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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman at Bay, by Nicholas Carter
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: A Woman at Bay
+       A Fiend in Skirts
+
+Author: Nicholas Carter
+
+Release Date: September 26, 2008 [EBook #26704]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN AT BAY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+A WOMAN AT BAY
+
+OR
+
+A Fiend in Skirts
+
+BY NICHOLAS CARTER
+
+Author of "Out of Crime's Depths," "Reaping the Whirlwind," "An Artful
+Schemer," etc.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+STREET & SMITH CORPORATION
+PUBLISHERS
+79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York
+
+Copyright, 1907
+By STREET & SMITH
+
+A Woman at Bay
+
+All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
+languages, including the Scandinavian.
+
+Printed in the U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS
+
+I           THE KING OF THE YEGGMEN.               5
+II          THE YEGGMEN'S CAMP FIRE.              22
+III         THE "KING'S" LIEUTENANT.              31
+IV          THE OUTLAW'S HOME.                    40
+V           NICK'S WONDERFUL STRENGTH.            49
+VI          NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK.              67
+VII         THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT.          76
+VIII        THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.         94
+IX          THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.           104
+X           ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.            114
+XI          PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.           121
+XII         BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.           128
+XIII        BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.            146
+XIV         BLACK MADGE GIVES JUDGMENT.          165
+XV          NICK'S CLEVEREST CAPTURE.            182
+XVI         NICK MAKES BAD MEDICINE.             201
+XVII        A WHOLESALE ROUND-UP.                210
+XVIII       BLACK MADGE'S THREAT.                218
+XIX         THE BAND OF HATRED.                  226
+XX          A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.              241
+XXI         CURLY JOHN, THE BANK THIEF.          249
+XXII        AT MIKE GRINNEL'S DIVE.              257
+XXIII       BLACK MADGE'S DEFIANCE.              266
+XXIV        THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE CELLAR.       275
+XXV         THE MAN IN THE BED.                  284
+XXVI        THE CRIMINAL'S COMPACT.              294
+XXVII       THE GLARE OF A MATCH.                303
+XXVIII      BLACK MADGE CAUGHT IN A TRAP.        311
+
+
+
+
+A WOMAN AT BAY.
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE KING OF THE YEGGMEN.
+
+
+Four men were seated around a camp fire made of old railroad ties, over
+which a kettle was boiling merrily, where it hung from an improvised
+crane above the blaze.
+
+Around, on the ground, were scattered a various assortment of tin cans,
+some of which had been hammered more or less straight to serve for
+plates, and it was evident from the general appearance of things around
+the camp that a meal had just been disposed of, and that the four men
+who had consumed it were now determined to make themselves as
+comfortable as possible. The kettle that boiled over the fire contained
+nothing but water--water with which one of the four men had jocularly
+said he intended to bathe.
+
+These four men were about as rough-looking specimens of humanity as can
+be imagined. Not one of them had been shaved in so long a time that
+their faces were covered with a hairy growth which suggested full
+beards; indeed, their faces looked as if the only shaving they had ever
+received, or rather the nearest approach to a shave, had been done by a
+pair of scissors, cropping the hair as closely as possible.
+
+The camp they had made was located just inside the edge of a wood
+through which a railway had been built, and it was down in a hollow
+beside a brook, so that the light of their fire was effectually screened
+from view, save that the glow of it shone fitfully upon the drooping
+leaves over their heads.
+
+The four men were tramps--hoboes, or yeggmen, of the most pronounced
+types, if their appearance went for anything at all.
+
+Their conversation was couched entirely in the slang of their order; a
+talk that is almost unintelligible to outsiders.
+
+But, strangely enough, the four men were not hoboes at all; neither were
+they yeggmen; and the lingo they talked so glibly among themselves,
+although perfect in its enunciation, and in the words that were used,
+was entirely assumed.
+
+For those four men were Nick Carter, the New York detective, and his
+three assistants, Chick, Patsy, and Ten-Ichi, a Japanese.
+
+The president of the E. & S. W. R. R. Co. had sent for Nick Carter a
+week before this particular evening, and as soon as he and the detective
+were alone together in the president's private room, he had opened the
+conversation abruptly with this question:
+
+"Carter, have you ever happened to hear of a character known as Hobo
+Harry, the Hobo King?"
+
+"I have," replied the detective. "I have heard about him in a vague sort
+of way. I have no particular information about him, if that is what you
+mean."
+
+"No; I merely wished to know if you were aware that there is such a
+character."
+
+"Yes. I have heard of the fellow."
+
+"Do you know what he is?"
+
+"A yeggman, isn't he?"
+
+"He is the king of all the yeggmen. He is the master mind, the
+controlling spirit of all the outlawry and lawlessness that goes on from
+one end of our big railroad system to the other. Hobo Harry costs us, in
+round numbers, anywhere from three to ten thousand dollars a month."
+
+"Really?" asked the detective, smiling.
+
+"Yes--really. This is no joke. There isn't a bit of thievery, however
+petty it may be, or a scheme of robbery, however grand and great, which
+they do not turn their hands to under the guidance of Hobo Harry--and we
+have about got to the end of our patience."
+
+"I suppose," said Nick, "that all this means that you want me to find
+Hobo Harry for you. Is that the idea?"
+
+"That is precisely the idea. Do you suppose you can do it?"
+
+"I can, at least, make the effort."
+
+"I should tell you one thing before you become too sanguine."
+
+"Well, what is it?"
+
+"Hobo Harry is largely a mystery. There are those--detectives, I
+mean--who insist that he does not exist at all, save in imagination."
+
+Nick nodded.
+
+"They say that he is only a figurehead; that he is only a name; that he
+is in reality an imperceptible, intangible idol, whom hoboes worship,
+and to whom they refer as their common leader, while, in reality, there
+is no real leader at all."
+
+"It is possible that they are correct in that idea," said the detective
+slowly.
+
+"It is possible, but it is not likely. There is too much system about
+their operations. I am at the head of a great system, and I know how
+such things are done. I am confident that the operations of these
+thieves--these yeggmen--could not have been carried on so successfully,
+and so systematically, without a head--a chief; and so I, for one,
+believe thoroughly in the existence of Hobo Harry."
+
+"Well?" asked the detective. "What does all this lead to?"
+
+"I am coming to that. I have had every railroad detective in my employ
+searching for Hobo Harry for months--I might say for almost a year, and
+without success. I have employed two of the largest and best--so
+called--detective agencies in the country to assist me. The result has
+in every case been the same."
+
+"What were the results?"
+
+"There have been any number of hoboes and yeggmen arrested; many of them
+have been sent to prison; some of them have gone up for long terms; we
+have proved the cases of robberies against them often enough--but the
+point is, that the robberies have gone merrily on afterward, just the
+same."
+
+"Go on," said the detective, nodding his head.
+
+"Eight separate times we have had, as we supposed, Hobo Harry himself in
+our clutches. Each of those eight separate times the prisoner who was
+supposed to be Hobo Harry has confessed that he was that individual,
+and----"
+
+"And so you have arrested eight Hobo Harrys, eh?"
+
+"That is about the size of it. But the point is----"
+
+"The point is that not one of the eight was really Hobo Harry."
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"Very good. Go ahead with your story."
+
+"In each case, after the arrest, as we supposed, of Hobo Harry himself,
+the robberies and thefts along the line have received an impetus; they
+have increased in number, and in volume--and also in seriousness. These
+yeggmen do not confine themselves to breaking into freight cars and
+stations along the line of the road. They burglarize post offices, and
+even country banks. They pillage houses. They turn their hands and
+their talents to anything and everything where there is hope of reward
+for them. The thing has got beyond endurance."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"We want you, Carter, to find Hobo Harry himself--if you can."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"The matter was discussed thoroughly at a meeting of our board of
+directors yesterday, and it was determined at that meeting that if you
+could find Hobo Harry and arrest him, and, having arrested him, could
+convict him and send him to prison, and, having done that, could prove
+to our entire satisfaction that the man is Hobo Harry, your reward will
+be fifty thousand dollars, spot cash. Only, you must understand, we must
+be certain that your man is the real article."
+
+"Hobo Harry, the King of the Beggars, eh?"
+
+"Yes. Beggars, you know, is supposed to be the name of their
+organization."
+
+The detective nodded.
+
+"Will you take the case, Carter?"
+
+"I suppose so--if there isn't a time limit set upon it."
+
+"You may take your own time; that is, of course, if it is not too long."
+
+"It will require some time to do the thing thoroughly."
+
+"I suppose so. Well, have it your own way; only succeed. That is all the
+railroad people desire--success."
+
+"I will get your man; only I won't promise to do it in a day, or a week,
+or a month. I won't set a time."
+
+"All right. You shall be your own master in the case."
+
+"I will have to be that--absolutely. After I leave this office, when my
+interview with you is finished, you will not see me again until I have
+got Hobo Harry in my clutches. You will not communicate with me, or
+attempt to do so, and I will not communicate with you."
+
+"That is a little hard, isn't it, Carter? We would like to know, from
+time to time, how you are getting on, and what you are doing."
+
+"That is precisely what you will not do."
+
+"All right. Have it your own way. But what about the other men that are
+now on the case, Carter?"
+
+"Leave them on it. Add more of them. Appear to increase your vigilance
+in other quarters. If there are fifty detectives on the case now, add
+fifty more if you wish. I would prefer that you should do so rather than
+not. The more the better."
+
+"But suppose that one of them should nab the real Hobo Harry while you
+are seeking him. You would lose the reward."
+
+"I will take my chances about that. The point is that I must work
+absolutely independent of all others who are on the case, and that
+nobody outside of yourself and the board of directors of your company
+must know that my services have been called into the matter. Will you
+agree to that?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Increase your vigilance on every side, if you can. If you do so, you
+will assist me."
+
+"I suppose," said the president slowly, "that it is your plan to become
+a yeggman yourself, in pursuing this case."
+
+"It does not matter how I may accomplish it, does it?"
+
+"No; I was merely going to say that that very thing has been tried four
+separate times; once with more or less success. But I ought to warn you
+that two of the four who attempted it lost their lives; a third is a
+cripple for life, minus a leg; and only the fourth, who ended by
+arresting the wrong man, after all, had any degree of success. And now
+he is frightened almost into imbecility, for his life has been sworn
+away by the yeggmen, and he expects to be murdered every time he goes
+out alone."
+
+"All the same," said the detective, "that will not deter me."
+
+"You will want money for your expenses, Carter. If you will tell me how
+much----"
+
+"I will present my bill of expenses along with my demand for the fifty
+thousand dollars reward," the detective interrupted quietly.
+
+By more closely questioning the president of the railroad, Nick learned
+that the depredations and robberies committed by Hobo Harry's gang had
+been remarkable in their extent and thoroughness; and that every effort
+to break up the gang had been in vain.
+
+Whenever one of the yeggmen was arrested and sent to prison, two new
+ones, even more proficient in their thievery, seemed ready to spring up
+in his place; and so the thing had gone on and on until the people who
+had been robbed so often became desperate.
+
+And then it was determined to call Nick Carter into the case.
+
+Of Hobo Harry himself, nothing whatever was known beyond the fact that
+there was such a character, and that he was the head and front of the
+hobo gang--their chief, to whom absolute and implicit obedience was
+accorded. His power over them seemed absolute.
+
+Whether it was because of fear of him, or for love of him, it was,
+nevertheless, true that not one of the fraternity of hoboes who had been
+arrested could be prevailed upon to betray the master. Neither threats
+nor offers of bribery had any effect upon them.
+
+Hobo Harry remained as entirely in the dark as ever; and even in the
+cases of the eight men to whom the president of the railroad had
+referred as having confessed that each of them was Hobo Harry
+himself--they had each seemed to get a queer sort of enjoyment in
+posing, even for a time, as their dreaded chief.
+
+As the president explained to Nick, there were many among the detectives
+who had been detailed upon the case who insisted that there was no such
+person as Hobo Harry. It was their belief that the name was merely a
+fictitious one, to which the hoboes, one and all, had agreed to give
+obedience.
+
+But the president of the railroad did not believe this; neither did the
+detective. The completeness of the organization of the gang was a
+sufficient negative to such a statement. To have a perfect organization
+there must be a chief; a head; a ruling power.
+
+By investigating the case a little further before actually starting out
+upon it, Nick discovered that the yeggmen had carried their depredations
+even into whole villages. In one town--Calamont--the place had been
+literally gutted in a single night.
+
+The yeggmen had descended upon it in such numbers that the inhabitants
+were terrified, and could only protect themselves by barricading their
+doors, and remaining with their guns and other weapons in their hands,
+while they watched the looting of their bank and post office. And there
+had been other occasions as bad as that one.
+
+Sometimes the yeggmen traveled in small groups; sometimes they worked
+in twos or threes, but often they went about in large bands which had
+been known to include as many as fifty or even more.
+
+Had the outrages been confined to one community the inhabitants would
+have risen in their might and, by organizing vigilance committees, could
+have driven them out--possibly. But they were not confined to
+communities at all; they extended all along the line of the railroad,
+and the descent of the robbers seemed always to have been arranged far
+ahead--and perfectly planned by a master mind at that.
+
+These descents always happened when it was known that there were large
+sums of money, either in the banks that were robbed, or when the post
+offices that were broken open were better provided than usual with cash.
+
+At every place where there was a siding along the line of the railroad,
+freight cars had been broken open, and denuded of their contents; and
+this often happened when there was one or more night watchmen on hand
+for the purpose of preventing that very thing.
+
+But in each case the watchman had been overpowered, and either beaten
+into insensibility or maimed--and in at least one instance--killed.
+
+And hence it was that the railroad company was willing to pay well for
+the apprehension of the chief of these marauders.
+
+All of this information Nick Carter gleaned before he formed any
+definite plans for his campaign.
+
+Roughly speaking, there was a stretch of main line of the railroad over
+which, or rather along which, the yeggmen seemed to be most active. This
+principal thoroughfare for their nefarious trade was approximately five
+hundred miles long; and it was here where the greatest and the most
+persistent outrages were committed.
+
+There were branches of the line, too, along which they worked; but off
+the main line the organization seemed to lose some of its power for
+concentration of force.
+
+After Nick had pieced together all the information that could be gleaned
+without being actually at the scene of the trouble, he called his three
+assistants together in consultation with him. For he had determined to
+make use of all of them in this case. Indeed, that was the only method
+by which he believed that he could entirely succeed at it.
+
+To them he related the circumstance of his connection with the case,
+after which he told them all he had been able to learn about it; and in
+conclusion he said:
+
+"Now, lads, there is only one way by which we can hope to succeed in
+this undertaking, and that is, we must become hoboes ourselves."
+
+The three nodded almost in unison.
+
+"If we decide to do that," continued the detective, "we must do it
+thoroughly. We must do as General Grant did when he decided, against the
+wishes of his generals, to invest Vicksburg--be cut off from his base of
+supplies; and that is what we must do."
+
+"I don't think I understand exactly what you mean," said Patsy, who was
+paying close attention; for Patsy liked the plan inconceivably.
+
+"I mean," replied Nick, "that when we start out to become hoboes, we
+must become so in fact, and not in appearance merely. It is easy enough
+for any one of us to make ourself up as a tramp, or a hobo, or even a
+yeggman, and to play the part; but in this case we must do more than
+that: We must be the part."
+
+"But that 'base of supplies' business--what do you mean by that?"
+insisted Patsy.
+
+"I mean that when we start out on this case, there will be no returning
+here until we have lodged Hobo Harry behind the bars. We are going to
+live as hoboes, and do as hoboes do, carrying out a real robbery or so,
+on our own hooks, taking care, of course, that one or more of the real
+article shall know about it."
+
+"And taking care also," interjected Chick, "that we keep track of what
+we steal, so that it, or its value, may be returned to the owners later
+on."
+
+"Of course, Chick; that goes without saying. Now, there is another
+thing."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"At the present time there are no less than fifty detectives, some from
+Pinkerton's, and some from other places, engaged upon this case. If we
+play our parts as we should play them, we are bound to run into some of
+those chaps sooner or later. If we do that----"
+
+"Well?" asked Patsy.
+
+"We must continue to play our cards to the end, no matter what
+happens--even to the extent of being arrested, and possibly tried for
+the offenses that have been committed. If one of us should get caught,
+he must play his part even then, for the protection of the others who
+are still on their jobs; for if that one should confess himself a
+detective, the usefulness of the others would be past."
+
+"That is clear enough," said Ten-Ichi.
+
+"It sure is," said Patsy. "It isn't very pleasant, either. Although it
+will be some fun to work on the opposite side of the fence for once."
+
+"How do you mean?" asked Ten-Ichi.
+
+"Why, we are always chasing down criminals, aren't we? Now we will have
+some fun in letting others chase us while we play the criminal. Say,
+chief?"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"We will have a chance to learn a little about that other side of the
+fence. We will discover how it feels to be chased, instead of doing the
+chasing."
+
+"Yes," said the detective; and Patsy turned then to Ten-Ichi.
+
+"I'll make you a bet," he said. "I'll bet you anything you like, on the
+basis of two to one, that I don't get nabbed while we are on this lay."
+
+"That's a go," smiled Ten-Ichi, "for I think you will be the very first
+one to go under."
+
+"How much do you want to bet?"
+
+"Never mind the betting part of it, lads," Nick interrupted them. "The
+point is, that each of you is to do his utmost to carry out his part to
+the end, no matter what happens. Now, if you please, all step this way.
+I have a map here that I wish to show you."
+
+He spread the map upon the table, and upon it he showed them the five
+hundred miles of railway along which they were to work; and presently he
+put his finger upon the name of a town along the line, and he said:
+
+"Here is a place called Calamont. It is, roughly speaking, two hundred
+and fifty miles from New York. Some time ago Calamont suffered greatly
+by the descent of the hoboes upon it. It has not quite recovered from
+the effects of that time yet, although several months have elapsed since
+the occurrence. Do you see it, all of you?"
+
+They admitted that they did.
+
+"Right here," he continued, drawing his pencil with which he was
+pointing a little to the eastward, "is a patch of woods through which
+the railway runs. There are about twenty acres of woodland there, and
+the road passes through the centre of it."
+
+They nodded, and he went on:
+
+"To the south of the railroad, through the woods, is a swamp. It is
+almost an impassable swamp, I am told. I will have more to say about
+that part of it presently. Understand, do you?"
+
+They did understand.
+
+"To the north of the tracks, through the woodland and beyond it, the
+country is hilly and almost mountainous. There is a limestone formation
+there. There are deep ravines and gulches, high cliffs and precipices,
+and, although I stated in the first place that there is only about
+twenty acres in the woodland, I meant to say in that particular patch of
+woods to which I first drew your attention."
+
+"Yes," said Chick.
+
+"As a matter of fact, the country all around this region is wild and
+unsettled. It is much too rough to settle, and there are woods and
+forests everywhere. Just beyond these woods, to the northward, the
+forest is almost unbroken for several miles, save that there is a narrow
+clearing to separate this particular bit of woods from those beyond it."
+
+"Well?" asked Chick, who was paying close attention.
+
+"To the south of the tracks it is almost the same, save that the
+country is flat and low. As a matter of fact, the railroad passes across
+the spur which lies between the rough country to the north and the flat,
+swampy country to the south.
+
+"I have not been able to gain any very exact information about those
+swamps, but from the best opinions I can get, I should assume that it is
+a sort of another Dismal Swamp down there. Men and cattle, horses and
+sheep have been known to wander in there, and never return. Presumably
+they were lost in the swamps or----"
+
+"Or else eaten up by the yeggmen," suggested Patsy.
+
+"Precisely. But it is a wild country. Now"--he rested one finger upon
+the map--"right here at the point where my finger rests, two weeks from
+to-morrow, at or near the hour of darkness, I will meet each of you. You
+will find me just north of the track; or, if any of you get there before
+I do, you will wait there for me, and for the others. Whoever arrives
+first must build a fire. We part to-night, here, now. You must each
+leave the house separately, and become lost to the world--you must each
+become a hobo in the meantime, in your own particular way. Fix
+yourselves up as you please, and go where you please--only go
+separately. And keep your appointment for two weeks from to-morrow.
+That's all."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE YEGGMEN'S CAMP FIRE.
+
+
+Each of the detective's three assistants understood thoroughly that Nick
+Carter's reason for directing them to do as he did was that they might
+each have learned the parts they had to play thoroughly by the time the
+actual work of it should begin.
+
+And not only that, they would have had two weeks during which to wear
+off the newness of habit and apparel; and by the time they arrived at
+the place of meeting, each would have become sufficiently schooled in
+his part to play it quite naturally.
+
+And there was still another reason which Nick hoped they would take
+advantage of, although he said nothing about it: That was that they
+would make acquaintances among such of the ilk as they happened to meet.
+Such acquaintances might be of value later in the game.
+
+When Chick left the house, about two hours after the interview with
+Nick, he had his traveling bag in his hand, and he went direct to the
+railway station, where he took a train for the West--for a city far
+beyond the line of the road upon which Nick Carter's campaign was to be
+worked out. It was his intention to start from there.
+
+Ten-Ichi took his departure a little sooner than Chick, and he was
+dressed as usual, also. Outside the house, on the curb, he stopped for a
+few moments, and appeared to be thinking; and then he started down the
+street on foot, and disappeared.
+
+Patsy was the last to go, except the chief himself, who was smilingly
+watching these departures from an upper window of the house. He had said
+no more than he did to them purposely, for he was curious to see how
+each would go about it. He knew that each one of his assistants was
+entirely proficient in his way, but he also knew that each had a way of
+his own for doing things.
+
+When Patsy left the house he also hesitated in front of it for a moment;
+and then he walked rapidly away up the street, and disappeared.
+
+And that was all that Nick cared to see; he wished to feel assured that
+each had departed on his own hook, and that it was their intention to
+work singly. He had left the map for them to study in the library after
+he left them alone together, and he had no doubt that each would be
+fully competent to find the place of appointment when the time should
+come.
+
+He was the last to leave the house, of course. There were many
+directions to give before he finally took his departure. Joseph had to
+know how to account for his absence from home to those who might inquire
+too particularly about him; and the absence of the three assistants had
+to be accounted for also.
+
+Having arranged that, and provided himself with everything which he
+regarded as needful, he selected one of his own disguises--one that he
+was fond of, and which will appear more particularly later on, and with
+that in a small satchel which he expected ultimately to rid himself of,
+he went out, and away also.
+
+And from that moment we will skip to the time of the opening paragraphs
+of this story, which was two weeks and one day later--to the time when
+we behold the camp fire made of railway ties, with the four hoboes
+grouped around it, having enjoyed their evening meal and now ready to
+smoke and rest; for if there is anything in the world which a hobo
+really enjoys, it is rest.
+
+It was only a little bit after dark--and the night was not a dark one at
+that. Already the moon was shining down upon the world.
+
+But around the immediate vicinity of the camp fire it seemed quite dark
+by contrast, and the light thrown back by the trunks of the trees
+rendered the scene a picturesque one.
+
+Nick Carter had purposely been the last one to arrive at the trysting
+place, if such it may be termed; but he had been a close observer of the
+arrival of the others, nevertheless; and he accomplished that by
+arriving in the vicinity early in the day, and by later climbing among
+the boughs of one of the trees, from which perch he was enabled to
+watch the coming of his assistants.
+
+Patsy came first. His eagerness led him to do that, and Nick had
+expected it; and as the detective watched his youngest assistant he was
+pleased to see the manner in which he made his approach.
+
+Had Nick Carter, concealed in the boughs of the tree, been an enemy,
+instead of a friend, he could not have had one suspicion aroused by
+Patsy's manner.
+
+The young fellow was most disreputable in appearance. His hair, and it
+was his own, too, he had managed to dye to brick-red hue. His face and
+his hands were grimy, and there was a considerable growth of beard upon
+the former. He wore good shoes--just out of a store, they appeared to
+be, and he carried a string of three other pairs, equally new, in one
+hand. His coat was much too large for him, and he had turned the sleeves
+back at the wrists for convenience. His hat had once been a Stetson; it
+had also quite evidently been a target for a shotgun.
+
+When Nick first spied him he was walking along the track, whistling; but
+directly opposite the place of meeting he stopped, and, after a moment,
+he dived quickly over the fence into the woods, and approached with care
+the place which he finally selected for the fire.
+
+And there he scraped some dried boughs together, made his fire, brought
+an old tie from the track to aid it, arranged his crane of green sticks,
+and, from a bundle that he carried slung upon one shoulder, he produced
+the kettle, a package of meat, some bread, and other articles, with
+which he began the preparation of his supper.
+
+A little later a second figure appeared so suddenly out of the gathering
+gloom that neither Patsy, at the fire, nor Nick, in the tree, had any
+idea of its near approach.
+
+"Hello, pal!" he said gruffly; and Patsy wheeled like lightning, with a
+gun already half drawn, to face him.
+
+"Hello yourself!" he growled, not too cordially, and eying the newcomer
+suspiciously. "Who are you lookin' for?"
+
+The other came slowly forward without deigning to reply to this direct
+question, and without so much as glancing again at Patsy; but he slung
+his own bundle on the ground, and, after a moment, stalked away in the
+gathering darkness again.
+
+Presently he returned with another tie, which he dropped near the fire;
+and then he looked sullenly toward Patsy.
+
+"Share up, or chuck it alone?" he demanded, thrusting his hands deep
+into his pockets.
+
+"What you got?"
+
+"As much as you have, and as good as you have."
+
+"All right. I'm agreeable. Chuck it down."
+
+Half an hour later, when it was almost dark, a third one appeared.
+
+He was shorter and slimmer than the others, and the best dressed one of
+the three, although he was disreputable enough in all conscience.
+
+He came noisily over the fence from the track, and the two at the fire
+could hear him long before he reached them. But they made no move.
+Anybody who approached them with as much noise as that was not to be
+dreaded, it appeared.
+
+When he arrived within the circle of the firelight, he stopped and
+strangely enough began to laugh; and he laughed on, boisterously,
+amazingly, in fact; he laughed until there were tears in his eyes, and
+until he had to hold to a sapling near him for support.
+
+"Aw, what's eatin' you?" called out one of the men from the fire. "What
+you see that's so funny; must be in your own globes. Come along inside
+if you wants to, and don't stand there awakin' up the dead."
+
+"I ain't got any chuck of my own," he called back to them. "I was
+laughing to think how near I came to getting it--and didn't."
+
+"Well, there's enough here for three--'r four, for that matter. Come in
+and set down, pal."
+
+And it was not until the meal was cooked, and spread out upon all sorts
+of improvised arrangements, that the fourth member of the party
+appeared--and he made his arrival in a most surprising manner.
+
+He dropped literally among them, seemingly from the clouds--or the
+tree--just as they were beginning to eat; and he squatted beside them,
+and, reaching out without a word, helped himself to a hunk of the
+toasted meat, which he began to tear viciously with his teeth.
+
+"Nice guy, ain't he?" said Patsy, leering at the one with whom he had
+agreed to share.
+
+"Looks as if he might have come over in the steerage of a cattle ship,
+inside a rawhide, don't he?" assented the other, who was Chick. But
+neither Chick nor Patsy was at all assured that this new arrival was
+their chief, and they determined to play their parts to the end, or, at
+least, until they were absolutely certain.
+
+In reality Nick Carter looked like a Sicilian bandit in hard luck. He
+certainly looked the Italian part of it, all right; but even among his
+rags there was some display of color, which an Italian is never happy
+without.
+
+When the other referred to him in this slighting way, he raised his eyes
+sullenly toward them, and he also released his hold upon the food he was
+eating long enough to finger the hilt of his knife suggestively; for
+Nick was aware of the fact that not one of the three was sure of his
+identity, and he preferred not to make himself known just yet.
+
+"Me understands da Inglis you spik," he muttered, in a sort of growl.
+"Better hava da care wota you say dees times. I hava da bunch uh banan
+in da tree ifa you want more chuck. Go getta it--you!"
+
+He drew his knife quickly and leveled the point of it at the one whom
+the others had already christened 'Laughing Willie'; but Ten-Ichi,
+nothing daunted by the implied threat, only shrugged his shoulders, and
+went on eating.
+
+"Go getta da banan, or I slice you up fora de chuck," repeated the
+supposed Italian, rising slowly from his seat by the fire and advancing
+toward Ten-Ichi; but he had not taken a step before he found himself
+looking into the muzzle of a pistol, and Patsy, in his capacity as host
+over the meal, said sourly:
+
+"Sit ye down, dago, or I'll make a window of your liver. We're three
+friends enjoying a feast, and you're welcome to part of it if you want
+it, but if you make any more breaks, out you go--feet first, if you
+prefer it that way."
+
+The Italian subsided with a grunt, and the meal continued undisturbed
+until all but Ten-Ichi, who appeared to have been really very hungry,
+had drawn back from the fire; and then it was that Chick made the remark
+about his hurrying that was mentioned in the beginning of this story.
+
+But Nick had in the meantime managed to make it known to the others who
+he was, although he had said no word in reference to it. They each one
+of them knew that there might still be others concealed in the trees or
+somewhere near at hand watching them. There was no telling how many
+pairs of eyes had observed them when they entered the wood. Yeggmen are
+as cautious and as careful about what they do in the lonely places among
+their brethren as the cave man used to be in primitive times.
+
+For they prey upon one another, those men, as readily as they prey upon
+society. Among them it is always merely a question of the survival of
+the fittest--and the fittest is always the quickest, and the strongest,
+or the most alert.
+
+It was not likely that they would have this firelight to themselves for
+a very long time, and they knew it; and, in fact, it was not ten minutes
+after their meal was finished, and their pipes were alight, before, like
+shadows, three other men suddenly loomed beside the fire, as if they had
+sprung out of the ground.
+
+And they stalked forward from three sides at once--came forward as if
+they owned the woods.
+
+But not one of our four friends, already seated there, made a motion or
+uttered a word. They smoked stolidly on, but with their eyes alert for
+anything that might happen.
+
+And then, out of the darkness around them, appeared three more figures,
+and then two more; and the eight, who had seemed to come together,
+grouped themselves with their backs to the fire, and gazed sullenly and
+silently down upon the four they found there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE "KING'S" LIEUTENANT.
+
+
+The moment was an ominous one, and no one was better aware of the fact
+than Nick Carter. Everything depended now upon the perfection which his
+three assistants had attained in the parts they were to play.
+
+The sudden coming of the eight yeggmen, arriving as they had, so closely
+together, could not be the result of mere chance, and Nick had no doubt
+that they were in reality members of the very gang he was seeking. For
+the detective had determined in the beginning that the headquarters of
+the gang was somewhere in this vicinity. Everything in his first
+investigations pointed to that. And if their headquarters were located
+near that wood, or below the track in the swamp, it was certain that
+they kept outposts stationed where the arrival of newcomers could be
+reported at once.
+
+Thus the appearance of Nick Carter on the scene, and the coming of the
+others soon after his arrival, had doubtless been reported, and their
+actions carefully watched from the very beginning.
+
+The detective was intensely glad now that his own actions, and those of
+his friends, had been so perfect--that is, perfect in the sense of
+creating the impression in the mind of a possible observer that they
+were strangers to one another. He knew perfectly well that if a watch
+had been kept upon them there could be no doubt in the minds of the
+watchers that the four men grouped around the fire were unknown to one
+another.
+
+But here were eight burly men grouped around them, each standing in a
+position so that he could make himself extremely dangerous on the
+instant should he choose to do so. And there was no telling how many
+more might be concealed out there in the darkness of the woods around
+them.
+
+It is not the fashion among yeggmen to welcome an addition to their
+party, no matter whether that addition is composed of one or of many.
+Sullen silence is the rule at first, during which each man studies the
+others. Suspicion is always the first impulse at such meetings. Their
+attitudes are exactly that of strange dogs which encounter each other
+for the first time, and walk round and round, with the hair on their
+backs raised, and with their tails straight out, every nerve on a
+tension, and every impulse prepared for mortal combat.
+
+And people who have watched dogs while they go through with these
+mannerisms know that it requires only a few moments for them to
+determine whether they will be friends or foes, or if they will only
+politely tolerate the presence of each other on the scene.
+
+So Nick Carter sat silent, making no movement, save to puff vigorously
+at the short pipe he was smoking; and so the others of his party did
+likewise; for the forces of the newcomers were much stronger.
+
+This tableau--if tableau it could be called, continued for five minutes,
+and then one of the late arrivals cast aside the stub of a cigar he was
+smoking, and broke the silence.
+
+"Where might you hoboes be from?" he demanded, in an even tone, and
+without a gesture of any kind.
+
+Nobody made any reply whatever to this question, and after a moment he
+spoke again.
+
+"Which one of you is the leader of this outfit?" he asked.
+
+Again nobody replied to him; the assistants kept silent because they
+well knew that their chief would answer if he considered it wise to do
+so; and Nick remained silent merely because he did not consider that it
+was yet time to speak.
+
+And now the spokesman of the other party addressed himself directly to
+Nick Carter, as being, doubtless, the fiercest and most
+villainous-looking one of the bunch.
+
+"You heard me, didn't you?" he demanded.
+
+"Yes; I heard you," was the calm reply.
+
+"Hello! You can talk United States, can't you?"
+
+"Quite as well as you, if necessary," was the cool response.
+
+"You look like a dago."
+
+"What I look like, and what I am, is none of your business--unless you
+show some authority for questioning me."
+
+"Ho, ho, ho, ho! Hear him, my coveys! What do you think of that?" And
+then to Nick again: "What sort of authority do you expect me to show?"
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders, knocked out the ashes of his pipe, rose
+slowly to his feet, and stood facing the other calmly, as he responded:
+
+"There is only one kind of authority, signor, in a party like this. You
+know what that is. I don't know you any more than I know these other
+guns around here. It may all be a put-up job, for all I know. I don't
+much care if it is. I am quite willing to fight you all, one at a time,
+if necessary--and with guns, or knives, or fists, as you please. I come
+here, and I get into a tree and wait. Why? Because I have been told of
+this place, and that always there is somebody around here. I thought I
+would see who the somebody was before somebody saw me. So I get myself
+into a tree. Pish! And then not only one, but two, and three arrive on
+the scene; and then eight more come. If you want to know who I am, and
+are brave enough to fight me, and man enough to lick me--then you'll
+know. If not--mind your own affairs, and leave me to attend to mine."
+
+It was a long speech, and the others listened in absolute silence to
+the end of it. But the instant Nick ceased speaking, the man to whom he
+had addressed his remarks drew back his arm with a sudden motion, and
+drove his huge fist forward with the quickness of a cat.
+
+Any other person than Nick Carter might have felt the force of that
+treacherous blow. Even he might have done so had he not been expecting
+it, and, therefore, been entirely ready for it.
+
+But the bony fist of the man struck only the empty air, for Nick
+sidestepped in a manner that would have made Jim Corbett, in his
+palmiest days, green with envy; and the battering-ram flew past his ear
+harmlessly.
+
+And then the man who had delivered it, before he could recover from the
+effect of his own effort, found himself seized in a viselike grip,
+raised from his feet, and hurled backward straight over the fire, and
+beyond it, so that he sprawled at full length among the bushes.
+
+He leaped to his feet with a curse, and his hand flew to his hip pocket
+in search of a weapon; but he did not draw it forth again, for he found
+himself looking into the muzzle of an ugly-looking forty-four.
+
+"Drop it!" Nick ordered sharply. "I didn't hurt you, when I might have
+done so easily. Are you satisfied?"
+
+The anger of the man seemed to pass as quickly as it had arisen, and he
+grinned as he slowly resumed his former position beside the fire.
+
+It was quite true that he was not hurt; it was equally true that he knew
+that this stranger might have hurt him severely had he chosen to do so,
+and have been entirely excusable for doing it too.
+
+"All right, pard, you pass," he said. "What's your handle?"
+
+"I'm called Dago John by them as know me. What's yours?"
+
+"Hand---- The guns call me Handsome, by way of shortening it. Shake?"
+
+"Yes," said Nick; and they clasped hands for an instant. Then Handsome
+added:
+
+"Who might these gazaboes be?"
+
+"Search me, Handsome," growled Nick, resuming his seat, and beginning to
+refill his pipe. "If they ain't a part of your outfit, they sure ain't a
+part of mine."
+
+Handsome wheeled upon Chick then.
+
+"Who are you?" he demanded, "and where are you from?"
+
+"I'm the 'Chicken'; they know me around Chicago, if they don't here.
+Maybe you've heard of me; but it don't make any difference whether you
+have or not. I'm the Chicken, all right; and it's Chick for short."
+Chick did not so much as move an eyelash while he made this retort; but
+his questioner was plainly affected.
+
+"The Chicken!" he exclaimed. "The Chicken is dead. We got it straight.
+Shot by----"
+
+"Shot by a cop, eh? That's the story, and it goes, all right. Only it
+happens that it wasn't the Chicken as was shot; cause why? The Chicken
+is here."
+
+"Who was it, then?"
+
+"It was a pal of mine. A likely gun he was, too. I jest changed hats
+with him when he slid under. The rest of the clothes didn't make no
+difference. They thought he was the Chicken--and it didn't hurt him any
+to have 'em think so, while it helped me a lot."
+
+"All right, Chicken," said Handsome, extending his hand a second time.
+"I know about you. You're all right. Who are these other two?"
+
+"Search me, Handsome. I reckon we're all strangers."
+
+Handsome turned to Ten-Ichi.
+
+"What's your handle, covey?" he growled.
+
+Ten-Ichi's answer was a peal of demoniac laughter; and he laughed on and
+on interminably, slapping his thighs and flinging his arms around him
+after the manner of a man who is warming himself, until the faces of the
+others around him developed broad grins--and until the man who called
+himself Handsome brought him to with a sudden thrust of his arm which
+nearly took the breath out of the lad.
+
+"What's eatin' you, you loon?" he demanded.
+
+"I was laughing," replied Ten-Ichi, now as solemn as an owl.
+
+"You don't say so! Were you? What at?"
+
+"You. It is so funny that you should be called Handsome."
+
+Handsome grinned with the others.
+
+"Well," he said. "What's your name? Out with it!"
+
+"I'm Tenstrike--Ten, for short. That's what."
+
+"All right, Ten; you pass. You're harmless, I guess--unless you let out
+that laugh of yours at the wrong time. I would advise you not to do
+that. And _you_?" He turned now to Patsy, with a sudden whirl of his
+body. "You were the first of this bunch to get here. Who are you?"
+
+"Sure," said Patsy, with a slow drawl, "I'm an Irishman, and me name
+doesn't matter to you. It's enough that they call me Pat. If ye don't
+happen to like it, sure you can call me Tim, or Mike, or Shamus, or any
+old thing that suits ye. And what am I here for, is it? Sure, I'm on a
+still hunt for a man I want to find. Mebby ye're after knowin' him."
+
+"Maybe I am. Who is he?"
+
+"Faith, I wish I knowed that. He calls himself Hobo Harry--that same!"
+
+A dead silence followed upon this unlooked-for announcement. The
+boldness of it surprised Nick, startled Chick, and frightened Ten-Ichi,
+lest unpleasant results should come of it. But it was evident that
+Patsy knew his ground, and had prepared for this very moment, for he was
+cool and smiling, and he appeared to enjoy hugely the effect that his
+words had had upon the others.
+
+It was Handsome who finally broke the silence that ensued; and he
+replied:
+
+"That's a name, Pat--if that's your own handle--which isn't spoken
+lightly around these parts. What do you want with him?"
+
+"By your l'ave, mister, I'll tell that to him when I find him. In the
+meantime, if youse be afther mindin' yere own business, it wouldn't
+hurrt ye any. Ye seem to be making of yerself a sort of highcockalorum
+elegantarium bosski. If ye tell me that ye know Hobo Harry, an' will
+take me to him, so's I can tell me story to him, mebby I'll answer ye;
+but not unless."
+
+Again there was silence; and this time it was Nick who brought it to an
+end.
+
+"Handsome," he said sharply, "who's this other bunch? What I want to
+know is, are they wid you?"
+
+"They are," was the quick reply. Then he wheeled quickly to Patsy again,
+and added:
+
+"Come with me--you--if you want to see the chief. I'll take you to him.
+The rest of you can wait where you are."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE OUTLAW'S HOME.
+
+
+A dead silence reigned around that camp fire for several moments after
+the two departed; but then the seven strangers who were left seated
+themselves in various attitudes, filled their pipes--or lit the stubs of
+half-smoked cigars, produced from their pockets; and after that, little
+by little, conversation was indulged in.
+
+The night was warm and balmy. There was no reason why any of them should
+seek other shelter than the boughs of the trees which already covered
+them; but Nick knew from the manner in which Handsome had left them that
+he expected to return, and that there was some other place near by to
+which he intended to take them--if the chief should say the word. And he
+saw now that Patsy, by rare forethought, had prepared for that very
+emergency.
+
+More than an hour had passed before Handsome made his appearance again;
+and then he loomed suddenly beside the camp fire, as silently and as
+stealthily as an Indian. Even Nick Carter, who was on the alert for his
+approach, did not hear him coming.
+
+"I'll take you now!" he said briefly to Nick. "The others can wait."
+
+Without a word more he turned away again, and Nick, leaping to his feet,
+followed him in silence through the darkness.
+
+The night was almost black in there among the trees, although the moon
+was shining above them; but nevertheless Nick had no difficulty in
+following his guide.
+
+They made directly for the railway tracks, and crossed the fence that
+intervened; but when they reached the top of the grade, Nick's guide
+halted and faced him.
+
+"You said you are Dago John," he said slowly. "Who might Dago John be,
+pard?"
+
+"They call me Dago John because I look like an Italian, I suppose,
+although I am not one," replied the detective. "But I try to carry out
+the idea. If you have worked your way through the South at all, maybe
+you've heard of Sheeny John. It will do as well as Dago John. A name
+doesn't make much difference."
+
+"It makes a sight of difference here, my friend. What's your lay?"
+
+"Anything that I can turn my hand to--or my brains."
+
+"You have an education?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Can you write a good hand?"
+
+"It's my one fault that I can--too good a one."
+
+"Have you looked through the screens?" (Been in prison.)
+
+"Never yet--to stay there. What do you want to know all this for?"
+
+"I've been telling the main guy about you."
+
+"What about me?"
+
+"I told him of your strength, for one thing. There isn't another man in
+our outfit who could lift me off my feet the way you did it."
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I could have done it as easily if you had been twice the man you are,"
+he said contemptuously.
+
+"There is no doubt of that. I don't bear you any ill will for it,
+either. Neither does the boss."
+
+"And who may he be, Handsome?"
+
+"Don't you know, Dago John?"
+
+"Maybe I do, and again maybe I don't."
+
+"Didn't you come here looking for him?"
+
+"Maybe so."
+
+"Well, who were you looking for?"
+
+"Maybe the same one that the other fellow was looking for--maybe not."
+
+"That's all right. You can come along, I guess. But I warn you to have a
+care what you say to him."
+
+"Say to who?"
+
+"To Hobo Harry. He isn't one to be trifled with."
+
+"Say, Handsome, on the level now, _is_ there such a person?"
+
+"Sure there is. You'll find that out all right, too, before you are much
+older. Didn't you come up here to get into the gang? Isn't that what you
+are here for?"
+
+"Sure thing; but, on the level, I didn't think that I could do it so
+easy."
+
+Handsome laughed as if he were intensely amused.
+
+"If you think that you are in it now, you are very much mistaken," he
+said, with a shrug. "We don't take men into the bosom of our family
+quite as easy as that. But with us there is always room for a good man,
+and he always has a chance to prove whether he is good or not. That is
+the sort of chance you are going to get."
+
+"Will you tell me about it?"
+
+"I will if you will agree to teach me that hold by which you threw me
+over the fire into the bushes a little while ago."
+
+"Sure thing, Handsome. I'll teach you that, and a lot of others as well,
+if you wish. That is one of the ju-jutsu tricks."
+
+"I've heard about that. It's all right, all right."
+
+"Sure thing. Now, where are we going? Are we to stay here all night,
+Handsome?"
+
+"Not quite."
+
+"Tell me what is expected of me, then; where we are going?"
+
+"I am to take you to the chief; to Hobo Harry himself, for he happens
+to be here to-night. It is only once in a while that he is here, too;
+but it happens that he is to-night. He is to interview you.
+Otherwise--that is, if he were not here, you would have to hang around
+on the outside until he showed up to pass upon you in person."
+
+"I see."
+
+"He is the only man in the whole bunch who has a right to do that. I've
+got to blindfold you after we get across the fence on the swamp side of
+the tracks."
+
+"All right."
+
+"I suppose you would like to know what you are up against before I take
+you into the old swamp, wouldn't you?"
+
+"Sure thing, Handsome."
+
+"Well, it's just this: If you don't pass muster with the boss, you'll
+never come out again. There are deep holes in that swamp, Dago."
+
+"Oh, I don't doubt that; but what do you mean by passing muster?"
+
+"I mean just this, and nothing more: If you are not what you appear to
+be, and what you say you are, it's a slit across the windpipe for yours;
+see?"
+
+Nick did see, and he nodded understandingly.
+
+"I reckon I'll pass, all right," he said negligently. "If you are ready,
+I am."
+
+They descended the embankment, and climbed the fence on the swamp side
+of the tracks; and then, as soon as they had penetrated a short
+distance into the wood, Handsome stopped again, and, drawing a huge
+bandanna from his pocket, proceeded to bind it around the detective's
+eyes securely.
+
+"Now," he said, "can you do the lockstep?"
+
+"Never tried it," said Nick.
+
+"Sure about that?"
+
+"Never learned--never had to."
+
+"Well, you'll have to learn it now--unless you wish to fall into the
+swamp. Get up close to me, and take hold of my sides under my arms. Then
+follow in my footsteps as nearly as you can."
+
+"I say, Handsome, you've got some education yourself."
+
+"Never mind that now. We're not going into pasts just at present."
+
+"All right. Lead the way. I'm ready."
+
+Nick's eyes were so securely bandaged that he had not the least idea
+where they were going, or where his footsteps tended; but even had he
+been without the bandage he could hardly have told that, for the deeper
+they penetrated into the swamp, the darker it became, and only those who
+were perfectly familiar with the pathway could pass that way in safety
+in the night.
+
+There were times when Nick's feet slipped from the precarious footing,
+and he slid into the water up to his knees; and once he went in to his
+waist; but Handsome was always ready to seize upon him and support him
+to dry land again at such times.
+
+And their way wound round in a serpentine course. They climbed over
+fallen and moss-grown logs; they slushed through shallow water; they
+crawled on their hands and knees under embankments and rocks, and at
+last, at Handsome's order, they stepped into a boat of some kind which
+the latter pushed away from the bank with a pole.
+
+After that a long time passed while the boat was propelled steadily
+onward with the pole, sometimes gliding under trees that hung so close
+to the water that they were obliged to get flat down inside the scow to
+avoid them; and they wound around many curves and twists, until at last
+they stopped, and Handsome removed the bandage from Nick's eyes.
+
+They were beside a high bank, and directly ahead of them, through the
+trees, the detective could see the lights of many gleaming fires; and he
+could also discern the shadowy forms of men grouped around them, engaged
+in different occupations.
+
+"Now, keep your mouth shut, and your eyes and your ears open," was
+Handsome's warning, as he led the way from the scow, and signed for Nick
+to follow him. "If anybody speaks to you, don't answer; and when you get
+in the presence of the chief, answer questions, and don't ask any."
+
+"Right you are, pardy," was Nick's reply; and then he followed his
+conductor through the trees toward the fire.
+
+They came out presently upon an open glade in which a dozen camp fires
+were burning. At some of these men were engaged in eating; others were
+preparing to eat; and still others had finished their meal, and were
+lying around in various attitudes, smoking. Some were playing cards by
+the light of the fires. Nick judged, in the rapid estimate he made, that
+there were in all at least twoscore of men gathered there.
+
+He saw, too, that around this circular glade there were sheds built, and
+some of these had lights behind the brush or canvas fronts. Two of them
+had board fronts, and he judged that they were used when the weather was
+too inclement, or too cold, to remain in the open.
+
+As they passed through the circle of light cast by the fires, many of
+the men looked up lazily toward them; but beyond one stare, no attention
+was paid to them; and they passed on into the gloom beyond.
+
+Here they traversed a narrow but well-beaten pathway through the thick
+growth of alders, and presently came out upon a second glade that was
+larger than the first; and higher and dryer, too.
+
+But that was not what attracted the detective.
+
+In the very centre of this patch of clearing was a house; or a cottage,
+it would more properly be called; but it was large, and apparently
+comfortable. The roof extended down in front of it and over a wide
+piazza, where Nick could see that two men and a woman were seated.
+
+But directly in front of the piazza, a man--one of the hoboes, without
+doubt, to judge from his appearance--was pacing regularly up and down,
+with the precision of a sentinel; and he carried a rifle in the hollow
+of his arm, which, as soon as Handsome and Nick appeared, he raised and
+pointed at them, while Nick could hear the click of the lock as he
+raised the hammer.
+
+Handsome threw up both hands, holding them high over his head, and Nick
+did the same; and thereupon the gun was lowered, and, still with their
+hands held high, the two men advanced.
+
+There was not a word spoken; the sentinel resumed his pacing up and
+down, as if there had been no interruption; and Nick's guide approached
+the edge of the piazza, still with his hands raised.
