Miss Lansing came hurriedly in.
“The two gentlemen whom uncle expected are downstairs at the door,” she said, walking to the table and picking up the letter. “I will return presently, Mr. Jones.”
“I am in no hurry, Miss Lansing.”
When again left alone, Nick picked a cigarette from the box and put it in his pocket.
He was ready to leave when Miss Lansing returned.
“Must you go?” asked the girl.
“Yes, but I would like to leave some one here, if you have no objections.”
“Who, Mr. Jones?”
“One of my assistants. If possible, I would be glad if his presence here could remain a secret between us—even if your uncle should come.”
“It could be arranged, Mr. Jones.”
“Then I will summon my assistant. Will you conduct me to a rear window on this floor?”
The girl was puzzled, but led Nick to a window in the rear, overlooking the back yard between Forty-fourth and Forty-fifth Streets.
In one of the yards, in plain view of the rear of the Montgomery house, a roughly dressed young man was working at a clothes pole.
Nick waved his hand.
The man nodded and started to slide down.
“Now,” said Nick, “if I can go down and admit him——”
“I will do that myself, Mr. Jones.”
In a few moments Patsy was with his chief and had received his instructions.
Louise Lansing accompanied Nick to the door.
“If your uncle should return, Miss Lansing,” said Nick, in a low tone, “please tell him nothing about my having been here.”
“Very good. When will my brother come?”
“To-night; but that must also be kept a secret, especially from your uncle and the servants. Your brother will explain to you.”
When Nick departed he left behind him a very much bewildered young lady, yet a very happy one, nevertheless.
“Meet me at the corner, Chick,” said Nick, as he passed the man who was working on the street.
Nick waited, just around the corner on Sixth Avenue, and Chick came, stripped of his white overalls, blouse and hat and wearing his own garments.
He had traded with the regular street cleaner, for the time being, and the street cleaner was five dollars better off by the deal.
“Did you observe closely the two men who called at the house while I was there?” Nick asked.
“Yes. They drove up in a two-wheeler, and when they came out one of them was reading a letter.”
“Did the letter excite them?”
“They seemed a trifle worked up.”
“They’ll be worked up a good deal more before they finally quiet down,” laughed Nick. “You have got to pass for one of those men to-night, Chick, and Patsy for the other.”
“If it’s pretty dark, I guess we can.”
“Patsy will be busy all day, and you’ll have to secure the disguise for him as well as for yourself.”
“All right.”
“Get both disguises and bring them to the house. First, however, you are to take this cigarette and go to Cruse & Cupell’s. Find Mr. Cupell and confer with him privately. Tell him who you are and that you want him to smoke the cigarette and assay it, just as he did the other.”
“I see.”
“Have him make a rush job of it.”
“Sure.”
“Then find out if Gillman has come back to work this morning.
“Anything else?”
“That’s all.”
Chick boarded a Sixth Avenue car and started for Twenty-third Street.
Nick went to the address given him by John Lansing.
It was an obscure boarding house over on the other side of Broadway.
At the door Nick asked for “Herman Trevor,” which was the name Lansing had penciled on the card.
Mr. Trevor was sick in bed, the servant said.
“He’ll see me,” said Nick.
“Who shall I tell him wants to see him?”
“Don’t tell him. Just say it’s in regard to the Royal Ophir.”
Nick was admitted to the “sick” room and found that Lansing was feigning illness in order to keep in his room without causing remark.
He gave the young man a brief outline of what he had accomplished and of what he hoped yet to accomplish.
Lansing was astounded when he saw the drift of the detective’s logic.
He did not agree with Nick in his deductions, but promised faithfully to carry out his instructions.
Nick went away and proceeded to a secondhand clothing store to buy a suit of clothes that he desired for his own use.
It was difficult to find what he wanted, but at last he succeeded and made for home.
Chick was already there.
“Here’s the assay,” said Chick, handing over the certificate.
“Fifty thousand to the ton,” murmured Nick, looking at the certificate. “The cigarettes all pan out the same. You got the disguises?”
“Yes.”
“Put on yours and be ready to go with me at seven o’clock. We’ll carry Patsy’s get-up with us in a satchel.”
“I’ll be ready. Gillman hasn’t shown up at the assay office to-day, Nick.”
“I didn’t think he had.”
Chick went away and Nick threw himself down to smoke.
At seven o’clock Chick came into the study.
He had a brown satchel in his hand and looked like a red-haired capitalist.
“Good!” said Nick. “You’ll do for Cooper.”
“Providing you don’t throw a flash light on me,” laughed Chick. “You’re good, too, but I don’t know who you stand for.”
“Horace Montgomery.”