+
+One of the men who were seated there rose and stepped forward; then he
+peered long and earnestly at the two men, and then he said:
+
+"You may advance. Go inside."
+
+And as they crossed the piazza, and stepped inside the house, the woman
+of the group rose and followed them, closing the door behind her; and
+Nick Carter wondered if Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, was a woman.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+NICK'S WONDERFUL STRENGTH.
+
+
+When Nick Carter gazed upon the woman who stood before them, with her
+hands clasped behind her, he thought that he had never seen another like
+her. She could not by any stretch of the imagination have been called
+beautiful; she was too masculine in her appearance for that--that is,
+the expression of her face, her manner, and the position she assumed
+were masculine; but the suggestion of it ended there.
+
+She was as tall or taller than the detective, and her complexion was as
+dark as the hue to which he had stained his own. Her eyes were large,
+and round, and full, and fierce, and she held her head, with its crown
+of dead-black hair, as if she were monarch of all she surveyed. And the
+strangest part of it all was that she did not appear to be more than
+twenty years old.
+
+With a steady stare she took in every detail of Nick's appearance, from
+the top of his head to the shoes he wore on his feet; and then she
+turned slowly to Handsome.
+
+"Whom have we here?" she demanded.
+
+"Dago John, he calls himself," was the reply.
+
+"The man you spoke of?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who is so strong that he could throw you over the fire into the bushes,
+and who did not harm you when he might have done so, after you had
+struck at him with your fist?"
+
+"The same."
+
+She turned her attention to Nick then.
+
+"Who are you?" she demanded.
+
+"Just what you see, missus; no more and no less," replied Nick, speaking
+boldly, for he deemed that to be the surest way to her favor.
+
+"I see very little; nothing whatever that betokens the strength you are
+said to possess."
+
+"You can't always tell what's inside of a crib before you crack it," was
+the reply; and the woman smiled.
+
+"Where do you come from?" she asked.
+
+"I ain't giving out my past history, lady, if it's all the same to you,"
+said Nick coolly; and she frowned. Evidently she did not like this
+answer.
+
+"What errand brought you to this part of the country, and finally
+induced you to make your camp in the woods out there?" she asked,
+smiling again.
+
+"I suppose you want the plain truth, lady?"
+
+"Yes," she replied, in an easy tone; "that is, if you put any value on
+your life."
+
+"Well, the truth is this: I have heard, here and there, a good deal
+about a certain person who is known as Hobo Harry, the Beggar King. I
+have heard that he has gathered around him a lot of my kind, and I
+reckoned that maybe he'd give me a show to be one of them. That's what I
+came here for, and that's why I camped out there in the woods."
+
+"And who are the three men who came with you?"
+
+"Nobody came with me. I came alone."
+
+"There were three other men there when Handsome found you? No?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who are they?"
+
+"Handsome can tell you that as well, or better, than I. He did the
+questioning."
+
+"Why do you want to join the forces of Hobo Harry?"
+
+"Because I'm tired of going it alone, and because I have heard that he
+takes good care of his followers."
+
+"What can you do?"
+
+"I can do anything that I am told to, once I have acknowledged a chief."
+
+"That is a good answer. It covers a good deal of ground. Now, who told
+you about Hobo Harry?"
+
+"I have heard about him in a good many places."
+
+"Who told you where to find him?"
+
+"A gun friend of mine, who croaked down in Indianapolis, a month ago or
+more. Jimmy the Sly he was called." (It was true that there had been a
+Jimmy the Sly, who was one of the many of the band who had been arrested
+and imprisoned; and after his release he had gone to Indianapolis, and
+died there, in a hospital. Nick knew this from his interview with the
+railroad president, and therefore he was not afraid to make use of the
+name.)
+
+"So you knew Jimmy the Sly, did you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Describe him to me."
+
+"He was tall and slender, with a pock-marked face, and the longest
+fingers I ever saw; and he had a wart on the side of his nose, and
+a----"
+
+"That will do. That is sufficient. How comes it that Jimmy never
+mentioned you to me?"
+
+"You'll have to ask Jimmy that, I reckon--and you might burn yourself if
+you undertook to do it. I reckon it's hot where Jimmy is, madam."
+
+She smiled at this. Nick could see that he was making a good impression
+upon her. He was still wondering if she were indeed the chief, or if she
+were only his representative. It was certain that he had had no
+expectation of finding a woman in this place.
+
+"And what do you wish me to do with you, now that you are here?"
+
+"I reckon that I'll have to leave that to you. I didn't come with my
+eyes shut. I guessed pretty well what I was up against. But I came here
+to be made one of you, and I hope you will give me a chance."
+
+"What do you know of Hobo Harry?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"What do you think he is?"
+
+"The head gazabo of this bunch."
+
+"What do you suppose he is like?"
+
+"Just at present writing, madam, he looks to me very much like a
+beautiful woman who has the grace of a siren and the courage of a lion."
+
+"You should be a Frenchman instead of an Italian."
+
+"I am neither one nor the other. I'm just a--a yeggman."
+
+"You were about to say something else."
+
+"I was going to say--a crook."
+
+"You have not been a yeggman always, have you?"
+
+"I never knew anybody who had been, madam."
+
+"You are not really a yeggman, or a hobo. Confess the truth now; aren't
+you under cover, and playing the rôle for the purpose of being out of
+sight for a time?"
+
+"I'm willing to say yes, if it pleases you."
+
+"What has been your line of work, Dago?"
+
+"Well, I'm a fair penman; I'm a good mechanic; I could be a passable
+druggist if I tried, and I wouldn't shy at taking a hand at running a
+bank, if it was big enough for the risk."
+
+"I begin to think that you are all right, Dago."
+
+"You can betcher life that I'm all right, madam, if it comes to that.
+But I don't reckon that you'll take me on my say-so. You'll be wanting
+some sort of proof of me before you consent to take me into the fold."
+
+"You are correct about that."
+
+"I'm ready for anything."
+
+"You have told me that you are a penman, which means that you could be a
+forger; you have said that you are a mechanic, which means that you
+could crack a crib if necessary; you called yourself a druggist, which
+means that you know how to use the chemicals, and the poisons, too, if
+necessary; and you would not refuse to tackle a bank job if one should
+come your way. Do you happen to have the mark of blood against you,
+too?"
+
+"I don't suppose there is any mark that I haven't got."
+
+"That doesn't answer my question."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't stay in a house if I wanted to get out when a live man
+stood in my way, if that is what you mean."
+
+The woman turned to Handsome quite suddenly.
+
+"What time do you start?" she asked of him; and he replied, as if the
+question were a continuance of their conversation:
+
+"I ought to start now--inside of ten minutes."
+
+"Very good," she said. "Take Dago with you. Break him in. Let him have
+the worst of it. If he makes good, all right. If he doesn't--shoot him."
+
+"All right," said Handsome cheerfully. "What about the others? There are
+two more out there near the tracks."
+
+"I will attend to them. Go, now. Take this man with you. Give him all
+the rope he needs--but watch him. I'd sooner trust him with you than
+anybody else, anyhow--and I believe he is all right."
+
+"Come!" said Handsome, seizing Nick by the arm; and he pulled him
+through the door after him. But all the way to the door, Nick kept his
+eyes upon the woman, who was looking at him strangely, and with a
+curious smile on her face.
+
+Outside, when they had passed the sentinel, and were again in the part
+which led to the other glade, he stopped.
+
+"Wait a minute, Handsome," he said. "I want to ask you a question."
+
+"There isn't time now, Dago. Save it until later. We must get away from
+here at once. Do you remember where we left the boat?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Go there alone, and wait there for me. I won't be three minutes."
+
+He did not await a reply, but darted off to one side as soon as they
+reached the glade, and Nick saw him disappear inside one of the cabins
+before referred to.
+
+"I am in for it now, to the whole length of the tether," he told
+himself, as he stepped briskly forward toward the place where he knew
+the boat to be; and he was halfway across the glade when suddenly from
+one of the groups of men near a fire, one of them leaped up and
+confronted him, with his hands upon his hips, a cigar pointed at an
+angle in the corner of his mouth, and a leering grin upon his face.
+
+"Where to now, my pal?" he demanded, standing in front of Nick, and thus
+stopping him.
+
+Nick looked at the man, and smiled. He did not answer. He guessed
+instantly why Handsome had left him to find his way to the boat alone.
+This was doubtless one of their tricks--to see what a new recruit would
+do under these circumstances. Possibly, too, he thought, the woman
+wished to see an exhibition of his strength, and they had for that
+purpose pitted one of their best bullies against him.
+
+He surveyed the fellow with a quick and comprehensive glance; and in
+that glance he saw that the man was a burly one, who evidently possessed
+great strength. But Nick did not care for that. He was only turning over
+in his mind in that instant what course it would be best for him to
+pursue. And the answer came to him when the bully repeated the question.
+
+"Where to, pard?" he demanded again, still with the sarcastic leer on
+his dirty face.
+
+"When you get back, I'll tell you!" exclaimed Nick; and at the same
+instant he darted a step forward and seized the man by the
+throat-and-hip hold of ju-jutsu, and the next instant had sent him
+whirling through the air as if he were a cartwheel.
+
+He struck the ground ten feet away, and went rolling over and over among
+the bushes, where there happened to be a mass of cat brier, or creeping
+thorn; and the series of howls and curses he sent up was a wonder.
+
+A roar of laughter from every side proved to Nick that all had been
+watching for the outcome of that episode; but he looked neither to the
+right nor the left, but strode onward toward the boat.
+
+And then he heard a cry of warning from behind him, and he leaped aside
+just as the fellow he had thrown fired a bullet pointblank at him from
+close behind.
+
+As it was, the missile pierced his coat sleeve inside his arm.
+
+As Nick leaped aside he also turned.
+
+The hobo who had fired the shot was already running toward him, and now
+he was endeavoring with every effort in his power to discharge the
+weapon again; but for some reason the mechanism of the lock refused to
+work, and in an instant more Nick had leaped upon him and grasped him a
+second time.
+
+He was determined now that the fellow should have a lesson indeed; so
+while he held him at arm's length with one hand, he pummeled him with
+the other until his face was a mass of bruises; and then, when the
+yeggman was in a condition bordering upon insensibility, Nick raised him
+bodily from his feet, and holding him in his arms, ran with him down
+along the path toward the water.
+
+And reaching the edge of the swamp, he threw him out into the muddy
+water, headfirst.
+
+It was not deep, but it was filled with soft ooze, which filled the
+ears, and eyes, and nose, and mouth of the fellow, so that, when he rose
+to his feet, he was sputtering and spitting, and coughing and swearing
+when he could.
+
+The detective left the man to make his way out of the water to dry land
+as best he could, and turned coolly away to rejoin Handsome, who
+approached at that moment, grinning.
+
+"Well done, Dago," he said. "You served him just right. Come along."
+
+They entered the scow without more words, and Handsome poled it away
+from the shore, and along the waterway through the almost impenetrable
+darkness--but there was never a word said about the use of the
+blindfold.
+
+"How is this?" Nick asked, after a little. "Aren't you going to tie that
+handkerchief over my face again?"
+
+"No. I ought to do it, I suppose, but it's too much trouble. Besides,
+you're all right. I can tell a man when I see one."
+
+"All right," said Nick. "It's your funeral; not mine. Only if the lady
+should raise a kick--what then?"
+
+"She would raise a kick, too, if she knew about it," replied Handsome
+dubiously. "But how is she going to know it? You are not likely to tell
+her, and I won't."
+
+"No," said Nick, "I won't tell her."
+
+"Well, then we'll dispense with the handkerchief."
+
+They poled on in silence for a time after that; but presently Nick
+asked:
+
+"What's the lay to-night, Handsome?"
+
+"I can't tell you that, Dago. You'll have to wait, and find out; and
+you'll have to do your own part, too; for if you flunk by so much as a
+hair, it's my duty to kill you."
+
+"Which I suppose you would do, eh?"
+
+"Sure I'd do it--why not? If you ain't what you seem to be, I'd as soon
+put a hole in you as dip this pole into the water. You hear me!"
+
+"Sure thing."
+
+"And that notwithstanding I like you. I reckon you're all right, and I'm
+going a great way toward proving what I think about it by not binding
+that handkerchief over your eyes now."
+
+"Are there any others in this thing with us, Handsome?"
+
+"You'll find out soon enough. The best way for you is not to ask too
+many questions, but to be satisfied to do as you're told."
+
+They lapsed into silence after that, and there was no more said until
+after they had arrived at the bank where the scow was to be left.
+
+"I suppose I can ask about those other guns that we left in the woods
+to-night, without giving offense, can't I?" asked Nick then.
+
+"That depends on what you want to ask about 'em," was the reply; they
+were now hurrying in the direction of the tracks.
+
+"I want to know if Hobo Harry is going to send for them?"
+
+"Didn't you hear her say so?" was the rejoinder; and then, when Nick
+laughed softly, Handsome turned on him with fury, and would have seized
+him had he not suddenly recalled the fact that his own strength was no
+match for that of the man beside him.
+
+But his anger disappeared as quickly as it came, and he joined in the
+laugh.
+
+"I gave it away that time, didn't I?" he said. "You were too cute for
+me, Dago. But it is dangerous knowledge, Dago. I'll tell you that."
+
+"You didn't give it away," replied Nick. "Any fool would have known that
+the woman was Hobo Harry."
+
+"Then there are a lot of fools in the outfit. You're wrong, Dago. Lots
+of 'em don't suspect it. They think only that she is Hobo Harry's wife,
+or sister, or sweetheart, or something like that. There isn't half a
+dozen of us who really know for certain that Black Madge is Hobo Harry.
+And there! I've let the cat out of the bag again. But you're all right.
+It won't do no harm to tell you."
+
+"Not a mite," replied Nick; but he chuckled noiselessly all the same.
+That last admission made by Handsome was worth hearing.
+
+"Black Madge, eh?" he was thinking to himself. "Now I know why it was
+that there was something so strikingly familiar about the woman. Black
+Madge, eh? Well, well, who would have supposed that?"
+
+For Black Madge was a character well known in the criminal world, and to
+the police, although very little was known about her really. There was a
+picture in the Rogues' Gallery in New York that purported to be of her;
+but Nick knew now that it was not.
+
+Nevertheless, he remembered that once upon a time he had seen Black
+Madge, who was the daughter of a Frenchwoman by an Italian father; Black
+Madge, who had already made an unenviable record for herself on both
+sides of the ocean.
+
+It was a long time before that when Nick Carter saw her. She was only a
+grown-up child at that time, but she was already a hardened criminal,
+nevertheless; and he recalled now the circumstance of his meeting with
+her.
+
+It was in Paris. He had gone to the prefecture of police to see the
+chief of the secret service, who was awaiting him, and had found the
+girl in the room with the chief, who was engaged in questioning her
+closely in reference to a crime that had been committed, and because it
+was thought that she knew the parties concerned. But she had given no
+information, and had been allowed to go; and after her departure the
+chief had said to Nick:
+
+"Monsieur Carter, some day that young woman will appear on your side of
+the water. I hope you thought to take a good look at her face."
+
+"I did," replied the detective.
+
+"Remember it, for some day you will have cause to do so, I do not doubt.
+She is a terror, and she has brains. The worst kind of a criminal. She
+should have been a man, for she has a man's daring, a man's
+recklessness, and a man's way of doing things. Black Madge, we call her
+here."
+
+Nick recalled all that conversation now, plunged into a reverie about it
+by Handsome's use of the name. All the time he had been in the room with
+her in that house in the swamp, he had felt that he ought to remember
+where he had seen those eyes before. Now, he counted the years that had
+passed since he saw her, and, to his astonishment, they were five.
+
+"She was seventeen then, the chief told me," he thought, "that would
+make her twenty-two by now."
+
+And then it came back to him how strangely she had looked at him while
+he was leaving her presence, and he wondered if her recollection for
+faces was as good or even better than his own.
+
+"But," he argued, "it could not be possible that she would remember me
+from that one short glance she must have had of me at that time. And,
+besides, I was not disguised at all, and now I look no more like myself
+than--well, than she does."
+
+"What the devil are you so silent about?" demanded Handsome. They had
+reached the fence at the railroad track, and Handsome was leaning
+against it.
+
+"I was trying to figure out in my mind what sort of a lay we are on
+to-night," replied Nick. "I'm not used to starting out without knowing
+where I am going. I feel like a horse--with you for a driver."
+
+"Well"--Handsome laughed--"I won't use the whip unless you get
+skittish."
+
+"What are we waiting here for?"
+
+"We are waiting for our chauffeur with the automobile," grinned
+Handsome. "Nice road for an auto, isn't it?--bumping over those ties."
+
+"Hark!" said Nick.
+
+"I'm harking, my gun."
+
+"It does sound like an automobile, sure enough," said Nick.
+
+"Didn't I tell you that we are waiting for one. Come on."
+
+He leaped the fence, and Nick followed him over; then they climbed the
+grade, and paused beside the track.
+
+And then, while they stood there, and the droning sound peculiar to
+automobiles came momentarily nearer and nearer, the detective began
+thoroughly to realize for the fist time that something really serious
+was afoot for the night.
+
+But he was not long left in doubt as to the character of the approaching
+vehicle, for in a moment more it swept around a curve in the railroad,
+and came to a stop immediately in front of them.
+
+And, strangely enough, it was an automobile arrangement, only that it
+was equipped with car wheels instead of with rubber tires; wheels that
+had flanges to fit the tracks. But it was provided with a gasoline
+engine, and Nick knew from the appearance of the apparatus that it was
+capable of great speed.
+
+When it came to a stop Nick saw that it already contained two men, one
+of whom was driving; but he got down from the seat under the steering
+wheel, and climbed into the rear of the machine, while Handsome took his
+place.
+
+"New man; Dago for a handle," said Handsome briefly, by way of
+introducing Nick to the others. What their names might be he evidently
+did not deem it important to mention.
+
+"Try-out?" asked one of the men, while Nick was climbing into the box of
+the machine.
+
+Handsome nodded curtly--and that was all that was said at the moment.
+
+It was significant, however, to Nick, for it meant a lot. It meant that
+these other men entirely comprehended the situation, and that all three
+of them were prepared to shoot him in the back at any moment when his
+conduct of the business in hand did not entirely satisfy them.
+
+But Nick was resolved not to be shot in the back that night. Whatever
+the business might prove to be upon which they were engaged, he was
+resolved to see it through to a finish, even to the extent of helping
+them burglarize a bank, if that was the lay.
+
+"To do a great right, do a little wrong," he muttered to himself.
+Whatever might be stolen or whatever damage might be done that night, he
+would charge up in his expenses, and see to it that the railroad people
+made it good later on, when his work should be done.
+
+In the meantime the railroad automobile had been gathering speed, and
+now it seemed to Nick to be little less than wonderful that it remained
+on the tracks at all, for if he was any judge of speed, he knew that
+they must be flying along at much more than a mile a minute--and he
+wondered what would happen if the headlight of a locomotive should loom
+suddenly before them--and then, just as the thought occurred to him,
+they rounded a short curve, and came to a sudden stop.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK.
+
+
+The instant the strange machine was brought to a stop--and it was done
+wonderfully soon, considering the speed at which they had been
+traveling--the three men leaped to the ground beside the track, and Nick
+was ordered to follow them.
+
+He did so, and then he was told to bear a hand; and, following
+directions that were given him, he seized hold of the boxlike tonneau.
+
+Almost in a twinkling of time after that the machine was lifted from the
+track in sections, and finally, still in sections, was carried to a
+highway near at hand, where it was put together again, minus the iron
+wheels. But there were other wheels concealed in that commodious body,
+and these were quickly taken out and adjusted.
+
+Within twenty minutes of the time when they came to a stop on the track,
+after rounding the curve, the machine was fitted with regular automobile
+wheels, and was ready to proceed along the highway.
+
+Nick saw in this arrangement much that had puzzled other men who had
+been on the job. He had no doubt from what he knew of automobiles that
+this machine was capable of sixty miles an hour, or even more than
+that, on the highway; and, if that was true, it, of course, could make a
+half greater speed than that on rails.
+
+But he made no comment. That was not expected of him, and would have
+been resented had he attempted to do so; but he climbed to his place
+when he was told, and again they sped away toward some destination, the
+nature of which he did not know.
+
+Once he ventured to ask the man nearest him what time it was, and
+received a curt "Shut up!" by way of reply; so he remained silent after
+that.
+
+And after a while--less than half an hour--they drove into a village,
+and presently ran the machine around behind a church, where it was
+placed in one of the stalls of a shed.
+
+And still his three companions worked in utter silence. Beyond now and
+then a curt word uttered by Handsome, who seemed to be in command of the
+expedition, nothing at all was said.
+
+Nevertheless, each man there seemed to know exactly what to do; as if
+every move they made had been nicely planned out for them--and such Nick
+believed to be the case.
+
+When the machine was stored away, the men fell into line, Nick being
+shoved into position directly behind Handsome, and then, in Indian file,
+they moved silently forward toward a high fence that was near at hand.
+
+They went over this one by one, Handsome waiting with patience until the
+last one was over, and then the march was taken up again.
+
+They passed now through the rear of a large yard, and before them loomed
+a brick building, which Nick figured must be a courthouse; and after a
+moment they made a half circuit around, and came to a stop between two
+buildings of brick, one of them being that one already mentioned.
+
+The night was dark now, for the moon had gone down, and there were no
+street lamps in that village evidently; or, if there were, they were not
+burned on nights when there was supposed to be a moon.
+
+But there was light enough for Nick to discover that they were close to
+the main street of the village; he could see the store windows on the
+opposite side; and it suddenly came to him that the building that was
+next to them--the second one--was a bank, and that they were about to
+rob it.
+
+He knew now what was expected of him; and again he determined to see the
+thing through to the end.
+
+It was not to prevent one robbery that he was engaged; but to prevent
+many. It was not to apprehend the participants in a minor job like this
+one promised to be, but to capture the head that directed many such
+robberies, and so stop them altogether.
+
+And still no word--not even a whisper--was spoken between the men. They
+worked on in utter silence, as if their plans had been thoroughly
+conned until they were learned absolutely by heart.
+
+Nor did they pause in the yard next to the bank. There was scarcely a
+halt there; but they passed to the rear of the building, and followed
+one another over the high fence that was there, to the rear of the bank
+building.
+
+Keeping themselves well in the shadows, they crept forward silently to a
+rear door of the building, and here Handsome paused for a moment, and
+put down a canvas bag that he had been carrying all the way; and now he
+whispered in Nick's ear:
+
+"There are the tools, Dago. Let's see what kind of a cracksman you are."
+
+Nick did not need a second bidding. Having determined upon his course,
+he did not hesitate, but he seized the bag, pulled open the mouth of it,
+and, having selected such tools as he wanted, he applied himself to the
+task that had been set for him.
+
+A professional burglar of long experience could not have gotten that
+huge oak door open more quickly and silently than Nick Carter did, and
+Handsome gave him an approving pat on the shoulder.
+
+He was the first to enter the bank, Nick following, and the others
+coming behind them; and presently, after forcing another door, they
+stood crouching inside the bank itself.
+
+A dim light burned in a gas jet in the centre of the large room, which
+was divided only by the wire screen which separated the customers' side
+of the rail from the clerks; and almost beneath the light, exactly where
+it could shine full upon the steel doors, was the huge safe of the
+institution.
+
+A person might not stand in front of that safe for a moment without
+being in full view from the street should any one happen to pass there.
+Nick saw that at a glance; but nevertheless Handsome silently placed a
+drill and a bottle of liquid in his hand, and motioned that he was to
+begin the dangerous part of the work.
+
+"Didn't you bring a screen with you, you chump?" demanded Nick, in a
+whisper. "If you had told me what the lay was, I'd have made one."
+
+Handsome nodded, evidently well pleased; and at the same time he
+produced a roll from under his coat, and gave it to the detective. Nick
+unrolled it, and found that it was merely a piece of burlap, rather more
+than a yard long, and about two feet in width, and with a roll of cord
+attached to each corner of it.
+
+He knew what that was intended for readily enough, and, taking it in his
+hands, he crept forward without another word, and quickly attached the
+four strings to objects which he selected as being situated about right
+for his purposes.
+
+In two minutes the screen was in place, and it afforded a perfect
+shelter from view from the street, and just the sort of one that would
+never be noticed from the outside at all, unless a person stopped at
+the window and deliberately peered inside--and that nobody was likely to
+do, unless something else first attracted attention.
+
+In fixing the screen in place so quickly and perfectly, Nick evidently
+won over not only Handsome, but the others; and now there was no more
+question of his doing the drilling alone. Each man took his own part of
+the work in silence, as if Nick had always been one of them; and,
+besides, now there was no time to be lost.
+
+Drilling through the steel doors of a safe is not an easy task, and it
+is not done quickly, although expert burglars carry tools these days
+which will cut anything.
+
+They took their turns at the drill, as they took them also with the
+acids and oil; and the work went on merrily until the holes were ready
+for the charges.
+
+And here again it seemed that Handsome was determined to try Nick out to
+the last, for he bent forward and whispered in his ear:
+
+"Prove one thing more, Dago, and you're made."
+
+"Want me to do the blowing?" asked Nick.
+
+Handsome nodded.
+
+"All right," said Nick. "Light out, then."
+
+"But----"
+
+"Get out, I say. If I do the blowing I'm boss for the time being. Git!"
+
+They did; and again, with the implements and the explosives at hand,
+Nick went to work; and, as before he worked rapidly and well--as if he
+were an experienced hand at that sort of employment.
+
+And then, when the charge was ready, Nick pulled up the heavy rope
+matting from the floor, and after doubling it again and again until
+there was a huge wad of it, he braced it with desks and chairs against
+the front of the safe; and when all that was done to his satisfaction,
+he lighted the fuse, and ran back to the rear hallway, where the others
+were watching and waiting.
+
+They had not long to wait after that. There was a lapse of perhaps a
+minute and a half, and then a dull, booming roar shook the building, and
+the burglars rushed forward.
+
+Now was the time when they were compelled to work rapidly, if ever.
+
+It was true that Nick had so muffled the sound of the explosion that it
+was hardly possible that the noise of it had roused anybody at all; but
+there was always a chance of somebody near at hand being wakeful or
+watchful.
+
+At any moment they might be interrupted--and no burglar likes to be
+interrupted. It always means a fight, in which somebody is likely to get
+killed, and burglars rarely do any killing unless they have to in order
+to escape.
+
+They rushed forward together; but now Nick purposely kept in the
+background. He had no idea of being taken himself if they should be
+interrupted; nor did he wish to give his companions an opportunity to
+kill any person who might interrupt them. It was all right from his
+standpoint to participate in the burglary, in order that he might
+ultimately catch all the thieves; but he did not wish to be a party to
+any fight that might come of it.
+
+But he was made to hold one of the bags while Handsome filled it from
+the inside of the safe.
+
+They pried open the inner compartments, and threw them indiscriminately
+upon the floor as soon as they were emptied; they jimmied open the steel
+boxes as readily as if they had been made of softest pine--and in twenty
+minutes after the explosion they were stealthily climbing the fence
+again, into the courthouse yard.
+
+And, so far as they could see, not a soul in the village had been
+awakened or alarmed.
+
+They returned to the shed, where they had left the automobile, by the
+same route they had covered in approaching the bank; the machine was
+backed out; they entered it, turned on the power, and sped away through
+the silent streets as they had come, with nobody the wiser for what they
+had done, the havoc they had wrought, and the wealth they had stolen.
+
+Down beside the road where they had made the change before, from the
+track of the railway to the highway, they paused long enough to secure
+the iron wheels, and here the change was made back to a railway machine.
+The car was lifted in sections to the tracks, and with everything
+adjusted they were soon flying down the shining rails at a frightful
+rate of speed, and in silence--for it seemed to be a rule among these
+men that there should be no talking.
+
+Mile after mile they covered in this way, and then the machine was
+slowed down, and came to a stop at the point where it had picked up
+Handsome and Nick at first, and here they got down, and, having taken
+out the plunder, stood beside the track until the machine had
+disappeared from view.
+
+"Now, Dago, help me with the swag," said Handsome; and together they
+picked it up, and once more started for the outlaws' retreat in the
+middle of the impassable swamp.
+
+When they were in the boat, and almost ready to land where Nick had
+thrown the man into the water, Handsome turned to him, and whispered:
+
+"You're all right, Dago. I'll tell Madge so, too!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT.
+
+
+When Nick Carter was shown a place to sleep that night--or, rather, that
+morning, for it was well toward daylight by the time Handsome and he
+returned to the outlaws' camp--he tumbled upon the bunk that was shown
+him, and he lost no time in doing so; nor did he open his eyes again
+until he felt a hand shaking him lustily, and a voice crying out to him:
+
+"Wake up, Dago! You're wanted!"
+
+He sprang up instantly; and, because he had laid himself down with
+nearly all his clothing still upon his person, he was not long in making
+himself ready. To have insulted the profession he had adopted by washing
+his face was not to be thought of.
+
+"Gee! But I'm hungry!" he said to Handsome, who was standing near,
+waiting for him.
+
+"Madge will give you something to eat. She is at her breakfast now," was
+the whispered reply. "She wants you."
+
+"Then," said Nick, "if I am going into the presence of a lady, and am
+expected to eat with her, I'll have to wash my face and hands. Show me
+where."
+
+Handsome laughed.
+
+"I do it myself once in a while," he said. "Come with me."
+
+And he led Nick to a place along a path through the swamp where he
+succeeded in giving himself a good wash--for Nick had the satisfaction
+of knowing that the stain he had used was of such a quality that it
+would defy water. Alcohol alone would remove it.
+
+They found Madge on the doorstep, awaiting them; but Handsome paused at
+the edge of the clearing, and muttered:
+
+"I leave you here, Dago. I'm not in this. You're to have this interview
+alone."
+
+"All right," replied the detective, and was about to move on, when
+Handsome detained him by a gesture.
+
+"Put in a good word for me, Dago, if you get the chance," he whispered.
+"I have already said many a good one for you--and I made it as easy for
+you as I could all around."
+
+"All right," said Nick again.
+
+"And one more word, Dago. I forgot to tell you----"
+
+"What?"
+
+"Cremation Mike has got it in----"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Cremation Mike--he worked in a crematory once--has got it in for you.
+He's the chap you chucked into the soup, you know. He sneaked away after
+you left last night, so I'm told, and he swore black and blue that he
+would have your life for that act. He will, too. He's sure bad medicine,
+that fellow. He's a bad member, too. I just thought I'd give you the
+pointer."
+
+Handsome turned away then, and Nick went on alone to the piazza, where
+Black Madge was awaiting him.
+
+He stopped just before he put his foot upon the veranda, and waited for
+her to make some sign; and she approached quite near to him, looking him
+straight in the eyes.
+
+"Good morning, Dago," she said, smiling.
+
+"Good morning, madam," he replied gravely.
+
+"You look quite like a gentleman this morning," she continued, laughing
+lightly. "Or, no, rather like a mountain bandit of Italy."
+
+"I could be either if I chose," he replied again, as gravely as he had
+spoken before.
+
+"I do not doubt it. I have been giving you considerable thought since I
+talked with you here last night. Come inside. You haven't had your
+breakfast, I suppose?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"Then you shall breakfast with me. I was about to eat mine when I
+remembered you, and sent for you."
+
+"Madam is most kind."
+
+She led the way into the house, where a table was spread with good
+things, well cooked, too, they appeared to be; and she pointed toward a
+chair at the opposite side of the table.
+
+"Sit there," she said. "I declare, we are quite domestic."
+
+"So it would appear, madam. I am afraid that you are doing me too much
+honor, for one who has been so short a time among you."
+
+"Bah! I am glad to have somebody who can talk decently near me. I tire
+of all these ragamuffins who are my men. Sometimes I kill one of them
+just for the mere fun of ridding myself of the vermin."
+
+"Madam is incautious, perhaps."
+
+"Why so?"
+
+"Some day one of them might take it into his head to kill madam."
+
+"Then somebody will have to be mighty quick about it. I'm not so easily
+killed as all that. Tell me--have you guessed who I am?"
+
+"I am not a good guesser, madam."
+
+"On the contrary, I should suppose you to be a good one--an
+exceptionally good one. Answer me: Have you guessed who I am?"
+
+"I might make a guess now, madam."
+
+"Oh, drop that madam. I don't want you to madam me all the time. Who do
+you suppose I am?"
+
+"If I am to make a guess, I should suppose that you are that
+distinguished and elusive person whom the outside world refers to as
+Hobo Harry."
+
+She laughed long and heartily, stirring her coffee vigorously the while.
+
+"Upon my word, you are a good one," she said, still with laughter in her
+voice. "Yes, I am that distinguished and elusive person. There is no
+doubt about that. I have spent a long time in bringing this organization
+to perfection, Dago. What do you think of it?"
+
+"I think it is a wonder."
+
+"Right you are, my man! It is a wonder. For example, what did you think
+of the operation that was performed last night?"
+
+"I thought it was carried out very perfectly. The men must have been a
+long time in laying their plans."
+
+She laughed again.
+
+"Not one of those men--not even Handsome--had ever seen that place
+before. They only obeyed my orders; nothing more. I made the plans
+myself. I told them exactly what to do, and when, and how to do it. It
+is all a question of mathematics, and of obeying orders."
+
+"It was perfectly done, madam."
+
+"There you go again. By the way, Handsome gives me an excellent report
+of you."
+
+"I had supposed as much, else I would not be here breakfasting with
+you."
+
+"That is not why I sent for you; that has nothing to do with last
+night."
+
+"No?"
+
+"I want you to tell me where I have seen you before--and where you have
+met me before," she said swiftly, and with a sudden and dangerous
+narrowing of her eyes.
+
+If Nick had not had himself perfectly in hand he must have given a start
+then that would have betrayed him; as it was, he answered instantly, and
+as if the subject had also occurred to him:
+
+"For the life of me, madam, I cannot remember. I have tried to recall
+the time and place ever since I saw you last night; but it eludes me. I
+cannot tell."
+
+"It is well that you have answered as you have," she said, with a
+threatening cadence in her voice.
+
+"Why so, madam?"
+
+"Because I saw plainly in your eyes last night that you remembered to
+have seen me somewhere before that time. Had you denied it, you would
+have lied to me; and it is not healthy for people to tell me lies."
+
+"I can imagine that, madam. But since I have no reason to do so----"
+
+"Tell me what there is about me that is familiar to you, Dago."
+
+"It must be your great beauty that I remem----"
+
+"That will be about enough of that, thank you," she interrupted him
+coldly. "I know all about my beauty, and don't in the least need to be
+told about it."
+
+"One could not very well remember you at all without remembering your
+beauty," insisted Nick boldly. "It is the first thing about you that
+strikes one; and the second is----"
+
+"Well--what? Possibly I will be more interested in that."
+
+"The fear you inspire, I think. You have what the French call a 'way'
+about you."
+
+She started perceptibly.
+
+"What do you know about the French?" she demanded; and Nick saw
+instantly that he had made a mistake in reminding her of her career in
+Paris. Now it was possible that she might recall where she had seen him.
+
+But he dismissed the idea as soon as it came to him, for he remembered
+again how perfectly he was disguised, and how impossible it should be
+for her to remember him after all these years, through the disguise.
+
+But now she was looking steadily at him, and for the moment she had
+forgotten to eat.
+
+"Who are you, Dago?" she demanded suddenly. "You are not what you seem."
+
+"Few of us are," returned the detective evasively.
+
+"Who are you?"
+
+"I have told you, madam, as much as it is possible to tell. You do not
+demand the past records of your followers. All that you insist upon is
+that they shall be faithful in the future."
+
+"Who are you?" she repeated again.
+
+"I am Dago John, madam, at your service."
+
+"But you have another name than Dago John."
+
+"I had another--once."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"Madam does not suppose, when she asks the question, that it will be
+answered, does she?" Nick inquired boldly.
+
+"By Heaven, sir, do you dare to defy me?"
+
+"Not at all. I merely feel sure that madam asked the question as a joke,
+knowing that it could not be answered."
+
+For a moment it seemed as if she did not know whether to be angry at him
+for his cool effrontery, or to laugh the matter off entirely, in
+admiration of his bravery. She decided upon the latter course evidently,
+for she did laugh--in a way that was not quite pleasant to hear,
+however; and she said:
+
+"Try to think where you have seen me before. Help me to remember. I want
+to recall it."
+
+"It is impossible, madam. I have already tried."
+
+"Is the memory that is associated with me pleasant or otherwise?"
+
+"It could not be but pleasant, since it was--you," he ventured; and she
+frowned. It was plain that she did not relish such compliments.
+
+And now she sat with her eyes fixed upon him, idly stirring her second
+cup of coffee, and seeming to look him through and through, while she
+cast her memory back over the storms of her life, not yet more than
+twenty-three years, all told, and attempted with all her strength of
+will to call up for recognition the ghost which his appearance had
+conjured.
+
+After a little she leaned forward, nearer to him, and her eyes, coal
+black, and blazing, fairly burned into his own; but he held his gaze
+steadily upon her, never once flinching from the scrutiny.
+
+And then, so suddenly that it startled him, she leaped to her feet,
+knocking her coffee to the floor, and she stood over him--but whether in
+anger or only in astonishment that she had remembered, he could not have
+told.
+
+"By all the gods!" she cried out. "I remember you now. It is your eyes
+that have haunted me, and now I remember where I have seen them. I
+remember. It was in Paris. It was at the prefecture of police. I was
+there. I was only a girl. I had just finished with the chief when you
+entered the room. I did not notice your name when it was announced, but
+now I remember you--at the prefecture of police in Paris! Tell me--tell
+me, I say, what you were doing there!"
+
+The detective knew that it would be folly to deny the charge that she
+made. He knew that she remembered now, perfectly well, and that nothing
+could disabuse her mind of the determination it had reached.
+
+Acting upon the impulse of the instant, therefore, and determined now to
+play out his rôle as it should appear, Nick pretended instantly to be as
+greatly astonished as she was at the recollection, and the strangeness
+of it.
+
+He, too, leaped to his feet, imitating an astonishment as great as her
+own. He did not tip over his coffee, but he did manage to upset his
+chair, so that it fell backward on the floor; and then for the space of
+a moment they stood staring into each other's eyes, both--from all
+appearances--speechless with astonishment.
+
+And then, very slowly, she subsided into her chair again, still keeping
+her eyes upon him, and still evidently taxing her memory to the utmost
+to recall all the incidents of that meeting at the prefecture in Paris.
+
+"I remember now," she murmured at last, more to herself than to him. "It
+all comes back to me, bit by bit. Monsieur Goron was chief at the
+time--no? Yes. I remember. There had been a sudden death in the house
+where I lived--it was on the floor just beneath me--and Goron sent for
+me to question me about it. It was thought at first that Lucie had been
+murdered, and Goron thought that perhaps I would know about it. He had
+just finished questioning me when you entered the room--ah!"
+
+Her eyes blazed with a sudden fire of anger, and her lips tightened over
+her teeth.
+
+"When you entered the room Goron rose and shook hands with you. Why did
+he do that? Goron did not shake hands with criminals!"
+
+"Nor with his police spies, did he?" asked Nick, smiling and shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+"But why did he shake hands with you?"
+
+"Because we were old acquaintances, madam."
+
+"And he called you by name. What was that name?"
+
+"Madam, for some time past I have deemed it best to forget it."
+
+"Nevertheless you shall remember it now."
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders, and did not reply.
+
+"What was that name?" she demanded again.
+
+"I have told madam that I----"
+
+She started from her chair, and ran across the room so suddenly that
+Nick was interrupted in what he was about to say; and she seized a rope
+that hung from the ceiling and stood with her hand upon it, grasping it.
+
+"If I pull this rope," she said coldly, "as many of my followers as hear
+it will rush to this place. You know what is likely to happen then if I
+loose them upon you. They are all like wild beasts, or like dogs, ready
+to tear each other at the slightest provocation. If I should point my
+finger at you--so--and say to them, 'Take him; he is yours,' your life
+would not be worth as much as the dregs in your coffee cup. Tell me,
+what that name was, or I will summon the men."
+
+The detective shrugged his shoulders, and leaned back in his chair,
+smiling.
+
+"It would be a foolish and a useless proceeding," he said calmly. "I
+should not tell them that name any more than I tell it to you. I will
+not tell it. It is of no moment here. It could do you no good to hear
+it, and to mention it might do me harm; therefore, I shall not mention
+it, no matter how often you order me to do so. It pains me to disobey
+you, madam, but you force me into the alternative, and I have no choice.
+Pull the rope if you will."
+
+Instead of pulling it, she released it, still staring at him, and she
+returned slowly to her chair.
+
+"You are a strange man," she murmured, "and a brave one. There is not
+another who would dare to defy me as you have done."
+
+"Perhaps there is not another who has so much at stake," he replied
+quietly, but with perfect truth, as the reader knows.
+
+Again she knit her brows in perplexity; again the detective knew that
+she was concentrating her mind upon that incident at the prefecture,
+trying with all her power to recall the merest detail of it.
+
+Nick remembered that his name had been mentioned aloud at that time; he
+recalled the fact that Goron, in rising to shake hands with him, had
+called him by name plainly enough. It was evident that she also
+remembered that much of the facts, and was now straining every energy
+she possessed to recall what that name was.
+
+And while she thought so deeply, her face gradually assumed an
+expressionless cast. She closed her lips firmly together. Her eyes
+became sombre. She seemed oblivious of his presence, and of her
+surroundings. For the moment she was back again in Paris, at the
+prefecture, in the presence of Goron, five years ago.
+
+After a little, without another change of expression, she shrugged her
+shoulders, and rose from her chair, and then, with an assumption of
+carelessness, she passed from the room upon the piazza, saying as she
+went:
+
+"Come. We will not bother any more about this for the present. We will
+take up the subject again another time, after we have both had
+opportunity to think it over. If you care for a cigar, Dago, there are
+some in that cupboard yonder. Help yourself."
+
+Now, it happened that Nick did care for a cigar. He had not had one in
+many a day, but had forced himself to be content with an old pipe. The
+prospect of a cigar was enticing, and so he took her at her word, and
+helped himself--turning his back to her as he did so, and so he did not
+see the strange smile which crossed her face as she passed through the
+door upon the piazza.
+
+He was a bit puzzled by this sudden change in her attitude and manner.
+He could not exactly account for it. Had she remembered? He could not
+tell.
+
+He realized, however, that he was in a predicament--that his position
+was precarious; for if she should remember--if she should recall the
+name of Nick Carter as connected with that incident, he knew that his
+own life would not be worth the snap of a finger, no matter how bravely
+he might fight, or how many of the foe he should overcome in the contest
+that would inevitably follow.
+
+For, scattered about in that stronghold in the swamp, there were no less
+than a hundred of her followers, and there was not one among them who
+would not kill at her bidding.
+
+She was standing upon the piazza, looking away through the woods, when
+he came out, and, without turning her head, she said to him:
+
+"Take that chair, and remain there until you have smoked your cigar. The
+men might take it into their heads to be jealous if you should go among
+them with it, and they should know that you, a new arrival, had
+breakfasted with me. I will return in a moment."
+
+She left him then, entering the house; and with no thought of immediate
+danger in his mind, Nick followed her suggestion, and leaned back in the
+chair, tilting it against the house, determined to enjoy that smoke to
+the utmost.
+
+After that it was difficult to tell exactly what did happen.
+
+He remembered afterward that he smoked on in enjoyment of the cigar for
+some minutes, and that he thought it somewhat rank, notwithstanding the
+fact that it had the appearance of being of excellent quality.
+
+And then suddenly the cigar flashed, exactly as if there had been three
+or four grains of gunpowder wrapped in it--and he was instantly
+conscious of an intensely bitter taste in his mouth.
+
+And then it seemed to him almost as if somebody had struck him, so
+strange were his sensations--and from that instant memory left him
+entirely.
+
+The woman had been watching him narrowly from the doorway; she was
+waiting for that flash from the end of his cigar, and when it came she
+passed out through the door swiftly, and caught him as he was about to
+fall from his chair to the floor of the piazza; caught him, and held
+him, and then deftly raised him to his feet, and half carried him inside
+the house before anybody--had a person been observant of the
+scene--could have realized that anything was wrong.
+
+She possessed great strength, this remarkable woman; for the instant she
+was inside the door, heavy as he was, she raised him in her arms, and
+carried him into an adjoining room, where she closed the door behind
+her, and deposited him upon a couch.
+
+And then, still working with great rapidity, she pulled aside a rug that
+was on the floor, and, having lifted a trapdoor, she again took him in
+her arms, and descended through the opening in the floor to the depths
+beneath it.
+
+After a little she reappeared, and this time there was a grim smile upon
+her face, while she replaced the rug over the trapdoor, and otherwise
+rendered the room the same as it had been before the incident happened.
+
+She passed coolly out upon the piazza, and for a time strode up and down
+it in deep thought; but at last she raised her head quickly, and called
+sharply to the sentinel who was pacing up and down in front of the
+cottage.
+
+"Send Handsome to me!" she ordered; and then she continued her pacing
+until Handsome appeared.
+
+Handsome belied his name terribly in the light of day, for an
+uglier-looking chap could not be imagined; and yet, withal, there was a
+gleam of humor in his eyes and at the corners of his mouth. She turned
+to him abruptly.
+
+"Where are the others of that bunch who were found with Dago?" she asked
+sharply.
+
+"Yonder," replied Handsome, jerking his thumb over his shoulder toward
+the glade beyond them.
+
+"What do you think about them, Handsome?" she asked again.
+
+"I haven't thought much about them," he replied. "They are about the
+usual sort, I believe; no better and perhaps no worse."
+
+"I am not so sure of that."
+
+"No?" he asked, vaguely surprised.
+
+"Handsome, I want you to take them, one by one, to the pool in the
+woods, strip them, and scrub them with soap, and water, and sand, if
+necessary. I want you to make sure that there is no suggestion of
+disguise about any of the three. Do it at once--and when it is done, no
+matter whether there is a question of disguise about any of them or not,
+bring them to me."
+
+Handsome departed without a word. It was plain that Black Madge was
+accustomed to obedience. It was plain also that her suspicions were
+thoroughly aroused; for now she paced up and down again restlessly, and
+continued so to pace until almost an hour later Handsome stood before
+her again.
+
+"Well?" she demanded.
+
+"Two of them were plainly disguised," he replied.
+
+"And the other?" she demanded, frowning.
+
+"The other, as plainly was not disguised."
+
+"And the two who were disguised--what of them?"
+
+"I cannot tell if they are known to each other. I cannot tell whether
+they are spies or not, only it is quite likely that they are."
+
+"And the third one? The one who wore no disguise?"
+
+"I think he is all right. He is the one called Pat. When he realized
+that the others who had been with him were in disguise, he flew at one
+of them, thinking that he had been followed himself, and I think would
+have killed the fellow if I had not been there to prevent it."
+
+Madge listened, with a shrug of her shoulders; then she said briefly:
+
+"Bring them here, Handsome. Bring the two who were disguised, first.
+Leave the other one alone until I send for him. What are the supposed
+names of these two?"
+
+"One is called Tenstrike, and the other calls himself the Chicago
+Chicken."
+
+"The Chicago Chicken," she said slowly. "Chick, for short, is it not? I
+think we are on the right track, Handsome. Bring that one here
+alone--first."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.
+
+
+Chick had committed the folly of not being entirely thorough in the
+creation of his disguise; so also had Ten-Ichi; and the soap and
+scrubbing brushes, as employed by Handsome, had done the work of
+removing it.
+
+But Patsy? Well, it had not been necessary for Patsy to be quite so
+thorough, for his own particular person and features were sufficient
+disguise, with a few minor alterations and additions.
+
+For instance, at the risk of not having it wear off soon enough to suit
+his purposes, he had gone to a professional hair dyer, and had ordered
+his shock of hair indelibly dyed to a dirty brick-red; and he had put
+spots on his face, and the back of his hands, with nitrate of silver, so
+that the spots burned into the skin. No soap and water could remove
+these. They would only disappear with time; but Patsy had never traveled
+on a reputation for beauty, and he did not give the matter a thought
+beyond the immediate necessities.
+
+He had taken another precaution, also, just before he entered the woods
+to go to the place of meeting. He had stripped himself in a secluded
+place near the railway tracks, and he had rolled himself in the coal
+dust around the track, griming the dirt into his body, so that when it
+came to the time that Handsome stripped him--well, it can be imagined
+how he looked.
+
+A little snuff rubbed thoroughly against his teeth had rendered them
+sufficiently discolored, and altogether he so thoroughly looked his part
+that Handsome, when he stripped him, had not the slightest doubt of his
+reality.
+
+But the frauds connected with Chick and Ten-Ichi were easily detected.
+
+Black Madge, while still seated at the table with the detective, had
+suddenly recalled the name that had long ago been mentioned in her
+presence by the chief of the Paris police. It had come to her in a flash
+that the name was Nick Carter--and that this man who was so calmly
+seated in her presence was Nick Carter.
+
+Madge knew a great deal more about Nick Carter than Nick supposed she
+did; she knew all about his household, and about his assistants. She
+knew their names as well as if they were followers of her own--and when
+Handsome, in mentioning the names of the other men, had talked about
+Tenstrike and the Chicken, she had connected the names at once.