Nick wore an iron-gray wig and mustache and chin whiskers, gold-bowed spectacles rested on the bridge of his nose, and a silk hat of slightly old-fashioned block covered his head.
A grayish frock coat, with trousers of same material, patent leathers, dark spats and a gold-headed cane finished the disguise.
In each hip pocket he had one of his small but reliable revolvers, and in the breast of his coat were two pairs of handcuffs.
They rode in a cab to the Montgomery house, the cab was dismissed and they walked up the steps to the door.
As Nick was about to press the bell the door opened and Montgomery himself stepped out.
For an instant the two confronted each other in the semi-gloom.
“Merciful heavens!” gasped Montgomery, gazing as one transfixed at the living and breathing counterfeit of himself.
He recoiled, brushing a hand across his forehead.
His eyes wandered to Chick.
“Cooper,” he cried, “what does this mean?”
“I’ll tell you what it means, Montgomery,” answered Nick, sternly. “Go up to your study. Cooper will go with you, and I will join you both in a few moments.”
As one in a dream Montgomery turned and entered the house.
He walked up the stairs, Chick close behind him.
When they had passed from sight, Nick turned to Louise Lansing, who was standing in the parlor doorway with distended eyes.
“Is—is it really you, Mr. Carter?” she queried.
“Yes.”
“I can hardly believe my eyes.”
“Is everything all right?”
“It is.”
“How long has your uncle been here?”
“Not more than an hour.”
“Now, listen, Miss Lansing. I will give the signal by dropping a book.”
“I understand.”
Nick ran hurriedly upstairs, and, as he turned from the landing, Patsy stepped out of a room and caught his sleeve.
“Anything happened here since I left you, Patsy?” whispered Nick.
“Not a thing of any consequence.”
“You understand what’s to be done?”
“Yes.”
“Miss Lansing knows the signal.”
Nick passed into the study, closing the door after him.
Montgomery, a harassed and apprehensive look on his face, sat in the chair before his desk.
He turned his startled eyes on Nick as the latter entered.
“What does this farce mean?” he demanded, making a great effort to regain his composure.
“It means that I shall pose as Horace Montgomery for a few hours.”
“What sort of a crooked game are you attempting to play?”
“It is not crooked.”
“Who in the fiend’s name are you, anyway?”
“Nicholas Carter.”
Montgomery had started to rise, but at the sound of that name he sank back with glassy eyes.
“You—you——” he faltered. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to have a little talk with you. Could you load a few cigarettes for me, Mr. Montgomery?”
Had a bomb exploded at Montgomery’s feet he could not have been more startled than he was then.
He sprang forward in his chair and stared at the great detective as one fascinated.
“When you speculated with the money belonging to John and Louise Lansing, why did you not tell them?”
Montgomery’s white lips moved but gave no sound.
“After you lost that money, why have you tried to make your wards believe that you were going to invest it in the Royal Ophir mine?”
The guardian swallowed a lump in his throat, and his face was as white as a sheet.
“Did you want to make it appear that you had invested it in a salted mine, after an investigation that was seemingly sincere, and had lost it in that way?”
No answer came from the pallid wretch in the chair.
“What was to be your share of the money to be secured from Cooper and Bingham?”
Still no answer.
“Horace Montgomery, you are a thief!”
Nick was on his feet in front of the cowering man, pointing one finger at him.
Montgomery merely writhed in his seat, but did not say a word.
“But that is not the worst,” went on the detective, mercilessly. “You know that your nephew, John Lansing, started for Boston on Monday night, by the Fall River boat.”
Nick drew back to the library table and picked up a book that lay there.
“You told Yasmar—or Ramsay, to give him his real name—that John Lansing was going to Boston to talk with Cooper and Bingham in the attempt to dissuade them from making that investment in the Royal Ophir mine.
“He took the same boat that Lansing boarded.
“At midnight, out in the Sound, they had a talk, angry words were passed, Ramsay struck Lansing on the head in a moment of passion and flung him into the sea——”
“It’s a lie!” cried Montgomery, hoarsely.
“It’s the truth!”
“Are you man or devil?” whispered Montgomery. He made a sudden movement and jerked a revolver from a drawer in his desk. “But, man or devil, stop this bullet if you can!”
Chick made a motion as though he would grab Montgomery’s arm.
With a look Nick warned him not to interfere and threw the book to the floor.
Instantly the hall door opened.
“There,” cried Nick, whirling and pointing to the form of John Lansing standing in the door, “there stands your dead sister’s son, the boy you robbed, the boy you thought murdered!”
The revolver trembled in Montgomery’s hand.