+
+As for the other one--Pat--that had a significance also; but Pat is a
+very common name, and she did not do herself the honor to suppose that
+Nick Carter would bring all three of his assistants into the woods with
+him in search of her. One, she thought, would have to be left behind to
+look after the business, and, therefore, she was all the more ready to
+believe that Patsy, since he was not in disguise, was one of her own
+kind, who had inadvertently fallen into the company of the detectives.
+
+Handsome and four other men accompanied Chick to the cottage, and when
+he stood before Madge she looked him over from head to foot with cold
+scorn.
+
+"So," she said venomously, "you thought to deceive me, did you--you and
+your master?"
+
+Chick made no reply, and, after a moment, she went on:
+
+"We have a way of ridding ourselves of such men as you are, when they
+come among us. It is not pleasant for them, but it serves as a lesson to
+others. Step inside the house. Take him inside, Handsome. Let the others
+wait out here, and if there is the slightest sound of a row inside the
+house let them enter it at once."
+
+When the three were in the room together, she said to Chick:
+
+"You observe that I know who you are?"
+
+Chick nodded--and he also smiled.
+
+She stamped her foot upon the floor under her, and continued:
+
+"Down there, beneath us, unconscious and chained to the wall, is Nick
+Carter. Even Handsome did not know that till now. He did not know that
+Dago John, who went with him last night to rob the bank, was no other
+than Nick Carter. But it is true, Handsome."
+
+"Gee!" breathed Handsome, his fingers twitching.
+
+"He is all right now, Handsome. He cannot hurt you. I have put him out
+of business--and I don't think we had better let the men know that Nick
+Carter has been among them. Let them wreak their vengeance upon this
+fellow, and upon the other--that little Jap. As for Nick Carter himself,
+I will take care of him. He will never come out of that cellar alive.
+And now, Chick, I want you to answer me a question."
+
+"You will save your breath if you do not ask it," replied Chick. "I am
+not answering questions just at present."
+
+"Not to save yourself, or your master?"
+
+"I know very well that nothing that I can say will have the least effect
+upon my fate, or upon Nick Carter's," he replied.
+
+"Very good," she replied slowly; and then to Handsome: "Take him away,
+Handsome. Take him out there to the men. Tell them who he is, and that
+they may do as they please with him. I think the quicksand bog would be
+as good a place as any for him; or the fire tree; but they may do as
+they please--so long as they kill him. Take him away."
+
+Chick, realizing that it was all up with him, and that he might as well
+make a fight for it, leaped forward quickly, full at the woman,
+intending to seize upon her, and hold her as a shield; but even as he
+attempted to do so, the floor beneath him sank under him for the depth
+of two feet, and before he could recover his balance, Madge had thrown a
+table cover over his head, and in another moment Handsome had thrown him
+to the floor, and called the others to his assistance.
+
+And so Chick was tightly bound and borne away a captive--to what fate he
+could only imagine.
+
+"You need not bring the Jap here at all," Madge called after them. "Let
+my hoboes take him with them, along with this one; but do you bring the
+man Pat to me at once."
+
+And five minutes later Handsome reappeared with Patsy in tow, only that
+Patsy was not a prisoner--as yet.
+
+"Now, my man," said Madge coldly, "you will have to give a pretty
+straight account of yourself. You were found in bad company."
+
+"Sure, ma'am, don't I know the same? I've been apologizing to meself
+ever since I discovered it, an' if Handsome here had only left me alone,
+faith, I'd have settled wan part of me misgivings then and there, so I
+would. I had me doubts about the bunch from the beginning, ma'am, when
+they came a-sneakin' up to me fire, and eatin' of me grub; and when
+that other gazabo dropped from the trees, sure, I was certain of it. I
+was after kapin' me eyes peeled all the time since then, your worship,
+but I thought it wasn't f'r the likes of me to be after makin'
+suggestions to y'r majesty, at all, at all."
+
+"Who are you, and what are you, Pat?" she asked, smiling upon him.
+
+"Sure, ma'am, it's nobody I am. I've never done anything worse than pick
+a pocket untel a short time ago, when I had the misfortune to get mixed
+up in a bit av a scrap--and the other feller didn't have the common
+dacency to get on his feet ag'in when it was over. He jest stayed there,
+so he did, and thinkin' that somebody would be axin' questions of me, I
+lit out. Ye wouldn't know a thing more about me if I should talk for a
+week--but, sure, if there's a question ye'd like to ax me, I'll be
+afther answerin' it to the best of me ability, so I will."
+
+"What brought you to me?"
+
+"Me legs--no less; begging y'r pardon for mentionin' it. They weren't
+purty to look at when Handsome stripped me--but we needn't mention that,
+aither."
+
+"But you came here in search of Hobo Harry."
+
+"I did. That same."
+
+"Who sent you here to find him?"
+
+"Nobody. I had to go somewhere. I had been readin' the papers, and I
+had seen a lot about Hobo Harry in 'em. All of the papers said that he
+was to be found around here somewhere, and that the divil himself
+couldn't catch him; and I says to mesilf, says I, sure that's the broth
+av a boy ye want to find, Pat--and here I am, ma'am."
+
+"Did you ever hear of Nick Carter?"
+
+"I have that."
+
+"Ever see him?"
+
+"I did that."
+
+"Would you know him, do you think, if you should see him again?"
+
+"I would that. It isn't three weeks since I saw him wid these two eyes
+as plain as I see y'r own beautiful face this minit. Sure, I'd know
+him."
+
+"Come this way, then."
+
+She went into the adjoining room, and they followed. There she pulled
+aside the rug again, and, having raised the trapdoor, descended, Patsy
+and Handsome following close behind her.
+
+The narrow steps took them into a spacious cellar, and, having passed
+through a partition by opening a heavy oaken door, they entered what
+appeared to be a prison room.
+
+Nick Carter was there. He had recovered consciousness, and was seated on
+a low stool against the wall. His arms were stretched wide apart, and
+each was held in position by an iron chain on either side of him. A
+ring of these chains had been passed around each wrist, and locked
+there, and the chains were fastened to the stone walls by staples.
+
+Madge stopped directly in front of the detective, and glared at him,
+while he returned her fierce look with a half smile--for he had entirely
+recovered from the effects of the dose she had administered.
+
+She raised her arm and pointed toward the detective, but before she
+could utter a word, Patsy cried out:
+
+"That's him! That's him! Sure, ma'am, I'd know him among a thousand!
+He's got stain on his skin; I can see that; and he is disguised in other
+ways, ma'am, I can see that, too; but it's him. I'd take me oath to it,
+so I would."
+
+Madge smiled, and softly rubbed her hands together.
+
+"Carter," she said coldly, "do you know this man who recognizes you?"
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders in disdain, for he understood perfectly well
+that Patsy had some well-defined plan in his head for doing as he did;
+and he replied:
+
+"I suppose he is somebody whom I have arrested at some time. It is only
+the worst criminals, like yourself, Madge, that I take the trouble to
+remember."
+
+She turned away with a toss of her head.
+
+"Come!" she ordered; and they followed her from the cellar room, and up
+the narrow stairs again, where she reclosed the trap.
+
+"Go back, Pat, and take your place among the others," she ordered him
+then. "You will be watched for a long time, and at the first break you
+make you will be knifed, or shot. It is up to you whether you make good
+in this community or not. Go now."
+
+When he had gone, she turned to Handsome.
+
+"Handsome," she said slowly, "you can go now, too. Keep an eye on that
+Pat. At midnight to-night, come here to the cottage, for I want you to
+help me to carry the body into the woods to the quicksand pit. We will
+throw him there--Nick Carter, I mean."
+
+"Of course. Shall you chuck him in alive?"
+
+"No; for he would find some way to crawl out and escape. I will put him
+out of the way first. It will be only a dead body that we will have to
+carry, but I don't want the men to know that Nick Carter has been among
+us until after he is dead. Then it will not matter."
+
+"Right you are," said Handsome; and he took his departure.
+
+But down in the cellar beneath them something had happened, for as soon
+as the party of three left him, Nick calmly and easily pulled the iron
+staples from the wall and stood upon his feet. The fact was that he had
+already succeeded in loosening them when he heard the approach of Madge
+and the others, and he had been afforded barely time to resume his
+position of helpless captivity when the door was opened and they
+entered.
+
+But now he was free, save for the short chains that were still fastened
+to his wrists, and the plank walls that rose between him and liberty.
+
+But the chains on each wrist were short, and the walls were only plank;
+and in Madge's eagerness and haste in fastening him there she had
+neglected--or she had not thought it necessary--to search him for his
+weapons.
+
+He knew now that there was very little time to spare, and that he and
+his three assistants were in a bad predicament.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.
+
+
+In the meantime, Patsy had been in half a dozen different kinds of a
+brown study. He realized that now the entire situation depended solely
+upon him, and that the lives of his chief, and of Chick and Ten-Ichi,
+rested wholly in his hands.
+
+He stood, be it said, all alone, in the midst of a huge swamp, from
+which escape could only be had by means of a boat, and into which he had
+been conducted blindfolded. Around him were men, all ready at any
+instant to take his life for the merest excuse; and already the lives of
+his three friends were sacrificed unless he could do something--and that
+very speedily--to save them.
+
+In the cellar at the cottage he had not dared to look squarely at his
+chief, for fear that the inclination on his own part to make some sort
+of signal would be too strong for him to resist; and he had known that
+Madge was watching every act and motion, as a cat watches a mouse.
+
+When he left the cottage, and had gone as far as the edge of the glade,
+he halted, and waited there for Handsome, for he guessed that the man
+would be sent away directly; and when Handsome did come, Patsy said to
+him:
+
+"Sure, Handsome, will ye tell me what is to be done wid the others?"
+
+"I haven't made up my mind about that yet," replied Handsome.
+
+"And is it left to you that it is?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Faith, but that's fine. I wish it was left to me, so I do."
+
+"What would you do to them, Pat?"
+
+"I'd skin 'em, begorra!"
+
+Handsome laughed.
+
+"Perhaps I will give you a chance," he said. "However, it is likely that
+they will go into the quicksand."
+
+"Where is that same, then?"
+
+"Out in the swamp a bit. There is no getting out of it, and it tells no
+tales. Once a man is thrown into that, he sinks out of sight in a few
+minutes, and that is the last of him. It is our graveyard. There are
+about fifty in there now. The place is bottomless."
+
+"Cheerful, isn't it? Sure, man, it's unhealthy, it is; but I'll go and
+have a look at it. Where is it?"
+
+Handsome directed him how to find it, and he hastened away; but he
+paused before he started long enough to select a long, strong rope that
+he had seen near one of the cabins. This he carried with him, and
+disappeared among the trees.
+
+Patsy was gone less than half an hour, but when he returned he was
+whistling; and then, after a little, he found an opportunity to linger
+around the place where Chick and Ten-Ichi were confined in one of the
+cabins.
+
+And presently he began to sing; at first in a low tone, and in
+unintelligible words; but his voice was good, and it attracted
+attention, even among that motley crew, and after a little, perceiving
+that they were listening, he sang the louder.
+
+If they had but known it, he was singing in Japanese, which Ten-Ichi had
+taught him to speak perfectly; and the words he uttered as he sang,
+translated, were:
+
+"There is a quicksand pit not far from here. They are going to throw you
+both into it. I have carried a rope to the quicksand pit. I have tied it
+to a tree near there. When you are thrown into the pit, spread out your
+arms. And also spread out your legs. Keep as still as possible so as not
+to sink too fast. I will be there as soon as I can do it. I will throw
+you the end of the rope. And with your own combined strength and mine,
+we can pull you out. I am not suspected, so I can do the act, all right.
+Keep up your pluck, and manage not to go into the pit head down."
+
+He sang this over and over several times until he was sure that Ten-Ichi
+had heard and understood, and would convey the message to Chick, and
+then he sauntered away.
+
+Twice after that he tried to get near to the cottage to sing to Nick
+Carter; but each time he was stopped and turned back again; and at last
+he muttered to himself:
+
+"I'll have to wait till to-night for that part of it. After I have
+rescued Chick and Ten-Ichi I will have them to help me, and then it will
+be funny if we don't get the chief out of the pickle he is in."
+
+It was well toward evening, almost the hour of sundown, before Chick and
+Ten-Ichi were carried to the quicksand pit; and then a procession
+followed them. The hands and feet of the prisoners were not bound, for
+it was desired that they should flounder in the quicksand in order to
+hasten its work; and without ceremony they were hurled into the midst of
+it, one, and then the other.
+
+Patsy's only fear was that the horde of hoboes would throw sticks and
+stones at the helpless men in the sand pit; but he found that this was
+against orders, since the presence of such impedimenta would give the
+victims something to seize hold of; and the operation of sinking was so
+slow, and the hoboes had seen it so many times, that they had lost
+interest in it; so that almost at once after Chick and Ten-Ichi were
+thrown in they began to withdraw to their several occupations; and
+finally when only a group of four remained, Patsy, who was one of them,
+called out: "It's tired of this I am. Come on!" and, nothing loath, the
+others followed him away.
+
+But he was not long gone. Almost at once he found an opportunity to
+leave them, and, by making a detour, to hurry back again.
+
+Already when he had reached the pit a second time the two detectives had
+sunk almost to their armpits; but in an instant Patsy found the rope he
+had concealed, one end of which was fastened to a tree.
+
+The task which followed can better be imagined than described, and only
+for the great strength of the trio it must have been unsuccessful. But
+with Chick and Ten-Ichi straining for their lives at one end, and Patsy
+pulling on the other as best he could, they came forth inch by inch,
+until at last they stood, covered with mud, to be sure, but on solid
+earth.
+
+"Now, go around that way," said Patsy, speaking rapidly. "The cottage is
+over there, as you know. You'll have to cross a neck of the swamp in
+getting to it, but the chief is there, a prisoner. I have seen him. He
+is chained to the wall in the cellar. If you get a chance before I do,
+overcome that beast of a sentinel, who is walking up and down near the
+house. I'll go back through the glade, and I'll manage somehow to join
+you there, if I have to kill somebody in order to do it; and take these.
+They are extra ones. I swiped them." He handed them each a pistol as he
+spoke.
+
+Chance played into Patsy's hands when he returned to the glade. Two of
+the men had been quarreling, and they had taken the centre of the glade
+to settle their differences; and there a ring had formed around them--a
+ring which comprised almost every man of the outfit.
+
+The point was that the attention of everybody was diverted from Patsy,
+and, merely bestowing a single glance upon what was taking place, he
+hurried silently past them--it was almost dark now--and in a moment more
+had passed through the pathway to the clearing around the cottage.
+
+As he entered the clearing silently, he came directly upon the sentinel,
+who, after listening to the row in the glade for a moment, had just
+turned to retrace his steps; this made him assume a position with his
+back toward Patsy, and in an instant the young athlete had leaped upon
+his back and shoulders, and had seized him by the throat, so that he
+bore him to the ground in absolute silence.
+
+And even as he did that, Chick and Ten-Ichi dashed out of the woods and
+helped him; and Ten-Ichi, none too gentle, now that his anger was
+aroused, rapped the sentinel on the head with the butt of his pistol, so
+that he stiffened out and offered no more resistance.
+
+They had been thoughtful enough to bring the rope with them, too, and
+it did not take long to tie the man; and then the three assistants of
+Nick Carter leaped forward toward the door of the cottage, realizing
+that at any instant they might be interrupted in their work, and knowing
+that the odds would be terribly against them if they were.
+
+They leaped upon the piazza--and as they did so the door opened directly
+in front of them, and Nick Carter appeared before them with the
+senseless form of Black Madge in his arms.
+
+For just one instant he started backward; and then he recognized his
+three assistants.
+
+"Quick!" he exclaimed. "Hold her, Chick!" and he put Madge into Chick's
+arms. "I have drugged her with some of her own stuff. There's plenty of
+it in the house. Get into the woods, all of you, over there"--and he
+pointed to the spot he wished them to go--"and wait for me. I'll be
+there in a moment."
+
+While they obeyed him, he turned back into the house; and from the edge
+of the clearing, where the others had concealed themselves, they
+presently saw a blaze flare up inside the house; then another, and then
+another, until there were many of them; and then Nick Carter dashed out
+of it again and ran toward them with all speed.
+
+"Look, now!" he said. "Watch that upper window, in the gable!"
+
+And looking as he commanded them to do, they presently saw, when the
+light had gained in brightness, the form of a woman standing there,
+outlined against the blazing fire; and if they had not known
+differently, there was not one of them who would not have sworn that it
+was Black Madge who stood there, surrounded by flames.
+
+"It is a dummy that I fixed up," whispered the detective. "It was done
+to keep the attention of the crowd away from us. Look! The men have
+discovered the fire!"
+
+The hoboes were rushing toward the scene in crowds now; and they saw the
+figure of the woman at the window in the gable instantly.
+
+A cry, then a shout, then a wail went up, for they thought it was their
+chief--Black Madge, otherwise Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, as she
+preferred to be known outside her own fraternity; and in that instant
+the crowd went mad.
+
+There was not a soul among them who did not rush to the rescue of their
+chief, believing that Nick's dummy at the window was she; and then
+danced and shouted, and yelled and screamed around that burning cottage,
+like so many madmen.
+
+"Come, now," said the detective. "This is our opportunity!"
+
+Like shadows they sped away through the trees. They skirted the glade,
+now without a sign of life within it; they hurried down the path among
+the alders toward the place where the boat was kept, and where there
+were now no less than four boats.
+
+But they took them all in order that none might be left for the
+pursuers, when it should occur to them to take up the chase; and then,
+with the strength of desperation, and guided by Nick, who had been twice
+over the route without being blindfolded, they made their way silently
+and swiftly through the maze of the swamp, to dry land at the other side
+of it.
+
+"We have not made good our escape yet," said Nick, as they climbed the
+grade of the railway. "If only a train would come along now, so we could
+flag it--hark!"
+
+Even as he spoke, a freight came around the curve toward them, and Nick,
+giving the unconscious form of Madge into the care of Chick, leaped out
+upon the track between the rails, and, at the risk of his life, stood
+within the glare of the advancing headlight and waved his coat for the
+engineer to stop.
+
+Fortunately it was a freight, and it was going rather slowly. The
+engineer saw the frantic appeal, and closed his throttle and applied the
+brakes.
+
+The party was taken aboard, and Black Madge was locked up in the jail at
+Calamont. She jeered at her captors, assuring them that she would be
+free again, and that when she was they had better remember who and what
+she was.
+
+Nick and his assistants then returned to New York, pretty thoroughly
+tired out by their experiences with Black Madge and her followers.
+
+The following day Nick Carter called upon the president of the E. &
+S. W. R. R. Co., and told him the story of the capture of "Hobo Harry."
+
+"Also, I want to tell you," said the detective, "that I was one of the
+burglars that robbed the bank at Calamont. I see there is quite a stir
+about it. But I know where the loot is concealed, and if you will raise
+a hundred men for me I will go back and clean out that swamp, and not
+only return the property to the bank, but I will find almost all that
+has been stolen from different places for a long time."
+
+Arrangements were at once made to carry out Nick's plans, but the
+detective was not quick enough.
+
+The news of the arrest of Black Madge had spread through the surrounding
+country like wildfire, and, by the time Nick and his force of railroad
+employees reached the place, the gang had fled, and the people of the
+near-by towns, having formed vigilance committees, had swooped down on
+the stronghold in the swamp.
+
+Nick and his men, however, destroyed everything that remained, with axes
+and matches, and what they could not destroy in that way they blew up
+with dynamite, so that the place no longer offered a refuge for the
+hoboes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.
+
+
+It was about a week later that Nick Carter received a note from the
+president of the railroad which caused him great astonishment. It was
+brief and to the point. It read:
+
+     "Can you call on me at once? Black Madge has escaped."
+
+That was all, but it was enough to stir the detective to action, and,
+taking Patsy, who happened to be in when the message arrived, along with
+him, Nick at once visited the office of the railroad.
+
+"Well, Carter, it didn't take long for Black Madge to make good her
+threat, did it?" said the president as he rose and shook hands with the
+detectives.
+
+"I think," replied the detective, smiling, "that, considering the
+trouble we were put to in capturing her, it was a very short time for us
+to hold her. Now, what can I do for you, Mr. Cobalt?"
+
+"Do? Why, you can catch Black Madge again for us."
+
+"Oh," said the detective, smiling. "Can I? Well, possibly."
+
+"You see," the president continued, "we have called a hasty meeting of
+the board since the information of the escape of Black Madge came to us,
+and we have decided that no effort shall be spared to get that woman
+into custody again. At liberty, she is a constant menace to the welfare
+of the road, and of every town along the line, as well as of everybody
+who lives in those towns."
+
+"I'll admit that she's a bad one," said Nick.
+
+"We don't want her at liberty. With the following she has, she is a
+dangerous woman--much more dangerous than a man would be in her
+position."
+
+"I don't know about that. But she is dangerous enough without argument
+about it."
+
+"Exactly. We want her caught. And we want you to catch her."
+
+"I imagine that this time, Mr. Cobalt, it will be rather a harder task
+than it was before."
+
+"Why so?"
+
+"She will be very much more on her guard now than then. And, besides,
+she knows enough about me to know that now I will most certainly hunt
+her down."
+
+The railway president was thoughtful a moment, and then he said:
+
+"You see, Carter, the very manner of her escape is a menace to us."
+
+"How is that?" asked the detective. "The first and, therefore, the only
+information I have had on the subject was that contained in your
+message, which told me merely that she had escaped. What is there that
+is particularly interesting about the manner of her escape?"
+
+"Then you have not heard about it, eh?"
+
+"I have just informed you that I have heard nothing."
+
+"Well, to say the least, her escape was characteristic. Her hoboes did
+it for her."
+
+Nick raised his brows.
+
+"You don't say so!" he exclaimed. "Well, we might have expected
+something like that, I suppose. I regarded it as a little bit
+unfortunate that the arrest was made in the county where it was, for
+that compelled us to put her temporarily in the Calamont jail--and I
+thought at the time that the Calamont jail was a trifle close to her
+stamping ground. Now, suppose you tell me exactly what happened."
+
+"You know Calamont, of course?" asked the railway president, and the
+detective smiled broadly.
+
+"I know very little about it," he said, "with the exception that I
+assisted in the robbing of a bank that is located there."
+
+It was the president's turn to smile.
+
+"That was a queer experience for you, Carter, wasn't it? But the
+president of that bank is quite willing that you should rob it again on
+the same terms. You know we fixed him all up again, and my company
+promises to keep a large deposit there now. Altogether, they regard your
+descent upon the bank as a very fortunate experience for them."
+
+"No doubt. Now about that escape."
+
+"Calamont is a village of about three thousand inhabitants. That bank,
+for instance, is the only one there."
+
+"What has that----"
+
+"Wait a moment. Calamont has suffered a great deal from the depredations
+of the hoboes, and now has a force of special constables, whose duties
+consist in arresting and taking to jail every tramp who crosses the
+borders of the village. The other night, when Madge made her escape, the
+jail was filled with them."
+
+"Oh," said the detective. "I begin to understand."
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"It was a put-up job on their part to get as many of their kind as
+possible in the jail for that night, and then to take their queen out of
+it; eh?"
+
+"Precisely; and that is just what they did do. You see, the tramps began
+coming in early in the day. They made intervals between the times of
+their arrivals, and they appeared at different parts of the town, so
+that before anybody realized it, the jail was about filled with them.
+But they seemed not to know one another, and so the residents of the
+town went peacefully to sleep that night, as usual."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, in the morning when they woke up, the jail had been
+gutted--literally gutted."
+
+"In what sense do you mean?"
+
+"In every sense."
+
+"Tell me what you mean, please."
+
+"I mean that all the tramps who had been locked up there overnight had
+disappeared; that they had managed to break into the main part of the
+jail, and that when they went away they took Black Madge with them; and
+that before they went away they passed through the jail with axes and
+smashed everything in sight. They tore down partitions, they smashed
+doors, and where the doors could not be smashed, they destroyed the
+locks. They tied up the jailer, and threatened to kill him--I regard it
+as a wonder that they did not kill him."
+
+"So do I. Go on."
+
+"That is all there is to it. They went there, of course, with the
+deliberate intention of rescuing Black Madge--and they did it."
+
+"I suppose they must have taken to the woods north of the railway line;
+eh?"
+
+"You've guessed it, Carter."
+
+"That is a wild country up through there, Mr. Cobalt."
+
+"You bet it is. I used to go through there every fall on a hunting
+expedition, when I was younger. The country hasn't changed much since
+that time. It is as wild as if it were in an uncivilized country,
+instead of being surrounded by----"
+
+"I understand. Then you do know something about that country up through
+there, eh?"
+
+"Yes; I used to boast that I knew every inch of it; but, of course, that
+wasn't quite so, you know."
+
+"Yet you remember it fairly well?"
+
+"I think so."
+
+"Tell me something about it, for that is, I think, where I have got to
+search for the woman we are after."
+
+"There isn't much to tell about it, save that it is wild and uneven;
+that the formation is limestone, and the timber is largely red oak. The
+mountains--or hills, rather--are not high, but they are precipitous,
+rocky, impassable, full of ravines, and gulches, and unexpected
+depressions, and scattered around through that region there are
+innumerable caves, too."
+
+"That is bad," said the detective. "It will make it so much the harder
+to dislodge the hoboes."
+
+"So you have got your work cut out for you this time, and no mistake."
+
+"Could you suggest a competent guide for that region, Mr. Cobalt?"
+
+"Old Bill Turner--if he would go."
+
+"Who is he?"
+
+"An old hunter, who used to take me out with him, and who afterward
+served as guide for me. But he is an old man now."
+
+"Where does he live?"
+
+"In Calamont. You will have no difficulty in finding him. Ask the first
+man you meet in the street to direct you to old Bill Turner, and he will
+do it."
+
+"That part of it is all right--if he is not too old to go."
+
+"Oh, I think he can be induced to do it. Old Bill likes the looks of a
+dollar as well as any man you ever knew. You have only to offer him
+enough, and his rheumatism will disappear like magic."
+
+"Then that part of it is all right, too. I am to understand that I have
+the same free hand in the matter that I did before?"
+
+"Of course. Your directions are: Catch Black Madge and break up her
+gang."
+
+"And that, I suppose, is about all that you have to say to me at
+present."
+
+"Yes; unless you have some questions to ask."
+
+"Not one, thank you. I will ask them of Black Madge--when I catch her."
+
+"Good! I hope it won't be long before you can ask them."
+
+"I don't think it will be very long; only, she is a little bit the
+smartest woman I ever tried to handle."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.
+
+
+When Nick Carter and Patsy left the office of the railway president,
+they strolled in silence down the street until they came to a
+restaurant, and, entering, they found a secluded table in one corner,
+where they seated themselves and gave the order for luncheon.
+
+When it was brought to them, and the waiter had departed, Nick said to
+his assistant:
+
+"Well, Patsy, we start about where we began on the other case, with the
+single exception that we have broken up the stronghold in the swamp. It
+is safe to say that Madge has no less than fifty men around her, and
+probably as many more. I should not be surprised if there were fully one
+hundred in the gang, all told."
+
+"Nor I."
+
+"Well, I shall start for Calamont as soon as I have finished with the
+meal I am now eating."
+
+"And what do you wish me to do?"
+
+"I want you to do a serious thing, and a dangerous one, Patsy."
+
+"Good! That is what I would like to do."
+
+"I think that Black Madge rather liked you in your character of a young
+Irish crook; but I think also that she had some suspicion of you."
+
+"There isn't any doubt of that."
+
+"And, therefore, it will be an extremely dangerous thing to do to return
+there, and still represent yourself as the same character."
+
+"Gee! Is _that_ what you want me to do?"
+
+"Yes. Do you suppose it can be done?"
+
+"It can be tried."
+
+"You must not forget that they will look upon you with suspicion."
+
+"Oh, I don't forget that."
+
+"They will connect you with their misfortunes at once. Handsome,
+particularly, after being so nicely fooled by me, will be even more
+suspicious of you."
+
+"I think I can get around Handsome, all right. It is Madge I am shy of."
+
+"There will be one thing in your favor, Patsy, if you _do_ undertake
+it."
+
+"If I _do_ undertake it? Of course, I shall undertake it."
+
+"Then there will be one thing in your favor."
+
+"What is that, please?"
+
+"The very fact that you _do_ go back among them in the same character in
+which you appeared before. I am inclined to think that now they would
+not take in a new man, no matter how well he might be recommended; but
+one that they have known before will stand a lot better chance with
+them."
+
+"I think so."
+
+"The very fact of your returning will go far to allay any suspicions
+they might have had about you formerly. It would never occur to them
+that if you were really a detective that time, you would dare to return
+to them in the same character."
+
+"You are right about that."
+
+"And, consequently, if you succeed in passing the investigation of the
+first few hours, you will be all right."
+
+"I am going to try it, anyhow."
+
+"Good, Patsy! But don't for a moment forget or neglect the danger you
+will be in every minute you are there."
+
+"I will not."
+
+"You will have to cook up a good story----"
+
+"I have that all ready now."
+
+"Then you can start whenever you please. I shall not interfere with you
+in the slightest manner."
+
+"But I want a little further instruction, chief."
+
+"The only instruction I have to give you is this: Go there; get among
+them; become one of them, and one with them; pick up all the information
+about them that you can, with names and identifications, so that you
+will be a good witness against them when the time comes."
+
+"I can do that."
+
+"I want you to work independently of me entirely. Your only part of the
+game, so far as it is directly connected with my part of the work, will
+be to hold yourself in readiness to lend me a helping hand from the
+inside at any moment I may happen to want you."
+
+"Of course. That goes without saying. Are Chick and Ten-Ichi going to be
+in this?"
+
+"Yes. But I have not determined in what way as yet. You will have to be
+on the lookout for them. I may take one of them with me, and send the
+other in to follow you. Or I may send both after you, and go it alone
+myself. Or I may take them both with me. All that will depend upon what
+information I pick up when I get to Calamont."
+
+"I see."
+
+"Now, Patsy, it is up to you. All that red you used on your hair before
+has not disappeared yet; but you had better go to a hair dyer's and get
+it fixed up over again. Then make yourself over once more into Pat
+Slick. I leave the rest to you. But as a last warning, I repeat--look
+out for that man Handsome."
+
+"Oh, I am not afraid of Handsome. He's a----"
+
+"He is a much smarter man than either of us gave him credit for. He is
+an educated man, who can represent the hobo so perfectly that you would
+never suspect that he has a college education. And he is devoted to
+Madge. Look out for him. He is her right-hand man, and he is dangerous.
+If he saw through you before, or had any idea that he did see through
+you, your life won't be worth a snap of your finger the next time you
+meet--unless you can manage to shoot first."
+
+"I know that, too. But he did not suspect."
+
+"I am not so sure of that. Madge had a little time to think things over
+while she was in the jail, and as soon as she got out, she and Handsome
+had a chance to talk things over. With their two heads together, they
+make about as dangerous a pair to play against as could be imagined."
+
+"All right. I'll stand pat--and bluff."
+
+"Be careful that they don't call you. That's all."
+
+"Is there any particular game afoot with the hoboes just now?"
+
+"Not that I know of."
+
+"What specific charge are we after Madge for?"
+
+"No specific charge, save that she is accused of all the old ones. There
+is enough against her to send her to prison for the rest of her life,
+once she is caught."
+
+"I guess that's no pipe dream."
+
+"The railway people object to her being at liberty. That is about all."
+
+"And it is up to us to catch her?"
+
+"That's the idea."
+
+"What about the rest of the gang?"
+
+"If we can round up the entire outfit, that is what they want us to do.
+We are to get as many of them as we can, and make the charges after
+that. That is what you are going inside the ring for: to pick up all
+the information about the individual members of the gang that you can."
+
+"I see."
+
+"The battle cry is: Break up the gang! Root it out, so that it cannot
+grow again."
+
+"It is a pretty big proposition, chief; don't you think so?"
+
+"It is a big proposition, and no mistake. But I shall make my
+arrangements about that part of it, so that if we ever succeed in
+getting them rounded up, there will be no difficulty in carrying out the
+rest of it."
+
+"All right. Now, I suppose I have my instructions."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And that's all?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you don't expect to see me or to communicate with me again
+until--when?"
+
+"Until I see you inside the stronghold of the hobo gang."
+
+"That is all right. We'll meet there. I'll get there, and I'll find a
+way to make them believe in me."
+
+"I hesitate to send you on this business, Patsy. You have never in your
+life gone out to face quite as much peril as you will find in this
+expedition of yours now."
+
+"Well, I'll face it; and I'll overcome it, chief."
+
+"You're a good lad, Patsy. God bless you!"
+
+"Don't worry about me, chief; not at all. I will be all right. The hobo
+hasn't been born yet who can get away with me."
+
+"Don't forget that there are perhaps one hundred of them."
+
+"I'm not forgetting it."
+
+"And that the worst and most dangerous of the lot is the man called
+Handsome."
+
+"I'll not forget that, either."
+
+Nick rose from the table and stretched out his hand.
+
+"Good-by, my lad," he said. "I don't know when we will meet again. A lot
+depends upon yourself. Even now I feel almost as if I ought not----"
+
+"Don't say another word, please. I'm going to do what you have laid out
+for me to do. I wouldn't obey you now if you should change the order."
+
+"Oh, yes, you would. But I won't change it."
+
+And so they parted there in the restaurant.
+
+And a little later Nick Carter took the train for Calamont.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.
+
+
+When Nick Carter arrived at Calamont, he was disguised as a lumberman.
+It was not exactly the season of the year for lumbermen to enter the
+woods, unless they were measurers, who were engaged in preparing in
+advance work for the winter; so that was the character which Nick Carter
+adopted.
+
+Measurers go into the woods, measure trees on the stump, as it is
+called, blaze them with cabalistic marks, and otherwise prepare the way
+for the workers with the axes and saws who are to come later.
+
+It is well known that some of the most expert lumbermen in the world are
+French Canadians, and so Nick adopted this character, and he knew that
+as such he could wander at will around the woods and mountains of that
+region without danger of being suspected for what he really was.
+
+If any of the hoboes who made their headquarters in that region should
+see him, they would not be inclined to suspect what he really was, and
+the only actual danger he would stand in would be that they might be
+inclined to knock him on the head or shoot him from ambush in order to
+possess themselves of the few articles he had in his possession.
+
+And for that very reason he adopted the disguise of a French Canadian
+lumberman, for it was rarely that they were supposed to have anything
+more than what they carried in sight on their backs.
+
+The month was September, and therefore warm. The leaves in some places
+were getting yellow and red, although there had been no frost; but oak
+leaves turn earlier than others.
+
+When he descended at Calamont Station, he stood there on the platform
+until the train had pulled out, and the other passengers who had arrived
+by it had departed their several ways. Then he approached the
+baggageman.
+
+"Me want find ze man named Beel Turner," he said slowly.
+
+"What's that?" asked the baggageman.
+
+"Me want find Beel Turner."
+
+"Oh! Bill Turner, is it? Well, go up that street there until you come to
+the post office. You'll like enough see an old, white-whiskered chap
+standing there, chewing tobacco. That'll be Bill Turner."
+
+"Beel Turner? He ees known here? No?"
+
+"Known here? Gee! He has lived here since the oldest inhabitant was a
+baby. He has always lived here. He is about a thousand years old, my
+man; but as strong and as lively as a kid yet. You'll find him somewhere
+around the post office."
+
+Nick thanked him in his broken English and strode up the street.
+
+Sure enough, when he arrived in the vicinity of the post office, he saw
+a white-whiskered man standing there, and he approached him at once.
+
+"You ees Beel Turner?" he asked modestly, sidling up to the man.
+
+"I be," was the response, while Bill Turner fixed his clear gray eyes
+upon the detective. "What might you be wantin' of me, stranger?"
+
+"I have--hush!--I have some money for you, Beel Turner. Can you take me
+where we can talk so that nobody will overhear us?"
+
+Turner eyed him suspiciously for a moment; then he turned abruptly away
+with the remark:
+
+"Come along with me, stranger."
+
+Nick walked beside him through the town to the very end of the main
+street. Then they turned into a roadway, which led up a steep hill for
+some distance, and which presently brought them to a modest cottage that
+was almost hidden under the brow of the hill.
+
+"Here is where I live," said Turner. "I live here all alone, 'cept a cat
+and two dogs. But the dogs hev got old like me, now, and they can't go
+out among the hills as they used to; although, bless you, I reckon I kin
+walk jest as fur as ever I could, if I try. Come in."
+
+Nick followed him inside, and Turner offered him a rocker near the open
+window. The whole house was as neat and clean as if it had the care of a
+woman.
+
+"Now, mister," said Turner, "what hev ye got on yer mind?"
+
+"In the first place," replied Nick, in his natural voice, "I am not what
+I seem to be. I am not a lumberman, or a Frenchman--or a Canadian. I am
+a detective."
+
+"Sho! You don't say so. Well, that beats me. Sure, ye do it fine,
+mister. I would never hev suspected at all that you are not what you
+seem. But go on."
+
+"I have come here after that gang of hoboes who infest the neighborhood
+for fifty or sixty miles around this place. I am principally after the
+woman who is their chief. Do you know who I mean?"
+
+"I reckon ye must be referrin' to that there Black Madge and her gang."
+
+"That's right."
+
+"Well, yer up agin' a proposition. That's all I kin say about it."
+
+"I know that; and what I want of you is to get you to help me with that
+proposition, Bill Turner."
+
+"Ain't I too old?"
+
+"Not a bit of it."
+
+"Is there good pay in it?"
+
+"The very best; and there is fifty dollars down for you right now--if
+you are inclined to do as I want you to do."
+
+Nick took a roll of bills from his pocket as he spoke, and laid it on
+the table before the avaricious glances of the old man.
+
+"Well, sir," said Turner slowly, "all I've got to say is this: If I can
+do what you want done, I'll do it. I want that money as bad as anybody
+could want it and not grab it right now where it is lying; but I have
+never had a penny in my life that I didn't get honestly, and I am afraid
+that I'm too old to do what you want done."
+
+"I tell you that you are not."
+
+"Then, in that case, I'll take the money and put it in my pocket--so.
+There! Now, go ahead. If the work is honest, and such as an honest man
+can do, I'll do it--if I ain't too old, and you say I ain't. But if the
+work ain't honest, I'll return your money. Now, what is it, mister?"
+
+"I want you first to promise that you will not reveal my identity. I
+must be Jules Verbeau to you to the end, and you must forget that I am
+not he in fact."
+
+"You kin consider that done, sir."
+
+"Second, I want you to answer some questions for me."
+
+"Fire away."
+
+"How well do you know the hills and mountains, the ravines and gulches,
+the rocks and the caves around this region?"
+
+"As well as I know that dooryard in front of you," replied the old man,
+pointing through the window. "I know every inch of the country--every
+inch of it."
+
+"Now, another question which you will not understand at once: Do you
+know how to use a pencil, and is your hand steady enough to draw plans
+for me?"
+
+"Yes, sir. I began life as a draughtsman; but that was when I was a
+boy."
+
+"That will suffice. Now--could you draw a plan of different parts of the
+mountains, so it would be plain enough for me to follow without your
+being present with me?"
+
+"That would depend upon you, sir. If you are a man who has some
+woodcraft in your make-up, I say yes. It would depend upon you."
+
+"We will consider that question answered, then. Now, have you any idea
+to what part of the mountainous region around here--say, within fifty
+miles of where we are seated--the hobo gang would select in which to
+hide themselves?"
+
+"I think I could guess it to a dot."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because there is one region up among those hills which is exactly
+fitted for them; and from which you couldn't drive them out with a
+thousand men. That's why!"
+
+"Good. That sounds as if it might be the place they would select. How
+far is it from here, as you would travel afoot."
+
+"A matter of thirty miles."
+
+"Now, can you draw me a plan of that region?"
+
+"I kin."
+
+"And how to get there?"
+
+"I kin."
+
+"And are there caverns there? Do you suppose those people are hiding and
+making their headquarters in caves?"
+
+"Yes, to both questions. The hills round that 'ere region are
+honeycombed with caves. Some of 'em is big, and some of 'em is little;
+but there's a lot of 'em there."
+
+"Good; and you know them well enough to give me a working plan of them?
+What a sailor would call a chart?"
+
+"You bet I do."
+
+"Now, another subject: Have you ever traveled away from here? Have you
+ever been to New York, for instance?"
+
+"Never in my life. I've always lived right around here. I don't suppose
+I have been ten miles away from here, except in the woods, in forty
+years. But in the woods I sometimes used to go a good ways."
+
+"I've no doubt of that. How would you like to make a visit to New
+York?"
+
+"I should like it very much--only it would cost such a lot, you know."
+
+"Suppose your expenses were paid?"
+
+"Well, that would be different."
+
+"How much, in cash, will you take for your whiskers, Mr. Turner?"
+
+"Now what the devil do you mean by that? Are you making fun of me?"
+
+"Not at all. I was wondering if fifty dollars more, down, would induce
+you to shave off your whiskers."
+
+"Humph! Jest tell me what you are getting at and I'll answer you."
+
+"This: I want to disguise myself so that I look like you. I want to go
+out in the mountains as you would go out. While I am making believe that
+I am Bill Turner, I want you to take a trip to New York, and to live
+there, at my house, and take it easy, see all the sights, go to the
+theatres and the museums, and all that, until I return, and I want you
+to shave off your whiskers, and let me blacken your brows and otherwise
+make some changes in your appearance, so that if any of the people from
+Calamont should happen to meet you in the street down there they
+wouldn't say, 'Why, there is Bill Turner!' Would you consent to do
+that?"
+
+"For another fifty dollars down?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I would. When do you want me to shave?"
+
+"I will tell you in good time. First, I want you to fix up those plans."
+
+"Hadn't I better git about it right now?"
+
+"Yes. I think you had. And I will remain here with you while you do it
+in order that you may explain things to me as you work upon them."
+
+"That's a good idee, too. I can make you know them mountings as well as
+I do, in a short time. I knows 'em so well----"
+
+"That reminds me. Do you happen to know by sight, or have an
+acquaintance with, any of the members of that gang?"
+
+The old man shifted uneasily in his chair, and at last he replied:
+
+"I know one of them--purty well. He calls himself Handsome."
+
+"Good! What does Handsome know about you, Bill?"
+
+"He don't know nothin' about me, 'cept that I'm a woodsman, and that I'm
+too old to do him any harm. I helped him once, and once he helped me a
+leetle, and we're sort of friends. But I ain't never seen him but twice
+in my life, and then both times I met him in the woods, so I ain't never
+mentioned nothin' about him to other folks."
+
+"That's splendid! It is just what I hoped. It couldn't be better! I want
+you now to tell me what you talked about when you and Handsome met each
+other those two times in the woods."
+
+"That's easy. The first time, I was walking through the woods, up about
+where you are going--that is, it was in that region--when I heard
+somebody hollerin' fur help. At first I couldn't tell for the life of me
+where the hollerin' come from; but after a leetle I located it up on the
+side of one of them steep hills, and so I crawled up there. Well, when I
+got there, I found that a man had slid into a hole in the rocks, and
+that he couldn't git out nohow. If I hadn't happened along the chances
+are that he'd starved before he'd ha' been helped out."
+
+"And as it was--what?"
+
+"I helped him out. I didn't have no hatchet, but I had a good huntin'
+knife along with me, and I managed to whittle down a good-sized spruce,
+which I trimmed so's to make a sort of ladder of it. When that was done
+I lowered the butt end of it into the hole, and Handsome--that was who
+it was in the bottom of the hole--he climbed up so's I could get hold of
+him, and then I pulled him out. There wasn't much to that, was there?"
+
+"It saved his life."
+
+"Probably."
+
+"Wasn't he grateful?"
+
+"Suttingly."
+
+"What did you talk about after that?"
+
+"We sot down there a spell and chinned, that's all. He axed me who I
+was, and I told him. He axed me if I was long in these parts, and I told
+him allers. He axed me where I lived, and I told him about this cottage.
+That's all--only he said he was a hobo, and that he was called Handsome.
+I allowed that the people who called him that lied mightily; but I
+didn't say so jest then."
+
+"What more was talked about?"
+
+"Nothin'."
+
+"When was the next time you saw him?"
+
+"That was in the middle of the summer, and it was farther south--not far
+from the railroad tracks."
+
+"Well, what happened then?"
+
+"That was the time he helped me."
+
+"How was that?"
+
+"I can't never tell you exactly how it was, but somehow I had got my
+foot wedged in the root of a tree, and I had been tryin' an hour to git
+it out, without success. The tree was hard, and I was just tacklin' that
+root with my knife--I'd have cut through it in about an hour, I
+reckon--when 'long comes that feller Handsome that I had saved from the
+hole in the rocks. He had an axe on his shoulder, and when he spied me
+he stopped, and laughed, and laughed until I got mad.
+
+"'Caught in yer own trap, ain't ye?' he axed me.
+
+"'I be,' says I. 'You've got a axe, and mebby you kin help me out o'
+it.'
+
+"Well, he did. He chopped the root in a jiffy, and I was free; but,
+bless you, I could 'a' done it myself with my knife in a hour, anyhow.
+All the same, I was grateful to him, and we sot down on a log and
+chinned for a while."
+
+"What about?"
+
+"He asked me what I was doing around there, and I told him that I was
+thinking of looking over the swamp below the tracks a leetle, with some
+idea of settin' traps there late this fall and winter, and he said as
+how he wouldn't advise me to do it. He said as how I wouldn't be likely
+to ketch the sort of animals I was after, and that some of the animals
+might ketch me; and, as I ain't exactly a fule, I ketched onto what he
+meant, and I ain't been nigh that place since. And then it turned out
+afterward as I thought it would, them hoboes had a hidin' place in that
+very swamp."
+
+"Right you are, Bill!" said Nick, laughing. "Is that all the
+conversation you had with Handsome?"
+
+"Every bit of it."
+
+"And you have never seen him since?"
+
+"Never. Hold on; he axed me that time if I had ever mentioned the fact
+of our fust meetin', and I told him I had not. He seemed pleased at
+that, and he told me never to mention it. I allowed that I didn't see no
+reason why I should, and he laughed at that and seemed entirely
+satisfied."
+
+"That is excellent, Bill. Now, we will get at those plans. I don't want
+to lose any time."
+
+"Would you mind telling me why you axed me all about them two meetings?"
+
+"Not at all. When I go out into the woods in the character of Bill
+Turner, I am likely at some time to run across Handsome himself. I want
+to be posted, so that he won't know but what I am you. I don't want him
+to catch me; see?"
+
+"Yes. But do you suppose you kin fix yourself to look enough like me
+so's he won't know the difference when he sees you?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+The old man shook his head.
+
+"I don't believe it," he said, "but maybe you can. How about the voice?
+Your voice ain't no more like mine than a----"
+
+"I can do that, too," replied Nick, exactly simulating the voice in
+which the old man was speaking; and he looked around him in wonder, and
+then at the detective.
+
+"It does beat all!" he said at last. "I guess you're some too many for
+me, sir."
+
+"Shall we get at those plans now?"
+
+"Right away."
+
+Turner brought out paper and pencil, and, having cleared the top of his
+table, he began to work.
+
+First he drew a large circle on the paper, and at one edge of it he made
+a cross.
+
+"That there cross is Calamont," he said. "Where we be now; and all
+that's inside of the ring I've made lies to the east of here, from
+nor'-nor'east to sou'-sou'east--and east. You understand?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+"Well, jest about in the middle o' that ring is the place where I think
+them fellers would hide. It's the best place for them."
+
+"Tell me about it before you draw anything; or, rather, talk while you
+are drawing."
+
+"That's jest what I'm going to do. Now, you follow my pencil and pay
+attention."
+
+"Go ahead," said Nick.
+
+"When you leave here--if you start from Calamont, which I suppose you
+will--you start right about here. You take a general direction nor'east
+from here at first. You'll find a path through the woods after you git
+about two miles from here, and that path will lead you several miles.
+But about here it'll disappear, and you won't have nothin' to guide you
+'cept what I show you and tell you now."
+
+"Exactly," replied the detective.
+
+"Up here, at about the time you lose all trace o' the path, you'll come
+to a deep ravine. You want to follow up the middle of that, to the top.
+And when you git to the top of it you will think that you have run up
+ag'inst a cliff, and there ain't no gettin' out of it without goin'
+back.
+
+"But that ain't so. There's a waterfall at the end of the ravine. It
+comes around a sort of a twist in the rocks, and if you ain't afraid of
+gettin' damp, you follow around there, and you will find as nice a piece
+of steps cut in them stones as you ever saw in your life. Indians cut
+'em more'n a hundred years ago, so I'm told.
+
+"Well, they take you to the top of that cliff. When you're up there, you
+find you're in another ravine, not so deep as t'other. Right here that
+would be," he added, making a mark with the pencil.
+
+"All right," said Nick.
+
+"About a mile farther up that second ravine you want to leave it. You'll
+find a big dead oak that hangs out over it, and beside the dead oak
+there is a path up the side of the ravine. It is one of my own paths.
+You get up it by hangin' onto two things you find there for the purpose.
+I put 'em there more'n twenty years ago, mister."
+
+"Go ahead."
+
+"When you git to the top, you want to branch off this way--so. You'll
+find a clearin' about there, and off to the east you'll see some high
+hills. You want to make for them."
+
+"And those hills, I suppose, is my destination."
+
+"That's where the caves are. That's where you will find the gang if
+they are hiding anywhere in that 'ere region."
+
+"Now, tell me about the caverns. Tell me how to find them."