He dropped it, sprang up and stood looking at his nephew as though confronted by a specter.
Suddenly he threw up his hand and fell backward into his seat.
“John!” he groaned; “John!”
Nick sprang to his side.
“Where were you to meet this man Ramsay or Yasmar to-night?” cried Nick. “I knew that you were to meet him and to take Bingham and Cooper with you. Where was it? Tell me, quick!”
Montgomery looked into Nick’s face with frenzied eyes.
It seemed hard for him to comprehend anything.
Nick repeated the question.
“Tell me, I tell you!” he finished. “You thought your nephew was killed, and you kept the matter a secret; and you tried to kill me and my assistant in Boucicault’s last night——”
“Before Heaven, Carter——” began Montgomery.
“Where were you to meet him to-night?” demanded Nick.
“The Obelisk, Central Park.”
“What time?”
“Eight-thirty.”
“Who were to be there?”
“Himself, Starlick, Gillman.”
“You were to exchange money for a deed?”
“Yes.”
“Not at the Obelisk?”
“No. We were to go to a room.”
Montgomery’s desk-chair was a massive piece of furniture, with high carved arms running from back to seat.
With a quick movement Nick slipped the man’s wrists together, one hand under the arm.
The next moment he had snapped on the handcuffs, securing Montgomery to the chair.
Owing to the height of the chair arms the position was not uncomfortable.
“Oh, Mr. Carter,” cried the voice of Louise Lansing from the door, “is it a necessary cruelty?”
“For a little while only,” answered Nick. “I have prevented the steal that your uncle, in connection with Ramsay—or Yasmar, as you have known him—and his accomplices, tried so hard to accomplish.
“Ramsay is wanted in Montana for another crime, but your uncle I shall leave in your hands.”
Nick turned to John Lansing.
“Here is a key to those handcuffs,” he said. “Do not release him until nine o’clock.”
John Lansing was very pale and was trembling visibly.
It was evident that his nerves were greatly shaken at the disclosure he had heard.
“I will do as you say, Mr. Carter,” said he.
“Chick,” went on Nick, facing his assistant, “Patsy is in the hall. Take him that outfit and have him make ready. There’s sharp work ahead.”
In five minutes Patsy was ready, and the detectives departed.
At eight-thirty sharp a “four-wheeler” dashed up the east drive of Central Park and came to a halt opposite the Egyptian relic known as the Obelisk, otherwise “Cleopatra’s Needle.”
Three men got out of the carriage.
An electric light faintly illuminated that particular spot, and the forms looked dark and indistinct.
But their general outlines were plain enough.
Three more men sat on a park bench hard by the Obelisk.
One of them was tall and wore a slouch hat.
“Here they come,” he said, in a low voice to those near him.
At the same moment Nick Carter had breathed to his two aides:
“Get the cuffs on them as soon as we get within arm’s reach. I’ll take Ramsay. Chick, you’ll attend to the man in the brown derby. Patsy, take the third.”
The three men on the bench got up and spread out, separating so that there were two or three yards between each of them.
The detectives also separated, each making for the man that had been picked out for him.
A mounted policeman, further along the drive, was approaching at a trot.
He had seen the four-wheeler driving faster than the park regulations allowed, and had started after it at a gallop.
Now that the carriage had stopped haste was not necessary, and he came on at a more leisurely gait.
Nick and Ramsay came close together at the railing about the base of the monument, Nick with his right hand thrust into the breast of the frock coat and holding the second pair of cuffs.
“On time, I see,” said Ramsay.
“Always on time,” answered Nick, edging closer.
“Are those fellows all right?”
“Whisper,” said Nick, bending forward.
Ramsay brought his face close.
Snap!
Almost before he could realize what was up the cold steel was about his wrists.
“You’re my prisoner, my dear Ramsay,” said Nick, calmly. “Make a break and you’ll stop a bullet.”
“Nick Carter!” cried the amazed Westerner.
“The same.”
“Curse you!”
He sprang at Nick furiously.
Nick grabbed him by the collar, but he wrenched away, fighting like a demon with his manacled hands.
“Here, none o’ that!”
It was the officer.
He had dismounted to read the riot act to the driver of the carriage, the latter having jumped from the box to fix one of the harness tugs.
Seeing that a row, as he supposed, had started up the incline, toward the monument, he ran in that direction.
“Stop!” shouted Nick to Ramsay, who was a yard or more away. “Stop or I’ll shoot you.”
Nick had a revolver in his hand, but the officer was close enough to grab it.
“Don’t you know better than to——”
“Nick Carter, officer!” exclaimed Nick. “I’m after that man—he’s a thief.”
“Je-ru-sa-lem!” gasped the astounded bluecoat.