+
+"They're easy enough to find--some of 'em is; others ain't. Wait a
+minute."
+
+He pushed that paper aside, and took a fresh one.
+
+"Now, when you come to the hills, you will approach 'em at what we call
+the Dog's Nose. So named because that's what it looks like. It's a rock
+that sticks out right about here, and you can't miss it. It looks
+exactly like a dog's nose, stickin' out and smelling things.
+
+"You want to go right up under that there dog's nose; and when you git
+there you'll see a hole in the rock that ain't no bigger than the lower
+half of that window. It's a leetle bit of a hole, and it's as dark as a
+pocket inside it, too. Nobody, even if they found the hole, would ever
+think of going in there. It ain't invitin' to look at."
+
+"How did you happen to go into it?"
+
+"I didn't. I came out of it. I got lost in that cave for three days
+once, when I was a boy, and when I found my way out I came out of that
+hole. Nobody knows about that entrance but me, though I suppose lots of
+folks knows it's there."
+
+"And it communicates with the cave?"
+
+"It does. It'll take you to any part of the cave; and there is only one
+rule to follow in going through it. You'll want a light, though."
+
+"I've got the light. What is the rule?"
+
+"Always--no matter where you are in any of them caves, take the way to
+the right. Never take a gallery to the left, goin' in either or any
+direction. It's a rule that holds good in them caves. It's a sort of way
+that nature provided so's you could find your way through there; and I
+happened to discover what it was."
+
+"It all sounds very simple and easy."
+
+"And it is, if you've got the pluck and the sand. But it's a ticklish
+place. There is a good many places in there that I ain't never explored,
+and don't want to; and it's safe to bet that the hoboes ain't done it,
+neither. I reckon, mister, that that's about all I kin show you--hold
+on, though!"
+
+"What now?"
+
+"Well, there's one place up there which it might be handy for you to
+know about, and I don't think anybody but me knows about it, either."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"Well, you might find occasion to want to hide yourself away while you
+are in there."
+
+"That is more than likely, Bill."
+
+"Well, just arter you pass through the hole that is under the Dog's
+Nose, and about twenty rods from there, you'll find a place where there
+is a bowlder sort of set into the rocks. You won't notice it unless you
+look for it, but it is there. Under it you'll find a small stone wedged
+fast. If you pull out that small stone, and then push on the big rock,
+it'll swing around like it was on a pivot, and you kin step inside the
+hole it leaves, and close up the door after you. You'll find an
+interestin' place in there, too, if you ever have occasion to use it,
+mister; and nobody will find you there, either."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.
+
+
+The detective passed the remainder of that day, and much of the night,
+in old Bill Turner's company, and during that time they talked
+incessantly about the mountains to which Nick was going, about the
+caverns in those mountains, and the trails through them; and when the
+conversation was finished Nick felt that he could find his way without
+difficulty wherever he cared to go among them.
+
+When he saw that the old man was tired out, he sent him to bed, and
+himself dropped upon a couch in Turner's living room, where he slept
+like a top till morning.
+
+Soon after dawn they were both astir; and after they had eaten some
+breakfast, and Turner had made his usual pilgrimage to the post office,
+they began again upon the plans and went over them for the last time.
+
+And then came the task of making the changes in their personal
+appearance. This, to the layman, sounds like no easy task; but to Nick
+Carter it was merely the practicing of an art of which he was thoroughly
+a master.
+
+He had brought with him the things necessary to accomplish the changes;
+and when the old man returned from the village he set to work--first
+upon himself--for he knew that he must make his own disguise letter
+perfect if he hoped to deceive such a man as Handsome.
+
+He first made up his face, not with paints, but with stains that would
+not wash off, to represent the leathery, weather-beaten countenance of
+the old man; and here he was, perhaps, fortunate in the fact that the
+profusion of white whiskers worn by the old man rendered his face the
+easier to copy, and in reality concealed much of it from view.
+
+Then he adjusted the beard.
+
+But not as false beards are supposed to be adjusted. This was done
+almost hair by hair. That is, the beard was divided into tufts of hair,
+and each tuft was stuck on with a glue of Nick's own creation, so that
+there was no danger that it would drop off under any circumstances--and
+so that it could not be pulled off without drawing patches of skin with
+it.
+
+And this was as it should be, since if any one should suppose that the
+whiskers might be false, and should seize them and pull sharply upon
+them, they would resist the effort exactly as if the beard was natural.
+
+In height the two men were about the same. In figure, the old man was
+possibly somewhat stouter than Nick; but there was not enough
+difference to be noticeable.
+
+The detective occupied about three hours in making up that disguise, so
+particular was he about it; but when it was finished at last it was
+perfect. So perfect, indeed, that Turner regarded him in amazement; then
+came closer to look into his eyes, and at last he said:
+
+"I'm glad, Mr. Carter, that I didn't meet you on the street in that rig.
+It would have frightened me to death. I'd have been sure that I was dead
+and had met my own ghost, out for a walk."
+
+That night, when the train bound for the city passed through Calamont at
+half-past eleven, a man climbed aboard of it who--if anybody had noticed
+him particularly--it would have been supposed was the same French
+Canadian lumberman who had appeared there the day before.
+
+But there was no one there save the ticket agent, and he did not notice
+particularly. It is certain that he had no idea that in the black-haired
+man who went away was old Bill Turner.
+
+But so it was. Nick had made the old man up in a representation of the
+Frenchman; or at least near enough to it so that in the darkness the
+difference would not be noticed; and the old man, being made to appear
+young, really felt young, and he went away joyously.
+
+In his pockets he carried letters; one was to Chick, and the other was
+to Joseph, his confidential servant, in case Chick should happen not to
+be at home when Turner arrived there.
+
+And those letters gave instructions that Turner was to be treated to
+everything he wanted, and that Chick and Ten-Ichi should take turns in
+showing him about the city. Nick assured them that they could help him
+quite as much in that way as if they were among the mountains with him,
+assisting him in the actual work.
+
+And the next morning--the morning after the departure of Turner--Nick
+took the old man's place in the customary stroll, or hobble would be a
+better word, to the post office.
+
+He stopped and talked with people as he met them, having posted himself,
+with the old man's aid, in what he was to say. And he stood around the
+post office steps for two hours, as Turner was in the habit of doing.
+
+He was trying out the part; trying it on the dog, so to speak. And he
+was thoroughly satisfied with the result.
+
+In his talks there in front of the post office he gave it out that he
+was going to take another trip into the woods; and as it was the season
+of the year when Turner had been in the habit of being absent, no
+surprise was felt. And that afternoon he literally pulled up stakes and
+started.
+
+Once he was in the woods, Nick quickened his pace. He realized now that,
+figuratively, he had burned his bridges behind him, and that he must see
+the thing through to the end.
+
+He did not fear the consequences at all; he felt that there was only one
+chance of his failure, and that was in the shrewd eyes and keen
+intelligence of Handsome.
+
+Handsome had met Turner twice and talked with him each time. Nick knew
+Handsome well enough to know that the outlaw would have studied Turner
+very closely at those interviews; the question now was, would Handsome
+detect the fraud?
+
+Nick did not think it likely; and, anyhow, the risk had to be taken.
+
+That night the detective made himself a fire and camped in the woods; in
+the early morning he started on again.
+
+In due course of time he came to the ravine, and went up it to the top
+as the old man had directed him to do. And he went around the "rocks
+with a sort of a twist in them" until he found the steps that were cut
+in the stones, and so mounted to the top.
+
+Far up the second ravine he found the dead tree that hung over it, and
+the pathway up the side of the hill beside it; and that night he camped
+again in the woods.
+
+He had not far to go that second morning, after he had eaten some
+breakfast, before he arrived at the Dog's Nose. It was ten o'clock in
+the morning when he got there.
+
+All that morning Nick had noticed signs that he was approaching the
+region where he would find the hobo gang. He had seen where trees had
+been chopped down and corded up for firewood; and there were many other
+signs that many men were in the vicinity.
+
+When he came to the shelter of the Dog's Nose, he stopped there, and,
+having fixed himself a temporary camp, resolved that he would remain
+there until night, for he had some hope that some of the hoboes would
+happen along, and that he could talk with them.
+
+That was his game; not to sneak upon them unawares, but to let it be
+known that he was in the neighborhood, so that Handsome would come to
+him. He wanted that ordeal over with Handsome as soon as possible.
+
+He was destined not to be disappointed. The afternoon was well advanced
+when Handsome suddenly stepped out of a cluster of balsams, and stood
+before him.
+
+He had approached as silently as an Indian; as if he had passed his life
+in woodcraft, and, indeed, Nick had no doubt that he had.
+
+For a moment he stood there near the balsams, silently regarding the
+detective; and Nick, perfectly acting the part of Turner, looked up and
+nodded, but said nothing.
+
+After a little Handsome strode forward, no longer taking care to remain
+quiet; and he seated himself on a log near Nick, and facing him, while
+at the same time he toyed with apparent carelessness with a revolver he
+held in his hand.
+
+"What brings you here, Turner?" he asked at last.
+
+"The season of the year brings me," was the reply. "I have come here
+every autumn at this time for more'n fifty years."
+
+"Indeed!" Handsome looked at him with new interest. "Is that true?" he
+asked.
+
+"I wouldn't have any reason to lie to ye, would I?" asked Nick. "Old
+Bill Turner hasn't missed a year in fifty years in coming here, Mr.
+Handsome."
+
+"Then you must know these hills mighty well, eh?"
+
+"I know every inch of 'em; every leaf that falls on 'em, almost. That's
+the way I know 'em."
+
+"And do you know about the places under the hills as well?"
+
+"Do you mean the caves?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"I know 'em purty well--yes. There is some parts of 'em that nobody
+knows, I reckon; and while I--well, maybe I don't know all about 'em,
+and maybe I'd get lost in 'em now; only I don't think so."
+
+"What do you know about that hole up there, under that rock that is
+shaped like the nose of a dog?"
+
+"I know it's a hole. I reckon that's about all that anybody knows about
+it. It's a dark sort of a place. I ain't got no fancy for goin' into
+it."
+
+"Does it connect with the main part of the cavern?"
+
+"Maybe it does, and maybe it doesn't; but most likely it does; only I
+don't think that anybody would be after trying to find out."
+
+"You have never been through that hole, then?"
+
+"I ain't never been inside of it," replied Nick, with perfect truth.
+
+Handsome thought a moment, and then he asked suddenly:
+
+"Turner, who sent you up here?"
+
+"Nobody sent me; why?"
+
+"Didn't the people of Calamont send you to find me and my followers?"
+
+"Nary a bit of it."
+
+"Well, now that you have seen me, and know that I am here, and therefore
+guess that others are here with me, what would you do about it if you
+should go back to Calamont now, and somebody there should ask you if you
+had seen me?"
+
+"Look here, Handsome, I don't meddle with other people's affairs. I want
+'em to leave mine alone, and consequently I leave theirn alone. You hear
+me speak!"
+
+"But what answer would you make if that question was asked of you?"
+
+"I probably shouldn't answer at all."
+
+"Suppose an answer was insisted upon?"
+
+"I ain't never found nobody yet who could make old Bill Turner answer a
+question if he didn't want to."
+
+"Do you mean that you would not wish to answer that question?"
+
+"Look here, Handsome, if you want me to promise that I won't tell on ye,
+why don't you say so? What you and your fellers do ain't none of my
+funeral, so long as you leave me alone. Do you think I came up here to
+spy on you?"
+
+"That is what I thought when I first discovered you."
+
+"Well, forget it. I ain't carryin' no tales. I'd 'a' been dead long ago
+if I had done that. Life's too short. I ain't never mentioned to nobody
+about the two times I have met you, and I ain't likely to, either. I
+ain't got time. You ain't robbed my house, and I don't care what you do
+as long as you leave me alone."
+
+Again Handsome was silent a while, and then he said suddenly:
+
+"Turner, would you like to go to our camp?"
+
+"No; that is, I ain't particular about it. You might think I was trying
+to spy on ye--or some of the men might, and that would make me mad."
+
+"They won't think anything of the kind if I take you there."
+
+"All right. If you want me to go--I'll go."
+
+"Come along, then. You have got this far, and we've either got to trust
+you, or kill you. It will depend upon you which that will be."
+
+Keeping in his mind's eye the plans that Turner had made for him, Nick
+knew perfectly the route over which Handsome led him on the way to the
+camp, to which he had referred.
+
+It was a picturesque place. Turner had described it in detail to the
+detective, and had mentioned it as the most likely place for the outlaws
+to make their headquarters. He had said:
+
+"Ye see, mister, it's a sort of sasser in the mountings. There ain't
+only one way to git to it from the outside, and that is a purty hard
+one; so hard that half a dozen men could hold it agin' a thousand; and
+the other way to git to it is through the caves; and ye've got to know
+them galleries mighty well in order to find yer way through. I think
+you'll do it, because you act as if you had been in caves afore."
+
+The place was a "sasser" in the mountains, sure enough. On every side of
+it there were frowning cliffs, which rose hundreds of feet in the air;
+and these cliffs were as inaccessible from the outside as they were from
+the saucer itself. There was only one pathway, and that was through a
+narrow fissure, barely wide enough for one big man to walk through it.
+
+And this latter could have been stopped up with rocks in half an hour,
+so that nobody could get through it.
+
+Handsome made the supposed Turner walk in front of him when they entered
+the fissure; and thus it was that they appeared on the opposite side of
+it; then Handsome took the lead.
+
+Already the hoboes had erected cabins of slabs and of logs; and many of
+them were still at work building others; but as with one accord they
+ceased to work when they saw Handsome approaching with the old man; and
+they stared at him.
+
+"Have you got another one, Handsome?" somebody called out to him; but
+Handsome deigned no reply, passing on in silence, and leading the way to
+a cabin that was larger and better than the others, and which stood
+exactly in the centre of the miniature valley.
+
+Nick guessed that this was the temporary home of Black Madge, and he
+was, therefore, not at all surprised when she stepped out upon the porch
+in front of it.
+
+She showed her white and even teeth, and smiled, in her own bold way, as
+Handsome approached her, with Nick in tow; and she asked, as soon as
+they were near enough:
+
+"Whom have we here?"
+
+"It is the old chap I have told you about, Madge," replied Handsome.
+
+"Sent here to spy upon us, I suppose," she smiled scornfully. "Why
+didn't you shoot him at once instead of bringing him here?"
+
+Before Handsome could reply, Nick wheeled upon him.
+
+"Didn't I tell ye so?" he demanded, with a show of anger. "Didn't I tell
+ye so? Didn't I say that they be thinking that I was a spy; but you
+wouldn't have it so? Tell me that."
+
+"I don't think he is a spy, Madge," said Handsome. "Remember that I have
+known him for a considerable time. And I have found him on the level."
+
+Madge shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"All right," she said. "That is, all right this time. Only now that he
+is here, he stays. Don't forget that."
+
+"Oh, I haven't forgotten that."
+
+"Nobody leaves this valley without my permission; not a single one."
+
+"They are all pretty well satisfied that you mean that, Madge."
+
+"Now, tell me what you brought the old man here for."
+
+"Because he knows every inch of the galleries inside those caves. I want
+to know about them myself, and I want the old man to teach me about
+them. The time will come, Madge, when we will be mighty glad to know
+about those galleries."
+
+"Possibly so," she replied. "Do as you like with him; only
+remember--nobody leaves this valley without my permission. When I get
+the men thoroughly organized and so they will do what I want them to do,
+then I will turn loose upon the world one of the best--and the
+worst--criminal organizations that has ever been heard of. Do what you
+please with the old man. He looks old enough to have been dead long
+ago."
+
+"And as old as I am, madam, I've never before heard a woman speak so to
+me," said Nick, as if he were hurt by it.
+
+Madge turned to him quickly.
+
+"You mustn't mind what I say--always Turner," she said. "I have a habit
+of speaking harshly at times; but I am not unkind to those who are true
+to me. Do you happen to know a man who is named Nick Carter?"
+
+She asked the question suddenly, as if she expected the utterance of the
+name would make the supposed Turner start with surprise; but Nick looked
+at her quite calmly, and replied:
+
+"I know the name. He's a detective chap, ain't he? I heerd about him;
+something about that bank robbery."
+
+"Is he in Calamont now, Turner?"
+
+"No, ma'am; he ain't."
+
+"You speak positively."
+
+"Well, I know he wasn't there when I came out of town; and I didn't hear
+that he was expected there, nuther. And if he had been expected there
+I'd 'a' heerd it. There ain't nothin' goin' on in that town that I don't
+hear about."
+
+"Do you know if he has been sent for?"
+
+"I ain't heerd nothin' about his bein' sent for, ma'am."
+
+"If, some day, I should decide to send you into the village to do some
+errands for me, do you suppose you could make some inquiries about Nick
+Carter for me, and at the same time forget all that you know about us,
+who are here?"
+
+"I reckon I could, ma'am."
+
+"I'll think about it. I may want to use you," she said; and turned away.
+But she stopped and turned toward them again, calling to Handsome, who
+went to her side; but Nick could hear the conversation that passed
+between them.
+
+"What about that fellow Pat?" she heard Madge inquire; and he could
+barely refrain from giving a start that might have betrayed him, for
+that question told him plainly that Patsy had already managed to arrive
+among the hoboes, and--that his fate still hung in the balance. He
+listened eagerly for Handsome's reply.
+
+"I haven't had a chance to examine him yet," he said. "You wished me to
+talk with him before I brought him to you."
+
+"Go and bring him here now. Leave Turner here with me until you return."
+
+"Get up there on the porch and sit down, Turner," he said. "Smoke your
+pipe if you wish to. The queen won't object. I'll be back in a moment."
+
+But when Handsome had hurried away to bring Patsy, and Nick had seated
+himself upon a rustic chair, Madge came and stood in front of him.
+
+"Turner," she said severely. "Tell me the truth now. What brought you
+into this neighborhood?"
+
+"The season of the year brought me," Nick replied to her as he had done
+to Handsome.
+
+"Who sent you?"
+
+"Nobody sent me, ma'am."
+
+"Swear to that."
+
+"'Tain't necessary. I have said it."
+
+"Do you know what would happen to you if I should find that you were
+acting as a spy?"
+
+"I suppose I could guess."
+
+"I'd have you burned at the stake, just as Indians used to burn their
+captives."
+
+"Well, ma'am, I reckon I've lived too long a time now to be much afraid
+of death. When a man has passed eighty, he ain't much afraid of things."
+
+"Are you as old as that?"
+
+"Old Bill Turner is eighty-four, ma'am; but he don't look it, does he?"
+
+"No. I wish I could feel sure of you. I wish I could feel sure that you
+are not a spy."
+
+"Well, ma'am, it's my experience that we can't somehow help our feelings
+much. If you are in doubt about it, treat it as you would an
+earache--with silent contempt. Doubts, ma'am, are suthin' like boils;
+they're the devil and all while you've got 'em; but they do get well
+arter a while. You ain't got no call to doubt old Bill Turner, as I
+knows on."
+
+"I'll talk with you again, Turner. In the meantime, see that you walk in
+a straight line."
+
+"I can't do that no more. My old feet ain't so steady as they used to
+be. But I'll do the best I can."
+
+"We can't ask anybody to do more than that. Now keep silent. Here comes
+Handsome with another man who I fear may be a spy."
+
+Patsy, with his hair a brick-red, and with spots and freckles on his
+face that were a sight to see, came forward at that moment, led by
+Handsome.
+
+His hands were tied together behind his back, and he looked as if he had
+been treated rather badly. However, there was a grin upon his face as he
+approached, and ducked his head in what was intended to be a polite bow
+to the queen of the outlaws.
+
+"So you have come back again?" she demanded of him abruptly.
+
+"Yes, I'm back, your honor--I mean, ma'am," he replied, grinning the
+more.
+
+"Where have you been while you were away, then? Tell me that?"
+
+"Well, sure, your majesty, I was a-runnin' most of the time. When the
+fire broke out down there, and the divil to pay generally, they all
+thinkin' as how it was y'rsilf that was bein' burrnt to death inside the
+cottage, I helped all I could until it was found out that it wasn't you,
+at all, at all, but a dummy that had been fixed up to look like you. And
+then when the hull bunch of the spalpeens went crazy and tried to find
+out what had become of you, it wasn't long until I found out that I was
+all alone in that place, the rest having gone in search of you. And
+after that I thought it wasn't healthy for me around there."
+
+"I think you're a spy, Pat," she said coldly.
+
+"Divil a bit of it. Who says so? Don't you belave it!"
+
+"Why did you not stay with the rest of the men, then?"
+
+"Divil a wan of me can tell that same, now. I clean forget. I think I
+was scared out of me two wits. If I had been a long time wid yez, instid
+of bein' there only wan day, sure I'd have remained, so I would. But I'd
+been there so little that I thought it wasn't healthy for me. That's
+all."
+
+"What made you come back now?"
+
+"Sure I heard that ye'd escaped from your jailers, and I knowed that
+you'd be after protecting me. Didn't you tell me that I was all right?
+And, thinks I, if I can find 'em now, sure the quane will be after
+takin' care of me; and here I am."
+
+"When I heard that you had returned, I made up my mind to have you
+shot!"
+
+"Oh, glory be to gracious! Don't be after doin' that same, your honor!
+Faith, why should ye be after shootin' the likes of me? I ain't done
+nothin' at all."
+
+Patsy, with a perfect assumption of fright, fell upon his knees before
+the woman and raised his hands beseechingly to her.
+
+And for a moment she looked down upon him with cold contempt in her
+eyes. It was evident to Nick, who was watching the scene narrowly, that
+she was coldly calculating the chances of letting him live, and that a
+breath upon the scales either way would decide her.
+
+For a long time she remained in the same attitude, and then she raised
+her head and spoke to Handsome.
+
+"When one in my position is in any doubt," she said coldly, "there is
+only one thing to do, and that is to give myself, not the other person,
+the benefit of the doubt. That is what I have decided to do, Handsome.
+Take him away."
+
+"What shall I do with him?"
+
+"Take him back to the cabin where he was tied up, and tie him up again.
+To-night, when the fires are lit, we will convene a court and try him. I
+will be the judge at that trial, and after it is over we will probably
+hang him. I see no other way. Take him away. Go."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+BLACK MADGE GIVES JUDGMENT.
+
+
+It was a strange scene upon which the light of a huge camp fire shone
+that night, in the mountain retreat of the outlaws.
+
+A stake had been set in the ground, and to this Patsy was tied, so that
+all could see him plainly. Somewhat to one side, on a huge rustic chair,
+made by one of the men, the queen was seated in state, ready to act as
+judge at the trial that was to begin, and Cremation Mike was selected as
+prosecuting attorney.
+
+A jury of twelve of the men had been drawn, only it was a foregone
+conclusion that they would bring in their verdict according as the queen
+should direct.
+
+Handsome acted as master of ceremonies, and around them was gathered the
+entire membership of Black Madge's hobo gang--as villainous a looking
+crew as might be imagined.
+
+As yet, no one had been appointed to defend Pat, and now Madge raised
+one hand, when she was ready to begin the trial, and she announced:
+
+"There is no one who has offered to act as attorney for the prisoner.
+This trial will afford you some amusement, my men. We will have a good
+time out of it, anyhow, before we hang him. I will appoint counsel for
+him."
+
+They were all silent, waiting, and presently she spoke again.
+
+"I will name the old man there, Bill Turner, as counsel for the defense.
+Will you defend the man, Turner?"
+
+"I'll try to, madam, though I don't know anything about the case. He may
+be guilty for all I know. What is he charged with?"
+
+"With being a spy."
+
+"If you want me to defend him, I'll do my best."
+
+"Go ahead, then. Let the trial begin," she ordered.
+
+The prosecution took up the case; that is, Cremation Mike got upon his
+feet and began to make a speech to the jury. He said:
+
+"We've got proof enough that the man is a spy, ain't we, mates? We all
+know what happened down there in the swamp, the time that Nick Carter
+got among us, and carried away Black Madge almost before our eyes, and
+we none the wiser for it. We know how Nick Carter set the cottage afire
+after drugging Madge, and how then he fixed up a dummy in one of the
+windows, so that we would think that she was burning up. We know that,
+don't we, mates?
+
+"And don't we know that there were four men who came to our camp in the
+swamp at the same time, and who came together? Wasn't one of that four
+Nick Carter himself? And were not two others of that same four Nick
+Carter's assistants? And who was the fourth one of that four? Why, it
+was that cove there, tied to the stake, and waiting for you to hang him.
+
+"Would he have been in that sort of company if he hadn't been made out
+of the same kind of cloth? Didn't he come there with that other outfit?
+Didn't we prove--that is, didn't Madge prove that one of the four was
+Nick Carter; that another of the four was his assistant, who is called
+Chick? And that still another of the four was another assistant, who is
+called Ten-Ichi?
+
+"And don't you know that Nick Carter has got still another assistant,
+and that his other assistant is named Patsy? Haven't you heard of that?
+It is true. And so is this fellow's name Pat--or Patsy. It is all the
+same.
+
+"Now, again, didn't they come here together? Didn't Handsome find them
+camping in the woods, waiting for a chance to get to our camp, and
+didn't this fellow tell him the first one of the bunch that he was
+looking for Hobo Harry, the Beggar King--and ain't Hobo Harry and Black
+Madge one and the same? I tell you, there ain't any doubt that the man
+is a spy, and that he ought to be hanged.
+
+"Now, do you guns remember what happened the night of the fire, the time
+when Nick Carter got away with Madge, and took her to jail? I'll remind
+you of it. Don't you remember that when we found the other two out, they
+were sent to the quicksand pit? I was one of those who helped to throw
+them into the quicksand pit. Did you ever hear of anybody's getting out
+of that pit alive? I never did until that incident; but I have found out
+since that both those assistants, Chick and Ten-Ichi, are alive and
+kicking, down in New York, this very day.
+
+"Well, who got 'em out of that quicksand pit, then? Why, this fellow!
+That is where he was, and what he was doing while we were fighting the
+fire, and don't you forget it! We was all too busy to remember about the
+men we had chucked into the sand; but he didn't forget. For why? Because
+he was one of them himself, and because he had determined all along to
+go to that pit as soon as ever he could, and get them out of it.
+
+"How'd he get 'em out, you ask? I don't know. I only know that he did
+get 'em out somehow, for they are out. I know that for certain."
+
+Nick, in the character of Turner, leaped to his feet.
+
+"I object!" he cried out. "This man ain't tryin' this case fair. I don't
+know who he is, and I don't keer a cuss; I only know that you app'inted
+me to defend him, and I'm a-goin' to do it till you tell me to stop. I
+object, ma'am, to the course he is adoptin'. It ain't fair. He's making
+a lot of statements the which he ain't got a shadow of proof about. I
+don't know anything about that air fire he speaks about, 'ceptin' what
+I've heerd down at Calamont. But we ain't got the fire here as a
+witness; and we ain't got the quicksand here as a witness; and we ain't
+got the two men as he says was saved from it here as witnesses. And
+unless he can produce witnesses to testify to what he says about them
+air escapes, I move that the hull speech he made be strucken out, your
+honor. Let him call his witnesses to the stand, and swear 'em, or swear
+at 'em. Let him do suthin, 'cept standing up there and shootin' off his
+mouth."
+
+Madge smiled grimly. She was getting more enjoyment out of this affair
+than she had anticipated.
+
+"Call your witnesses, Mike," she said.
+
+"I ain't got none, Madge, to swear to what I have said, but every one
+here knows it is the solemn truth. I don't need no witnesses. However,
+I'll put Handsome on the stand fur a minute, about the way the bunch
+arrived at our camp, if you say so."
+
+"I think it would be a good idea. It would be more regular."
+
+"All right, Madge. Handsome, take the stand. Hold up your right hand,
+and swear that you'll tell the truth. That's all right. Now, did you
+hear what I said about your findin' that outfit in the woods north of
+the track?"
+
+"I did."
+
+"Wasn't it the dead-level truth?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"The hull four was there, warn't they?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"And they was all strangers?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"You never seen any one of them afore that time, had you?"
+
+"Never."
+
+"And, later, wasn't it found out that three of 'em were spies?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"And wasn't one of the spies Nick Carter himself?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And weren't the other two his assistants?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"Didn't they confess it?"
+
+"They did."
+
+"And weren't they afterward thrown into the quicksand pit to die?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"Did they die there?"
+
+"I don't think they did."
+
+"Don't you know that they escaped?"
+
+"I'm reasonably certain of it."
+
+"How did they escape?"
+
+"I don't know that."
+
+"Isn't it your opinion that this galoot here----"
+
+"I object!" shouted Nick.
+
+"Oh, well," exclaimed Mike, in disgust, "ask him some questions
+yourself, then."
+
+"I will. Handsome, when did you first see them four in the woods north
+o' the track?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know. Before dark that night."
+
+"Was they together?"
+
+"Part of the time."
+
+"Only part o' the time? What do you mean by that?"
+
+"They didn't come there together."
+
+"Oh, didn't they? Where was you?"
+
+"I was hiding, and watching them."
+
+"So you saw 'em all when they arrived there, did you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who got there first?"
+
+"This man--Pat."
+
+"Did the others appear to know him?"
+
+"No; but they didn't appear to know each other, either."
+
+"But if they were spies, and you afterward proved that they were, and if
+they got there, and found Pat already there, it would be natural that
+they should act as if they didn't know each other, wouldn't it, in order
+to deceive him?"
+
+"I suppose so."
+
+"Have you ever seen anything suspicious about the prisoner?"
+
+"No; only his disappearance after the fire and the arrest of Madge."
+
+"P'r'aps he kin explain that."
+
+"He can't. He has tried already. You heard him. I don't call that an
+explanation, but it is probably the best he can give."
+
+"Would you be afraid to trust him now?"
+
+"Personally? I don't think I would."
+
+"Then, personally, you don't think that he is a spy?"
+
+"No; but I don't _know_ that he isn't."
+
+"That'll do. I don't want to ask you any more questions." He turned to
+Cremation Mike. "Have you got any more witnesses?" he asked.
+
+"No," with a grin. "I don't need no more."
+
+"Maybe not. But I've got one witness."
+
+"Oh! Have you. Who is it?"
+
+"I'm going to put the prisoner on the stand."
+
+But Madge was plainly tired of the amusement already. She rose in her
+place, and her eyes were flashing darkly.
+
+"We will stop this farce here and now," she said. "It won't do any good,
+anyhow. I can see plainly enough that there are some here who believe he
+is a spy. I am a good deal of that opinion myself; and as there is a
+doubt in my mind, I'll just settle the thing right now. Jury, you can
+find the man guilty. That's what he is, probably."
+
+"Guilty," said the jury, with one voice, and grinning.
+
+"Prisoner," continued Madge, "you have got until to-morrow morning, at
+nine o'clock, to live. At that time the boys will take you to some
+convenient tree, and hang you by the neck until you're dead--and that
+settles it."
+
+Things looked dark for Patsy. It was quite evident that Black Madge was
+in deadly earnest in what she had said. One life more or less was
+absolutely nothing to her, and if there was the breath of a suspicion
+against one, it was, from her standpoint, better to put that one out of
+the way at once than to run any sort of risk by permitting him to live.
+
+Nor did the hoboes who had gathered there to hear and to witness the
+trial hesitate to voice their sentiments about it by loud cheering when
+Madge uttered the sentence of death. It would be a hanging, indeed, and
+it did not make much difference to them who was hung. It has been said
+before that they were much like wild beasts, or dogs, who are without
+any quality of compassion.
+
+When Nick walked away from the scene of the trial near the fire, he
+found that Handsome was beside him, and then, before either uttered a
+word, Madge joined them.
+
+She was smiling as if she were well pleased with her evening's work, and
+she said to the detective:
+
+"You did well, Turner. One would suppose that you had at some time been
+a lawyer."
+
+"I'd 'a' got the man free if I'd had a fair judge and jury," replied
+Nick boldly, stroking the white whiskers he wore.
+
+Madge frowned. Then she laughed aloud.
+
+"I like you for your boldness," she said. "But have a care that you do
+not find yourself suddenly in the same predicament, Turner."
+
+"I'd be inclined to shoot myself afore I came to trial, if I should,"
+Nick retorted.
+
+They had reached Madge's cabin by this time, and now they mounted to the
+porch, and Nick pulled out an old pipe that Turner had given him, filled
+it, and lighted it.
+
+The detective was determined in his own mind that before the dawn of
+another day he would find some way to save Patsy; but how it was to be
+done he had no idea.
+
+He did not know yet what disposition they intended to make of him. For
+all he knew they might send him into one of the cabins and lock him up
+for the night. But he did know that unless he acted, Patsy would be
+murdered at sunrise the following morning, and he did not intend to
+permit that to happen.
+
+"Miss Madge," he said, after a pause, during which he had smoked in
+silence, "if it is all the same to you, I'd like to know what you intend
+to do with me to-night. I'm an old man, and I'm sorter 'customed to
+going to bed rayther early, so, if you don't mind, and you'll tell me
+where I'm to sleep, I think I'll turn in."
+
+Instead of replying directly to him, Madge turned to Handsome.
+
+"What shall we do with him?" she asked. "You are responsible for his
+being here. I think I will turn him over to you."
+
+"All right," said Handsome, rising. "I'll take him to my own cabin.
+He'll be safe enough there. I'll be back in a minute, Madge."
+
+Nick followed him across the floor of the little valley to a hut that
+was at the opposite side of it, and close to the cliff--and Nick knew at
+once, from his recollection of the plan he had studied, that he was
+quite near to the entrance to the cavern.
+
+The cabin consisted of only one room, in which two bunks had been
+roughly built, and, after lighting a candle, Handsome indicated one of
+these, and said:
+
+"You can sleep there, Turner. Turn in when you like. To-morrow we will
+explore the caves together."
+
+"Right you are," said Nick, yawning widely. "I shan't need any rocking
+this night. My old legs are tired out for sure."
+
+Two minutes after the departure of Handsome, Nick blew out the candle,
+and for a time he stretched himself in the bunk, lest Handsome should
+return to see that all was right. But it was speedily evident to the
+detective that Handsome had no suspicion whatever of him, and had,
+therefore, left him to his own devices.
+
+But Nick knew that it could not be very long before the outlaw would
+return to seek his own rest and repose, and that he must, therefore,
+determine upon what he was to do before he should return.
+
+Ten minutes he lay there, and then he rose slowly and cautiously from
+the bunk and crept to the door which had been left open, and peered out.
+
+The fires were still blazing merrily, and many of the men were gathered
+around them. Some of the men were playing cards, and the others were
+engaged in various ways. At all events, they one and all seemed to have
+forgotten his existence, and that was what he chiefly desired.
+
+Nick knew in which cabin Patsy was a prisoner. He could see it from the
+doorway where he was standing, almost opposite him at the other side of
+the valley. The distance in feet from his own position was about the
+distance of a city block--two hundred feet.
+
+The old silver watch, the size of a turnip, which Turner had carried
+forty years or more, was in his pocket, and by the light of the stars
+Nick managed to see the time--ten o'clock.
+
+"There is no time like the present," he mused to himself, while he
+hesitated in the doorway. "If I wait until all is quiet, I will stand
+all the more chance of being discovered; and, besides, it won't be long
+until Handsome returns here, and after he has come and crawled into his
+bunk it will be next to impossible for me to get out of here without
+rousing him--unless I should drug him, and that will not do at all.
+Handsome is altogether too fly for that. He would know that he had been
+drugged.
+
+"Now, if it wasn't for these white whiskers, I could creep around the
+edge of the bottom of the cliff to the cabin where Patsy is, without
+being noticed; and I dare not take them off----"
+
+He stopped there. There was absolutely no use in conjecturing upon the
+"ifs" of the question, and so, after another moment, during which he
+studied the lay of the land intently, he slipped noiselessly out at the
+door and around behind the cabin, and from there crept on his hands and
+knees to the bottom of the cliffs. And there he discovered what he had
+been unable to see in the imperfect light. The grass there was quite
+tall, where it had not been trampled by the feet of the motley crew that
+infested the place, and he found that by lying at full length and
+pulling himself slowly along on his stomach he would be able to conceal
+himself almost entirely from view.
+
+Nick made that half circle of the small valley, crawling in that way,
+and entirely without being discovered; and in that manner he arrived
+directly in the rear of the cabin where Patsy was a prisoner.
+
+But here a new difficulty confronted him. There was a guard in front of
+the door, and that guard, strangely enough, was Cremation Mike.
+
+The cabin in which Patsy was a prisoner was built of roughly hewn logs,
+the crevices and chinks being stopped with mud and clay. The ground
+beneath it was hard--rocky, in fact; so there was no possibility of
+digging under the logs without tools to do it, and even then it would
+have taken too much time to accomplish it.
+
+Nick turned his attention to Cremation Mike. He was seated upon a
+convenient stump, smoking a short pipe. His back was toward the door of
+the cabin, and he was about ten feet from it. The door itself had been
+fastened by passing a freshly cut sapling across its front, and slipping
+either end of it into rustic slots that had been hastily fashioned for
+the purpose.
+
+It was plain that there was only one way to get Patsy outside of that
+cabin, and that was to overcome Cremation Mike; and, having determined
+upon this, Nick crept forward as silently as a shadow, and so rounded
+the corner of the cabin, and presently came up half standing, directly
+behind the unsuspecting outlaw.
+
+Nick did not wish to kill the man, but he did want to knock him out so
+effectually that he could not interfere in what was to follow, and
+therefore he had picked up a piece of round, smooth stone, which he had
+wrapped in his handkerchief.
+
+And now, with this improvised weapon, he struck Cremation Mike sharply
+on the back of his head, with the result that Mike pitched forward, and
+would have fallen to the ground had not Nick managed to catch him. Then
+he laid him down gently upon the ground, and turning swiftly, opened the
+door of the cabin.
+
+"Quick, Patsy!" he called in a sharp whisper. "It is I. Nick. Come."
+
+Patsy, who had not been bound, it seemed, leaped to the door with a low
+exclamation of surprise and pleasure.
+
+"Bully, Nick," he whispered. "I thought it was all up with me that time.
+And do you know, it never once occurred to me that the old man might be
+you. The disguise is perfect."
+
+"Come," said Nick. "There is no time for words now. Follow me, and do
+exactly as I do. I want to get back to my own sleeping place before my
+absence is discovered, if it is possible to do so. But, first, is there
+any sort of a chair or stool inside that cabin?"
+
+"Yes. A stool."
+
+"Bring it out, if you know where to put your hand upon it."
+
+Patsy brought it in a twinkling, and, placing it against the stump, Nick
+propped the senseless form of Mike upon it, so that from the front it
+appeared as if he were seated there quite naturally.
+
+"He will come around presently," said Patsy, "and miss me."
+
+"Let him. That is what I want him to do," replied Nick. "Come on, now."
+
+He dropped upon his knees again, and, with Patsy following, they crept
+around through the grass again along the edge of the cliff, and at last
+reached the cabin from which the detective had started.
+
+But he did not stop here. He made at once for the entrance to the
+cavern, which was near at hand, and passed inside, with Patsy following
+closely behind him; and then with his electric flash light, he led the
+way along the corridor of the cave--for it was his object to find that
+hiding place to which Turner had directed him in case he found it
+necessary to hide.
+
+"Keep to the right always in that cave, no matter which way you are
+going," Turner had told him with emphasis, and remembering that now,
+while he wondered if, after all, there were two corridors to the cavern,
+he followed the rule, and almost on a run--for the passage was quite
+smooth before them--he led the way through.
+
+They came at last to the bowlder to which Turner had referred, and Nick
+removed the small stone from beneath it. And then he pushed upon it as
+Turner had directed, with the result that the rock swung open before
+them, leaving an aperture through which they could easily pass.
+
+But Nick did not enter. Instead he thrust a candle and a box of matches
+into Patsy's grasp, and said to him:
+
+"Remain here until I come for you, even if you get hungry. I don't know
+any more about what is ahead of you than you do. I only know that you
+will be safe there. We have no time to talk now. I will shut this rock
+behind you."
+
+Then he turned and sped away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+NICK'S CLEVEREST CAPTURE.
+
+
+Nick Carter made his way as rapidly back through the cavern as he had
+gone through it with Patsy; but when he arrived at the entrance he came
+to a stop, and then went ahead again very slowly.
+
+He had no idea how long a time he had been gone, nor what might have
+happened during his absence. But when he peered out upon the valley,
+everything was apparently in the condition in which he had left it. If
+there had been any change at all, it was only that fewer of the men were
+gathered around the fires. Otherwise everything was the same.
+
+And so, with all the swiftness he could muster, he crawled to the cabin
+which Handsome had given him to occupy, entered it cautiously, and,
+finding it empty, crawled into the bunk that had been allotted to
+him--tired, but rejoiced to think that he had succeeded so well where
+there had been such small chance of success.
+
+And it so happened that he had barely laid himself down and composed
+himself to wait for developments, when a great cry went up, which was
+immediately followed by other shouts and loud curses--and Nick knew that
+the escape of Patsy had been discovered, and that he had returned just
+in time to avoid the consequences.
+
+Almost immediately following upon the utterance of the shouts, the door
+of the cabin flew open, and Handsome leaped inside, his eyes ablaze, and
+his whole form quivering with rage--and he carried a flash light, which
+he threw at once into the detective's face; into the face of the man he
+supposed to be Bill Turner.
+
+Nick could see that the instant the light fell upon him Handsome seemed
+greatly relieved; and then, before the outlaw could utter a word, Nick
+cried out in the voice of old Turner:
+
+"What--what's all that row about, Handsome?" and he blinked his eyes as
+if he had just been awakened.
+
+"It's lucky for you that you don't know what it's about!" was Handsome's
+rejoinder. "Get out of that, Turner, and come along with me."
+
+"But, what's the matter?" demanded Nick, sliding out of the bunk. "What
+has happened?"
+
+"That fellow Pat has escaped--that's what!" was the reply.
+
+"Sho! You don't say so! Well, well, well! When did he do it?"
+
+"I haven't found out yet. Come along. I thought at first that maybe you
+had had a hand in it--but I see you did not."
+
+"What! Me?"
+
+Every hobo that belonged to the gang had gathered in the centre of the
+place near where the mock trial had been held, and they were talking
+earnestly together. Cremation Mike, with one hand held at the back of
+his head, was the centre of the group--or rather of the throng.
+
+But Handsome burst unceremoniously through the crowd and confronted
+Mike, Nick following at his heels.
+
+Black Madge forced her way through it at the same time from the opposite
+side.
+
+"Now, Mike," said Handsome savagely. "Tell me how this happened."
+
+"I don't know. All that I know is, I got a crack on the head from
+behind. When I woke up, the bar had been ripped off the door and the
+bird had flown. That's all I know."
+
+"How long ago did it happen?"
+
+"How do I know that? Unless some one can tell how long I've been
+unconscious. But I'll bet my hat that it ain't ten minutes. I don't
+think it's three minutes. He can't be far away, and"--grinning--"he
+can't get away. He can't go through the pass, because the guards are
+there; I posted them myself; and the only way in which he could hope to
+get out is through the cave, and I don't believe he could find his way
+through there. I know that I wouldn't try it myself. I'd rather stay
+here and be hung."
+
+Madge interrupted the conversation here.
+
+"Do you think that he got out of the cabin without aid?" she asked of
+Mike. "Do you believe that it was he who struck you, Mike?"
+
+"I do, Madge. I'm sure of it."
+
+"Then, you weren't keeping good guard, that's all."
+
+"Well, I never thought it was possible for him to get out of that cabin.
+It may be that I dozed. I didn't suppose I did, but----"
+
+"But," said Madge icily, "the point is this: The boys shall not be
+disappointed in the hanging bee they were to hold in the morning. It is
+up to you, Mike, to find the prisoner. If you don't find him in time,
+you shall hang in his place--that's all. I mean it."
+
+Cremation Mike's face turned to the color of chalk, for he realized that
+she did, indeed, mean what she said. For a moment he stood there
+trembling, and then he seized a lantern which one of the men was
+holding, and cried out:
+
+"Come along, whoever will help me. I know that he can't have gone far.
+He ain't had time. I know it. Come along."
+
+"Wait," said Handsome coolly; and he turned to Nick.
+
+"Turner," he said, "I begin to think that it is fortunate that you came
+here when you did."
+
+"I am sure of it," said Nick in reply.
+
+"You know that cave from end to end, don't you?"
+
+"I think I do."
+
+"Then, you shall act as guide."
+
+"All right. I'm ready."
+
+But this short conversation had called the attention of Madge to the
+supposed old man, whom she had for the moment forgotten, and now she
+turned savagely upon him.
+
+"I believe that you are at the bottom of this," she said, her eyes
+blazing.
+
+Before Nick could make any reply, Handsome broke in.
+
+"That is nonsense, Madge," he said. "I know it. As soon as there was an
+alarm--as soon as Mike yelled out that the prisoner had escaped, I
+legged it for the cabin, and I found Turner just waking up from his
+sleep. He had no hand in it. He couldn't."
+
+"It's lucky for you," said Madge, still eying Nick sharply.
+
+"Will you guide us through the cave, Turner?" demanded Handsome.
+
+"Sure."
+
+"Then, come on."
+
+"Hold on a minute," said Nick. "Don't you think it would be a good idea
+to send some of the men to guard the other entrances? If the prisoner
+hasn't had time to get through the cave yet, and if he should happen to
+find one of the ways out on the other side, he'd run right into the
+arms of whoever was on the watch."
+
+"Good!" said Handsome. "We know of two outside entrances. How many do
+you know about?"
+
+"Four," replied Nick. "Four, not counting the hole under the Dog's Nose.
+That may be an entrance; but one man can guard that."
+
+"Where are those entrances?"
+
+Glibly Nick described how they might be found, using the exact language
+that had been used by the old man in his description of them; and after
+a short delay four men were sent away to each of the entrances, on a
+run, with instructions to remain on guard before them until they should
+be relieved.
+
+"Now," said Nick, when they had gone, "we know that the prisoner can't
+escape. We know it's only a matter of time when he'll be
+caught--therefore, we needn't hurry. Don't you agree with me, Handsome?
+He can't get out of the cave at any of the entrances, without being
+captured or shot down, an', o' course, he can't come back this way
+without meetin' with the same fate. Ain't that right?"
+
+"I guess it is," agreed Handsome.
+
+"Ain't that right, Miss Madge?" asked Nick again, turning to her.
+
+"It sounds entirely reasonable," she replied. "There has been only one
+mistake made from the start of this affair, and that is that Pat was not
+shot down when he first showed himself here. As it stands now, he has
+temporarily made his escape. I am satisfied, now, that he is a spy, and
+I commission each one of you to shoot him down without mercy, on sight.
+I shall go with you into the cave to search."
+
+"Do you wish me to direct the search?" asked Nick, still standing
+quietly before her.
+
+"Yes. What have you to suggest?"
+
+"This: There be four entrances outside o' the one here in this little
+valley. I should divide the men into four parts. I kin direct each party
+so that it won't have no difficulty in followin' the cavern and
+searching it thoroughly to the entrance. I'll take one o' the parties.
+How many men are there here now?"
+
+"Let me see," replied Madge. "Sixteen have gone away to guard the
+entrances, and four will have to remain here on guard. That takes away
+twenty. We still have eighty left."
+
+"Good. That'll give us twenty in each party. Now, madam, it's for you to
+say who'll lead them. Tell me who the leaders will be, and I'll instruct
+'em at once."
+
+She picked out four of the men, and ordered them to step forward; and,
+one by one, Nick directed each of them how to proceed after he had
+passed the entrance of the cavern with the men who were to follow him;
+and he made the directions so explicit that there was not one who had
+any doubt about being able to follow them.
+
+It was as Nick had suspected it would be; that Madge did not yet trust
+him far enough to give him the sole leadership of one of the parties,
+but she directed that Handsome should go with him--and at the last
+moment, when they were ready to start, and after the other three parties
+had entered the cavern, she decided to accompany Nick's party herself.
+
+"I may as well go along," she said. "I would like to learn something
+about the interior of that cavern myself, and I don't know a better way
+to learn it than to go with you."
+
+And so it was that presently the detective found himself in the cavern,
+leading twenty-two persons, for the extra two were Madge and Handsome.
+
+And the course that Nick had selected for himself was the one that would
+take him past the hiding place where he had left Patsy; for it was no
+part of his plan that he should give the others even a chance of an
+accident of finding that hiding place.
+
+It had been shortly after eleven o'clock when Nick returned to the cabin
+after assisting Patsy in his escape; it was now after midnight.
+
+There were torches and lanterns in abundance scattered among the four
+parties that were searching; and, in the directions that Nick had given
+each party, he had taken good care that they should become thoroughly
+lost if possible. He had an object in this, as will be seen.
+
+The way through the cave along the route which the detective had
+selected to follow was smooth and even, as we already know; but Nick
+made it as long and as rough as possible by taking the party off into
+some of the side galleries as they proceeded.
+
+He was looking for a place where he might lose some of them, and at
+least where he might, before the expedition was finished, succeed in
+separating them.
+
+What he chiefly desired was to finally get either Madge or Handsome
+alone with him.
+
+It was two hours later before they finally passed the bowlder behind
+which was the entrance to the hiding place where Patsy was concealed;
+but not one of the party so much as glanced toward it; and Nick led the
+way on past it to the exit--and that exit was not the hole under the
+Dog's Nose, but a larger one at some distance from it.
+
+There they found the four men who had been sent hither, and they
+reported that they had seen nothing; and cautioning them to remain on
+guard, Nick led his party back into the cave again.
+
+And then, after a few moments, he pretended suddenly to find that fifth
+entrance--the hole under the Dog's Nose--and there four other men were
+waiting--and they had seen not a thing to suggest the proximity of the
+prisoner who had escaped.
+
+"Now," said Nick, "I think we'd better s'arch them side galleries more
+thoroughly. If you'll return with me to the entrance from the valley,
+we'll start over again, and go into and through every one o' 'em. We'll
+divide our party into smaller groups o' three and four, and in that way
+we kin cover all of them at the same time. What do you say?"
+
+"All right," said Madge, still looking upon him with suspicion. "But
+Handsome and I will remain with you, Turner."
+
+"That is what I hoped you'd do," replied Nick; but he spoke with a
+meaning which she did not understand.
+
+They followed the plan suggested by the detective. That is, they
+returned to the entrance from the valley, and there Nick divided his
+followers into six parties, thus arranging that four of the parties
+should contain four searchers each, one of them should contain three,
+and his own immediate party should consist of himself, with Handsome and
+Madge.
+
+To the leaders of each of these subparties he gave the necessary
+directions, with the result that he sent them off as they arrived at
+their respective galleries, and after a little he found himself alone
+with the two chiefs of the outlaws.
+
+"There ain't much for us to do now," he said. "There ain't much more
+searching as we kin do. There's only two galleries left for us to
+explore 'less we find some hiding place that's remained unknown until
+now."
+
+"And that isn't likely, is it?" asked Madge. Her voice was still filled
+with suspicion against him.
+
+"You know as much about that ere as I do," he replied.
+
+But they searched each of the galleries without any result, and Nick
+finally directed the route so that at last they paused to rest directly
+in front of the movable rock behind which was the entrance to the place
+where Patsy was concealed.
+
+And Nick seated himself so that his own back was against that rock, for
+he did not care to run the chance that Handsome might lean against it
+hard enough to move it--at least, not until he was in every way prepared
+for that part of the drama.
+
+Madge was tired by this time, and she showed it. She leaned against the
+rocky wall and sighed deeply; and Handsome furnished the cue for the
+next scene--so perfectly that Nick could not have ordered it otherwise
+if he had tried.
+
+"I'm dry," said Handsome, yawning. "This is dry work, Madge. Don't you
+think we had better give the thing up for a time and wait. Pat will be
+starved out after a little. He'll have to come out and get caught."
+
+"If he ain't lost in the galleries," suggested Nick; and Madge replied:
+
+"No; we won't give it up. If you are dry, Handsome, suppose you go to
+the camp and get something for us all. I wouldn't mind having something
+myself."
+
+"I'll do it," said Handsome, rising. "Wait here."
+
+He was off like a shot, for now he felt that he knew the route
+sufficiently well through the caverns to find his way without
+difficulty; as, indeed, he did. And he had a lantern to light his path.
+
+Nick sat quietly until Handsome was well out of hearing, and then,
+purposely, he leaned very hard against the rock behind him--so hard that
+it moved, and he nearly fell upon his back inside the opening.
+
+With a well-simulated cry of surprise, he leaped to his feet, and stood
+staring, and Madge did the same.
+
+"A secret hidin' place!" cried out the supposed old man--and he pushed
+the rock farther in, thus making the opening even larger.
+
+Then he stooped forward toward it.
+
+"Hello in there!" he called lustily, for he wished to warn Patsy of what
+was taking place, and at the same time to instruct him what to do. "Come
+out of that, you--Pat! There are two of us here, and one is Madge
+herself. Come out of that!"
+
+"You fool!" exclaimed Madge.
+
+"Come out of that!" repeated the detective, pretending not to hear her.
+"Come out of that, or we'll come in after you!"
+
+There was no reply, and Nick turned to her.
+
+"Come along," he said. "We'll go inside and find him."
+
+She had a revolver in her hand, and now she stepped quickly forward, for
+there was nothing of the coward about Black Madge. There was not a thing
+on earth that she feared.
+
+She stepped forward so quickly that she had passed inside the barrier of
+rock before Nick--as he intended she should--and then, as he stepped
+after her, he seized her quickly from behind--seized both her arms, and
+pulled them behind her with a suddenness that made her drop her weapon
+to the rocky floor.
+
+As he pulled her backward, she tried to cry out, but he had anticipated
+that, and already he had grasped her so that he could press one of his
+hands for an instant over her mouth, and at the same moment he called
+out:
+
+"Quick, Patsy! On your life! There isn't an instant to spare!"
+
+And Patsy was ready and fully prepared.
+
+He had approached them through the darkness at the first note of warning
+from Nick, and was in reality only a few feet distant when they entered
+the rocky passage; so that when the detective seized upon Madge and
+pulled her backward, Patsy was ready to leap forward and to give his
+aid.
+
+When Nick's hand was pressed over her mouth to stop the cry that rose to
+her lips, Patsy was there to seize her, also; and he did it; and,
+although she struggled fiercely, she was quickly overpowered, and a gag
+was thrust into her mouth.
+
+Then they tied her, hand and foot, with cords with which Nick had
+provided himself, and together they carried her far back into the recess
+behind the rock.
+
+"There is a big room here," said Patsy. "And it is stocked with
+provisions, and a stream of pure water trickles through it. One could
+live here a month without going out."
+
+"Good!" said the detective. "Carry her in there. Then when we have made
+her safe, we will wait for Handsome, and serve him in the same manner.
+And after that, I have got a plan which will work the whole thing out to
+a finish."
+
+Madge was glaring at him venomously all this time, for she could not
+speak. But her eyes were terrible to see in their utter ferocity.
+
+She knew now what the game was that had been played against her. She
+knew now that the man she had supposed to be old Bill Turner was all the
+time no other than Nick Carter himself.
+
+She could have bitten her tongue out with rage and chagrin. She fairly
+writhed in the ecstasy of her impotent anger.
+
+But they laid her gently upon the rocky floor, where there were some
+blankets over leaves--it was evident that Bill Turner had used this
+place as a retreat of his own, and had provided it for that purpose,
+like a schoolboy who finds a cave and makes a cache--and then Nick spoke
+to her.
+
+"You see, Madge," he said, "it is all up with you and your gang; or very
+nearly so. We are going out now to capture Handsome, and bring him here
+to keep you company. After that I will show you a trick that will make
+you green with envy, and that will finish up this hobo business of yours
+once and forever. Come on, Patsy."
+
+They left her there and returned to the entrance.
+
+"Now," said the detective, "there is only one way to make Handsome fall
+into the trap. We must leave this entrance open for him to discover when
+he returns. He will first miss us. Then he will see the hole behind the
+rock. Then he will step forward to look inside. Then no doubt he will
+call out. I will stand here and remain silent; and then Handsome will do
+one of two things--he will either come inside to search for Madge and
+me, or he will set up a yell for the others to come to him."
+
+"Suppose he brings some of the men back with him?" asked Patsy.
+
+"We have got to chance that."
+
+"Well, what are we to do when he steps inside this hole--for he will do
+that?"
+
+"You stand over there in that niche," replied Nick. "When he steps
+inside the very nature of the place will bring his back toward me. I
+will tap him on the back of the head with my fist and knock him into
+your arms. You are to grab him with your arms around him, and hold him
+so that he cannot get at a weapon, and until I can get my fingers on
+him. That is all. Now, ready and wait."
+
+They had some time to wait; longer than Nick expected, and he began to
+fear that Handsome would bring some of the men back with him; but at
+last they saw the glimmer of his light as he approached, and Nick knew
+by the sounds he heard that Handsome was returning alone.
+
+Presently he appeared. He was calling out softly, for he could not
+understand why he had not been answered--and the light he carried
+prevented him from seeing the hole behind the rock until it was directly
+in front of him.
+
+And then he came to a sudden stop, and gazed at it in astonishment.
+
+"Gee!" Nick heard him exclaim. "Dogged if they haven't found a hole
+here. And they have gone into it, too. I wonder if that old cuss knew
+about it all the time?"
+
+He remained in doubt for a moment what to do; and then, as Nick had
+predicted, he stepped softly forward, and, holding his light aloft,
+peered through the opening.
+
+But Nick had chosen his place of concealment well, and Handsome could
+not see him.
+
+Then Handsome called out:
+
+"Madge! Bill! Where the devil are you?"
+
+There was no reply, and he waited a moment before he called again. Then
+he repeated:
+
+"Madge! Madge!"
+
+When no reply came to this second call, he stood for some time in doubt,
+as if he thought of calling assistance to him before he entered that
+dark and unknown place; and once Nick thought he half turned, as if he
+had decided to summon some of the others.
+
+But he evidently thought better of this, for he turned about resolutely
+again, and boldly stepped into the opening. Two such steps brought him
+exactly into the position where the detective wanted him, and as soon as
+he had achieved it, Nick struck him with his fist.
+
+With a half-articulated cry, Handsome pitched forward and fell into the
+grasp of Patsy, who was ready for him; and then, when he would have
+struggled, other arms--Nick's--seized him from behind, and another blow
+fell upon him, striking him behind the ear, and rendering him half dazed
+for the moment.
+
+And then Nick, knowing that Patsy could hold him, turned about and
+closed the rock door of the retreat; and before Handsome had recovered
+his senses sufficiently to offer any resistance, the two detectives had
+bound him so securely that he could not move.
+
+"Take his feet," ordered Nick, then. "We will carry him back into that
+chamber, to keep Madge company."
+
+While they were doing that, Handsome managed to recover his powers of
+speech--for, now that the rock door was closed, Nick did not think it
+necessary to gag the man--and his powers of speech in this particular
+instance were something frightful to listen to.
+
+He was still swearing when they dropped him, none too gently, upon the
+floor of the cavern not far from Madge; and then Patsy lighted two
+bracket lamps with which the place was provided, while Nick smilingly
+removed the gag from Madge's mouth.
+
+And where Handsome had worn out his vocabulary of curses, Madge took it
+up, and completed it in masterly style, and there was really nothing for
+either of the detectives to say for a long time. But her breath was gone
+after a while, and she lapsed into sullen silence, closing her remarks
+with the request:
+
+"At least give me something to drink out of that bottle that Handsome
+went after."
+
+Nick could really do nothing less, and he complied; and the liquor
+seemed to restore some of her accustomed coolness, for she looked at
+Nick with an ugly gleam in her black eyes, and said:
+
+"You are Nick Carter again, aren't you?"
+
+"Again?" replied Nick, laughing. "I was always Nick Carter. I was so
+interested in that last interview I had with you, Madge, that I couldn't
+stay away; and now, when you condemned my assistant to death, you
+hastened the reckoning. That is all."
+
+"I'll condemn you to death yet--and watch you die, too!" was her
+retort.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+NICK MAKES BAD MEDICINE.
+
+
+Handsome had also recovered from his paroxysm of rage by this time, for
+he was one who had the gift of knowing when he was beaten, and the logic
+to accept a situation when he knew that it could not be avoided.
+
+"I reckon you've got the drop on us, Carter," he said. "You've played
+the game mighty well, too. There is one thing about it that I would like
+to know, though, if you will tell me. Will you?"
+
+"What is it?" asked the detective.
+
+"I want to know if you have been old Bill Turner from the beginning. I
+want to know if it was you whose acquaintance I made in the first place,
+the time I was pulled out of the hole in the rocks, or if it was old
+Bill himself."
+
+"That was the old man himself," replied Nick, smiling.
+
+"And the second time I met him; was that him--or you?"
+
+"That was the old man, also."
+
+"Well, all that I can say is that you have played the part so devilish
+well that I find it hard to believe even now that you are not what you
+appear to be."
+
+"You're a fool!" said Madge spitefully.
+
+"Oh, I admit the impeachment, Madge. There isn't any doubt of it. I'm a
+fool, all right."
+
+"And you are up against it rather hard just now, Handsome; you and
+Madge," said Nick.
+
+"I know that, too. I'm no fool as far as that is concerned. What are you
+going to do about the rest of the gang?"
+
+"I'm going to capture the whole bunch," was Nick's rather astonishing
+reply.
+
+"I don't see how you are going to do it," retorted Handsome. "There is a
+cold hundred of them, all told--and every entrance to the cave is
+guarded. You attended to that yourself."
+
+"Certainly, I did; because I foresaw this very moment."
+
+"Well, all that I can say is that you can see a cussed sight farther
+into a stone fence than I can."
+
+"I'll show you how it is done, if you are interested," replied the
+detective. "But, first, I am afraid that I will have to ask you to step
+out here a moment, into the other part of the cave, always remembering
+that if you make any kind of a break, down you go with a cracked skull;"
+and Nick leaned forward and loosened the cords around his ankles.
+
+"Oh, I know when my hands are in the air, Carter. If I make any breaks
+it will be because I think I see a chance of winning. What do you
+want?"
+
+He rose stiffly to his feet as he asked the question; and Nick looked
+him in the eye as he replied:
+
+"I want you to remember, in the first place, that I am more than twice
+or three times as strong as you are, and that if you offer to give me
+any trouble I shall hurt you; and hurt you so badly, too, that you won't
+get over it right away. I am going to take you into the other part of
+this cavern, toward the door where we entered. I am going to free your
+hands, and then I shall ask you to put on these old togs that Turner has
+left here for a change of clothing in case he got wet--for I want these
+that I am wearing for Patsy. After you have made the change I shall tie
+you up again, and then you will see--what you will see. But, remember,
+if you refuse to obey me on the instant that I give an order, down you
+go, and I will take the clothing off your senseless body, instead of
+letting you do it, and keep well. Now, are you ready?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Nick took him into the adjoining part of the cave, and held the light on
+him while he made the necessary change; for Nick had found some extra
+clothing of Turner's in the cave; and when that was done he tied
+Handsome up again, more securely than ever, and placed him on the floor
+again.
+
+"Now, Patsy," he said, "you and I will make a change. You will play the
+part of old Turner, and I will play the part of Handsome. It is
+necessary for what we have to do."
+
+Nick first dressed himself in the outer clothes that Handsome had
+removed; and then he sent Patsy into the other part of the cave to put
+on the clothing he had taken off--the suit that he had worn as old
+Turner; and, while Patsy was making the change, he was himself busily
+engaged in removing the white beard and hair that he had been wearing.
+
+It will not be necessary to describe in detail this operation; it is
+sufficient to say that the two detectives worked steadily for a long
+time; and that when at last they were through with what they were doing,
+Nick had assumed the personality of Handsome, and Patsy was transformed
+into what Nick had been--old Bill Turner.
+
+When everything was in readiness, he saw to it once more that the bonds
+which held his two prisoners were sufficiently secure, and that there
+was no possibility of their escaping; and he went so far as to fasten
+them to the opposite walls, so that they could not crawl within reach of
+each other, and make use of their teeth; and then he turned to Patsy,
+who was now, to all outward appearance, old Bill Turner.
+
+"Come along, Bill," he said, exactly imitating the voice of Handsome--so
+that Handsome grinned in spite of himself. "We have got a lot to do yet,
+and it will be daylight before we know it."
+
+They passed outside then, into the corridor of the cavern, and when Nick
+had shut the big rock in place over the entrance, he wedged the small
+stone under it, so that it could not be moved from the inside.
+
+"There," he said. "Even if they should get loose, which is not at all
+likely, they could not get out. And if they yell themselves hoarse,
+nobody could hear them. Come on. We've got a lot of work cut out for
+us."
+
+"What is there to do first?" asked Patsy.
+
+"The first thing is to return to the cabins in the valley, and find out
+what time it is. Oh, there is a watch in those clothes. Look at it. What
+time is it?"
+
+"Half-past two," replied Patsy, imitating the broken voice of the old
+man to perfection.
+
+"That's good, Patsy. I refer to your imitation. You will not have to use
+it much--possibly not at all; but it is as well to be perfect in your
+part all the same. I think we will have time enough for what we have to
+do if we hurry."
+
+He led the way rapidly then, back to the valley, where some of the
+searchers had already returned, and he found them grouped around the
+exit, when they issued from the cave.
+
+But when they attempted to address him, believing him to be Handsome, he
+returned no reply, for he had seen Handsome ignore them utterly many
+times; but it was Cremation Mike who stepped forward in front of them
+as they approached the cabin in which Madge was supposed to live.
+
+"Any luck?" he demanded surlily.
+
+"No," replied Nick, stopping for a moment.
+
+"Look here, Handsome, if that fellow is gone for good, do you suppose
+that Madge will do what she said she would?"
+
+"What was that, Mike?"
+
+"Hang me in his place?"
+
+"I shouldn't wonder if she did."
+
+"Say, Handsome, can't you say a word for me with her? Where is she? Can
+I see her?"
+
+"You had better keep away from her," suggested Nick.
+
+"No; I want to see her. Take me to her, will you?"
+
+"All right. Come along," replied the detective, and so Cremation Mike
+fell in behind them, and followed them into the cabin where Madge was
+supposed to be.
+
+But they were no sooner inside the house with the door closed than Nick
+wheeled in his tracks, and grasped Mike by the throat, and then struck
+him with his fist over the temple. The result was that Cremation Mike
+sank to the floor without a sound, and was speedily bound and gagged.
+
+"That's one," said the detective grimly. "There are a good many more,
+Patsy."
+
+"Do you expect to get them all, one by one, in that way?" asked Patsy.
+"It will take a week to do that."
+
+"No; I have a better plan than that. Wait."
+
+Nick knew of Madge's fondness for trapdoors, and also that she always
+kept a large supply of liquors on hand with which sometimes she treated
+her men, or some of them. He had no doubt that somewhere in that cabin
+he would not only find the liquors he wanted, but also drugs.
+
+There was a trapdoor in the floor of the largest room in the cabin, and
+under it was a shallow cellar wherein were several cases of liquors. The
+robbery of freight cars had always kept the hoboes well supplied with
+such articles.
+
+"Now, I'm going to make the hoboes a punch," he said to Patsy. He was
+searching through a cupboard while he spoke, and from there he produced
+a large bottle of laudanum. "I will have to use this," he continued. "It
+is the only thing here which will do at all, and as it has an
+excessively bitter taste, I will have to make a punch in order to
+conceal it. But it will do the work I want done better and more safely
+than anything else."
+
+"You'll have to use a washtub for the punch, to make enough for all of
+them," said Patsy. "And is there enough laudanum?"
+
+"Plenty; and there is a couple of pails. They will do as well as a tub.
+Now help me. We have lemons, and sugar, and everything that we require,
+here in this cupboard. But first, let's drop Cremation Mike into the
+cellar with the cases."
+
+They did that, and replaced the trapdoor; then they sliced lemons--all
+that they could find; they found a pot of cold tea, and this they dumped
+into the mess with the laudanum; and upon all this, bottle after bottle
+of the whisky was poured into the pails until they were filled to the
+brim.
+
+"Now, Patsy," said the detective, "remember that you are old Bill
+Turner. I want you to go out among the men right now, and tell them that
+Madge and Handsome have fixed them all up a punch, and if they will form
+in line and pass in front of the door of this cabin, each one of them
+can have two drinks of it. And it would be a good idea if you should act
+as if you had already taken your own two--or several. It will give them
+confidence."
+
+"I can do it," replied Patsy, and he went out.
+
+After a little Nick heard the murmur of voices before the cabin, and he
+stepped to the door and opened it; and then he found that the men,
+without an exception, save those who were on guard at different
+places--he found that eighty men had formed in line, and were ready for
+the treat that had been promised them.
+
+He carried out the two pails and stood them on the porch; and then with
+a dipper in one hand and a goblet in the other, he called out:
+
+"Come up slow, now; one by one. Don't be in haste. Remember there are
+two drinks each, for you, and no more. These two pails will just about
+do it. I'm doing the trick for Black Madge, who happens to be busy just
+now."
+
+And so they began the procession past him; and so he doled out the
+concoction he had arranged for them, and watched them gulp it down with
+evident relish; and he called out when he served the first drink:
+
+"The orders are that each one of you, as soon as you have had your two
+drinks, shall go to your quarters and turn in. You are wanted to rest
+up, so that we can begin this search again, and find that fellow we are
+after. Come on, now. When you have taken your medicine, go to your bunks
+and turn in--all of you!"
+
+And they came. Then they took their medicine, and so nicely had Nick
+calculated the quantity that would be required that there was scarcely a
+pint of the concoction left when they were through.
+
+Many of them stopped long enough to beg for a third drink of it, and
+only once did Nick grant that request--to a big fellow for whom two
+might not be sufficient.
+
+And within thirty minutes after that last one had passed the porch, that
+camp was as quiet as a church.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+A WHOLESALE ROUND-UP.
+
+
+"Patsy," said the detective, when they reëntered the cabin, after
+watching their punch consumed almost to the dregs, "this is about the
+biggest capture I was ever in."
+
+"But we are not through yet, chief," replied the assistant, stroking the
+white beard he wore so naturally that Nick laughed aloud. "There are
+sixteen more men at liberty yet, and we have got the whole bunch to tie
+up. Don't forget that there are four men stationed at each of the
+outside entrances to----"
+
+"Oh, I haven't forgotten it. We will serve them in the same way. All we
+have to do is to manufacture one more pail of punch. So here goes. And
+as for tying them up, that will hardly be necessary."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"They are good for twelve hours of solid sleep at the very least. Many
+of them will not waken in twenty-four hours."
+
+"And maybe some of them will never wake up. How is that?"
+
+"It is a chance that we had to take; but by restricting them to two
+drinks each, I figured that there would be no danger. No; I think we are
+all right. Now, help me make this extra pail of punch. After that we
+will carry it through the cavern to the different parties of four each."
+
+"Suppose they get suspicious, and won't drink it?"
+
+"No danger of that, my lad."
+
+When the punch was made, they divided it into two lots, each carrying
+half, and, thus equipped, they again entered the cavern, this time just
+as daylight was beginning to appear.
+
+The first party they selected to serve was the one farthest away, and
+the detective discovered that they were grumbling because they had not
+been relieved.
+
+But when he appeared with the pail of punch, and told them what had
+happened--that every one had been served with the same thing--they
+forgot their sorrows and had their share as the others had taken theirs.
+
+And here, in order to make doubly sure, Nick had given each of the
+drinks a larger dose of the sleeping draught than he had served in the
+valley. As soon as the men had drunk what was given them, and had been
+refused more, he left them, followed by Patsy, and returned through the
+cave to another entrance.
+
+And here again the operation was repeated in the same manner, an idea of
+suspicion never once entering the head of any of the men; they were far
+too eager for the drink which the thoughtfulness of their mistress had
+provided for them.
+
+"They'll be suspicious when they begin to feel drowsy all at once,"
+suggested Patsy, as they moved away.
+
+"Let them," replied Nick. "We won't be there, and not one of them will
+be able to go very far before he drops in a stupor. I have fixed it, all
+right."
+
+They found the second party as eager as the first, and one of them
+already the worse for too many drinks from a bottle he had had in his
+pocket; but they took the medicine that Nick portioned out to them as
+the others had done, and they in turn were left alone to drop off to
+sleep as they would; for they had been awake all night, and now it was
+broad daylight. They figured that they deserved some sleep.
+
+At the third entrance the four men were already asleep--all but one of
+them, and he was drowsing; and Nick, in his character of Handsome,
+pretended to be angry at first. He pretended to refuse to give them the
+punch that had been sent to them until they begged so hard that he
+finally relented.
+
+"Why," said Patsy, when they left them, and took their way toward the
+fourth, and last, place--the hole under the Dog's Nose, near the place
+where Handsome and Madge were prisoners, "it's all as easy as living on
+a farm."
+
+"And not half so interesting," laughed the detective.
+
+They walked past the movable rock behind which the two prisoners were
+confined without so much as devoting a glance to it, for they were both
+intent upon accomplishing this last installment of capture through the
+medium of the laudanum; and here they found the four men who were on
+duty, just about ready to mutiny because they had not been relieved.
+
+But the presence of Handsome--or the man they believed to be
+Handsome--quieted them at once, for they stood in wholesome dread of him
+and his anger; and when they understood what had been brought to them,
+they were ready for anything.
+
+And so it was that in their turns they took their medicine as the others
+had done. When they had swallowed it, Nick said to them:
+
+"Stretch out, now, you fellows, where you are. I'll let you sleep for a
+while, at least. I'm going to sit here and smoke. I am tired myself.
+Turner, sit down. We'll keep watch here for a spell."
+
+The men did not require a second invitation, but speedily took advantage
+of the permission--and it was surprising how soon the laudanum took
+effect upon them.
+
+Ten minutes had not elapsed before the four were sleeping soundly, and
+snoring as if they never expected to awake again.
+
+"I think we can go now," said Nick, at last, rising.
+
+"What is the next trick to be done?" asked Patsy.
+
+"Let me see," replied Nick. "It's thirty miles from here to Calamont.
+How far is it to the railway track in a direct line? That is the way you
+came, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How far is it?"
+
+"About four miles, possibly. I can make it in an hour."
+
+"Then skip. This is the nearest point to start from. Get to the track as
+soon as you can. Flag the first train that comes along, no matter what
+it is. Get aboard it, and go to the first station. Get off there, and
+use the telegraph operator. Have him wire to Mr. Cobalt, the president
+of the road, exactly what has happened. Ask Cobalt to send a special
+train to us from the nearest point. We will want about twenty officers
+to take charge of all these prisoners, and he had better send along some
+chains with padlocks on them. You can figure that out yourself. We will
+want to make chain gangs of these men, so that they can walk to the
+railway, but so that they are chained together and cannot escape. You've
+got the idea?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Go, then, and see how quickly you can get the officers here, and we can
+get this crew away from here."
+
+"And you?"
+
+"I'll stay here. Skip, now. Don't talk any more."
+
+"Have I got to carry these whiskers with me?" grinned Patsy.
+
+"You'd better not stop to remove them now. I put them on to stay. Go!"
+
+And Patsy went.
+
+Nick remained where he was for a while, thinking deeply, and altogether
+satisfied with what he had accomplished; but after a little he rose, and
+took his way back into the cave, intending to see what Handsome and
+Madge were doing, and if they were making any effort to free themselves.
+
+But after he had reëntered the cave, and had covered the twenty rods
+that intervened between it and the movable rock, he stopped in
+astonishment and stared.
+
+The rock was pushed wide open.
+
+With a bound he darted forward and entered the place, but only to find
+that Madge and Handsome had both disappeared. Their bonds were lying
+upon the floor of the cavern, but they were no longer there themselves.
+
+Nick did not wait to see more than that then.
+
+He turned away on a run, and darted through the galleries with all the
+speed he could summon under the circumstances--and he came out into the
+valley, where the sun was shining, directly behind his two escaped
+prisoners, for they had not preceded him by more than a minute,
+evidently.
+
+With one wild spring he was upon them, and as Handsome turned to defend
+himself, Nick hit him with his fist, so that he sent him reeling across
+the grass, where he fell senseless to the earth.
+
+But in the meantime Madge had turned with a scream of rage, and when she
+saw the real Handsome fall helpless, she broke into a run toward her own
+cottage, for she had no weapon to use now, Nick having deprived them
+both of their guns.
+
+But the detective ran after her, and, just as she was about to leap upon
+the porch, he succeeded in seizing her, and in pulling her back again
+toward him.
+
+She turned upon him then like a fury; but with a laugh he sprang under
+her extended arms, and seized her around the waist; and then he lifted
+her from her feet, and, still laughing, he ran across the grass to the
+cabin in which Patsy had once been a prisoner, and in another moment he
+had tossed her inside, closed the door and fastened it.
+
+For a long time he could hear her storming in there, but he had to hurry
+back to Handsome, who was still down and out when he got to him, but who
+presently revived.
+
+But he had all the fight taken out of him, and he allowed himself to be
+bound again securely, after which Nick led him to Madge's cabin, and
+tied him to one of the rustic chairs on the porch.
+
+Including Black Madge and her first lieutenant, Handsome, there were one
+hundred and two prisoners turned over to be dealt with by the law when
+Patsy returned to the place in the hills, having piloted the officers
+who were sent by special train to complete the capture.
+
+Black Madge did not see the detective again to speak to him; but she
+sent him a note, in which she said:
+
+"I haven't done with you yet, Nick Carter. I will
+never forgive you for fooling me as you did. I shall
+manage to get my liberty again, somehow, some time,
+and when I do, it will be for the purpose of
+wreaking vengeance on you. And I will get even some
+day, never fear."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE'S THREAT.
+
+
+Nick Carter had entirely forgotten Black Madge's threat when he was
+forcibly reminded of it one morning by the following letter which he
+found on his breakfast table:
+
+"NICK CARTER: One month ago--how time flies--I wrote
+to you that I hadn't done with you yet; that I would
+never forgive you, and that I would get even some
+day.
+
+"That was a month ago. I thought when I wrote that
+it might take a year--but they are easy marks in
+this State.
+
+"It was my hope after you captured me and all my
+followers, that I would have a chance to see you
+again, and to talk to you before I was taken away to
+prison. You would say probably that I wanted to
+boast; for a threat, after all, is only another kind
+of boasting. But it wasn't so, Nick Carter; I wanted
+to tell you what you had succeeded in doing; and
+this is it:
+
+"You have succeeded in creating in me a passion
+which supersedes all others in my nature--the
+passion of hatred. Twice now you have foiled me;
+twice you have been successful in arresting me, and
+the latter of these two times you not only destroyed
+the organization which I had created, and rendered
+it utterly impotent for my future uses, but you
+destroyed almost at one blow every ambition that I
+had through that organization and by reason of it.
+
+"You didn't know that, and you couldn't appreciate
+it; and it wouldn't matter at all to you if you had;
+neither has it anything to do with the purport of
+this letter.
+
+"I know you will say that I am a fool to take the
+trouble to warn you, but I would be less than a
+woman, and much less than the bad woman I am, if I
+did not take this opportunity of exulting over the
+chance that is now promised to me to get square with
+you.
+
+"Heretofore my every effort has been centred upon
+playing on my fellow men; heretofore I have had only
+two thoughts in pursuing my career; one was to
+create an organization of which I was the supreme
+head, and the other was to secure by the operation
+of that organization all the money that it was
+possible to obtain.
+
+"I have always been a thief with a system. My
+robberies have all been committed after careful
+planning; you know that because of the one you
+helped to commit yourself. But now I have only one
+ambition left--to get square with you. I haven't
+decided yet how I shall do it, or when, or where it
+shall be done. If I had so decided I would not tell
+you, so it makes no difference.
+
+"But I have been a hard student, Nick Carter, of
+many things. I have had good instructors in the
+science of mixing and using poisons; there is no
+person living to-day, man or woman--yourself
+included--who is a better marksman than I am with
+firearms; there is no person, man or woman, who is
+more adept to-day in the use of all weapons than I
+am. This is not boasting; it is fact.
+
+"Moreover, I have the power to appear in many
+guises--disguises you might call them. In one or
+more of them--perhaps in many of them--I shall
+appear to you, and when you are least expecting it I
+shall strike.
+
+"Don't think by that that I mean to strike you dead.
+That would not be making you suffer enough; but I
+shall find other and better ways in which to
+strike--ways that will make you suffer and realize
+what you did when you made me your enemy, and made
+me hate you as I do.
+
+"And another thing; I have already set to work to
+bring together, as rapidly as I can find them,
+people who have criminal records and who have reason
+to hate you as I do; people whom you have pursued as
+you have pursued me; those whom you have sent to
+prison; those whose careers you have interrupted;
+those you have threatened; and those who have cause
+for holding a grudge against you.
+
+"I have sought many of those, and I have found many.
+I am still seeking others, and I shall find more;
+and when I have got together enough of them, and
+have selected from that number those whom I deem
+most available for my purpose and competent to carry
+out my directions as I shall give them, I shall
+organize them into a Band of Hatred, the sole object
+of which shall be your undoing and, ultimately, your
+death.
+
+"You have preyed too long already upon that class
+of humanity to which I belong, and from our
+standpoint your position is much the same as is our
+position from yours.
+
+"You know me well enough, Nick Carter, to know that
+from this moment forward you will never be safe from
+danger for one moment of your life; whether you are
+sleeping or waking; whether you are afloat or
+ashore; whether you are quartered in the seclusion
+of your own study at home, or are abroad upon the
+streets of the city.
+
+"You know that I do not threaten idly. You know that
+I am a woman with a purpose. You know that I am
+intelligent, educated, and determined. You know that
+I am a woman to be feared.
+
+"I have thought this matter all over, and decided
+upon it during those hours when I was locked in the
+cabin up there in the hills, after you had drugged
+the men of my company, and succeeded in capturing us
+all.
+
+"When I was taken to prison I knew that it would be
+only a short time before I would be able to make
+good my escape. How I have succeeded in
+accomplishing it does not matter. I have found one
+key in my experience that never fails to open prison
+locks, if it is properly applied; the fact that it
+is made of gold is sufficient explanation, and gold
+I had in plenty, for I have always been successful,
+and even now I have hoards concealed in different
+places which will supply me with funds more than
+sufficient to carry out to the bitter end this
+campaign of vengeance upon which I have determined.
+
+"I think that is all.
+
+"I shall leave here for New York City an hour after
+this letter is put in the mail. When you will see me
+first I do not know.                   BLACK MADGE."
+
+The detective read this remarkable letter twice from beginning to end,
+and then he passed it in silence across the table to Chick, who was
+seated opposite to him.
+
+And Chick also read it twice in silence, and as silently returned it.
+Nick, realizing that Ten-Ichi and Patsy would also fall under the
+sweeping hatred of Black Madge, tossed it over to them with the
+direction that they read it also.
+
+There was not one among them who felt like making any comment upon the
+letter, or its contents, at least until their chief had spoken; but
+presently, with a gesture to Chick, which meant that he was to follow
+him as soon as he had finished his breakfast, the detective left the
+table and went to his study.
+
+It was only a few moments after that when Chick entered the room,
+smiling.
+
+"I hope, Nick," he said, dropping into a chair near the window and
+lighting a cigar, "that you enjoyed the reading of that letter from
+Madge?"
+
+The detective was silent a moment before he replied, and then quite
+slowly he said:
+
+"So far as I am personally concerned, Chick, the letter or its contents
+has no more effect upon me than the snapping of your fingers, but I will
+confess that I am in some dread concerning what she might do to you,
+and to Ten-Ichi and Patsy."
+
+Chick leaned back in his chair and laughed aloud.
+
+"If you will excuse me for saying so," he remarked, "that is utter
+nonsense. Of course, the boys downstairs and I are quite capable of
+taking care of ourselves."
+
+"I don't doubt that," said Nick, "but that is not exactly the point."
+
+"What is, then?"
+
+"You have forgotten one part of her letter," said Nick.
+
+"What part?"
+
+"That part wherein she speaks about making me suffer, rather than
+attempting to do me physical harm."
+
+"Oh! I haven't forgotten it."
+
+"Do you understand what she means by that, Chick?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Let me hear if you do."
+
+"Well, she probably means that it would be her first effort to make you
+suffer by injuring those whom you love--in other words, by doing
+something or other to one of us. But forewarned is forearmed, and,
+anyhow, I don't think it behooves any of us to be afraid of a woman."
+
+"This is a case," said Nick, "where a woman is much more dangerous than
+a man. A man would fight out in the open; a woman will fight in the
+shadow; or, at least, such a woman as that will. She is a pretty bad
+one, Chick, and a grave foe."
+
+Chick nodded.
+
+"It is always best," continued the detective, "to give your enemy or
+your adversaries credit for every advantage they possess. Black Madge is
+a wonderfully smart woman, and is unprincipled and implacable as she is
+smart. She will halt at nothing to carry out her design of vengeance,
+and just as sure as you are sitting there, Chick, we will presently feel
+the surety of that threat."
+
+Chick flicked the ashes from his cigar, and then strode across the room
+to the window, where he stood for a moment looking out.
+
+"I don't see exactly what we are going to do to head her off before she
+begins," he said presently.
+
+"There is nothing to do," replied Nick gloomily.
+
+"Upon my word," said Chick, laughing, "one would think that you were
+more than usually affected by that letter from Madge. Do you really take
+it so seriously as all that?"
+
+"I take it seriously," replied the detective, "because I so well
+understand what the woman means, and she means just what she says.
+Instead of going on evenly and living the life we have been living, we
+must not be for an instant off our guard from this day on, until she is
+again behind the bars, and I hope the next time I arrest her it will be
+within the limits of the State of New York, where I can place a watch
+over her so that she will not escape."
+
+"And I hope so, too," said Chick.
+
+"And now, in the meantime," continued Nick, smiling, "since we have this
+letter and know what she is about to do, I think we will meet her
+halfway, and not wait for her to open the ball. Since she is at liberty,
+we will set about capturing her at once."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+THE BAND OF HATRED.
+
+
+Down on the East Side of New York, in Rivington Street, and some
+distance east of the Bowery, on the second floor of one of the oldest
+buildings in the city, a remarkable meeting was being held during the
+night that followed the receipt of Madge's letter by Nick Carter.
+
+In a room on this floor, which was brilliantly lighted by four gas jets
+blazing from the chandelier, nine people were seated. They were gathered
+along two sides of the room, in which was a centre table, and behind
+this table was Black Madge.
+
+Before her on the table were various sheets of letter paper, which she
+had turned from a pad one after another as she made notes upon them, and
+in her hand she held a pencil which ever and anon flew rapidly over the
+paper while she recorded such information concerning those who were
+present with her as she cared to remember.
+
+They had been present in that room for upward of an hour, and during
+that time Madge had questioned each one of the eight who faced her
+concerning the statements they had made, and which she had noted.
+
+Now she leaned back in her chair, and, holding one of the sheets of
+paper in her hand, she said:
+
+"Stand up, Scar-faced Johnny, and answer the questions I shall ask you."
+
+One of them, a short, stocky, red-headed, brutalized being, who was
+almost as broad as he was long, leaped to his feet, thrust his hands
+deeply into his pockets, and with his chin stuck forward aggressively,
+waited.
+
+"You hate Nick Carter, do you, Johnny?" Madge asked.
+
+"I hate him like poison."
+
+"And you would kill him if you could?"
+
+"I'd cut his throat in half a minute if I was sure of not being caught."
+
+"Tell me again why you hate him so."
+
+"Ain't he sent me twice to prison? Once for four years and once for
+three. And the last time he done it didn't he hand me a welt alongside
+of the jaw that I'll never forget? A man can't hit me like that and have
+me love him afterward. You just show me the way to do it, Black Madge,
+and I'll lay him out cold--so cold that he'll never get over it again.
+All I want is a chance."
+
+"All right," said Madge, "take your seat.
+
+"Now, Slippery Al, you stand up. What's your line of graft, Slippery?"
+
+Slippery, who was tall, and sallow, and lean, and unkempt, and who
+looked consumptive and otherwise unwholesome, grinned sheepishly, as he
+replied:
+
+"I reckon my name ought to answer that question. I slips in and I slips
+out where I can and when I can, and picks up anything that's lying
+around."
+
+Madge laughed scornfully.
+
+"You don't look as if you had sense enough to hate anybody or anything,"
+she said.
+
+"Oh, I hate Nick Carter, right enough," was the unhesitating reply.
+
+"Why do you hate him?"
+
+"Because he sent my father and my mother and my two brothers to prison,
+and they're all there now, and they weren't doing a thing that
+interfered with him in any way."
+
+"What were they doing?" asked Madge.
+
+"Well, if you want to know it straight, Black Madge, they was running a
+little counterfeit plant of their own--making dimes and quarters and a
+few half dollars for some of us to blow in when we couldn't find the
+real rhino."
+
+"Running a counterfeit plant, eh?"
+
+"That's it, marm."
+
+"And Nick Carter sent them all to prison, did he?"
+
+"He did that."
+
+"How does it happen that he didn't send you along with them?"
+
+"Well, I managed to slip out just in time," said Slippery, with one of
+his sheepish grins; "but he sent a bullet after me when I was running
+away that singed the hair over my right ear, and taking it all in all I
+hate him about as much as anybody."
+
+"Not enough to kill him if I should ask you to do it, do you?"
+
+"Well, Madge, when it comes to killing, that ain't in my line; but if
+you want me to lead him on somehow where somebody else could do the job,
+I think I'd be about the covey that could do it."
+
+"That'll do for you. Sit down, Slippery."
+
+"What's your name?" she added to the man who was next him.
+
+A dark, beetle-browed, heavy-jawed, coarse-featured man, who looked as
+if he was as powerful as a giant, rose slowly to his feet, and replied
+in a surly tone, and with an ugly glitter in his eyes:
+
+"I have got about forty names; leastwise, the police say I have; but
+they as knows me best calls me Bob for short; sometimes they fixes it up
+a little by calling it Surly Bob. But I think that Bob will do for you."
+
+"What have you got against Nick Carter, Surly Bob?" asked Madge,
+smiling. She liked the looks of this hard-featured individual. He was
+just brutal enough in his appearance to satisfy her ideas of what a man
+should be.
+
+Bob deliberately took a huge chew of tobacco into his mouth before he
+replied, and then, with a slow and almost bovine indifference, he
+responded:
+
+"I don't know as it makes much difference to you, Black Madge, what I
+hate him for as long as I do hate him, and I'm bound to get square with
+him some day, whether I do it in connection with this organization that
+you're getting together or on my own hook without the help of any of
+you," and he glanced defiantly around. "It's enough that I do hate him.
+He's done enough to me to make me hate him. It's enough that if I had
+him alone in this room to-night one of us would never leave it alive
+unless he got the best of me without killing me, for I would certainly
+do him if I got half a chance.
+
+"But I'll tell you one thing about him that maybe it will do some of you
+good to hear, for I give you fair warning that you want to give Nick
+Carter a wide berth unless you can manage somehow to catch him foul.
+He's about as strong as three horses, and if he ever succeeds in getting
+his grip on you you're gone. I'm about as tough as they make them, but
+I'm a wee baby in Nick Carter's hands, and don't any of you forget it."
+
+"Tell us the story," said Madge.
+
+"Oh, it ain't no story; it's just a short account. We ran into each
+other once near the front door of a bank I had gone into after hours and
+without the permission of the president and board of directors. When I
+picked myself up from the middle of the street after he grabbed me there
+was a crack in the top of my skull which didn't get well for three
+months. That's all I've got to say about it, but I want to add this: If
+that fellow Slippery Al, who says killing ain't in his line, but leading
+astray is, wants to bring Nick Carter my way, and will fetch him along
+so as I can get him foul, I'll fix him for keeps, and no questions
+asked."
+
+And Surly Bob sat down.
+
+He had no sooner taken his seat than the individual next to him sprang
+up without waiting to be asked to do so. If you had encountered this
+individual along Broadway or on Fifth Avenue in New York City, you might
+not have devoted a second glance to him; but if you had, and still had
+not studied him closely, you would not have thought him other than a
+gentleman.
+
+His features were handsome or would have been handsome were it not for
+the crafty and shifty expression of his eyes and the otherwise
+insincerity that was manifest in his face. Among his companions of the
+underworld he was known far and near as Gentleman Jim.
+
+By profession he was what is known as a confidence man, although it was
+said of him that he had the courage to take any part that might be
+required of him in preying upon the world at large.
+
+He had been known to assist, and to do it well, at a bank robbery. He
+had once lived for some time in Chicago as a highwayman. It was said of
+him that in his youth he had begun his career of crime by rustling
+cattle in the far West, and that he was as quick and as sure with a gun
+as any "bad man" of that region.
+
+His attire was immaculate and in the height of fashion. He was clean
+shaven, and he wore eyeglasses which gave to him somewhat of a
+professional look, and which he had been heard to say were excellent
+things to hide the expression in a man's eyes.
+
+In stature he was tall, rather broad, and extremely well built. In
+short, Madge looked upon him when he rose with undoubted admiration in
+her eyes, as if she believed that here was a man who could be anything
+he chose to be in the criminal world.
+
+When he spoke it was in an evenly modulated tone of voice which might
+have done excellent service in a drawing-room; and, moreover, his voice
+was pleasant to listen to.
+
+"I suppose you would like to hear from me, as well as from the others,
+Madge," he said slowly. "I haven't got very much to say, except that I
+don't take much stock in boasted hatreds. Where I was raised, and where
+I began my career--and I am not particularly proud of that career--when
+we hated anybody we rarely said much about it, but I will say this to
+you, and to the others who are here: I am very glad that this
+organization is being perfected. I am very glad that some concerted
+action is to be taken against this man, Nick Carter, who has come pretty
+near putting us all out of business. You all know who I am, and some of
+you have got a pretty good idea what I am. Nick Carter knows about as
+much about me as any of you, which, after all is said, is next to
+nothing at all. But I have been on a still hunt for Mr. Nick Carter for
+some time, and when I get him in a position which Surly Bob calls foul,
+I shan't wait to send to any of you for assistance. I'll do the rest
+myself."
+
+"And now you," said Madge, fixing her eyes upon the individual who was
+seated next to Gentleman Jim "Rise in your place and tell us your name,
+and make us a little speech, as the others have done."
+
+"My name is Cummings--Fly Cummings, I'm called. Some of the bunch here
+knows me and some don't. Those that do know me don't need to be told
+anything about me, and those that don't know me are just as well off.
+I'm in business for myself, and always have been. The world owes me a
+living, and it's been paying it pretty regular ever since I was sixteen
+years old, and I'm now coming sixty-two. I'm like the others here in one
+respect: I've got a grudge against the man we've been talking about.
+I've never been able to make him feel it, because I've always fought
+mighty shy of him rather than get within his reach; but when I heard
+that this here movement had been started going by you, Madge, and the
+word was passed around among the guns downtown that you wanted a few of
+us that hated Nick Carter to come to the captain's office and form a
+little organization, it struck me that it was just about the right thing
+to do. I've heard what Surly Bob had to say, and I know that Surly isn't
+the sort of chap that's in the habit of talking through his hat. If
+Surly Bob had it in for me I'd patronize the New York Central Railroad,
+and take a train out of town right away.
+
+"I've heard what Gentleman Jim had to say, and if Jim was looking for my
+gore to-night, I'd take a steamer across the ocean or commit suicide,
+because I'd know I couldn't get away from him in any other way.
+
+"I've heard what Slippery Al had to say, and while Slippery ain't of
+much account, he's about the nastiest toad that ever picked a pocket,
+and I wouldn't care to have him down on me.
+
+"And as for Scar-faced Johnny, well, Johnny is a bad one, too. I ain't
+making any threats particularly, Madge, but I'm willing to join this
+organization, or I wouldn't be here, and I want to say now that when
+you're fixing up the business, and arrange for the signals so that we
+can summons each other when we want them, I'll do my part to the tune of
+compound interest; and I guess that'll be about all from me."
+
+The sixth man of the party, who was the next to get upon his feet, had
+the stamp of prison life all over him. His face bespoke the pallor which
+is acquired in no other place in the world, and the vicious, shifty,
+sneaking gleam in his eyes spoke well of the craftiness which is the
+result of long confinement under the domination of brutal guards and
+turnkeys.
+
+So recently had he escaped from prison, apparently, that his hair was
+still cropped short to his skull, and one almost expected when looking
+at him to see the stripes of prison garb upon him.
+
+"I am Joe Cuthbert," he said slowly, in a tone so low that it could
+scarcely be heard. "I wouldn't have come here to-night at all if I
+hadn't been assured on the level that it would be perfectly safe to do
+so. I don't think there is any one of you in this room except Madge
+herself who knows me, but you will all hear from me later on as sure as
+I'm alive and can escape arrest.
+
+"You may have been told since you came here that I have just escaped
+from prison, or if you haven't been told it, and know how to read, you
+have probably seen the rewards for my recapture. You will know, too,
+that I was sent up for croaking another chap, or, as they call it in the
+courts, for murder. I want you all to know that I served eight years.
+Eight years of hell, and that I've come out of there with the
+determination of getting square with the man that sent me up. That man
+was Nick Carter; and that's all I've got to say."
+
+There was a moment of utter silence after this announcement, which had
+in it many of the elements of the dramatic.
+
+There was not a person in that room who had not seen the inside of a
+prison, and many of them had served as many as four years, while others
+had been in prison many times for short terms.
+
+But to have just escaped from prison after having been confined for
+eight long years seemed to them the climax of the possibilities of
+hatred.
+
+But the moment passed, and Madge fixed her eyes upon the seventh of the
+group, who slowly rose to his feet and said:
+
+"After what we've just heard, Madge, it doesn't seem that anything that
+I can say can add to the intensity of feeling that pervades this
+distinguished assembly. I regard it as quite an honor to be among those
+who know so well how to hate. As for me, I have also been inside a
+prison, to which this man Nick Carter sent me. I had been mixed up in a
+little diamond robbery from one of the big firms in this town. I don't
+know but maybe some of you heard about it; it was called the taking of
+the pear-shaped diamonds, and at the time that happened I was in love
+with a very beautiful girl, and was outwardly leading a very respectable
+life. It's enough for me to say now that when the exposure that
+followed Nick Carter's investigation of that case, and through it the
+exposure of all my previous criminal record, which before that time I
+had been able to conceal, the girl went back on me, and would have
+nothing more to do with me. Now she is married to another man, and while
+I don't blame her any, I do blame the man that exposed me, and if any of
+you people that are gathered here can help me in getting square with him
+I'll be eternally grateful. My name is Eugene Maxwell."
+
+There was only one other individual left in this collection who had not
+as yet spoken, and now, although Madge fixed her eyes instantly upon
+him, he remained in his chair as he was, with immovable, sphinxlike
+countenance and gloomy eyes. He was a tall, spare, rather well-dressed
+figure, when he rose at last in reply to her spoken request, and he
+stood, half leaning upon a cane which he held in his two hands, and bent
+a little toward her as he spoke.
+
+"I haven't any name, so far as anybody knows," he said slowly, and with
+distinct and deliberate enunciation. "It has pleased my friends always
+to bestow a title upon me. Until to-night I have always worked alone,
+and have rarely made myself known to any of the inhabitants of the
+underworld, and if any of you here have ever happened to be told about
+The Parson, you will know who I am."
+
+There was a distinct stir in the room when he uttered this name or
+title, for The Parson had always been more or less a mystery, and one
+that was much envied by thieves generally. He was a confidence man of
+the higher type; the sort of man who would go into strange cities or
+villages or communities, and represent himself to be a professional man;
+sometimes a minister; sometimes a priest; again a rabbi; and it was his
+graft to solicit and collect contributions for charitable purposes upon
+forged recommendations and letters which he had prepared in advance.
+
+His success in this line had been enormous, and his work had always been
+done in the dark and alone, until six years before this particular
+occasion, having done it once too often, Nick Carter had trailed him
+down and captured him.
+
+He continued:
+
+"I was always very successful in my line of graft until Nick Carter got
+after me, and while I didn't get quite so long a term as our friend
+Cuthbert, I was sent up for five years, and served four years and three
+months of it. I want to say to you now that every night and every
+morning of my life during those four years and three months I cursed
+Nick Carter and everybody and everything that belonged to him. That's
+why I'm here. I take part in this little scheme that Madge has concocted
+to down that fellow with the greatest pleasure I have ever known. If you
+should happen to be in want of funds any time----"
+
+"I'll supply the funds," interrupted Madge.
+
+"All the same, if you should happen to be in want of funds at any time,
+all you've got to do is to whisper it to The Parson and I'll put my hand
+down in my pocket and supply the dollars, for I've got a few left, and I
+know where there are a lot more to be obtained."
+
+He resumed his seat slowly, rested his chin upon the head of his cane
+between his hands, and the gloomy look came over his face again like a
+mask.
+
+And now Madge stood up behind the table, resting her hands upon it, and
+leaning a little bit forward as she spoke.
+
+"I'm a proud woman, my friends," she said. "I'm a young woman, too,
+being not yet twenty-four, and a good hater. I am part Spanish and part
+French. I was raised in Paris, and learned all that I know about my
+business over there. The first time that I ever saw Nick Carter in my
+life was in the office of the Prefecture of Police in the room of the
+Chief of the Secret Service. I was seventeen years old at the time when
+the chief had sent for me to question me about the death of a woman
+which had occurred in the house where I lived on the floor above me, and
+about which, fortunately, I knew absolutely nothing.
+
+"But Nick Carter came into the chief's office while I was there. I had
+only a fleeting glance of him at the time. I left the room almost as
+soon as he entered it. I did not see him again for five years, at which
+time he came in disguise to the thieves' headquarters where I was
+staying. I recognized him that time by his eyes, but nevertheless he
+captured me and sent me to jail.
+
+"I escaped from that jail before I came to trial, and did it through the
+help of my friends. Somewhat later than that he hunted me down a second
+time, but I escaped, and I have sworn now to be even with him, and that
+is why I have brought you here together. You will please to stand up
+now, raise your right hands, and repeat after me in taking the oath of
+The Band of Hatred."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.
+
+
+A strange series of accidents began the night of the day following the
+receipt of the letter, and Nick Carter had no doubt whatever that it was
+the first act to be played in the drama of vengeance which Black Madge
+had inaugurated against them.
+
+It was rather a simple thing of itself, and did no damage to amount to
+anything. The fact was that during the night some malicious person had
+placed under the front steps in the areaway of his house a barrel that
+had been filled with cotton waste saturated with oil. It was only
+necessary after that to apply a match to the inflammable material to
+start an incipient conflagration. Had the house itself not been built of
+granite, and--save the doors and windows and other trimmings--been
+practically fireproof, the result would have been disastrous; as it was,
+however, beyond badly scorching the door, and cracking a few of the
+stones by reason of the intense heat that was generating, no damage was
+done.
+
+But the fact had been sufficient to remind Nick Carter and his three
+assistants that Madge had not threatened idly, and that already she had
+undertaken to carry out the substance of some of her warning.
+
+At midnight the day following the fire in the areaway a blazing bomb was
+hurled through the window of the second story of Nick Carter's house,
+and rolled to the middle of the floor, where it blazed furiously, and
+would undoubtedly have done a great deal of damage had it not so
+happened that the housekeeper was present at the time, for Nick had a
+guest that night, and she had been called late to prepare the room for
+him.
+
+The day following this one, about four o'clock in the afternoon, Joseph
+discovered a dynamite cartridge containing a pound and a half of the
+explosive in the vestibule at the front door. The fuse of this cartridge
+was already alight and would have reached and exploded the percussion,
+or detonating cap, if Joseph, for some reason unknown, had not gone to
+the front door at that moment. He was not called there, and had not
+heard anybody in the vestibule, or on the steps, and Joseph forever
+insisted after this incident that it was an intervention of Providence.
+
+This last incident was extremely serious, for had the cartridge been
+exploded it must have torn away the entire front of the house, and have
+done enormous damage, even if it had taken no lives.
+
+Friday night of that week at about half-past eight o'clock in the
+evening Chick and Patsy were walking up Madison Avenue together, and
+when they arrived at the corner of Thirtieth Street, and were about to
+turn toward Fifth Avenue, a shot was fired at them from across the
+street.
+
+Fortunately the bullet did not strike either of them; and, although they
+both immediately pursued the would-be assassin, he was evidently
+prepared to avoid them, for he leaped upon a bicycle and sped away so
+swiftly that there was no hope of overtaking him. They only saw that he
+was tall and slender, and that was all.
+
+The Saturday morning following an express wagon stopped at Nick Carter's
+house and delivered a package addressed to the detective, which was
+marked: "Fragile. This side up, with care."
+
+Joseph carried it to the detective's study, placed it upon the table,
+and was about to leave the room when Nick stopped him.
+
+"What is that, Joseph?" he asked.
+
+"An express package, sir, which just came for you."
+
+"Who brought it, Joseph?"
+
+"The express wagon, sir."
+
+"Bring it over here. Let me see it."
+
+Joseph took the package in his hand, carried it over to place it on the
+desk in front of the detective, who regarded it with a smile, while
+strangely enough his mind went back to the number of attempts to injure
+him that had been made during the week that was now nearly past.
+
+"Did you sign for it, Joseph?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"I am expecting no package." said the detective.
+
+"No, sir," said Joseph, not knowing what else to reply.
+
+"I think, Joseph," said the detective, "that if you will take it to the
+basement, or, rather, to the laundry, and draw one of the tubs there
+full of water, it would be a good idea to put the package to soak for
+five or six hours before we open it."
+
+"Really, sir," said Joseph. "Why?"
+
+"Joseph, if that package had come here as it has a week or ten days ago,
+I should have opened it without a second thought, but, under the
+circumstances and considering all that has happened of late, I deem it
+wise to use every precaution. Take the package down and soak it as I
+have directed."
+
+Some hours later, when the detective recalled the incident to mind, he
+and Chick went to the basement together, found the package, and with a
+great deal of care opened it--from the bottom.
+
+It was found to contain an infernal machine of the most approved
+pattern, loaded with broken glass, slugs of lead and old iron, and an
+assortment of nails, old keys, and bullets.
+
+"A very pretty little present to send a fellow," said Nick, smiling
+grimly. "I rather think it is a lucky thing, Chick, that it occurred to
+me to give it a good soaking. I wonder what the woman will do next?"
+
+Sunday evening when the detective entered his room he found Joseph
+writhing on the floor in evident agony, brought about by the contents of
+what had been a box of candy, and Nick instantly guessed that another
+attempt had been made upon his life, this time to poison him.
+
+But Joseph fortunately had only nibbled at one of the pieces, and,
+beyond an hour's suffering for his foolishness, was not injured.
+
+It appeared, when Nick questioned him, that a boy had handed the box of
+candy in at the door, saying, when Joseph appeared to receive it, that
+it had been ordered by the detective himself, and was to be placed in
+his study for him; and the boy had had the temerity to raise the lid of
+the box when he delivered it, wink slyly at Joseph, and exclaim:
+
+"See! aren't they dandy? I tasted one; they're fine."
+
+And then he had run away, laughing.
+
+Joseph had seen the candy, and, being fond of it, could not resist the
+temptation also to take a taste of it when he placed the box upon his
+master's table.
+
+That same night, at half-past eleven o'clock, Nick was seated at the
+desk in his study, which is located on the third floor in the rear of
+his house. He was engaged in looking over some notes relative to an old
+case which he wished to recall to mind.
+
+The shade at the window was lowered, but the light was in such a
+position that it threw his shadow against the curtain and outlined his
+head upon it almost perfectly.
+
+Suddenly he was startled by the report of a gun, and the next instant a
+bullet crashed through the glass of his window and buried itself in the
+opposite wall of the room.
+
+Later on, when he investigated the incident, he found that the bullet
+had passed directly through the shadow of his head as it was cast upon
+the window shade, the person who fired it evidently supposing that his
+head was directly behind that shadow; but the fact that the light was at
+one side of the room, and had therefore thrown the shadow somewhat back
+of where he was actually seated, saved his life.
+
+Further investigation disclosed the fact that the bullet had been fired
+from the rear of one of the houses in the block directly behind where
+the detective lived. It was not discovered how the would-be assassin had
+secured his position on the roof.
+
+But this accumulation of accidents--so called for want of a better
+term--was altogether too much for the serenity and the composure of the
+detective and his assistants.
+
+It was evident that Madge had determined to make his life miserable if
+it could be done, and when Nick recalled the substance of the letter she
+had sent him he decided in his own mind that the bullet had not really
+been intended to take his life, but only to warn him of the dangers that
+were hovering over him every minute that he lived.
+
+In the meantime--or, rather, during the time that has already been
+mentioned--the detective and his assistants had not been idle. There had
+not been a day or a night when he and Chick and Patsy and Ten-Ichi had
+not been engaged in searching some part of the city for Black Madge, or
+for some trace of her.
+
+They had visited the dens in the lower part of the city; they had
+questioned the policemen and the stool pigeons of the detective bureau,
+and they had even gone so far as to communicate directly with crooks who
+were known to them for information concerning the woman.
+
+But none had been forthcoming. Black Madge was keeping herself as
+thoroughly under cover as if she were still in the prison in that other
+State from which she had escaped.
+
+But after this occurrence of Sunday night, when the bullet was shot
+through the window at the detective, he determined to make no more
+half-hearted efforts to find Madge, but to set out at once that very
+night in search of her; and accordingly he put away his papers and
+called Chick into the room with him.
+
+"Chick," he said, "do you happen to know anything about Mike Grinnel's
+place?"
+
+"I only know," said Chick, "that he is said to keep one of the worst
+dives in the city, and that it is located somewhere in Rivington Street.
+I am not sure about it, because I have never had occasion to go there.
+The only thing I do know about it is that it is said to be a great
+Sunday night resort for thieves and crooks of all classes."
+
+"Right," said Nick. "That coincides with what I have heard. I have never
+been there, either, Chick but I am going there to-night--now. The
+question is, do you want to go with me?"
+
+"I sure do," replied Chick.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+CURLY JOHN, THE BANK THIEF.
+
+
+Mike Grinnel's place in Rivington Street was at that time one of those
+monstrosities which were permitted to exist within the limits of New
+York City nobody knows how. During the day and the early part of the
+evening it was to all appearances merely an ordinary saloon, and if a
+stranger were passing it he would regard it as a likely place to enter
+if he required refreshment.
+
+But when the hours deepened into the night, the place gradually assumed
+more and more the aspect which might be labeled dangerous. Men and women
+drifted in together and talked in low tones at tables arranged along the
+side of the room, and as the time continued toward midnight, and passed
+it, the air of respectability gradually disappeared until it was
+entirely gone.
+
+By eleven o'clock the place was usually thronged by people who seemed to
+know each other in a furtive sort of way, and who sometimes would call
+others by name across the room.
+
+At one o'clock the front doors were closed and locked; the curtains were
+tightly drawn so that not a ray of light was permitted to escape into
+the street, blinds were pulled up to make this fact doubly secure, and
+this was when the place really began to live and thrive in its true
+character. Then also was when Mike Grinnel himself came out of his
+shell, and assumed personal charge of the affairs of the place; for Mike
+Grinnel had a reputation among the crooks and thieves who were his
+customers, and if an incipient row started at any time among his guests
+he had only to look with his frowning brow in their direction to quell
+it.
+
+The way into this dive of Grinnel's after the legal hours, and when it
+was supposed to be closed, was, strangely enough, through a house from
+the other side, and of course it followed that only the initiated--those
+who were known to the man at the door--could pass.
+
+When Nick Carter and his first assistant left the house that particular
+Sunday night to go to Mike Grinnel's, the principal question was how
+they were to get inside the place at all.
+
+Nick had no doubt in his mind whatever that if Black Madge were in town
+that she would be one who would most certainly visit Mike Grinnel's dive
+Sunday night, for that was the red-letter night of the week at that
+place among the inhabitants of the underworld.
+
+He knew that she would feel perfectly secure against intervention there.
+He knew that she would have perfect confidence in the espionage which
+Mike Grinnel exercised in his place for the safety of his customers,
+for it was his boast that no thief or criminal of any sort had ever been
+arrested in his place and taken from it by the officers.
+
+And, therefore, Nick felt sure that if he could but gain admission and
+Black Madge were in the city, which he did not doubt, he would find her
+there.
+
+To enter a place of this kind one must be actually introduced; that is,
+vouched for by some frequenter of it. It will not suffice for one to
+apply at such a place, and state merely that he knows so-and-so and is
+all right; he will be turned down hard. But Nick Carter was never
+without resource in a matter of this kind, and, therefore, when he left
+the house with Chick, instead of going directly to Mike Grinnel's they
+took their way to police headquarters, where, as he knew would be the
+case, he found the inspector.
+
+"Inspector," he said, "I noticed in the paper yesterday morning that
+Curly John had been arrested by one of your men and brought to
+headquarters on suspicion of being connected with that Liverpool bank
+robbery three months ago."
+
+"That's correct," said the inspector. "Do you know anything about the
+case?"
+
+"Not a thing in the world," said Nick, laughing; "but I want to use
+Curly John. I want to use him very badly. I want you to lend him to me
+for to-night, if you will."
+
+The inspector could only stare his amazement. He had known Nick Carter a
+good many years, but never before had he received a request of this kind
+from him.
+
+"I guess you will have to say that again, and say it slow, Nick; I don't
+think I understand you."
+
+The detective laughed heartily. Then he began at the beginning and told
+first about the letter he had received from Black Madge containing the
+threats, and then one by one related the incidents that had happened to
+him and to his household during the week that was past. In conclusion,
+he said:
+
+"Now, inspector, I am convinced that if Black Madge is in the city of
+New York, she is now at this very moment seated at one of the tables at
+Mike Grinnel's place. I want to go there to find out. If she is there I
+want to know it. If she is there and I can manage to find out where she
+goes when she leaves there, that is all I care to know to-night."
+
+"But how can Curly help you?" asked the inspector.
+
+"Curly can help me in this way: I know something about his reputation
+and his career. I came across him once several years ago in reference to
+an old case of mine with which he had nothing to do, but concerning
+which he gave me some valuable information. I found that Curly John was
+all right at that time, and, as people of his profession regard it,
+pretty much on the square. I want you, if you will, to ring the bell
+and order him brought up here and let me talk to him."
+
+"That's easy," said the inspector, and he did as requested.
+
+Five minutes later when Curly John entered the room he paused when he
+was just inside of the door, and fixed his eyes intently upon Nick
+Carter, and then, with scarcely a glance at the inspector, who had
+summoned him, he addressed himself directly to the detective.
+
+"I know you," he said. "I remember you perfectly well, Mr. Carter, and I
+wouldn't be afraid to bet that it was you that sent for me right now. I
+hope you've come to get me out, for I give you my word that I know no
+more about that Liverpool crib-cracking business than you do, and that's
+what they're holding me for just now."
+
+"Curly," said Nick, "you gave me some assistance once in a case I had
+after I assured you that you would not betray a pal in doing it, and
+that I would do a certain favor for you afterward. Did I keep my word
+with you?"
+
+"You kept it for fair, Mr. Carter. I ain't forgot it, neither."
+
+"Well, Curly, I have come here to-night to get you to do another favor
+for me, but first answer me one question."
+
+"All right, sir. What's that?"
+
+"Do they let you in at Mike Grinnel's Sunday night prayer meetings?"
+
+"They sure do, Mr. Carter."
+
+"If you were at liberty at this minute, isn't that the first place you
+would point for?"
+
+"That's about the size of it."
+
+"And you would have no trouble in getting inside?"
+
+"Not the least in the world."
+
+"If the inspector will consent to let you go will you take me there--me
+and this young man beside me, who is my assistant--on condition that I
+make you a solemn promise that I will make no arrest while there; that I
+will in no way interfere with Grinnel's business, or with any of his
+customers who are there, and that unless you reveal the fact yourself it
+will never be known that I was inside the place?"
+
+Curly John scratched his head in perplexity.
+
+"That's a pretty big contract you ask of me, Mr. Carter," he said.
+"What's the game?"
+
+"The game is, Curly, that I am very anxious to find out if a certain
+person is in the city. If that person is in the city that person will be
+at Grinnel's to-night, I know."
+
+Curly scratched his head some more.
+
+"And suppose, Mr. Carter, that person is at Grinnel's to-night, what do
+you expect to do to that person?"
+
+"To use your own words," replied Nick, "not the least thing in the
+world."
+
+"Then what do you want to go there for?"
+
+"I have already told you that. I want to find out if that person is in
+the city."
+
+"Are you giving me this on the square?" asked Curly John.
+
+"Absolutely on the square."
+
+"And you won't make any trouble?"
+
+"Not a particle of trouble of any kind."
+
+"You nor that chap over there who is with you?"
+
+"Neither of us. You have my word for that."
+
+"Well, what about what's to come after it? Do you intend to follow that
+person down and do the arresting afterward?"
+
+"I will promise you, Curly, that there shall be no arrest of any kind or
+of any person arising out of the visit to Grinnel's place to-night
+within twenty-four hours from this moment."
+
+Curly scratched his head a third time very intently and seriously, and
+at last asked:
+
+"Don't any of them coves over there know you, Mr. Carter?"
+
+"I suppose," said Nick, smiling, "that every one of them knows me, and
+that many of them know Chick as well."
+
+"And so that's Chick, is it? I have heard about him. Well, now, Mr.
+Carter, let me ask you this: You just now said that unless I told it,
+not a soul would know that you were there at that place to-night if I
+took you there. Now, how do you reconcile that with the fact that they
+all know you?"
+
+"In this way, Curly: That I shall ask you to wait here a few moments
+after you give your consent, while Chick and I step into the next room
+and make some alteration in our appearances with things that the
+inspector will loan me from his cabinet."
+
+Curly sneered.
+
+"Oh! this is a disguise business, is it? Well, Mr. Carter, do you think
+that the guns down there at Grinnel's are such blamed fools as not to
+see through a racket of that kind?"
+
+"Oh! I can fool them, all right," said Nick, "if you consent. Now,
+Curly, I have given you a promise once before in my life, and lived up
+to it literally. I have made you one now, and I will live up to it
+literally. The inspector will let you go and will send for you in case
+he should want you again. You get your liberty, and I get what I want.
+And now, Curly, it's up to you. Will you do it?"
+
+"Yes, by thunder, I'll do it! Go into the next room and get ready. When
+you're ready, I am. And I will introduce you and Chick there as a pair
+of old pals of mine from the other side of the water."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+AT MIKE GRINNEL'S DIVE.
+
+
+When Curly John knocked at the door of the Sunday-night entrance to Mike
+Grinnel's dive in a peculiar manner, that was evidently full of
+significance to the one behind it, it opened instantly, and the burly
+form of the bouncer of the establishment was discovered.
+
+His face, which might have been a stone mask for all the expression it
+manifested when he first appeared, beamed with joy, however, when he
+discovered Curly John, and thrust out his big hamlike fist with
+undoubted enthusiasm.
+
+"Hello, Curly," he said. "I thought you were in limbo."
+
+"And so I was," replied Curly, "until they discovered that they didn't
+want me."
+
+"Make up their minds that you wasn't in that little affair, eh?"
+
+"That's the size of it, Red. Here's my two friends that I brought with
+me. Some one you don't know, and they ain't either of them known inside,
+either. Do you let them pass?"
+
+"Sure, Curly. I lets them pass, if you say so."
+
+"Come, lads," said Curly, without vouchsafing any further statement to
+the guard at the door; and so it was that the way was open for the two
+detectives to enter upon the mysteries of that infamous retreat where it
+was the proprietor's boast that no police officer had ever appeared
+without his own expressed permission.
+
+The big room where the patrons congregated on Sunday night was
+comfortably filled when Nick Carter entered it with his two companions.
+
+In all that place there were only two tables unoccupied, and one of
+those was almost directly in the centre of the room. Curly led the way
+to it at once, and the three seated themselves around it while the bank
+burglar sent out his order for the refreshments that were required.
+
+Nick and Chick had made the necessary changes in their appearance; and
+each assumed the outward character and general aspect of a person who
+would be likely to frequent such a place as Grinnel's.
+
+Nick Carter was always a thorough believer in the maxim that too much
+disguise was worse than none at all, and therefore, when the occasion
+required that he should assume one, it was his habit to do as little
+real disguising as possible, and therefore, with the exception of giving
+himself a black eye, and blocking out a couple of his teeth, fixing his
+face so that it appeared as though there was a couple days' growth of
+beard upon it, and donning a rough-looking costume, he was unchanged.
+
+In a place like Mike Grinnel's no man thought of taking off his hat
+unless his head was too warm, and therefore Nick kept his on with the
+brim pulled down well over his eyes.
+
+The mere fact that the two detectives were in the company of Curly John
+was sufficient voucher for their personalities, and it did not occur to
+anybody, not even to Mike Grinnel himself, to question them.
+
+They were there; they were with Curly John; he had brought them, and
+that was enough. And, although there were many expressions of welcome
+spoken and called out to Curly John when he passed into the room and
+took his seat at the table, nobody in all that throng offered to
+approach him, for it was an unwritten law of the underworld that a man
+who reappears for the first time among his associates after imprisonment
+is left alone to make his own advances when he is pleased to do so.
+
+As for the two strangers who accompanied him, their presence did not
+concern the others, so long as Curly John vouched for them.
+
+If they thought anything about it at all, they assumed that the burglar
+was preparing for another professional trip, and that the two strangers
+were interested in his plans. They all regarded it as none of their
+affair, and in the underworld it is the rule of life to mind your own
+business, and let other people do the same.
+
+As soon as the detective had taken his seat--which he was careful to do
+in such a position that he could command a view of the greater part of
+the room without perceptibly turning his head--he began, little by
+little, and one by one, to study the people who were there.
+
+At first he paid no attention whatever to the men; but, since it was a
+fact that more than half of the guests, or patrons, or whatever you
+please to call them, were women, and as there were at least sixty
+persons present, it was some time before his eyes rested upon the face
+that he sought.
+
+But Madge was there without question. She had not thought it necessary
+to attempt any disguise of any sort, and her bold, black eyes were
+roving restlessly about the room when Nick Carter encountered them.
+
+But his own were so thoroughly shaded by the wide brim of the slouch hat
+he wore that he did not believe that she knew he was looking at her.
+
+In this manner he studied her for some time, and discovered that she was
+furtively watching Curly John and the two who had come there with him.
+
+It was apparent to the detective that Black Madge had not overcome her
+old habit of suspecting everybody; and the mere fact that there were two
+strangers present in the room, even though they were accompanied by one
+of the old habitués of the place, was to her a warning that they might
+not be all right.
+
+It had been Nick's intention to make no demonstration of any kind while
+he was inside Grinnel's dive; it was his purpose to go there and observe
+all that he could, and then to go away again without having exchanged a
+word with any one except Curly, unless it should become absolutely
+necessary.
+
+He intended--if he should succeed in finding Madge there--to trust to
+luck and his own ingenuity to follow her when she would leave the place,
+and so discover where she was living, and by that means he could keep
+his eye upon her for several days thereafter, and ultimately could round
+up the gang of crooks which he had no doubt she had organized.
+
+But Madge, although she had no idea that either of the strangers might
+be Nick Carter, did not intend that these two men should leave that room
+without passing through some sort of inspection which would serve to
+identify them for what they might be.
+
+While every one else in that place was thoroughly satisfied about them,
+because of their presence with Curly, this fact cut no ice with Black
+Madge, and always suspicious, she was instantly suspicious of them when
+they entered.
+
+Therefore, a very short time had elapsed after the detectives took their
+seats at the table, before she left her own place, and crossed the
+sawdust-covered floor swiftly to Curly's table.
+
+There she slapped him on the shoulder, as a man might have done, and
+with a laugh, which called the attention of every other person in the
+room to what she was doing, as she intended it to do, she exclaimed:
+
+"Hello, Curly. It does me good to see you back among us again. How did
+you put out the lamps of those chaps up in Mulberry Street, so that they
+let you out?"
+
+Curly, who was wise in his day and generation, jumped to his feet and
+shook hands heartily with Black Madge; for he guessed instantly that it
+was not to greet him that she had crossed the floor, but rather to gain
+a closer view of his companions, and by standing erect he could keep her
+a little distance without appearing to do so.
+
+"Oh! they just found out they didn't want me," he replied. And then,
+realizing that something was expected of him by the others in the room,
+at least, if not Madge herself, he jerked a chair around toward her, and
+added: "Sit down, Madge, won't you, and have something?"
+
+"Sure," she replied, laughing again, and dropping negligently into the
+chair.
+
+"What kind of a game are you playing now, Madge?" asked Curly, after he
+had motioned to the waiter to approach; and then, pausing long enough
+to give the order, he added: "Last I heard of you you were behind the
+mosquito bars resting up a bit."
+
+Madge laughed again. She seemed to be full of laughter to-night, but it
+was an uneasy, imperfect, and significant sort of laughter that Nick
+Carter had heard from her lips before, and which he, therefore,
+understood. He realized, now, that it was important that he should
+proceed with great caution.
+
+"Oh, yes," she said. "Nick Carter did that for me. But I'm out again,
+just the same, and now my lay is to get square with Nick Carter."
+
+"You don't say so," said Curly, shifting uneasily in his chair, and
+forgetting himself so far as to cast one furtive glance in the direction
+of the detective. "What are you going to do to him?"
+
+"Ask me that after I've got him where I want him," replied Madge, fixing
+her bold eyes full upon Nick Carter's face; and then, slowly removing
+them, and swinging her body half around until she again faced Curly, she
+added insinuatingly:
+
+"Aren't you going to introduce me to your friends, Curly?"
+
+Curly shook his shoulders. He was on safe ground, now, ground where he
+felt perfectly at home; for it was never necessary to indulge in
+introductions in that walk of life, not even when they were asked for,
+but he replied:
+
+"Sure, Madge. These are my two friends, and I guess that'll be about
+enough. You can call them by any name you want to, and they'll both
+answer you."
+
+"Under cover?" she asked.
+
+"A little," admitted Curly.
+
+"Are they dumb, or tongue-tied, or have they temporarily lost their
+voices; or, are they only bashful? I should think that two full-grown
+men such as they are might be able to speak for themselves."
+
+"It ain't always good taste to speak for yourself," said Curly, with an
+uneasy laugh. "They might do it once too often."
+
+Madge's suspicions were plainly aroused. She remained silent for a
+moment after that, and then, leaning forward, she rested her arms upon
+the table, and with her face thrust well forward over them, again stared
+into the detective's face.
+
+"Do you know who you are like?" she asked coolly.
+
+"Yes," replied Nick, just as coolly as she had spoken, "I have heard it
+said often, but if you will take my advice you won't mention the name
+aloud. It might excite some of the people here."
+
+She laughed.
+
+"That's just what I mean to do," she said, with a tightening of her
+lips. "They need excitement; that's what they live on. It's what we all
+live on. It's what we come here to get. Excitement is the backbone and
+muscle and sinew of our beings. And do you know that I think I could
+startle them all mightily right now if I should call something out to
+them which is on my mind to say?"
+
+She reached out her left hand, and seized Curly by the shoulder, pulling
+him over to her, and then, in a tone which only the three who were
+present with her could hear, she went on, her voice deadly calm:
+
+"Did you think, Nick Carter, that you could fool Black Madge? Did you
+think that you could come here into this same room where I am without my
+knowing instantly who you were? Don't you know that your very presence
+in the same room with me would make itself known to my sensibilities by
+reason of the very hate I bear you?"
+
+She paused a moment and laughed uneasily. And then she continued:
+
+"Don't you know, Nick Carter, that you have walked directly into a trap,
+from which you cannot escape? And were you not aware before you came
+here that if your identity became known your life wouldn't be worth a
+moment's purchase? If you so much as quiver an eyelid, Nick Carter, I
+will call out your name, and point you out as a spy, and you know what
+that will mean in Mike Grinnel's dive."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE'S DEFIANCE.
+
+
+It was a crucial moment for each of the three men who were seated at
+that table, and it affected each of the three quite differently.
+
+Chick was concerned only for the safety of his chief, for even then it
+did not occur to him that Black Madge had taken sufficient interest in
+himself to identify him, and that doubtless she still regarded him as
+really a friend of Curly's.
+
+Curly was plainly frightened, as well as utterly astounded. It had never
+occurred to him that the disguise of Nick Carter, which had seemed to
+him to be perfect, would be, or could be, so readily penetrated; and he
+realized, for the moment, at least, that he was in as much danger as
+Nick Carter himself, for if it should be known to the others--or should
+suddenly be made known to them--that Nick Carter was in that room, they
+would not only kill the detective, but they would also murder the man
+who had dared to bring him there.
+
+Black Madge was as thoroughly aware of this fact as was Curly himself,
+and she did the latter justice to believe that somehow he had been
+imposed upon by the detective, just as Nick had sought to impose upon
+all of them; in a word, she did not blame Curly for the existing
+situation.
+
+As for the situation itself, she was delighted with it, for it had
+thrust Nick Carter into her power much more quickly and certainly than
+she had ever supposed it could be done.
+
+She had not been seated at the table with them a full minute before she
+was perfectly assured in her own mind that the man opposite her was Nick
+Carter, and it did not occur to her to doubt that the other man was one
+of his assistants--it made no difference to her which one.
+
+And now, while she threatened the detective with death if he should make
+any overt omission, she was eagerly casting about in her mind how to get
+him entirely into her power to do with as she would without alarming the
+others that were present there.
+
+She knew that Nick Carter understood and realized the danger as
+thoroughly as she did; but she also knew that he was extremely
+resourceful whenever danger threatened, and that she might only count
+upon him as captured and overcome entirely when he was bound and gagged,
+or dead, before her.
+
+As for Nick, when Madge uttered the threat to him, he returned her gaze
+steadfastly, at the same time reaching out a little farther with the
+hand that was resting upon the table, and then he replied, quietly and
+in the same low tone that she had employed:
+
+"I took every one of those things into consideration, Madge, when I came
+here. Now, I want to know if you intend to shout out that name, and give
+the alarm, as you have threatened to do, or if you will sit there
+quietly where you are, pretending to be interested in the drink in front
+of you, and talk it over calmly."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders, and again leaned back in her chair, but at
+the same time drawing it a little nearer to the table.
+
+"As you please," she said. "I don't care to precipitate matters and
+break up the party here unless you force me to do so--at least, not just
+yet."
+
+"Madge," said Nick, "you think that you have me in your power. You
+believe that by shouting out my name I would be killed. That is
+doubtless quite true, but before that killing was accomplished I should
+have done a little execution on my own account, and Chick, who is here
+beside me, is quite ready to do his part. As for Curly, he is an
+innocent party in this affair, so we won't consider him at all, although
+you must admit that he would have to take the consequences of bringing
+me here, which would be far from pleasant."
+
+She nodded, and smiled at him fiercely, and then she replied:
+
+"Go on. You were about to tell me that in the sleeve of that arm, which
+is extended toward me over the table, you hold a weapon with which you
+could kill me before I could give the alarm a second time. Very well I
+know it, but all the same I am not afraid of it, Nick Carter, any more
+than I am afraid of you, and you know that I have never been that."
+
+"I know," said Nick.
+
+"Go on, then," she repeated. "What do you want to talk about? Since you
+wish to talk things over calmly, what did, you come here for, anyhow?"
+
+"I came," said Nick, "believing that you were in the city, and knowing
+that I would find you here if you were, I came because I was determined
+to find out where you were, and to put a stop to your career."
+
+She started savagely, but Nick held up his hand and hushed her.
+
+"I am not going to make any arrests in this place, Madge. I am not going
+to interfere with Mike Grinnel's business, or with his reputation for
+affording security to his patrons. If every person in this room was my
+friend instead of my enemy, you, Madge, would be as free to depart in
+peace when you get ready to do so as you would have been had I not come
+here."
+
+"That all sounds very fine," she said, "if only I cared to believe it."
+
+"Believe it or not, as you please, it is the truth."
+
+"And what did you come here for?"
+
+"I have told you that already. I came to find you."
+
+"And, having found me, to let me go away in peace?"
+
+"I have said that also, I believe."
+
+"Nick Carter," she exclaimed, laughing scornfully, "you are not a good
+liar."
+
+"I never lie," replied Nick.
+
+"Well," she said, "I will speak my little piece, now that you are
+through. You are here, and there are two locked doors between you and
+the street, and there are between twenty and thirty men in this room now
+who would rather be killed than let you escape if they knew you were
+here. I might as well confess to you that eight of those men belong to
+me. That is, they obey my orders. Now, what are you going to do about
+it?"
+
+"I think," replied Nick quietly, and smiling back at her, "that, with
+your permission, I will order another round of drinks."
+
+She pushed back her chair petulantly from the table, and half started to
+rise from it, but Nick Carter's voice, low, but sharp, halted her.
+
+"Stop, Madge," he said; "keep your seat. This thing has gone too far for
+either of us to attempt to fool the other. You might as well understand
+that if there is to be any row precipitated, I will do the
+precipitating."
+
+She blazed her eyes at him for an instant, and then parted her lips with
+the evident intention of shouting out his identity. And, while he did
+not move to prevent her from doing so, the steady gaze of his eyes
+somehow overcame her, and she closed them again without making a sound.
+
+"That is better, Madge," he said. "This is a case of diamond cut
+diamond, only for the moment my diamond is a little harder and sharper
+than your own. Take my advice, and sit where you are."
+
+Curly and Chick had both been absorbed spectators and listeners to this
+little scene between the detective and Black Madge.
+
+Chick had, of course, made himself ready at any instant to act, no
+matter what sort of action might be required.
+
+But Curly was distinctly in a quandary. He knew that it was no fault of
+Nick's that the discovery had been made, and he also knew that if she
+was forced to keep silent the identity of Nick Carter would not be
+discovered by the others present.
+
+If the thing should come to a row, every instinct of Curly's life and
+profession would force him to take the side of the underworld as against
+Nick Carter, and his impulse would be that way, too. But his strongest
+desire at that moment was to prevent an exposure at any cost. It was for
+this reason that he now intervened.
+
+"Madge," he said, "listen to me for a minute."
+
+"Hello, Curly," she said, turning her head lazily toward him, "it isn't
+necessary for you to butt in on this affair."
+
+"I am going to butt in, Madge, just the same. Now, listen to me."
+
+"Go on, then."
+
+"You know where I stand, Madge, and there ain't no reason why I should
+explain how all this came about; or, if you think there is, there ain't
+going to be any explanation offered anyhow, but the point about it is
+this: It wouldn't be healthy for you, nor for any of us, if you should
+yell out a certain name in this present community, and I want to tell
+you right now that I won't stand for your doing it. It's up to you to
+keep still, Madge, and mind your own business, for while I should be
+with the boys as against Nick Carter to the bitter end, if it actually
+came to a fight, at the same time I'd blame you for the fight, and
+although you're a woman you would be the first one I'd look for out of
+this bunch. Now, I've spoken my piece, and you can go on with yours."
+
+This was a development which Madge had not anticipated, but Curly had
+spoken so plainly to the point, and his premises were so well taken and
+so logical from his standpoint, that she could offer no objection.
+
+If she could have left the table for a moment; if she could have had
+time to think, or if she could have secured an opportunity to exchange
+half a dozen sentences with any one of the members of her Band of
+Hatred, it would have been different, and she might have planned for the
+overthrow of the detective.
+
+As it was, the circumstances had arrived at such a condition that
+leaving her chair would be equivalent--so far as her companions were
+concerned--to the calling out of Nick Carter's name.
+
+Madge knew Curly John, and she knew him for a man who never made idle
+threats. His reputation among his fellows was that he spoke very rarely,
+and said very little when he did speak, but that what he said was always
+to the point, and that he always meant what he uttered.
+
+And so she saw the tables rather turned upon herself. Instead of Nick
+Carter being in her power, she was temporarily in his.
+
+The situation had its ludicrous side. Each was in a sense the prisoner
+of the other, for, while Nick Carter could not hope to escape from that
+room unless she gave him permission to leave it, she could not rise from
+the chair upon which she was seated without risking death unless he
+permitted it.
+
+If only she could have conveyed the shortest kind of a message to Mike
+Grinnel, or have signaled some word to Slippery, or to Surly Bob, or
+Gentleman Jim, or Fly Cummings, or Cuthbert, or Maxwell, or The Parson,
+all of whom were in that room at the time, everything would have been so
+easy for her.
+
+But she could not leave her chair; neither could she signal to any of
+these.
+
+Nick Carter's eye was upon her; his arm was extended across the table,
+and she knew the potency of that arm, as well as something about the
+strength and fund of resource of the detective.
+
+But the situation was unbearable. She felt that she could not endure it,
+and that in some manner it would have to be brought to a close, and at
+once.
+
+And so she leaned still further back in her chair, gradually tilting it
+until it rested poised upon the two rear legs.
+
+And then, with a sudden motion, and at the same instant uttering a
+scream, which rang shrilly through the room, she threw herself directly
+backward, at the same time kicking up her feet and so striking them
+fiercely against the under side of the table.
+
+The weight of her body and the force with which she struck the table
+instantly overturned it, bottles, glasses, and all, so that it crashed
+to the floor in utter confusion.
+
+And at the same instant every one in that room leaped to their feet and
+reached for their weapons.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE CELLAR.
+
+
+The action of Black Madge was so sudden and so unlooked for that it came
+as an entire surprise, even to Nick Carter, and the act which overturned
+the table, coming as it did from a position directly opposite his own,
+sent the table full upon him, and spilled the contents that had rested
+upon it into his lap.
+
+More than that, in spite of his effort to resist the force of the
+attack, his chair was overturned backward, and he found himself the next
+instant sprawling upon the floor.
+
+But even if he was for an instant put out of business by the incident,
+there were other things connected with it which worked to his
+assistance.
+
+Always in a resort of this kind, where there is ever the least
+likelihood of police interference, there are many arrangements prepared
+for instantly turning off the lights, and it is the first impulse of
+every person who finds himself in such a place to "dowse the glim"
+instantly upon the raising of a disturbance, if it is possible to do so.
+
+Again, when there is the sudden noise of crashing glass and the
+appearance of confusion in such a place at such a time, it never can be
+determined at once what the cause of it is, and, as discretion is
+always the better part of valor, and certainly is counted so among the
+denizens of the underworld, there were at least a dozen men in that room
+at the time who leaped for the switch to turn off the lights the instant
+that Madge upset the table.
+
+Mike Grinnel himself happened to be standing where one of the switches
+was within reach of his hand, and so it happened that before Nick
+Carter's chair could reach the floor the place was in total darkness.
+
+Nick was not unaccustomed to experiences of this kind. It was by no
+means the first time that he had been present in a resort like this one
+when the lights had been turned off, and it is safe to say that he never
+in his life entered a room where such a thing was likely to occur
+without studying his surroundings carefully the moment he was inside,
+and determining then and there what course he would pursue if such an
+event should occur.
+
+Consequently, although Madge's action came as an utter surprise to him,
+he was nevertheless prepared for it. And so was Chick.
+
+When the detective found himself falling, and knew that his chair must
+topple over, the thought instantly came to him that Chick would escape
+the greater part of the confusion resulting from it--and he knew that
+he could rely upon Chick's activity and resource as thoroughly as upon
+his own.
+
+Nick managed to seize the edge of the table with his hands while
+falling, and exerting the great strength of his arms to the utmost, he
+literally picked it from the floor and hurled it over his head, while he
+was practically lying on his back.
+
+Then, kicking the chair from under him, and half rolling over--realizing
+in that instant that Madge could not possibly get upon her own feet as
+quickly as he could on his--he leaped to his knees, and threw himself
+forward across the now empty space which the table had occupied, and so
+managed to seize the skirt of Black Madge's dress.
+
+One jerk of his strong arms pulled her toward him, and the next instant
+he had seized her, and by passing one arm around her neck clapped his
+hand over her mouth, thus preventing her from calling out.
+
+Although she struggled fiercely, clawing with her hands, and kicking
+with her heels, and attempting vainly to scream, the confusion in the
+room was so great that no one was conscious of what she was doing, save
+Nick Carter himself, who held her.
+
+And Nick knew that behind the bar, almost midway in its length, there
+was a small door, which connected with some sort of an apartment back of
+it. What that apartment was, he did not know, other than that he had
+seen Grinnel pass out and return through that small door twice since he
+entered the place; and he concluded that it must be sort of a retiring
+room, possibly a private office of the proprietor.
+
+The door was not tall enough for a man to pass through standing in an
+upright position, and it was considerably narrower than an ordinary
+door; but all the same, to Nick's idea, it offered a safe and secure
+retreat for the moment, if he could but succeed in reaching it.
+
+What was beyond it, he did not know. But it was enough for him, that, if
+he could get past it before the lights were turned on again, he at least
+would be out of that crowded room, and have time to catch his breath,
+and determine what it was best to do.
+
+He regarded Chick as entirely competent to take care of himself.
+
+Therefore, the instant that he seized upon Madge, and stopped her
+screaming by clapping his hand over her mouth, he pulled himself to his
+feet, and, holding her struggling form firmly, he carried her safely
+across the space which intervened between him and the end of the bar--a
+space which he knew would be practically clear of impedimenta at the
+moment.
+
+Nick figured that Grinnel, having turned off the lights, would stand
+silently with his hand upon the switch ready to turn them on again in an
+instant.
+
+If he could only succeed in carrying Madge behind that bar and through
+the door already described before the lights were turned on, much would
+be accomplished.
+
+The detective reached the end of the bar in safety, and, feeling the
+back of it with his body, glided around behind it to the spot where he
+knew the small door to be located, and then, releasing his left hand
+from the woman he carried long enough to reach for the latch of the
+door, he pulled it open, passed through, and closed it behind him.
+
+With the hand that was still free he pulled a pair of handcuffs from his
+pocket, and, before Madge could escape him, he snapped them upon her
+wrists behind her back and dropped her to the floor, at the same time
+pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and tying it firmly--much too
+firmly for her comfort--around her jaws.
+
+His next act was to produce his flash light and turn it upon the door,
+where, to his delight, he discovered that it was only necessary to drop
+a heavy iron bar into place to secure it; and this bar passed entirely
+across the door, and rested in iron slots at either side of it.
+
+He also noticed in that instant that the door was an extremely heavy
+one, and that the partition through which it opened was a substantial
+one. Without doubt, the room had been prepared by Mike Grinnel himself
+with great care as the means of a safe and sure retreat for him in the
+event of a raid upon his place.
+
+The detective discovered, also, that there was a gas jet in the room,
+and he turned this on, and lit the gas at once.
+
+Madge was in the meantime using every effort in her power to pull the
+handkerchief from her face, so that she could cry for help, but now with
+light sufficient to see what he was about, the detective lost no time in
+securing her so firmly that she was entirely helpless.
+
+To her baleful glances of utter hatred, he paid not the slightest
+attention, but he began at once to examine the room with great care,
+knowing well that there should be another means of entrance to and
+egress from it than the one he made use of. For Mike Grinnel, skilled as
+he was in the habits of the people he dealt with, would never have built
+for himself a den from which there was no escape after once he had
+entered it. Although there was no sign of a second door to be seen
+anywhere, Nick did not despair of finding one, and he began his search
+by first pulling out a sideboard which stood against the wall, and
+looking behind it.
+
+He next had recourse to a couch, under which he searched for a trapdoor,
+but found none; and then his attention was attracted to an iron safe,
+not quite so high as his head, which stood in one corner of the room.
+
+An iron safe is not a thing which is easily moved from its position, but
+Nick seized upon it, nevertheless; nor was he surprised when he found
+that it was so perfectly balanced on the wheels that supported it that
+it moved readily enough in response to his efforts.
+
+And behind it was the door he sought. It was not over three feet high,
+and thirty inches in width, but there was a latch upon it, mortised into
+the wood, and there was a hole in the door, through which was passed a
+small steel chain that was attached to a rung fastened to the iron safe.
+This, of course, was intended to use for pulling the safe back into
+position after the door had been made use of, and the fugitive, whoever
+he might be, had made his escape.
+
+Nick pulled open the door, thus making it ready for his use, and then
+quickly returned to Black Madge's side. He raised her in his arms,
+carried her to the little door, and, having unceremoniously thrust her
+headfirst through it, crawled after her, closed the door, and pulled the
+safe into place again with the aid of the chain.
+
+He found himself now in a narrow corridor, faced by rough bricks on
+either side of him, evidently constructed between the party walls of the
+two buildings, and ten feet in front of him he perceived a flight of
+steps leading downward.
+
+Again picking Madge up in his arms, he hurried down the narrow stairs to
+the bottom, and there came upon an iron door, fastened with a spring
+lock on the inside, which he therefore easily opened.
+
+Passing through this, and closing it behind him, so that the lock
+snapped again, he found himself in the cellar beneath the building that
+adjoined the one in which Mike Grinnel's dive was located. Across the
+cellar, and at the far end of it, was a flight of wooden stairs.
+
+Nick regretted at that moment that he did not remember what sort of a
+place was located next to Grinnel's, but he realized the imperative
+necessity of getting out of the building into the street as quickly as
+possible, no matter how he accomplished it, and therefore, when he
+carried his captive up those stairs to the top of them, and found there
+only an ordinary wooden door locked against him, he lost no time in
+kicking it open, and passing through.
+
+When he did so, and when he came out in the room above, it happened that
+the battery of his own light gave out, and before he could determine his
+surroundings he was in utter darkness.
+
+This lasted, however, only a moment, and he was in the act of hastening
+forward toward the front of the house, when, with startling suddenness,
+the whole place flashed into brilliant illumination, and he found
+himself standing at one end of what looked like a Chinese laundry, while
+directly in front of him, and not many feet distant, was Mike Grinnel
+and three of the men from his place, confronting him, with drawn
+revolvers in their hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+THE MAN IN THE BED.
+
+
+The detective knew in that instant that he could no longer hope to save
+his prisoner; that is, to escape with her, and that the chances were
+about a thousand to one against his own escape.
+
+That Mike Grinnel was thoroughly incensed, and that he was determined
+that the detective should never get out of that place alive, was
+apparent in the cold glitter of his eyes, as he looked at Nick across
+the barrel of his revolver.
+
+And Nick knew how Grinnel had succeeded in heading him off. He could see
+in his mind just what the surprise was in the saloon when the lights
+were again turned on and it was discovered that one of the strangers who
+had come there with Curly had disappeared, and had taken Black Madge
+with him.
+
+Grinnel, knew, of course, that there was only one way out of that place,
+which was through the private door back of the bar into the little room
+which he used as an office, and thence through that other door behind
+the safe, through the narrow corridor, down the stairs into the cellar,
+and then up again into the back end of the Chinese laundry.
+
+And Grinnel had lost no time in summoning to his aid three of his most
+trusted adherents, and hastening with them to the laundry, where he was
+ready to head off the detective's retreat.
+
+It had not been difficult for them to get there and be ready for him
+before he could reach the place with his burden; for he had used up a
+great deal of time in searching out the secret door behind the safe, and
+in finding his way through the cellar.
+
+And, moreover, Mike Grinnel was a man of expedient. Having arranged this
+method of escape for himself, if the necessity of it should arise, he
+had also prepared the laundry with lights to turn on or to extinguish as
+he might desire; and, therefore, having reached the laundry and prepared
+himself and his followers for the coming of the detective, they had only
+to wait silently in the darkness until they heard him approaching, when
+Mike switched on the lights.
+
+It was a moment fraught with peril, and with unnumbered possibilities.
+At such times there is always an instant of inaction; an instant when
+neither party concerned knows quite what to do.
+
+But the detective, as it happened--with the possible exception of Mike
+Grinnel himself--was the first to recover.
+
+The detective was carrying Madge in his arms; and now, at the risk of
+injuring her, realizing that it was the only way by which any
+possibility of escape could be offered to himself, he raised her over
+his head at the very instant that the turning on of the lights revealed
+his enemies, and threw her with all his strength at Mike Grinnel's burly
+figure.
+
+Of course, not one of the crooks dared to use his weapon, lest Black
+Madge herself be shot, and it was upon this idea that the detective
+acted as much as any other.
+
+Nor did it occur to Mike Grinnel that this other, whom he had seemed to
+have now guessed must be Nick Carter, would resort to any such measure
+as he had, and, therefore, he was not prepared.
+
+The body of Madge, flying the short distance across the room, struck
+Grinnel squarely on the chest, and thus forced him backward against two
+of the men who were with him; and so in that instant four people all
+together were huddled in a heap upon the floor, and only one of Nick's
+visible enemies remained standing.
+
+And the instant that Nick threw Madge at them, he leaped forward and
+seized the switch, which was almost at Grinnel's shoulder, where he had
+been standing; and, with a twist of his wrist, he turned off the lights
+as suddenly as they had been turned on.
+
+At the same instant he had taken into consideration the position of the
+one man of the enemy who was left erect, and no sooner had he turned the
+switch than he leaped forward toward the spot where he knew that man to
+be standing.
+
+Nicely calculating the distance, he struck out a savage blow with his
+right hand, and he heard this last one of his enemies go down in a heap
+upon the floor.
+
+And then the detective leaped over him toward the door which he had seen
+during that brief interval of illumination, passed through it, and
+pushed it shut behind him.
+
+He knew now that he was in the front room of the laundry. He knew that
+there should be tables and benches there, and it was only the work of an
+instant for him to reach out and feel around until he seized upon one,
+and then, exerting his great strength, he pulled it over in front of and
+against the door he had closed.
+
+A faint light shone into that room from the street, and Nick instantly
+leaped for the front door of the shop, reaching it only to find that it
+had been locked when the others entered.
+
+But the door was of glass, and, hesitating not an instant, he seized a
+chair and hurled it into the street, thus making a hole through which he
+had no difficulty in passing.
+
+The next instant he was outside, and for the moment, at least, safe. But
+the detective knew that he was by no means free from pursuit as yet,
+although he had no intention of fleeing very far; and, as he was about
+to turn away, he remembered that he had left Chick inside the saloon
+surrounded by rascals of every kind.
+
+It was not in the nature of Nick Carter to desert any one under such
+circumstances, much less his favorite, Chick.
+
+While he hesitated, he heard a noise behind him in the laundry that was
+made by Grinnel and his three followers, attempting to escape from the
+predicament into which he had thrown them.
+
+He remembered then that Grinnel and his men must have come out of the
+dive by the front door or by the hall-door entrance, in order to have
+reached the laundry when they did, and he figured in that instant that
+it was more than likely that in doing so they had not thought to fasten
+the door behind them, or had purposely, perhaps, left it unlocked in
+order that they might be able to return with all the more speed to the
+safety and seclusion of the dive.
+
+He heard them pounding against the door against which he had pulled the
+heavy bench, and he knew that at least three or four minutes must elapse
+before they could make their escape; and in that moment he decided to
+return to the saloon at whatever cost, if it were possible for him to
+get there.
+
+A few quick bounds brought him to the front door of the dive--that door
+which swung so ceaselessly to and fro during the legal hours of its
+business. He knew, although he tried it softly, that it was securely
+locked against him, and he passed on to the hall door of the house,
+which was just beyond it. This, as he had guessed might be the case, was
+not fastened, and he pushed it open and passed beyond it.
+
+He found himself in a hallway in black darkness, and while he paused for
+a moment to listen, not a sound of any kind came to his ears, a fact
+which led him to determine that either Chick had already been done for
+by the frequenters of the dive, or else that he had been made a
+prisoner, and was lying somewhere, bound and gagged, awaiting the return
+of Grinnel.
+
+Nick now crept along the hall until his hand came in contact with a
+balustrade; and here he paused, uncertain whether to proceed through the
+hall to the rear of the building, which he knew should give an entrance
+to the saloon, or to ascend the stairs and temporarily hide himself in
+the neighborhood of the house. Everything considered, this latter course
+was distinctly the best one, since, doubtless, it would never occur to
+Mike Grinnel or to any of those who were concerned with him in this
+incident, that Nick Carter would have the temerity to return to the same
+house from which he had just escaped.
+
+Therefore, if safety were the only incentive for Nick Carter, to act
+upon this was the very best course he could have adopted. But Nick was
+ever one who considered his own safety last. His whole impulse now was
+to do the best that could be done to get Chick out of the predicament
+into which he had been thrust; and he considered that to be the very
+method he had adopted.
+
+Nick knew the characteristics of the people against whom he was pitted
+well enough to understand that the moment they realized that he had
+escaped them they would simply return to the saloon of the dive to
+discuss it--and doubtless, also, to call to severe account those who
+were responsible for the affair.
+
+Such a discussion would not take place until two things had
+happened--until they were satisfied utterly that Nick Carter had escaped
+them, and also that they had Chick so thoroughly in their power that he
+could not hope to escape.
+
+And so the detective ascended the stairs softly, and as silently as a
+shadow. He had no means of knowing, of course, the character of the
+rooms on those floors, or their location; but, nevertheless, the
+circumstances were such that he had to take desperate chances, and
+therefore when he reached the landing he felt with his hands silently
+along the wall until he came to a door, which he felt slowly down until
+he touched the knob. This he turned, trying to open the door which
+resisted him, showing that it was locked.
+
+There is a way to force a door--that is, an ordinary door--and at the
+same time make very little noise. It is done--if the door opens
+inward--by seizing the knob firmly with both hands, having turned it,
+and then by bracing the body with one knee pressed firmly against the
+door directly under the knob. In this position, if it is assumed by a
+strong man, every effort may be centred upon one sudden impulse forward,
+which, while there is no visible or perceptible impact, will place all
+of the muscular force and weight of the man directly upon the point
+where the latch or lock of the door is located; and it is a very
+substantial lock which will not give way under this sort of pressure
+when it is correctly applied. Nor is there any perceptible noise, more
+than that of the tearing out of the slot which holds the bolt of the
+lock.
+
+When this door gave way before the detective it admitted him to a square
+room at the rear of the house--a room in which a lamp, turned low, was
+burning; and as he closed the door behind him and pulled a chair in
+front of it to hold it shut, he saw a figure of a man, who had been
+sleeping fully clothed on a bed in one corner of the room, start to an
+upright posture, staring and apparently alarmed.
+
+"Who----" the man started to exclaim, but the detective interrupted him
+with a sharp command.
+
+"Shut up," he ordered, "if you let out a peep you will be the worse for
+it."
+
+Without a word, the man sank back upon the pillow, apparently not in the
+least alarmed now, and evidently believing that the person who had
+entered his room was only another like himself, who, having gotten into
+some sort of trouble, was fleeing from his pursuers; and by all
+precedents, if the man was pursued to that room, it would be infinitely
+better for its permanent occupant to appear to be still sleeping
+soundly, than to have any of the aspect of a confederate, and so he
+closed his eyes again as if he were still alone.
+
+Nick waited a moment at the door, listening for sounds outside, and
+while he stood there he heard the hall door from the street open, and
+presently close again, and he could distinguish the tramping of feet
+along the hall as several persons passed to the rear of the house,
+evidently on their way to the saloon again.
+
+As soon as these noises had ceased, he knew that he was for the moment
+at least safe from pursuit. He piled other things against the door, and
+then deliberately crossed the room to the lamp and turned it up, after
+which he strode over to the bedside.
+
+"Now, my friend," he said to its occupant, "I'll have to ask you to wake
+up for about three minutes."
+
+"All right," was the simple response. "What do you want? Who are you,
+anyway? And what in blazes do you mean by bursting into my room in this
+way?"
+
+"First," said Nick, "I want to know who you are, and whether you belong
+here or not?"
+
+"Oh, you make me tired," grunted the man on the bed. "I'm Phil, the head
+day bartender downstairs."
+
+"All right, Phil," said Nick, smiling. "Get up on your feet, where I can
+look at you, and where you can answer a few questions for me."
+
+"Oh, what's eating you?" growled the bartender. "I ain't been to bed
+more than an hour. Let me sleep."
+
+Instead of replying, the detective reached out his hand, and, seizing
+Phil by the shoulder, jerked him from the bed to the floor, stood him on
+his feet, and then seated him forcibly upon one of the wooden chairs
+near at hand--so forcibly that his jaws snapped together like the
+cracking of a nut.
+
+"Now, will you be good?" asked Nick, smiling grimly.
+
+"Yes, curse you," was the surly reply. "What do you want?"
+
+"I want to talk to you."
+
+"Well, talk on, can't you? I'm listening. Who are you, anyhow?"
+
+"I'll tell you who I am," answered the detective, "and after I have done
+so, perhaps you will consent to listen to me. I am Nick Carter, the
+detective, and I want to make a little bit of use of you right now,
+Philip."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+THE CRIMINAL'S COMPACT.
+
+
+"How long have you been here in this room?" asked the detective sharply.
+
+"I told you about a minute ago," was the surly reply. "About an hour."
+
+"Where were you before you came here?"
+
+"That's none of your infernal business."
+
+"I want to know if you were downstairs in the saloon?"
+
+"No, I wasn't, if that will satisfy you."
+
+"Have you been there at all to-night?"
+
+"Yes, I was there about three hours ago."
+
+"Was Black Madge there when you were there?"
+
+A cunning leer came into the fellow's face before he answered, and then
+he replied by asking another question.
+
+"Who's Black Madge?" he demanded.
+
+"You know well enough who Black Madge is," insisted the detective; "and,
+Phil, if you keep a civil tongue in your head and answer my questions as
+I ask them, it will be all the better for you. If you do not----"
+
+"Well, what then?"
+
+"If you do not, there are several little things connected with your
+career which will make it unpleasant to have the inspector up at
+headquarters question you about."
+
+"Well, I ain't a-goin' to give away anybody downstairs, no matter what
+happens," said the bartender.
+
+"I'm not asking you to give anybody away. I merely asked you to answer
+my questions."
+
+"Well, go ahead and ask them. I will answer them if I can."
+
+"Was Black Madge in the saloon downstairs when you were there?"
+
+"Yes. She was."
+
+"Has she been in the habit of coming here frequently of late?"
+
+"I can't tell you for certain about that. You know, I'm on duty in the
+daytime, and people of her kind come only at night."
+
+"Answer my question," said the detective sternly. "You know the answer
+to it, and you understand that I know you do."
+
+"Well, I guess she's been in most every night for the last week."
+
+"Do you know where she lives?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Do you know any of the gang that is traveling with her?"
+
+"Yes; I guess I know most of that bunch."
+
+"Well, Phil, I want you to tell me their names; every one of them. That
+is, every one that you are certain forms one of her gang."
+
+"There ain't anything certain about it, Carter. I'll tell you that on
+the level. All I know about her and her gang is guesswork. But if I was
+asked to mention them I should say that, judging from appearance, there
+is about eight of them. Besides, Madge has got something up her sleeve,
+but what it is I haven't an idea. It looks to me, though, as if they
+were getting ready to crack some pretty big crib, and make the haul of
+their lives. Now, if you're on to that lay, and your only purpose is to
+prevent them doing it, so that I ain't telling you anything that will go
+for putting them behind the bars, I will be on the level and tell you
+all I know."
+
+"You will have to tell me, anyhow, Phil," returned Nick quietly. "If you
+don't do it willingly, I know of more than one way to compel you to do
+it. However, you may rest easy upon the point you have made. I am not at
+the present moment seeking to put any of them behind the bars; only
+Black Madge herself. She has got to go there, whether you talk to me or
+not."
+
+"Well," said the bartender, "she don't cut any ice with me, anyhow.
+She's too stuck up for my kind."
+
+"All right," said Nick; "tell me the names of those eight men."
+
+"There's Slippery Al, Surly Bob, Gentleman Jim, Fly Cummings, Joe
+Cuthbert, Eugene Maxwell, and The Parson. Oh, and there's Scar-faced
+Johnny; I forgot him. Now, I'll leave it to you, Carter, if that ain't a
+likely bunch."
+
+"And they were all in the room downstairs to-night," murmured the
+detective meditatively.
+
+"What!" exclaimed the bartender in astonishment, "do you mean to say
+that you have been inside that saloon to-night?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Would you mind telling me how you got there?"
+
+"Never mind all that, Phil. That is not what I am here for--to explain
+things to you. Do you know where Black Madge lives, or where she can be
+found besides in this saloon?"
+
+"I don't know anything about her more than I've told you."
+
+The detective looked around the room for a moment, and discovered that
+one of its articles of furniture was a tall, old-fashioned pier glass,
+which reflected the full length of a person who stood before it. Then he
+turned around and commanded the bartender to stand on his feet, studied
+his appearance carefully, and then he shook his head.
+
+"It won't do," he muttered.
+
+"What won't do?" asked Phil.
+
+"I was considering the possibility of making myself up in your likeness,
+and of venturing in that disguise to go to the saloon," replied the
+detective.
+
+"What! right now?" asked Phil.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you don't think you could do it, eh?"
+
+"No, Phil. You're too tall and too big. I never could make myself up to
+look like you in the world. I will have to think of some other way."
+
+Phil was thoughtful for a moment, while the detective was absorbed in
+his own study of the situation, and then he looked up suddenly and
+exclaimed:
+
+"Why don't you send me downstairs for you?"
+
+"Because," replied Nick, "the moment you got there you would call up the
+whole gang, and have them up here after me inside of a minute."
+
+"I wouldn't, either, Carter. Not if I agreed not to."
+
+"I can't trust you, Phil."
+
+Again that cunning leer came into the dissipated face of the bartender,
+and he said quickly:
+
+"You can trust me, if you pay me enough for it."
+
+"A bribed man is usually the first to betray," said Nick.
+
+"Not if the bribe is big enough, Carter."
+
+"Do you mean to say that I can trust you to go down into the saloon and
+to come back here presently and tell me exactly what the situation is?"
+
+"You can, if you pay me enough. I told you that before."
+
+"It isn't the question of pay, Phil; that is, the amount of pay. I would
+be willing to give you almost anything if I thought you would perform
+exactly what I want done, and return to me with the information I
+desire, without saying or doing anything to betray my presence here."
+
+"Well, I'm your huckleberry, if you want me to do it. All you've got to
+do on your part is to cough up the dough."
+
+The detective, who always went well supplied with funds, took a roll of
+bills from his pocket, and slowly counted out one hundred dollars,
+which, without a word, he handed to the bartender.
+
+"I am going to take you at your word, Phil," he said slowly, "and that
+is the first installment only of what I shall give you if you perform
+the service well and thoroughly, and do exactly as I instruct you to do,
+no more, and no less."
+
+"And if I do it all as you tell me to do, how much more do I get?"
+
+"Listen, and I will tell you."
+
+"I'm listening, you bet your life."
+
+"I came here to-night, Phil, with my first assistant, Chick; he is
+downstairs somewhere now, probably bound and gagged and thrown under a
+table, or behind the bar, or locked up in a closet. I want you to go
+down there, and find out exactly what has become of Chick, and what has
+happened to him. I want you to pick up all the information you can about
+what has happened there to-night--that is, what they are saying about
+it. You will have to remain there perhaps half an hour to accomplish
+this, and all of that time you must be extremely careful not to let it
+appear that you know anything about me at all."
+
+"Well, and after that, what am I to do?"
+
+"When you know what has become of Chick, and where he is now, figure out
+the best way in which we can set him at liberty at once, or, if you can
+manage to do it before you return to me, do it. If you succeed in
+setting him at liberty yourself within the next half hour, I will,
+before the sun goes down to-morrow, give you nine hundred dollars more,
+and that will be a pretty good nest egg for you, Phil."
+
+"I'll do the job, you needn't fret."
+
+"Wait, there is another thing."
+
+"Well, sir?"
+
+"If you find that you cannot liberate him yourself without assistance,
+you are to return to me at once, and we will plan together how it can
+best be accomplished. When we have done that, if through your aid I
+succeed in getting Chick safely away from here, you shall have the nine
+hundred plunks extra just the same."
+
+"On the level, Carter?"
+
+"Yes, on the level, Phil. I mean every word I say."
+
+"Well, I'm the huckleberry that can do it."
+
+"Wait, Phil, before you start, there is one more thing still."
+
+"What! another?"
+
+"Yes. This. After we have gotten safely out of this pickle, and the
+place has quieted down, it will be up to you to find out for me where
+Black Madge hangs up her clothes. It is important, Phil, that I should
+get that woman back into the prison where she belongs."
+
+"I ain't no stool pigeon," grumbled the bartender.
+
+"Neither am I asking you to be a stool pigeon," said the detective.
+"What I want you to do is simple enough. I am not laying any plans
+against any of the regular frequenters of this place. It's only Black
+Madge I want, and you have confessed already that you don't like her.
+Now, it's up to you if you want to go through this whole job, and do it
+right. And, Phil, if you will stick to me and see the whole game through
+the way I have outlined it to you, another thousand goes with the first
+one."
+
+"Geewhiz! do you mean that?"
+
+"I certainly do."
+
+"Well, then, I'm game for the whole layout, and I will see it through to
+the end, but I don't want you to forget, Carter, that, if anything ever
+comes of it so that my part in this business is found out by any one of
+that crowd down there now, male or female, I wouldn't give a snap for
+my chances of being alive twenty-four hours afterward."
+
+"They won't find it out through me," said the detective. "If they find
+it out at all it will be through you. And there's one thing more you
+must remember, Phil, and that is if you betray me you will be in a whole
+lot worse fix than you would be if your friends downstairs discover your
+treachery. For if you do betray me, I will never let up on you, Phil,
+until I see you behind the bars for a term of years that will make you
+an old man before you come out again."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+THE GLARE OF A MATCH.
+
+
+When the bartender had taken his departure, Nick found a cigar in one of
+his pockets, and seated himself to smoke quietly until Phil should
+return. But when more than half an hour later the cigar was consumed,
+and he had thrown it aside, he began to feel a sense of uneasiness that
+the man should be gone so long a time.
+
+However, he realized that it was no easy task that Phil had undertaken,
+and that he might well occupy an hour or more in accomplishing it.
+
+He had no more cigars to smoke, but he seated himself resolutely in a
+chair, determined to wait with patience until his messenger should
+return.
+
+There was a small clock, ticking away merrily on the mantel, at the far
+end of the room, and the detective watched it while the minute hand
+worked its way slowly around the dial, until an hour, then an hour and a
+quarter, and, finally, an hour and twenty minutes had elapsed since the
+departure of the bartender.
+
+His impatience was now so great, and his natural distrust of the
+confederate he had employed was so prominent in his mind that he left
+his chair, having first extinguished the light, and, going to the door,
+opened it softly and peered outside.
+
+The hallway was in utter darkness, the same as when he was there last,
+and, although he listened intently, he could not hear the suggestion of
+a sound from the lower regions of the house. After waiting a few moments
+longer, he tiptoed forward cautiously to the stairs, and descended them,
+being careful to step as closely as possible to the spindles of the
+balustrade, in order that they might not creak beneath his weight, and
+thus alarm others in the house. In this way he gained the lower floor.
+
+Nick was somewhat handicapped without his flash light, but he remembered
+quite distinctly the location of the sound he had heard two hours
+earlier, when the party from the laundry had followed him in, and passed
+through the hallway to a rear door. Now he sought that door by following
+carefully along the wall until he came to it.
+
+But, although he searched diligently for many minutes, he could not find
+so much as a suggestion of a door anywhere.
+
+He remembered then that in all probability there was no perceptible door
+at all; that the door which was there somewhere was concealed in the
+wainscoting in some way, or otherwise hidden from casual observation. To
+have maintained a door of entrance to the saloon from that hallway would
+have rendered it entirely unnecessary for Grinnel to keep up his
+private entrance to the saloon from the other street. Nick's only method
+of finding it now was to light a match, and this he hesitated to do, not
+knowing what warning its glare might convey to others.
+
+But there was no alternative, and presently he began his search by
+lighting matches one after another, permitting them to flare up
+sufficiently for a moment's vision, and then throwing them quickly to
+the floor, after the manner adopted by burglars when they were engaged
+in robbing a house before the pocket flash light was invented.
+
+He was not long in discovering the entrance he sought. The walls along
+the hallway were not plastered; they were merely built up with matched
+boards, which had stood there unpainted for so long a time that they had
+achieved a veneer of filth and dirt which made them look, in the flare
+of the match, like mahogany.
+
+But he could easily see where there was a keyhole cut into one of these
+boards, and, although around it there was no other evidence of a door,
+he knew that if he could turn the tumblers in that lock it would be
+revealed to him.
+
+He went to work with his picklock, and, as he supposed, the instant the
+bolt of the lock was shot back the door opened easily and noiselessly in
+his grasp, and from beyond it he could at once hear the murmur of
+distant voices; also very far ahead of him, and beneath what was
+evidently another door, he could perceive a gleam of light.
+
+He stepped through, and closed it after him, but, realizing that it was
+more than likely that he might wish to leave in a hurry, he left it
+unlocked.
+
+And now he tiptoed forward to the door beneath which the light shone,
+and, getting upon his hands and knees, held his ear down where he could
+hear with more distinctness.
+
+The effect was almost the same as if he were inside the saloon.
+Strangely enough, also, it was Madge's voice that came to him first, for
+it appeared that she was seated near that very door, and by the answers
+that were returned to her, Nick knew that no less a person than Mike
+Grinnel himself was her companion. And they were speaking in low tones,
+but, nevertheless, every word they uttered could be heard distinctly by
+the detective.
+
+It was in the midst of their conversation, evidently, that Nick began to
+listen, and Madge was saying:
+
+"I swore then, Mike, that I would be even with him, and that if I ever
+succeeded in getting out of that prison where he put me I would never
+rest another minute until Nick Carter was placed beyond the power of
+injuring anybody."
+
+"You bit off a little more than you could chew, didn't you, Madge?"
+asked Mike Grinnel, in his slow, even voice, in which he never permitted
+a sign of emotion.
+
+"No, I didn't," she retorted. "I made some mistakes, maybe. I shouldn't,
+for instance, have written him the letter I did."
+
+"What was the letter, Madge?"
+
+"Like a fool I wrote him a threatening letter, in which I told him to
+look out for me. That was my vanity, I suppose. I wanted him to know
+that I was on his track. I wanted to worry him; to give him something to
+think of, and a lot of things to look out for."
+
+"Well, what then, Madge?"
+
+"It was then, Mike, that I began to get the guns together, Slippery Al,
+and Gentleman Jim, and the others, and, of course, I made this place our
+headquarters."
+
+"That, Madge, is just what you shouldn't have done. That's what I'm
+finding fault with you about now.
+
+"Well," she said, "it's done, and it can't be helped; and Nick Carter
+has been here, and he's gotten away again; but, all the same, we've got
+Chick in our power, and if I do to him as I feel like doing now, he will
+regret the day that he ever took my trail."
+
+"If you leave him where he is now, Madge, he'll do that," said Grinnel,
+laughing softly.
+
+"Why, what would happen to him there?" she demanded quickly.
+
+"For one thing the rats would probably eat him up before very long, and
+it wouldn't be the first meal of that kind they've had down there,
+either."
+
+"You didn't tell me where you put him," said Madge.
+
+"I don't tell anybody exactly where that place is, Madge. It's a little
+hole that I've dug out underneath the cellar of this house; if it was
+anywhere in the old country it would be called a dungeon; as it is, I
+call it the grave--people who go there have a habit of never coming out
+again."
+
+The detective was anxious to know what had become of Phil, the
+bartender. It was evident that the man had done nothing to betray the
+detective, since these two were talking so quietly just inside the door
+where Nick was listening.
+
+The next words, while they did not exactly reassure him, made him think
+that, after all, the bartender might be carrying out his contract by
+attempting to set Chick at liberty himself.
+
+"Is that where you sent Phil a few moments ago?" she asked. "Down there
+to the dungeon where you put Chick?"
+
+The detective could hear Grinnel chuckle and then reply:
+
+"Yes, Madge, I sent him down there to fasten the young fellow up, so
+that there would be no chance of his getting loose. You see, he was
+senseless when we chucked him in there, and I forgot to make him fast,
+as a sailor would say, but there are staples in the wall down there, and
+there are chains fastened to those staples, and there are nice little
+steel bracelets at the end of those chains, that fit beautifully around
+a man's ankles. I sent Phil down to lock them fast."
+
+"I thought nobody knew where that place was except yourself," said Madge
+quickly.
+
+"Oh, Phil's all right. I have to have some confidence in my men here, or
+I couldn't run the place."
+
+"All the same," the detective heard her murmur, "I'd rather you had left
+Chick to me. They're a slippery lot, those detectives, and I shall be
+uneasy----"
+
+The detective heard no more of what was said, for at that instant he was
+greatly startled by hearing a sound behind him, and evidently beneath
+him, the consequence being that he paid no further attention to the
+conversation beyond the door.
+
+Indeed, he drew back away from it, and softly rose to his feet, in order
+that he might be thoroughly prepared for anything that should happen;
+and while he stood there he was conscious of a cold, damp draught of air
+blown into his face--air that smelled as if it might come from the
+cellar--and he was somehow conscious that a trapdoor had been lifted,
+while the next moment he was aware that somebody was climbing through
+it into that narrow hallway--somebody who was not more than ten or
+twelve feet away from him. How he had wished for his little flash light
+then.
+
+Once he imagined that he could hear a faint whisper, and a sharp,
+warning hiss for silence immediately following it.
+
+Then it came back to him suddenly, all that he had heard Mike Grinnel
+say to Madge about the dungeon in the house, and the bartender's errand
+to it.
+
+He thought then that the people who had raised themselves through the
+trap--and he was sure that there were two of them--must be Phil and
+Chick, the latter having been liberated by the former; and, acting upon
+the impulse of the moment, he struck a match and held it into the faces
+of the two men. The glare of the match shone directly into the face of
+Chick.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE CAUGHT IN A TRAP.
+
+
+But the flaring up of the match also developed another rather startling
+fact, and that was the presence of Curly, who, with the bartender, Phil,
+was standing directly behind Chick.
+
+The light also discovered Nick Carter to the others, as it discovered
+them to him, and, although it burned but a moment, it was a revelation
+to all the parties concerned. It was Phil, the bartender, who acted more
+quickly than the others in this somewhat confusing moment of the
+encounter, for, with admirable presence of mind, he stepped quickly
+forward, and, reaching out his hands, managed to pull the others toward
+him until their heads were so close together that the faintest whisper
+could be heard, and then he said:
+
+"Follow me along the corridor into the front hall. We can talk there."
+
+They did so, and presently they stood together in the front hallway
+beside the stairs beyond the hidden doorway which Nick had discovered.
+And, during the time they occupied in getting to this point, Nick, who
+realized that the disguise he wore was no longer of any importance,
+busily engaged himself in removing it, or, at least, the facial part of
+it, so that, although in the dark they could not see him, he had
+restored himself, nevertheless, to his proper person.
+
+"Now, Curly," said the detective, "tell me what this all means. I don't
+understand it at all."
+
+"Let me talk," interrupted Phil. "It's this way, Carter: When you
+escaped from the barroom through the little door into the boss' sanctum,
+you had no sooner gone than Grinnel switched on the lights again, and
+your absence was discovered. Then it was that the whole bunch lit on to
+Curly and Chick here, with both feet, downed them, trussed them up, and
+when Chick was taken to the cellar below, to feed the rats, if he had
+been left there long enough, Curly was fired along with him. I tell you,
+right now, Carter, it's all up with Curly in this place. He never can
+make himself good with this bunch again as long as he lives, and it's up
+to him to light out now, for good and all, unless he wants to turn up
+his toes and go to the morgue."
+
+The detective turned to Curly again, and once more struck a match so
+that they could all see the faces of one another.
+
+"Is that straight, Curly?" he asked.
+
+"That's about the size of it, Mr. Carter."
+
+"Then," said Nick, "am I to understand that the occurrences of this
+evening have released me from my promise to you to make no arrests in
+this place, or any arrest of any one who is now in this place within
+twenty-four hours?"
+
+"Yes, sir, the promise is all off. You can do as you've a mind to. It
+would suit me to a T if you would gather in the whole push."
+
+"Thank you, Curly," said Nick. "That statement of yours lets me out of a
+peck of trouble, for having given the promise, of course I would not
+break it, and I could not quite see how we could carry this thing
+through to a finish without."
+
+He was silent for a moment after that, and then he asked:
+
+"Can I rely upon you, Curly, to stand by me through what is to come?"
+
+"To the last ditch, Mr. Carter," was the emphatic response.
+
+"And you, Phil--what about you?"
+
+"Well," was the slow reply, for the man was evidently considering his
+words with very great care, "I guess my usefulness in this place is just
+about over. When the boss finds out that Curly and Chick have both
+gotten out of the dungeon below, he will know mighty well who it was
+that let them out, and that will mean yours truly for the dead wagon in
+about fifteen minutes; so I think, Carter, that I'd better tie up to you
+while I've got the chance. I am not a crook myself, and never have been
+one, although I have consorted with them, and been companions with them
+for a good many years."
+
+"And will you see the thing through to the finish, Phil?" asked Nick
+again.
+
+"I will do just as Curly said he would do. I'll stand by you to the last
+ditch."
+
+"Are you all ready to obey my orders, exactly as I shall give them?"
+asked Nick again, slowly.
+
+"We are," came the unanimous response.
+
+"In this case," said the detective, "I am going to make a desperate
+effort to find out what a bold stroke will do, and here is my plan: We
+will go back together to that door before which I was standing a moment
+ago, which, I conclude, from its character, is rather a flimsy----"
+
+"It is that," said Phil.
+
+"And after we get there we will stand silently for a moment, each one of
+you preparing for the signal which I shall give. When I say, 'Now,' I
+will throw myself against the door, and burst it open, and as I do so,
+and leap into the room, you three are to follow me, one after the other,
+as quickly as possible.
+
+"You, Phil, will make directly for the electric switch, and you will see
+to it, no matter what happens, that the room is not plunged in darkness.
+
+"You, Curly--by the way, have you any weapons about you?"
+
+"I have got two guns in my pocket, all right."
+
+"Very well; you, Curly, the moment you get into the room, will draw your
+two guns, and level them at the crowd.
+
+"After that all you have to do is to follow the lead of Chick and
+myself, and protect yourselves until the fight is over--if there is a
+fight."
+
+"I reckon I can do that, too, Mr. Carter," said Curly.
+
+"I haven't a doubt of it, Curly. I want you to remember not to shoot too
+quick, and under no circumstances to shoot to kill, unless it is
+absolutely necessary; as a matter of fact, I don't expect that we will
+have much trouble, for when they see us in the room, fully armed, and
+hear the first words that I shall utter, I think we will have no
+difficulty in carrying our point."
+
+There was nothing more said then, and Nick turned away, and led them
+quickly back again to the door, near which he had heard the conversation
+between Black Madge and Mike Grinnel.
+
+For a moment they stood there, waiting to get their breath, and to
+prepare their muscles and sinews and nerves for the ordeal to which they
+were about to be put; and then from the detective came a low and
+emphatic--"Now!"
+
+The instant that the detective shouted out this word, he plunged
+forward, throwing his shoulder heavily against the flimsy door, already
+mentioned, so that it was burst from its lock and from its hinges at
+the same time, and was sent flying halfway across the room.
+
+But even before the clatter which followed the crash had subsided, Nick
+Carter, with a pistol in either hand, had leaped across the threshold,
+and with one more bound arrived at the spot directly beside Mike
+Grinnel.
+
+Turning the weapon about while he approached, he brought the butt of it
+down, with a resounding whack, upon Grinnel's skull, sending him
+tumbling to the floor, and then he straightened up, with both arms
+extended, and the muzzles of his pistols wavering from form to form of
+the astonished throng in the room, and he cried out:
+
+"Hands up, every one of you. I am here after just one person. The rest
+of you I don't want, unless somebody interferes with me, and if you do
+interfere there are enough outside of this house, without doubt, to take
+you all in."
+
+When he leaped across the threshold, the others followed him, as he had
+directed, and, having already cautioned Chick in a whisper to look out
+for Madge, and feeling sure that the others would do their respective
+duties, as he had directed, Nick had no fear whatever of the result.
+
+A collection of criminals assembled as these were are always glad to
+hear that there is only one among them who is "wanted," for each one
+seems instinctively to know that he is not "it." And Nick Carter knew
+the criminal class so well that he was certain that this announcement
+would prevent any immediate attack upon him by the twenty or thirty men
+who were gathered there.
+
+Having heard this statement, and having, also, taken due notice of his
+suggestion that there were plenty of reënforcements outside the
+building, although it will be remembered that the detective had not
+explained how far outside they were, and remembering that a considerable
+time had elapsed since Nick Carter left that room before, they were one
+and all willing to wait a moment before beginning what might be an
+unnecessary attack, which would be sure to send many of them to prison
+before it was over. And so they waited, casting furtive glances at one
+another, many of them with their hands upon their weapons, and all of
+them ready to fight, if need be, but quite as ready to avoid a fight, if
+it were policy to do so.
+
+"Now, listen to me," said Nick Carter. "I came here to-night to get
+Black Madge, and I know by the sounds I have heard behind me since I
+entered the room just now that she has got a pair of bracelets on her
+that she doesn't like to wear. I am going to take her away with me, and
+she is going to be sent back to the prison from which she escaped, and
+if there is anybody in this crowd that interferes with me, or offers to
+do so, it will be very much the worse for that person.
+
+"On the other hand, if I am not interfered with, we shall go away
+quietly with Madge, and what the rest of you may do after that does not
+concern me. You have my word for it, and you all know that when Nick
+Carter gives his word, he keeps it. Now, answer me, somebody, and let
+him speak for all. Does what I say go?"
+
+A voice from the far end of the room replied instantly:
+
+"I say it goes, for one."
+
+"Then answer, all of you," said the detective.
+
+"It goes. You bet it goes."
+
+In their eagerness to answer his request, they came near to all shouting
+at once.
+
+"Thank you," said Nick, smiling. "Now, I have one more word to say, and
+then we will take our departure. There are eight men here whose names I
+will call, and I want them each to take this as a warning from me. They
+are Scar-faced Johnny; a man called Slippery Al; Surly Bob, whose career
+I know; Gentleman Jim, who, for the good of his health, ought to take a
+vacation on the other side of the ocean; Joe Cuthbert; Eugene Maxwell;
+Fly Cummings; and, last, but not least, is the man who is known as The
+Parson, and that same Parson had better get himself out of New York as
+quickly as possible.
+
+"I am speaking now to those eight whose names I have mentioned. I know
+that you have all joined in with an organization created by Black Madge.
+I know, or think I know, the purpose of that organization. I will give
+all of you twenty-four hours to get out of the city of New York, and if
+any one of you is found inside of the limits of the city after that
+time, look out for squalls."
+
+There was a low murmur around the room following upon this speech by the
+detective, but whether in protest or approbation, the detective did not
+concern himself to discover.
+
+With calm deliberation, he turned his back upon them all, and motioned
+to Chick, who had Madge securely handcuffed to his own wrist, to precede
+him through the door.
+
+Then he motioned to Curly and to Phil to pass through it also.
+
+And, then, stepping himself to the door, he turned about upon the
+threshold, and faced the crowd once more.
+
+"One last word to you all," he said. "He among you who hurts Curly John,
+or Phil, the bartender, for this night's work, or attempts to do so,
+hurts me. I bid you good night."
+
+It is only necessary to add that, within forty-eight hours of that time,
+Black Madge found herself again in the prison of that State for which
+she had expressed such abounding contempt, and that, at her trial, which
+followed soon after, she was sentenced to serve ten years in the State
+prison, where she is at this day.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+"The Temple of Vice" is the title of New Magnet
+Series No. 1223, by Nicholas Carter. It is a story
+that will thrill you throughout its reading.
+
+
+
+
+NICK CARTER STORIES
+
+New Magnet Library
+
+Not a Dull Book in This List
+
+ALL BY NICHOLAS CARTER
+
+
+Nick Carter stands for an interesting detective story. The fact that the
+books in this line are so uniformly good is entirely due to the work of
+a specialist. The man who wrote these stories produced no other type of
+fiction. His mind was concentrated upon the creation of new plots and
+situations in which his hero emerged triumphantly from all sorts of
+troubles and landed the criminal just where he should be--behind the
+bars.
+
+The author of these stories knew more about writing detective stories
+than any other single person.
+
+Following is a list of the best Nick Carter stories. They have been
+selected with extreme care, and we unhesitatingly recommend each of them
+as being fully as interesting as any detective story between cloth
+covers which sells at ten times the price.
+
+If you do not know Nick Carter, buy a copy of any of the New Magnet
+Library books, and get acquainted. He will surprise and delight you.
+
+_ALL TITLES ALWAYS IN PRINT_
+
+901--A Weird Treasure
+902--The Middle Link
+903--To the Ends of the Earth
+904--When Honors Pall
+905--The Yellow Brand
+906--A New Serpent in Eden
+907--When Brave Men Tremble
+908--A Test of Courage
+909--Where Peril Beckons
+910--The Gargoni Girdle
+911--Rascals & Co.
+912--Too Late to Talk
+913--Satan's Apt Pupil
+914--The Girl Prisoner
+915--The Danger of Folly
+916--One Shipwreck Too Many
+917--Scourged by Fear
+918--The Red Plague
+919--Scoundrels Rampant
+920--From Clew to Clew
+921--When Rogues Conspire
+922--Twelve in a Grave
+923--The Great Opium Case
+924--A Conspiracy of Rumors
+925--A Klondike Claim
+926--The Evil Formula
+927--The Man of Many Faces
+928--The Great Enigma
+929--The Burden of Proof
+930--The Stolen Brain
+931--A Titled Counterfeiter
+932--The Magic Necklace
+933--'Round the World for a Quarter
+934--Over the Edge of the World
+935--In the Grip of Fate
+936--The Case of Many Clews
+937--The Sealed Door
+938--Nick Carter and the Green Goods Men
+939--The Man Without a Will
+940--Tracked Across the Atlantic
+941--A Clew from the Unknown
+942--The Crime of a Countess
+943--A Mixed-up Mess
+944--The Great Money-order Swindle
+945--The Adder's Brood
+946--A Wall Street Haul
+947--For a Pawned Crown
+948--Sealed Orders
+949--The Hate that Kills
+950--The American Marquis
+951--The Needy Nine
+952--Fighting Against Millions
+953--Outlaws of the Blue
+954--The Old Detective's Pupil
+955--Found in the Jungle
+956--The Mysterious Mail Robbery
+957--Broken Bars
+958--A Fair Criminal
+959--Won by Magic
+960--The Piano Box Mystery
+961--The Man They Held Back
+962--A Millionaire Partner
+963--A Pressing Peril
+964--An Australian Klondike
+965--The Sultan's Pearls
+966--The Double Shuffle Club
+967--Paying the Price
+968--A Woman's Hand
+969--A Network of Crime
+970--At Thompson's Ranch
+971--The Crossed Needles
+972--The Diamond Mine Case
+973--Blood Will Tell
+974--An Accidental Password
+975--The Crook's Double
+976--Two Plus Two
+977--The Yellow Label
+978--The Clever Celestial
+979--The Amphitheater Plot
+980--Gideon Drexel's Millions
+981--Death in Life
+982--A Stolen Identity
+983--Evidence by Telephone
+984--The Twelve Tin Boxes
+985--Clew Against Clew
+986--Lady Velvet
+987--Playing a Bold Game
+988--A Dead Man's Grip
+989--Snarled Identities
+990--A Deposit Vault Puzzle
+991--The Crescent Brotherhood
+992--The Stolen Pay Train
+993--The Sea Fox
+994--Wanted by Two Clients
+995--The Van Alstine Case
+996--Check No. 777
+997--Partners in Peril
+998--Nick Carter's Clever Protégé
+999--The Sign of the Crossed Knives
+1000--The Man Who Vanished
+1001--A Battle for the Right
+1002--A Game of Craft
+1003--Nick Carter's Retainer
+1004--Caught in the Toils
+1005--A Broken Bond
+1006--The Crime of the French Café
+1007--The Man Who Stole Millions
+1008--The Twelve Wise Men
+1009--Hidden Foes
+1010--A Gamblers' Syndicate
+1011--A Chance Discovery
+1012--Among the Counterfeiters
+1013--A Threefold Disappearance
+1014--At Odds with Scotland Yard
+1015--A Princess of Crime
+1016--Found on the Beach
+1017--A Spinner of Death
+1018--The Detective's Pretty Neighbor
+1019--A Bogus Clew
+1020--The Puzzle of Five Pistols
+1021--The Secret of the Marble Mantel
+1022--A Bite of an Apple
+1023--A Triple Crime
+1024--The Stolen Race Horse
+1025--Wildfire
+1026--A Herald Personal
+1027--The Finger of Suspicion
+1028--The Crimson Clew
+1029--Nick Carter Down East
+1030--The Chain of Clews
+1031--A Victim of Circumstances
+1032--Brought to Bay
+1033--The Dynamite Trap
+1034--A Scrap of Black Lace
+1035--The Woman of Evil
+1036--A Legacy of Hate
+1037--A Trusted Rogue
+1038--Man Against Man
+1039--The Demons of the Night
+1040--The Brotherhood of Death
+1041--At the Knife's Point
+1042--A Cry for Help
+1043--A Stroke of Policy
+1044--Hounded to Death
+1045--A Bargain in Crime
+1046--The Fatal Prescription
+1047--The Man of Iron
+1048--An Amazing Scoundrel
+1049--The Chain of Evidence
+1050--Paid with Death
+1051--A Fight for a Throne
+1052--The Woman of Steel
+1053--The Seal of Death
+1054--The Human Fiend
+1055--A Desperate Chance
+1056--A Chase in the Dark
+1057--The Snare and the Game
+1058--The Murray Hill Mystery
+1059--Nick Carter's Close Call
+1060--The Missing Cotton King
+1061--A Game of Plots
+1062--The Prince of Liars
+1063--The Man at the Window
+1064--The Red League
+1065--The Price of a Secret
+1066--The Worst Case on Record
+1067--From Peril to Peril
+1068--The Seal of Silence
+1069--Nick Carter's Chinese Puzzle
+1070--A Blackmailer's Bluff
+1071--Heard in the Dark
+1072--A Checkmated Scoundrel
+1073--The Cashier's Secret
+1074--Behind a Mask
+
+
+
+
+READ
+
+When you want real recreation in your leisure hours, read! Read the
+STREET & SMITH NOVELS!
+
+They are the cheapest and most interesting reading matter published in
+America to-day. No jazz--no sex--just big, clean, interesting books.
+There are hundreds of different titles, among which you will find a lot
+of exactly the sort of reading you want.
+
+So, when you get tired of rolling around in your Lady Lizzie or
+listening to the blah-blah of your radio, hie yourself to the nearest
+news dealer, grab off a copy of a good detective, adventure or love
+story, and then READ!
+
+Read the STREET & SMITH NOVELS. Catalogue sent upon request.
+
+Street & Smith Corporation
+79 Seventh Avenue   New York City
+
+Printed in the U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note: The original edition of this work did not contain a
+table of contents. A table of contents has been created for this
+electronic edition.
+
+The advertisement containing a list of other Nick Carter stories has
+been moved from the front of the book to the back.
+
+The following typographical errors present in the original edition have
+been corrected.
+
+In Chapter II, a period was changed to a comma after "who he was".
+
+In Chapter V, a missing period was added after "take me into the fold"
+and after "near the tracks".
+
+In Chapter VII, "dregs in you coffee cup" was changed to "dregs in your
+coffee cup".
+
+In Chapter XIII, "she heard Madge inquire" was changed to "he heard
+Madge inquire".
+
+In Chapter XIV, "lying at full lngth" was changed to "lying at full
+length".
+
+In Chapter XVI, "He rose stifly" was changed to "He rose stiffly".
+
+In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "but he sent a
+bullet after me".
+
+In Chapter XXII, "that wake of life" was changed to "that walk of life".
+
+In Chapter XXVI, a missing period was added after "too stuck up for my
+kind".
+
+No other changes have been made to the original text.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman at Bay, by Nicholas Carter
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN AT BAY ***
+
+***** This file should be named 26704-8.txt or 26704-8.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
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+
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+will be renamed.
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+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of A Woman At Bay, by Nicholas Carter.
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+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman at Bay, by Nicholas Carter
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: A Woman at Bay
+       A Fiend in Skirts
+
+Author: Nicholas Carter
+
+Release Date: September 26, 2008 [EBook #26704]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN AT BAY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
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+
+</pre>
+
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 337px;">
+<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="337" height="500" alt="cover" title="A Woman at Bay by Nicholas Carter" />
+</div>
+
+<h1>A WOMAN AT BAY<br />
+<span style="font-size: 60%;">OR</span><br />
+<span style="font-size: 80%;">A Fiend in Skirts</span></h1>
+
+<h2><span style="font-size: 60%;">BY</span><br />NICHOLAS CARTER</h2>
+
+<p class="center">Author of "Out of Crime's Depths," "Reaping the Whirlwind," "An Artful
+Schemer," etc.</p>
+
+<div class="figcenter" style="width: 163px;">
+<img src="images/logo.png" width="163" height="200" alt="publisher's logo" title="S and S novels" />
+</div>
+
+<p class="center">STREET &amp; SMITH CORPORATION<br />
+PUBLISHERS<br />
+79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York</p>
+
+<p class="center">Copyright, 1907<br />
+By STREET &amp; SMITH</p>
+
+<p class="center">A Woman at Bay</p>
+
+<p class="center">All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
+languages, including the Scandinavian.</p>
+
+<p class="center">Printed in the U. S. A.</p>
+
+
+<h2 class="newchapter">Table of Contents</h2>
+
+<table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" summary="Table of Contents">
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">I.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE KING OF THE YEGGMEN.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">5</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">II.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE YEGGMEN'S CAMP FIRE.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">22</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">III.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE "KING'S" LIEUTENANT.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">31</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">IV.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE OUTLAW'S HOME.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">40</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">V.</td>
+<td class="chapname">NICK'S WONDERFUL STRENGTH.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">49</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">VI.</td>
+<td class="chapname">NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">67</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">VII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">76</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">VIII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">94</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">IX.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">104</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">X.</td>
+<td class="chapname">ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">114</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XI.</td>
+<td class="chapname">PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">121</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">128</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XIII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">146</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XIV.</td>
+<td class="chapname">BLACK MADGE GIVES JUDGMENT.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">165</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XV.</td>
+<td class="chapname">NICK'S CLEVEREST CAPTURE.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">182</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XVI.</td>
+<td class="chapname">NICK MAKES BAD MEDICINE.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">201</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XVII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">A WHOLESALE ROUND-UP.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">210</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XVIII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">BLACK MADGE'S THREAT.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">218</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XIX.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE BAND OF HATRED.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">226</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XX.</td>
+<td class="chapname">A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">241</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXI.</td>
+<td class="chapname">CURLY JOHN, THE BANK THIEF.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">249</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">AT MIKE GRINNEL'S DIVE.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">257</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXIII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">BLACK MADGE'S DEFIANCE.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">266</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXIV.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE CELLAR.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">275</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXV.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE MAN IN THE BED.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXV">284</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXVI.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE CRIMINAL'S COMPACT.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI">294</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXVII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">THE GLARE OF A MATCH.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII">303</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td class="chapnum">XXVIII.</td>
+<td class="chapname">BLACK MADGE CAUGHT IN A TRAP.</td>
+<td class="chappage"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII">311</a></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span></p>
+
+<h1 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>A WOMAN AT BAY.</h1>
+
+<h2>CHAPTER I.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE KING OF THE YEGGMEN.</h3>
+
+<p>Four men were seated around a camp fire made of old railroad ties, over
+which a kettle was boiling merrily, where it hung from an improvised
+crane above the blaze.</p>
+
+<p>Around, on the ground, were scattered a various assortment of tin cans,
+some of which had been hammered more or less straight to serve for
+plates, and it was evident from the general appearance of things around
+the camp that a meal had just been disposed of, and that the four men
+who had consumed it were now determined to make themselves as
+comfortable as possible. The kettle that boiled over the fire contained
+nothing but water&mdash;water with which one of the four men had jocularly
+said he intended to bathe.</p>
+
+<p>These four men were about as rough-looking specimens of humanity as can
+be imagined. Not one of them had been shaved in so long a time that
+their faces were covered with a hairy growth which suggested full
+beards; indeed, their faces looked as if the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> only shaving they had ever
+received, or rather the nearest approach to a shave, had been done by a
+pair of scissors, cropping the hair as closely as possible.</p>
+
+<p>The camp they had made was located just inside the edge of a wood
+through which a railway had been built, and it was down in a hollow
+beside a brook, so that the light of their fire was effectually screened
+from view, save that the glow of it shone fitfully upon the drooping
+leaves over their heads.</p>
+
+<p>The four men were tramps&mdash;hoboes, or yeggmen, of the most pronounced
+types, if their appearance went for anything at all.</p>
+
+<p>Their conversation was couched entirely in the slang of their order; a
+talk that is almost unintelligible to outsiders.</p>
+
+<p>But, strangely enough, the four men were not hoboes at all; neither were
+they yeggmen; and the lingo they talked so glibly among themselves,
+although perfect in its enunciation, and in the words that were used,
+was entirely assumed.</p>
+
+<p>For those four men were Nick Carter, the New York detective, and his
+three assistants, Chick, Patsy, and Ten-Ichi, a Japanese.</p>
+
+<p>The president of the E. &amp; S.&nbsp;W. R.&nbsp;R. Co. had sent for Nick Carter a
+week before this particular evening, and as soon as he and the detective
+were alone together in the president's private room, he had opened the
+conversation abruptly with this question:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span>"Carter, have you ever happened to hear of a character known as Hobo
+Harry, the Hobo King?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have," replied the detective. "I have heard about him in a vague sort
+of way. I have no particular information about him, if that is what you
+mean."</p>
+
+<p>"No; I merely wished to know if you were aware that there is such a
+character."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I have heard of the fellow."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know what he is?"</p>
+
+<p>"A yeggman, isn't he?"</p>
+
+<p>"He is the king of all the yeggmen. He is the master mind, the
+controlling spirit of all the outlawry and lawlessness that goes on from
+one end of our big railroad system to the other. Hobo Harry costs us, in
+round numbers, anywhere from three to ten thousand dollars a month."</p>
+
+<p>"Really?" asked the detective, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes&mdash;really. This is no joke. There isn't a bit of thievery, however
+petty it may be, or a scheme of robbery, however grand and great, which
+they do not turn their hands to under the guidance of Hobo Harry&mdash;and we
+have about got to the end of our patience."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said Nick, "that all this means that you want me to find
+Hobo Harry for you. Is that the idea?"</p>
+
+<p>"That is precisely the idea. Do you suppose you can do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can, at least, make the effort."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span>"I should tell you one thing before you become too sanguine."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hobo Harry is largely a mystery. There are those&mdash;detectives, I
+mean&mdash;who insist that he does not exist at all, save in imagination."</p>
+
+<p>Nick nodded.</p>
+
+<p>"They say that he is only a figurehead; that he is only a name; that he
+is in reality an imperceptible, intangible idol, whom hoboes worship,
+and to whom they refer as their common leader, while, in reality, there
+is no real leader at all."</p>
+
+<p>"It is possible that they are correct in that idea," said the detective
+slowly.</p>
+
+<p>"It is possible, but it is not likely. There is too much system about
+their operations. I am at the head of a great system, and I know how
+such things are done. I am confident that the operations of these
+thieves&mdash;these yeggmen&mdash;could not have been carried on so successfully,
+and so systematically, without a head&mdash;a chief; and so I, for one,
+believe thoroughly in the existence of Hobo Harry."</p>
+
+<p>"Well?" asked the detective. "What does all this lead to?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am coming to that. I have had every railroad detective in my employ
+searching for Hobo Harry for months&mdash;I might say for almost a year, and
+without success. I have employed two of the largest and best<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span>&mdash;so
+called&mdash;detective agencies in the country to assist me. The result has
+in every case been the same."</p>
+
+<p>"What were the results?"</p>
+
+<p>"There have been any number of hoboes and yeggmen arrested; many of them
+have been sent to prison; some of them have gone up for long terms; we
+have proved the cases of robberies against them often enough&mdash;but the
+point is, that the robberies have gone merrily on afterward, just the
+same."</p>
+
+<p>"Go on," said the detective, nodding his head.</p>
+
+<p>"Eight separate times we have had, as we supposed, Hobo Harry himself in
+our clutches. Each of those eight separate times the prisoner who was
+supposed to be Hobo Harry has confessed that he was that individual,
+and&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"And so you have arrested eight Hobo Harrys, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"That is about the size of it. But the point is&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"The point is that not one of the eight was really Hobo Harry."</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly."</p>
+
+<p>"Very good. Go ahead with your story."</p>
+
+<p>"In each case, after the arrest, as we supposed, of Hobo Harry himself,
+the robberies and thefts along the line have received an impetus; they
+have increased in number, and in volume&mdash;and also in seriousness. These
+yeggmen do not confine themselves to breaking into freight cars and
+stations along the line of the road. They burglarize post offices, and
+even country<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> banks. They pillage houses. They turn their hands and
+their talents to anything and everything where there is hope of reward
+for them. The thing has got beyond endurance."</p>
+
+<p>"Well?"</p>
+
+<p>"We want you, Carter, to find Hobo Harry himself&mdash;if you can."</p>
+
+<p>"Well?"</p>
+
+<p>"The matter was discussed thoroughly at a meeting of our board of
+directors yesterday, and it was determined at that meeting that if you
+could find Hobo Harry and arrest him, and, having arrested him, could
+convict him and send him to prison, and, having done that, could prove
+to our entire satisfaction that the man is Hobo Harry, your reward will
+be fifty thousand dollars, spot cash. Only, you must understand, we must
+be certain that your man is the real article."</p>
+
+<p>"Hobo Harry, the King of the Beggars, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Beggars, you know, is supposed to be the name of their
+organization."</p>
+
+<p>The detective nodded.</p>
+
+<p>"Will you take the case, Carter?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose so&mdash;if there isn't a time limit set upon it."</p>
+
+<p>"You may take your own time; that is, of course, if it is not too long."</p>
+
+<p>"It will require some time to do the thing thoroughly."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>"I suppose so. Well, have it your own way; only succeed. That is all the
+railroad people desire&mdash;success."</p>
+
+<p>"I will get your man; only I won't promise to do it in a day, or a week,
+or a month. I won't set a time."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. You shall be your own master in the case."</p>
+
+<p>"I will have to be that&mdash;absolutely. After I leave this office, when my
+interview with you is finished, you will not see me again until I have
+got Hobo Harry in my clutches. You will not communicate with me, or
+attempt to do so, and I will not communicate with you."</p>
+
+<p>"That is a little hard, isn't it, Carter? We would like to know, from
+time to time, how you are getting on, and what you are doing."</p>
+
+<p>"That is precisely what you will not do."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. Have it your own way. But what about the other men that are
+now on the case, Carter?"</p>
+
+<p>"Leave them on it. Add more of them. Appear to increase your vigilance
+in other quarters. If there are fifty detectives on the case now, add
+fifty more if you wish. I would prefer that you should do so rather than
+not. The more the better."</p>
+
+<p>"But suppose that one of them should nab the real Hobo Harry while you
+are seeking him. You would lose the reward."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span>"I will take my chances about that. The point is that I must work
+absolutely independent of all others who are on the case, and that
+nobody outside of yourself and the board of directors of your company
+must know that my services have been called into the matter. Will you
+agree to that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>"Increase your vigilance on every side, if you can. If you do so, you
+will assist me."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said the president slowly, "that it is your plan to become
+a yeggman yourself, in pursuing this case."</p>
+
+<p>"It does not matter how I may accomplish it, does it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; I was merely going to say that that very thing has been tried four
+separate times; once with more or less success. But I ought to warn you
+that two of the four who attempted it lost their lives; a third is a
+cripple for life, minus a leg; and only the fourth, who ended by
+arresting the wrong man, after all, had any degree of success. And now
+he is frightened almost into imbecility, for his life has been sworn
+away by the yeggmen, and he expects to be murdered every time he goes
+out alone."</p>
+
+<p>"All the same," said the detective, "that will not deter me."</p>
+
+<p>"You will want money for your expenses, Carter. If you will tell me how
+much&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>"I will present my bill of expenses along with my demand for the fifty
+thousand dollars reward," the detective interrupted quietly.</p>
+
+<p>By more closely questioning the president of the railroad, Nick learned
+that the depredations and robberies committed by Hobo Harry's gang had
+been remarkable in their extent and thoroughness; and that every effort
+to break up the gang had been in vain.</p>
+
+<p>Whenever one of the yeggmen was arrested and sent to prison, two new
+ones, even more proficient in their thievery, seemed ready to spring up
+in his place; and so the thing had gone on and on until the people who
+had been robbed so often became desperate.</p>
+
+<p>And then it was determined to call Nick Carter into the case.</p>
+
+<p>Of Hobo Harry himself, nothing whatever was known beyond the fact that
+there was such a character, and that he was the head and front of the
+hobo gang&mdash;their chief, to whom absolute and implicit obedience was
+accorded. His power over them seemed absolute.</p>
+
+<p>Whether it was because of fear of him, or for love of him, it was,
+nevertheless, true that not one of the fraternity of hoboes who had been
+arrested could be prevailed upon to betray the master. Neither threats
+nor offers of bribery had any effect upon them.</p>
+
+<p>Hobo Harry remained as entirely in the dark as ever; and even in the
+cases of the eight men to whom<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> the president of the railroad had
+referred as having confessed that each of them was Hobo Harry
+himself&mdash;they had each seemed to get a queer sort of enjoyment in
+posing, even for a time, as their dreaded chief.</p>
+
+<p>As the president explained to Nick, there were many among the detectives
+who had been detailed upon the case who insisted that there was no such
+person as Hobo Harry. It was their belief that the name was merely a
+fictitious one, to which the hoboes, one and all, had agreed to give
+obedience.</p>
+
+<p>But the president of the railroad did not believe this; neither did the
+detective. The completeness of the organization of the gang was a
+sufficient negative to such a statement. To have a perfect organization
+there must be a chief; a head; a ruling power.</p>
+
+<p>By investigating the case a little further before actually starting out
+upon it, Nick discovered that the yeggmen had carried their depredations
+even into whole villages. In one town&mdash;Calamont&mdash;the place had been
+literally gutted in a single night.</p>
+
+<p>The yeggmen had descended upon it in such numbers that the inhabitants
+were terrified, and could only protect themselves by barricading their
+doors, and remaining with their guns and other weapons in their hands,
+while they watched the looting of their bank and post office. And there
+had been other occasions as bad as that one.</p>
+
+<p>Sometimes the yeggmen traveled in small groups;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> sometimes they worked
+in twos or threes, but often they went about in large bands which had
+been known to include as many as fifty or even more.</p>
+
+<p>Had the outrages been confined to one community the inhabitants would
+have risen in their might and, by organizing vigilance committees, could
+have driven them out&mdash;possibly. But they were not confined to
+communities at all; they extended all along the line of the railroad,
+and the descent of the robbers seemed always to have been arranged far
+ahead&mdash;and perfectly planned by a master mind at that.</p>
+
+<p>These descents always happened when it was known that there were large
+sums of money, either in the banks that were robbed, or when the post
+offices that were broken open were better provided than usual with cash.</p>
+
+<p>At every place where there was a siding along the line of the railroad,
+freight cars had been broken open, and denuded of their contents; and
+this often happened when there was one or more night watchmen on hand
+for the purpose of preventing that very thing.</p>
+
+<p>But in each case the watchman had been overpowered, and either beaten
+into insensibility or maimed&mdash;and in at least one instance&mdash;killed.</p>
+
+<p>And hence it was that the railroad company was willing to pay well for
+the apprehension of the chief of these marauders.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>All of this information Nick Carter gleaned before he formed any
+definite plans for his campaign.</p>
+
+<p>Roughly speaking, there was a stretch of main line of the railroad over
+which, or rather along which, the yeggmen seemed to be most active. This
+principal thoroughfare for their nefarious trade was approximately five
+hundred miles long; and it was here where the greatest and the most
+persistent outrages were committed.</p>
+
+<p>There were branches of the line, too, along which they worked; but off
+the main line the organization seemed to lose some of its power for
+concentration of force.</p>
+
+<p>After Nick had pieced together all the information that could be gleaned
+without being actually at the scene of the trouble, he called his three
+assistants together in consultation with him. For he had determined to
+make use of all of them in this case. Indeed, that was the only method
+by which he believed that he could entirely succeed at it.</p>
+
+<p>To them he related the circumstance of his connection with the case,
+after which he told them all he had been able to learn about it; and in
+conclusion he said:</p>
+
+<p>"Now, lads, there is only one way by which we can hope to succeed in
+this undertaking, and that is, we must become hoboes ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>The three nodded almost in unison.</p>
+
+<p>"If we decide to do that," continued the detective,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> "we must do it
+thoroughly. We must do as General Grant did when he decided, against the
+wishes of his generals, to invest Vicksburg&mdash;be cut off from his base of
+supplies; and that is what we must do."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think I understand exactly what you mean," said Patsy, who was
+paying close attention; for Patsy liked the plan inconceivably.</p>
+
+<p>"I mean," replied Nick, "that when we start out to become hoboes, we
+must become so in fact, and not in appearance merely. It is easy enough
+for any one of us to make ourself up as a tramp, or a hobo, or even a
+yeggman, and to play the part; but in this case we must do more than
+that: We must be the part."</p>
+
+<p>"But that 'base of supplies' business&mdash;what do you mean by that?"
+insisted Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"I mean that when we start out on this case, there will be no returning
+here until we have lodged Hobo Harry behind the bars. We are going to
+live as hoboes, and do as hoboes do, carrying out a real robbery or so,
+on our own hooks, taking care, of course, that one or more of the real
+article shall know about it."</p>
+
+<p>"And taking care also," interjected Chick, "that we keep track of what
+we steal, so that it, or its value, may be returned to the owners later
+on."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course, Chick; that goes without saying. Now, there is another
+thing."</p>
+
+<p>"What is that?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>"At the present time there are no less than fifty detectives, some from
+Pinkerton's, and some from other places, engaged upon this case. If we
+play our parts as we should play them, we are bound to run into some of
+those chaps sooner or later. If we do that&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Well?" asked Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"We must continue to play our cards to the end, no matter what
+happens&mdash;even to the extent of being arrested, and possibly tried for
+the offenses that have been committed. If one of us should get caught,
+he must play his part even then, for the protection of the others who
+are still on their jobs; for if that one should confess himself a
+detective, the usefulness of the others would be past."</p>
+
+<p>"That is clear enough," said Ten-Ichi.</p>
+
+<p>"It sure is," said Patsy. "It isn't very pleasant, either. Although it
+will be some fun to work on the opposite side of the fence for once."</p>
+
+<p>"How do you mean?" asked Ten-Ichi.</p>
+
+<p>"Why, we are always chasing down criminals, aren't we? Now we will have
+some fun in letting others chase us while we play the criminal. Say,
+chief?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well?"</p>
+
+<p>"We will have a chance to learn a little about that other side of the
+fence. We will discover how it feels to be chased, instead of doing the
+chasing."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span>"Yes," said the detective; and Patsy turned then to Ten-Ichi.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll make you a bet," he said. "I'll bet you anything you like, on the
+basis of two to one, that I don't get nabbed while we are on this lay."</p>
+
+<p>"That's a go," smiled Ten-Ichi, "for I think you will be the very first
+one to go under."</p>
+
+<p>"How much do you want to bet?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind the betting part of it, lads," Nick interrupted them. "The
+point is, that each of you is to do his utmost to carry out his part to
+the end, no matter what happens. Now, if you please, all step this way.
+I have a map here that I wish to show you."</p>
+
+<p>He spread the map upon the table, and upon it he showed them the five
+hundred miles of railway along which they were to work; and presently he
+put his finger upon the name of a town along the line, and he said:</p>
+
+<p>"Here is a place called Calamont. It is, roughly speaking, two hundred
+and fifty miles from New York. Some time ago Calamont suffered greatly
+by the descent of the hoboes upon it. It has not quite recovered from
+the effects of that time yet, although several months have elapsed since
+the occurrence. Do you see it, all of you?"</p>
+
+<p>They admitted that they did.</p>
+
+<p>"Right here," he continued, drawing his pencil with which he was
+pointing a little to the eastward, "is a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> patch of woods through which
+the railway runs. There are about twenty acres of woodland there, and
+the road passes through the centre of it."</p>
+
+<p>They nodded, and he went on:</p>
+
+<p>"To the south of the railroad, through the woods, is a swamp. It is
+almost an impassable swamp, I am told. I will have more to say about
+that part of it presently. Understand, do you?"</p>
+
+<p>They did understand.</p>
+
+<p>"To the north of the tracks, through the woodland and beyond it, the
+country is hilly and almost mountainous. There is a limestone formation
+there. There are deep ravines and gulches, high cliffs and precipices,
+and, although I stated in the first place that there is only about
+twenty acres in the woodland, I meant to say in that particular patch of
+woods to which I first drew your attention."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Chick.</p>
+
+<p>"As a matter of fact, the country all around this region is wild and
+unsettled. It is much too rough to settle, and there are woods and
+forests everywhere. Just beyond these woods, to the northward, the
+forest is almost unbroken for several miles, save that there is a narrow
+clearing to separate this particular bit of woods from those beyond it."</p>
+
+<p>"Well?" asked Chick, who was paying close attention.</p>
+
+<p>"To the south of the tracks it is almost the same,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> save that the
+country is flat and low. As a matter of fact, the railroad passes across
+the spur which lies between the rough country to the north and the flat,
+swampy country to the south.</p>
+
+<p>"I have not been able to gain any very exact information about those
+swamps, but from the best opinions I can get, I should assume that it is
+a sort of another Dismal Swamp down there. Men and cattle, horses and
+sheep have been known to wander in there, and never return. Presumably
+they were lost in the swamps or&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Or else eaten up by the yeggmen," suggested Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"Precisely. But it is a wild country. Now"&mdash;he rested one finger upon
+the map&mdash;"right here at the point where my finger rests, two weeks from
+to-morrow, at or near the hour of darkness, I will meet each of you. You
+will find me just north of the track; or, if any of you get there before
+I do, you will wait there for me, and for the others. Whoever arrives
+first must build a fire. We part to-night, here, now. You must each
+leave the house separately, and become lost to the world&mdash;you must each
+become a hobo in the meantime, in your own particular way. Fix
+yourselves up as you please, and go where you please&mdash;only go
+separately. And keep your appointment for two weeks from to-morrow.
+That's all."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE YEGGMEN'S CAMP FIRE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Each of the detective's three assistants understood thoroughly that Nick
+Carter's reason for directing them to do as he did was that they might
+each have learned the parts they had to play thoroughly by the time the
+actual work of it should begin.</p>
+
+<p>And not only that, they would have had two weeks during which to wear
+off the newness of habit and apparel; and by the time they arrived at
+the place of meeting, each would have become sufficiently schooled in
+his part to play it quite naturally.</p>
+
+<p>And there was still another reason which Nick hoped they would take
+advantage of, although he said nothing about it: That was that they
+would make acquaintances among such of the ilk as they happened to meet.
+Such acquaintances might be of value later in the game.</p>
+
+<p>When Chick left the house, about two hours after the interview with
+Nick, he had his traveling bag in his hand, and he went direct to the
+railway station, where he took a train for the West&mdash;for a city far
+beyond the line of the road upon which Nick Carter's campaign was to be
+worked out. It was his intention to start from there.</p>
+
+<p>Ten-Ichi took his departure a little sooner than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> Chick, and he was
+dressed as usual, also. Outside the house, on the curb, he stopped for a
+few moments, and appeared to be thinking; and then he started down the
+street on foot, and disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>Patsy was the last to go, except the chief himself, who was smilingly
+watching these departures from an upper window of the house. He had said
+no more than he did to them purposely, for he was curious to see how
+each would go about it. He knew that each one of his assistants was
+entirely proficient in his way, but he also knew that each had a way of
+his own for doing things.</p>
+
+<p>When Patsy left the house he also hesitated in front of it for a moment;
+and then he walked rapidly away up the street, and disappeared.</p>
+
+<p>And that was all that Nick cared to see; he wished to feel assured that
+each had departed on his own hook, and that it was their intention to
+work singly. He had left the map for them to study in the library after
+he left them alone together, and he had no doubt that each would be
+fully competent to find the place of appointment when the time should
+come.</p>
+
+<p>He was the last to leave the house, of course. There were many
+directions to give before he finally took his departure. Joseph had to
+know how to account for his absence from home to those who might inquire
+too particularly about him; and the absence of the three assistants had
+to be accounted for also.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span>Having arranged that, and provided himself with everything which he
+regarded as needful, he selected one of his own disguises&mdash;one that he
+was fond of, and which will appear more particularly later on, and with
+that in a small satchel which he expected ultimately to rid himself of,
+he went out, and away also.</p>
+
+<p>And from that moment we will skip to the time of the opening paragraphs
+of this story, which was two weeks and one day later&mdash;to the time when
+we behold the camp fire made of railway ties, with the four hoboes
+grouped around it, having enjoyed their evening meal and now ready to
+smoke and rest; for if there is anything in the world which a hobo
+really enjoys, it is rest.</p>
+
+<p>It was only a little bit after dark&mdash;and the night was not a dark one at
+that. Already the moon was shining down upon the world.</p>
+
+<p>But around the immediate vicinity of the camp fire it seemed quite dark
+by contrast, and the light thrown back by the trunks of the trees
+rendered the scene a picturesque one.</p>
+
+<p>Nick Carter had purposely been the last one to arrive at the trysting
+place, if such it may be termed; but he had been a close observer of the
+arrival of the others, nevertheless; and he accomplished that by
+arriving in the vicinity early in the day, and by later climbing among
+the boughs of one of the trees, from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> which perch he was enabled to
+watch the coming of his assistants.</p>
+
+<p>Patsy came first. His eagerness led him to do that, and Nick had
+expected it; and as the detective watched his youngest assistant he was
+pleased to see the manner in which he made his approach.</p>
+
+<p>Had Nick Carter, concealed in the boughs of the tree, been an enemy,
+instead of a friend, he could not have had one suspicion aroused by
+Patsy's manner.</p>
+
+<p>The young fellow was most disreputable in appearance. His hair, and it
+was his own, too, he had managed to dye to brick-red hue. His face and
+his hands were grimy, and there was a considerable growth of beard upon
+the former. He wore good shoes&mdash;just out of a store, they appeared to
+be, and he carried a string of three other pairs, equally new, in one
+hand. His coat was much too large for him, and he had turned the sleeves
+back at the wrists for convenience. His hat had once been a Stetson; it
+had also quite evidently been a target for a shotgun.</p>
+
+<p>When Nick first spied him he was walking along the track, whistling; but
+directly opposite the place of meeting he stopped, and, after a moment,
+he dived quickly over the fence into the woods, and approached with care
+the place which he finally selected for the fire.</p>
+
+<p>And there he scraped some dried boughs together, made his fire, brought
+an old tie from the track to aid it, arranged his crane of green sticks,
+and, from a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> bundle that he carried slung upon one shoulder, he produced
+the kettle, a package of meat, some bread, and other articles, with
+which he began the preparation of his supper.</p>
+
+<p>A little later a second figure appeared so suddenly out of the gathering
+gloom that neither Patsy, at the fire, nor Nick, in the tree, had any
+idea of its near approach.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, pal!" he said gruffly; and Patsy wheeled like lightning, with a
+gun already half drawn, to face him.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello yourself!" he growled, not too cordially, and eying the newcomer
+suspiciously. "Who are you lookin' for?"</p>
+
+<p>The other came slowly forward without deigning to reply to this direct
+question, and without so much as glancing again at Patsy; but he slung
+his own bundle on the ground, and, after a moment, stalked away in the
+gathering darkness again.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he returned with another tie, which he dropped near the fire;
+and then he looked sullenly toward Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"Share up, or chuck it alone?" he demanded, thrusting his hands deep
+into his pockets.</p>
+
+<p>"What you got?"</p>
+
+<p>"As much as you have, and as good as you have."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. I'm agreeable. Chuck it down."</p>
+
+<p>Half an hour later, when it was almost dark, a third one appeared.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span>He was shorter and slimmer than the others, and the best dressed one of
+the three, although he was disreputable enough in all conscience.</p>
+
+<p>He came noisily over the fence from the track, and the two at the fire
+could hear him long before he reached them. But they made no move.
+Anybody who approached them with as much noise as that was not to be
+dreaded, it appeared.</p>
+
+<p>When he arrived within the circle of the firelight, he stopped and
+strangely enough began to laugh; and he laughed on, boisterously,
+amazingly, in fact; he laughed until there were tears in his eyes, and
+until he had to hold to a sapling near him for support.</p>
+
+<p>"Aw, what's eatin' you?" called out one of the men from the fire. "What
+you see that's so funny; must be in your own globes. Come along inside
+if you wants to, and don't stand there awakin' up the dead."</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't got any chuck of my own," he called back to them. "I was
+laughing to think how near I came to getting it&mdash;and didn't."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, there's enough here for three&mdash;'r four, for that matter. Come in
+and set down, pal."</p>
+
+<p>And it was not until the meal was cooked, and spread out upon all sorts
+of improvised arrangements, that the fourth member of the party
+appeared&mdash;and he made his arrival in a most surprising manner.</p>
+
+<p>He dropped literally among them, seemingly from the clouds&mdash;or the
+tree&mdash;just as they were beginning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> to eat; and he squatted beside them,
+and, reaching out without a word, helped himself to a hunk of the
+toasted meat, which he began to tear viciously with his teeth.</p>
+
+<p>"Nice guy, ain't he?" said Patsy, leering at the one with whom he had
+agreed to share.</p>
+
+<p>"Looks as if he might have come over in the steerage of a cattle ship,
+inside a rawhide, don't he?" assented the other, who was Chick. But
+neither Chick nor Patsy was at all assured that this new arrival was
+their chief, and they determined to play their parts to the end, or, at
+least, until they were absolutely certain.</p>
+
+<p>In reality Nick Carter looked like a Sicilian bandit in hard luck. He
+certainly looked the Italian part of it, all right; but even among his
+rags there was some display of color, which an Italian is never happy
+without.</p>
+
+<p>When the other referred to him in this slighting way, he raised his eyes
+sullenly toward them, and he also released his hold upon the food he was
+eating long enough to finger the hilt of his knife suggestively; for
+Nick was aware of the fact that not one of the three was sure of his
+identity, and he preferred not to make himself known just yet.</p>
+
+<p>"Me understands da Inglis you spik," he muttered, in a sort of growl.
+"Better hava da care wota you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> say dees times. I hava da bunch uh banan
+in da tree ifa you want more chuck. Go getta it&mdash;you!"</p>
+
+<p>He drew his knife quickly and leveled the point of it at the one whom
+the others had already christened 'Laughing Willie'; but Ten-Ichi,
+nothing daunted by the implied threat, only shrugged his shoulders, and
+went on eating.</p>
+
+<p>"Go getta da banan, or I slice you up fora de chuck," repeated the
+supposed Italian, rising slowly from his seat by the fire and advancing
+toward Ten-Ichi; but he had not taken a step before he found himself
+looking into the muzzle of a pistol, and Patsy, in his capacity as host
+over the meal, said sourly:</p>
+
+<p>"Sit ye down, dago, or I'll make a window of your liver. We're three
+friends enjoying a feast, and you're welcome to part of it if you want
+it, but if you make any more breaks, out you go&mdash;feet first, if you
+prefer it that way."</p>
+
+<p>The Italian subsided with a grunt, and the meal continued undisturbed
+until all but Ten-Ichi, who appeared to have been really very hungry,
+had drawn back from the fire; and then it was that Chick made the remark
+about his hurrying that was mentioned in the beginning of this story.</p>
+
+<p>But Nick had in the meantime managed to make it known to the others who
+he was, although he had said no word in reference to it. They each one
+of them knew that there might still be others concealed in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> trees or
+somewhere near at hand watching them. There was no telling how many
+pairs of eyes had observed them when they entered the wood. Yeggmen are
+as cautious and as careful about what they do in the lonely places among
+their brethren as the cave man used to be in primitive times.</p>
+
+<p>For they prey upon one another, those men, as readily as they prey upon
+society. Among them it is always merely a question of the survival of
+the fittest&mdash;and the fittest is always the quickest, and the strongest,
+or the most alert.</p>
+
+<p>It was not likely that they would have this firelight to themselves for
+a very long time, and they knew it; and, in fact, it was not ten minutes
+after their meal was finished, and their pipes were alight, before, like
+shadows, three other men suddenly loomed beside the fire, as if they had
+sprung out of the ground.</p>
+
+<p>And they stalked forward from three sides at once&mdash;came forward as if
+they owned the woods.</p>
+
+<p>But not one of our four friends, already seated there, made a motion or
+uttered a word. They smoked stolidly on, but with their eyes alert for
+anything that might happen.</p>
+
+<p>And then, out of the darkness around them, appeared three more figures,
+and then two more; and the eight, who had seemed to come together,
+grouped themselves with their backs to the fire, and gazed sullenly and
+silently down upon the four they found there.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE "KING'S" LIEUTENANT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The moment was an ominous one, and no one was better aware of the fact
+than Nick Carter. Everything depended now upon the perfection which his
+three assistants had attained in the parts they were to play.</p>
+
+<p>The sudden coming of the eight yeggmen, arriving as they had, so closely
+together, could not be the result of mere chance, and Nick had no doubt
+that they were in reality members of the very gang he was seeking. For
+the detective had determined in the beginning that the headquarters of
+the gang was somewhere in this vicinity. Everything in his first
+investigations pointed to that. And if their headquarters were located
+near that wood, or below the track in the swamp, it was certain that
+they kept outposts stationed where the arrival of newcomers could be
+reported at once.</p>
+
+<p>Thus the appearance of Nick Carter on the scene, and the coming of the
+others soon after his arrival, had doubtless been reported, and their
+actions carefully watched from the very beginning.</p>
+
+<p>The detective was intensely glad now that his own actions, and those of
+his friends, had been so perfect&mdash;that is, perfect in the sense of
+creating the impres<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span>sion in the mind of a possible observer that they
+were strangers to one another. He knew perfectly well that if a watch
+had been kept upon them there could be no doubt in the minds of the
+watchers that the four men grouped around the fire were unknown to one
+another.</p>
+
+<p>But here were eight burly men grouped around them, each standing in a
+position so that he could make himself extremely dangerous on the
+instant should he choose to do so. And there was no telling how many
+more might be concealed out there in the darkness of the woods around
+them.</p>
+
+<p>It is not the fashion among yeggmen to welcome an addition to their
+party, no matter whether that addition is composed of one or of many.
+Sullen silence is the rule at first, during which each man studies the
+others. Suspicion is always the first impulse at such meetings. Their
+attitudes are exactly that of strange dogs which encounter each other
+for the first time, and walk round and round, with the hair on their
+backs raised, and with their tails straight out, every nerve on a
+tension, and every impulse prepared for mortal combat.</p>
+
+<p>And people who have watched dogs while they go through with these
+mannerisms know that it requires only a few moments for them to
+determine whether they will be friends or foes, or if they will only
+politely tolerate the presence of each other on the scene.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span>So Nick Carter sat silent, making no movement, save to puff vigorously
+at the short pipe he was smoking; and so the others of his party did
+likewise; for the forces of the newcomers were much stronger.</p>
+
+<p>This tableau&mdash;if tableau it could be called, continued for five minutes,
+and then one of the late arrivals cast aside the stub of a cigar he was
+smoking, and broke the silence.</p>
+
+<p>"Where might you hoboes be from?" he demanded, in an even tone, and
+without a gesture of any kind.</p>
+
+<p>Nobody made any reply whatever to this question, and after a moment he
+spoke again.</p>
+
+<p>"Which one of you is the leader of this outfit?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>Again nobody replied to him; the assistants kept silent because they
+well knew that their chief would answer if he considered it wise to do
+so; and Nick remained silent merely because he did not consider that it
+was yet time to speak.</p>
+
+<p>And now the spokesman of the other party addressed himself directly to
+Nick Carter, as being, doubtless, the fiercest and most
+villainous-looking one of the bunch.</p>
+
+<p>"You heard me, didn't you?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I heard you," was the calm reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello! You can talk United States, can't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Quite as well as you, if necessary," was the cool response.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span>"You look like a dago."</p>
+
+<p>"What I look like, and what I am, is none of your business&mdash;unless you
+show some authority for questioning me."</p>
+
+<p>"Ho, ho, ho, ho! Hear him, my coveys! What do you think of that?" And
+then to Nick again: "What sort of authority do you expect me to show?"</p>
+
+<p>Nick shrugged his shoulders, knocked out the ashes of his pipe, rose
+slowly to his feet, and stood facing the other calmly, as he responded:</p>
+
+<p>"There is only one kind of authority, signor, in a party like this. You
+know what that is. I don't know you any more than I know these other
+guns around here. It may all be a put-up job, for all I know. I don't
+much care if it is. I am quite willing to fight you all, one at a time,
+if necessary&mdash;and with guns, or knives, or fists, as you please. I come
+here, and I get into a tree and wait. Why? Because I have been told of
+this place, and that always there is somebody around here. I thought I
+would see who the somebody was before somebody saw me. So I get myself
+into a tree. Pish! And then not only one, but two, and three arrive on
+the scene; and then eight more come. If you want to know who I am, and
+are brave enough to fight me, and man enough to lick me&mdash;then you'll
+know. If not&mdash;mind your own affairs, and leave me to attend to mine."</p>
+
+<p>It was a long speech, and the others listened in ab<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>solute silence to
+the end of it. But the instant Nick ceased speaking, the man to whom he
+had addressed his remarks drew back his arm with a sudden motion, and
+drove his huge fist forward with the quickness of a cat.</p>
+
+<p>Any other person than Nick Carter might have felt the force of that
+treacherous blow. Even he might have done so had he not been expecting
+it, and, therefore, been entirely ready for it.</p>
+
+<p>But the bony fist of the man struck only the empty air, for Nick
+sidestepped in a manner that would have made Jim Corbett, in his
+palmiest days, green with envy; and the battering-ram flew past his ear
+harmlessly.</p>
+
+<p>And then the man who had delivered it, before he could recover from the
+effect of his own effort, found himself seized in a viselike grip,
+raised from his feet, and hurled backward straight over the fire, and
+beyond it, so that he sprawled at full length among the bushes.</p>
+
+<p>He leaped to his feet with a curse, and his hand flew to his hip pocket
+in search of a weapon; but he did not draw it forth again, for he found
+himself looking into the muzzle of an ugly-looking forty-four.</p>
+
+<p>"Drop it!" Nick ordered sharply. "I didn't hurt you, when I might have
+done so easily. Are you satisfied?"</p>
+
+<p>The anger of the man seemed to pass as quickly as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> it had arisen, and he
+grinned as he slowly resumed his former position beside the fire.</p>
+
+<p>It was quite true that he was not hurt; it was equally true that he knew
+that this stranger might have hurt him severely had he chosen to do so,
+and have been entirely excusable for doing it too.</p>
+
+<p>"All right, pard, you pass," he said. "What's your handle?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm called Dago John by them as know me. What's yours?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hand&mdash;&mdash; The guns call me Handsome, by way of shortening it. Shake?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," said Nick; and they clasped hands for an instant. Then Handsome
+added:</p>
+
+<p>"Who might these gazaboes be?"</p>
+
+<p>"Search me, Handsome," growled Nick, resuming his seat, and beginning to
+refill his pipe. "If they ain't a part of your outfit, they sure ain't a
+part of mine."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome wheeled upon Chick then.</p>
+
+<p>"Who are you?" he demanded, "and where are you from?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm the 'Chicken'; they know me around Chicago, if they don't here.
+Maybe you've heard of me; but it don't make any difference whether you
+have or not. I'm the Chicken, all right; and it's Chick for short."
+Chick did not so much as move an eyelash while he made this retort; but
+his questioner was plainly affected.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>"The Chicken!" he exclaimed. "The Chicken is dead. We got it straight.
+Shot by&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Shot by a cop, eh? That's the story, and it goes, all right. Only it
+happens that it wasn't the Chicken as was shot; cause why? The Chicken
+is here."</p>
+
+<p>"Who was it, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was a pal of mine. A likely gun he was, too. I jest changed hats
+with him when he slid under. The rest of the clothes didn't make no
+difference. They thought he was the Chicken&mdash;and it didn't hurt him any
+to have 'em think so, while it helped me a lot."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, Chicken," said Handsome, extending his hand a second time.
+"I know about you. You're all right. Who are these other two?"</p>
+
+<p>"Search me, Handsome. I reckon we're all strangers."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome turned to Ten-Ichi.</p>
+
+<p>"What's your handle, covey?" he growled.</p>
+
+<p>Ten-Ichi's answer was a peal of demoniac laughter; and he laughed on and
+on interminably, slapping his thighs and flinging his arms around him
+after the manner of a man who is warming himself, until the faces of the
+others around him developed broad grins&mdash;and until the man who called
+himself Handsome brought him to with a sudden thrust of his arm which
+nearly took the breath out of the lad.</p>
+
+<p>"What's eatin' you, you loon?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span>"I was laughing," replied Ten-Ichi, now as solemn as an owl.</p>
+
+<p>"You don't say so! Were you? What at?"</p>
+
+<p>"You. It is so funny that you should be called Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome grinned with the others.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," he said. "What's your name? Out with it!"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm Tenstrike&mdash;Ten, for short. That's what."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, Ten; you pass. You're harmless, I guess&mdash;unless you let out
+that laugh of yours at the wrong time. I would advise you not to do
+that. And <i>you</i>?" He turned now to Patsy, with a sudden whirl of his
+body. "You were the first of this bunch to get here. Who are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure," said Patsy, with a slow drawl, "I'm an Irishman, and me name
+doesn't matter to you. It's enough that they call me Pat. If ye don't
+happen to like it, sure you can call me Tim, or Mike, or Shamus, or any
+old thing that suits ye. And what am I here for, is it? Sure, I'm on a
+still hunt for a man I want to find. Mebby ye're after knowin' him."</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe I am. Who is he?"</p>
+
+<p>"Faith, I wish I knowed that. He calls himself Hobo Harry&mdash;that same!"</p>
+
+<p>A dead silence followed upon this unlooked-for announcement. The
+boldness of it surprised Nick, startled Chick, and frightened Ten-Ichi,
+lest unpleas<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span>ant results should come of it. But it was evident that
+Patsy knew his ground, and had prepared for this very moment, for he was
+cool and smiling, and he appeared to enjoy hugely the effect that his
+words had had upon the others.</p>
+
+<p>It was Handsome who finally broke the silence that ensued; and he
+replied:</p>
+
+<p>"That's a name, Pat&mdash;if that's your own handle&mdash;which isn't spoken
+lightly around these parts. What do you want with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"By your l'ave, mister, I'll tell that to him when I find him. In the
+meantime, if youse be afther mindin' yere own business, it wouldn't
+hurrt ye any. Ye seem to be making of yerself a sort of highcockalorum
+elegantarium bosski. If ye tell me that ye know Hobo Harry, an' will
+take me to him, so's I can tell me story to him, mebby I'll answer ye;
+but not unless."</p>
+
+<p>Again there was silence; and this time it was Nick who brought it to an
+end.</p>
+
+<p>"Handsome," he said sharply, "who's this other bunch? What I want to
+know is, are they wid you?"</p>
+
+<p>"They are," was the quick reply. Then he wheeled quickly to Patsy again,
+and added:</p>
+
+<p>"Come with me&mdash;you&mdash;if you want to see the chief. I'll take you to him.
+The rest of you can wait where you are."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE OUTLAW'S HOME.</h3>
+
+
+<p>A dead silence reigned around that camp fire for several moments after
+the two departed; but then the seven strangers who were left seated
+themselves in various attitudes, filled their pipes&mdash;or lit the stubs of
+half-smoked cigars, produced from their pockets; and after that, little
+by little, conversation was indulged in.</p>
+
+<p>The night was warm and balmy. There was no reason why any of them should
+seek other shelter than the boughs of the trees which already covered
+them; but Nick knew from the manner in which Handsome had left them that
+he expected to return, and that there was some other place near by to
+which he intended to take them&mdash;if the chief should say the word. And he
+saw now that Patsy, by rare forethought, had prepared for that very
+emergency.</p>
+
+<p>More than an hour had passed before Handsome made his appearance again;
+and then he loomed suddenly beside the camp fire, as silently and as
+stealthily as an Indian. Even Nick Carter, who was on the alert for his
+approach, did not hear him coming.</p>
+
+<p>"I'll take you now!" he said briefly to Nick. "The others can wait."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span>Without a word more he turned away again, and Nick, leaping to his feet,
+followed him in silence through the darkness.</p>
+
+<p>The night was almost black in there among the trees, although the moon
+was shining above them; but nevertheless Nick had no difficulty in
+following his guide.</p>
+
+<p>They made directly for the railway tracks, and crossed the fence that
+intervened; but when they reached the top of the grade, Nick's guide
+halted and faced him.</p>
+
+<p>"You said you are Dago John," he said slowly. "Who might Dago John be,
+pard?"</p>
+
+<p>"They call me Dago John because I look like an Italian, I suppose,
+although I am not one," replied the detective. "But I try to carry out
+the idea. If you have worked your way through the South at all, maybe
+you've heard of Sheeny John. It will do as well as Dago John. A name
+doesn't make much difference."</p>
+
+<p>"It makes a sight of difference here, my friend. What's your lay?"</p>
+
+<p>"Anything that I can turn my hand to&mdash;or my brains."</p>
+
+<p>"You have an education?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Can you write a good hand?"</p>
+
+<p>"It's my one fault that I can&mdash;too good a one."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>"Have you looked through the screens?" (Been in prison.)</p>
+
+<p>"Never yet&mdash;to stay there. What do you want to know all this for?"</p>
+
+<p>"I've been telling the main guy about you."</p>
+
+<p>"What about me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I told him of your strength, for one thing. There isn't another man in
+our outfit who could lift me off my feet the way you did it."</p>
+
+<p>Nick shrugged his shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>"I could have done it as easily if you had been twice the man you are,"
+he said contemptuously.</p>
+
+<p>"There is no doubt of that. I don't bear you any ill will for it,
+either. Neither does the boss."</p>
+
+<p>"And who may he be, Handsome?"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you know, Dago John?"</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe I do, and again maybe I don't."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you come here looking for him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe so."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, who were you looking for?"</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe the same one that the other fellow was looking for&mdash;maybe not."</p>
+
+<p>"That's all right. You can come along, I guess. But I warn you to have a
+care what you say to him."</p>
+
+<p>"Say to who?"</p>
+
+<p>"To Hobo Harry. He isn't one to be trifled with."</p>
+
+<p>"Say, Handsome, on the level now, <i>is</i> there such a person?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span>"Sure there is. You'll find that out all right, too, before you are much
+older. Didn't you come up here to get into the gang? Isn't that what you
+are here for?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure thing; but, on the level, I didn't think that I could do it so
+easy."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome laughed as if he were intensely amused.</p>
+
+<p>"If you think that you are in it now, you are very much mistaken," he
+said, with a shrug. "We don't take men into the bosom of our family
+quite as easy as that. But with us there is always room for a good man,
+and he always has a chance to prove whether he is good or not. That is
+the sort of chance you are going to get."</p>
+
+<p>"Will you tell me about it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I will if you will agree to teach me that hold by which you threw me
+over the fire into the bushes a little while ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure thing, Handsome. I'll teach you that, and a lot of others as well,
+if you wish. That is one of the ju-jutsu tricks."</p>
+
+<p>"I've heard about that. It's all right, all right."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure thing. Now, where are we going? Are we to stay here all night,
+Handsome?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not quite."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me what is expected of me, then; where we are going?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am to take you to the chief; to Hobo Harry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span> himself, for he happens
+to be here to-night. It is only once in a while that he is here, too;
+but it happens that he is to-night. He is to interview you.
+Otherwise&mdash;that is, if he were not here, you would have to hang around
+on the outside until he showed up to pass upon you in person."</p>
+
+<p>"I see."</p>
+
+<p>"He is the only man in the whole bunch who has a right to do that. I've
+got to blindfold you after we get across the fence on the swamp side of
+the tracks."</p>
+
+<p>"All right."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose you would like to know what you are up against before I take
+you into the old swamp, wouldn't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure thing, Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, it's just this: If you don't pass muster with the boss, you'll
+never come out again. There are deep holes in that swamp, Dago."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't doubt that; but what do you mean by passing muster?"</p>
+
+<p>"I mean just this, and nothing more: If you are not what you appear to
+be, and what you say you are, it's a slit across the windpipe for yours;
+see?"</p>
+
+<p>Nick did see, and he nodded understandingly.</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon I'll pass, all right," he said negligently. "If you are ready,
+I am."</p>
+
+<p>They descended the embankment, and climbed the fence on the swamp side
+of the tracks; and then, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> soon as they had penetrated a short
+distance into the wood, Handsome stopped again, and, drawing a huge
+bandanna from his pocket, proceeded to bind it around the detective's
+eyes securely.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," he said, "can you do the lockstep?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never tried it," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Sure about that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never learned&mdash;never had to."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you'll have to learn it now&mdash;unless you wish to fall into the
+swamp. Get up close to me, and take hold of my sides under my arms. Then
+follow in my footsteps as nearly as you can."</p>
+
+<p>"I say, Handsome, you've got some education yourself."</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind that now. We're not going into pasts just at present."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. Lead the way. I'm ready."</p>
+
+<p>Nick's eyes were so securely bandaged that he had not the least idea
+where they were going, or where his footsteps tended; but even had he
+been without the bandage he could hardly have told that, for the deeper
+they penetrated into the swamp, the darker it became, and only those who
+were perfectly familiar with the pathway could pass that way in safety
+in the night.</p>
+
+<p>There were times when Nick's feet slipped from the precarious footing,
+and he slid into the water up to his knees; and once he went in to his
+waist; but Handsome<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> was always ready to seize upon him and support him
+to dry land again at such times.</p>
+
+<p>And their way wound round in a serpentine course. They climbed over
+fallen and moss-grown logs; they slushed through shallow water; they
+crawled on their hands and knees under embankments and rocks, and at
+last, at Handsome's order, they stepped into a boat of some kind which
+the latter pushed away from the bank with a pole.</p>
+
+<p>After that a long time passed while the boat was propelled steadily
+onward with the pole, sometimes gliding under trees that hung so close
+to the water that they were obliged to get flat down inside the scow to
+avoid them; and they wound around many curves and twists, until at last
+they stopped, and Handsome removed the bandage from Nick's eyes.</p>
+
+<p>They were beside a high bank, and directly ahead of them, through the
+trees, the detective could see the lights of many gleaming fires; and he
+could also discern the shadowy forms of men grouped around them, engaged
+in different occupations.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, keep your mouth shut, and your eyes and your ears open," was
+Handsome's warning, as he led the way from the scow, and signed for Nick
+to follow him. "If anybody speaks to you, don't answer; and when you get
+in the presence of the chief, answer questions, and don't ask any."</p>
+
+<p>"Right you are, pardy," was Nick's reply; and then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> he followed his
+conductor through the trees toward the fire.</p>
+
+<p>They came out presently upon an open glade in which a dozen camp fires
+were burning. At some of these men were engaged in eating; others were
+preparing to eat; and still others had finished their meal, and were
+lying around in various attitudes, smoking. Some were playing cards by
+the light of the fires. Nick judged, in the rapid estimate he made, that
+there were in all at least twoscore of men gathered there.</p>
+
+<p>He saw, too, that around this circular glade there were sheds built, and
+some of these had lights behind the brush or canvas fronts. Two of them
+had board fronts, and he judged that they were used when the weather was
+too inclement, or too cold, to remain in the open.</p>
+
+<p>As they passed through the circle of light cast by the fires, many of
+the men looked up lazily toward them; but beyond one stare, no attention
+was paid to them; and they passed on into the gloom beyond.</p>
+
+<p>Here they traversed a narrow but well-beaten pathway through the thick
+growth of alders, and presently came out upon a second glade that was
+larger than the first; and higher and dryer, too.</p>
+
+<p>But that was not what attracted the detective.</p>
+
+<p>In the very centre of this patch of clearing was a house; or a cottage,
+it would more properly be called; but it was large, and apparently
+comfortable. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> roof extended down in front of it and over a wide
+piazza, where Nick could see that two men and a woman were seated.</p>
+
+<p>But directly in front of the piazza, a man&mdash;one of the hoboes, without
+doubt, to judge from his appearance&mdash;was pacing regularly up and down,
+with the precision of a sentinel; and he carried a rifle in the hollow
+of his arm, which, as soon as Handsome and Nick appeared, he raised and
+pointed at them, while Nick could hear the click of the lock as he
+raised the hammer.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome threw up both hands, holding them high over his head, and Nick
+did the same; and thereupon the gun was lowered, and, still with their
+hands held high, the two men advanced.</p>
+
+<p>There was not a word spoken; the sentinel resumed his pacing up and
+down, as if there had been no interruption; and Nick's guide approached
+the edge of the piazza, still with his hands raised.</p>
+
+<p>One of the men who were seated there rose and stepped forward; then he
+peered long and earnestly at the two men, and then he said:</p>
+
+<p>"You may advance. Go inside."</p>
+
+<p>And as they crossed the piazza, and stepped inside the house, the woman
+of the group rose and followed them, closing the door behind her; and
+Nick Carter wondered if Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, was a woman.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V.</h2>
+
+<h3>NICK'S WONDERFUL STRENGTH.</h3>
+
+
+<p>When Nick Carter gazed upon the woman who stood before them, with her
+hands clasped behind her, he thought that he had never seen another like
+her. She could not by any stretch of the imagination have been called
+beautiful; she was too masculine in her appearance for that&mdash;that is,
+the expression of her face, her manner, and the position she assumed
+were masculine; but the suggestion of it ended there.</p>
+
+<p>She was as tall or taller than the detective, and her complexion was as
+dark as the hue to which he had stained his own. Her eyes were large,
+and round, and full, and fierce, and she held her head, with its crown
+of dead-black hair, as if she were monarch of all she surveyed. And the
+strangest part of it all was that she did not appear to be more than
+twenty years old.</p>
+