By then, Ramsay, making good use of his legs, had reached the officer’s horse.
Without touching his manacled hands to the saddle he sprang to the animal’s back, gave a yell, and dug in with his heels.
Away went the horse at a wild gallop.
Half a dozen jumps carried Nick down the hill.
Another jump landed him on the seat of the carriage.
Grabbing up the lines and the whip, with one movement he plied the lash and the startled horses leaped madly away.
The policeman was close behind Nick, more than anxious to help undo the evil results of his mistake.
He was athletic enough, and he grabbed at the carriage as it started, rested one foot on the turning hub, and gained the box.
“We’ll get him,” he said. “Let me use the whip and you do the driving.”
The horses tore away at a mad gallop, the officer slapping them right and left.
Pedestrians scampered in every direction, but, owing to Nick’s skillful handling of the lines, no one was injured.
Nick did not think he could overtake the fugitive, but he knew that something would happen to the fellow, and he wanted to be near enough to see that he did not escape, in case of accident or other misadventure.
Suddenly a mounted officer appeared in the roadway directly ahead of Ramsay.
Taking in the situation, the officer turned his horse across the road and drew a gun.
“Halt!” he cried.
Ramsay halted, but he did not surrender.
Owing to the nature of the ground on each side of the driveway he could not turn from the road, so he whirled the horse sharply and started full tilt in the direction of the carriage.
Nick divined his object.
He counted on passing the carriage and making off in the other direction—a desperate expedient at best.
In order to keep those on the carriage seat from shooting him, Ramsay leaned down and shielded the upper part of his body behind the horse’s neck.
“I’ll have him now,” muttered Nick, pulling the carriage team to a halt. “Officer, take the lines.”
The officer took them, and Nick made ready for a spring.
On came the horse at a gallop, heading to pass within a few feet of the carriage, on Nick’s side.
The detective watched his chances, and, when the right moment had arrived, hurled himself outward and downward, grabbing the horse’s bits.
The weight on its head brought the animal to an abrupt stop—so abrupt that Ramsay was thrown from the saddle into the road.
Before he could rise, Nick was on top of him, pinning him down.
Ramsay, in spite of the handcuffs, had drawn a revolver from a breast pocket, and Nick jerked it out of his hand.
“Don’t be a fool,” said Nick. “You might have been killed!”
An oath was Ramsay’s only response.
Nick, groping about under the frock coat, found another revolver in his prisoner’s hip pocket and a knife and sheath in the breast pocket.
Both weapons he abstracted and threw to the policeman who had jumped down, caught his horse, and was standing near, ready to lend a hand in case help was needed.
But Nick did not require assistance.
“It’s up to you, Carter,” said Ramsay. “You’ve got me and I cave.”
“Get up, then.”
Nick got off the fellow’s prostrate form, thrusting a hand through his arm.
The policeman picked up Ramsay’s hat and put it on his head, and Nick marched his man over to where Chick and Patsy were holding Gillman and Starlick.
The capture was safely effected, but the great detective had had an exciting three minutes.
Patsy had had no trouble at all in getting the darbies on Gillman, and Chick had not had enough to speak of in making the capture of Starlick.
Starlick showed fight and tried to run around the Obelisk, an empty handcuff dangling from his right wrist.
Chick caught him in two leaps, threw him down, and put on the other bracelet.
The manacles had a quieting effect, and Starlick undertook the rôle of an “innocent bystander.”
“What does this mean?” he cried, angrily.
“If you don’t know you’ll find out quick enough,” replied Chick.
“It’s an outrage, an infernal outrage. Officer,” he turned to the man who accompanied Nick and Ramsay, “I demand that you have these handcuffs taken off my wrists.”
“Keep still!” exclaimed the officer, sharply. “Nick Carter knows well enough what he’s about.”
Starlick toned down, the very name of Nick Carter having a quieting effect.
An hour later the men were in the police station, and Nick had sent a telegram to the chief of police, Helena, Mont., telling of the capture of Ramsay.
Not one of the prisoners was brought to book on account of the clever swindle which would have been perpetrated but for the skill and vigilance of Nick Carter and his assistants.
Starlick was found to be an old offender and badly wanted for a safe-cracking job in Chicago.
He went that far West on the same train that took Ramsay back to Montana.
Both men were tried and sent over the road.
Gillman had all the elements that go to the making of a daring and successful crook.
But there was little to be brought against him, and he was allowed to go his way.
As for Montgomery, he shot himself the day following and was found leaning over his desk, dead.
The revolver was still clutched in his hand, and a letter lay in front of him addressed to his two wards.
A portion of the letter ran as follows: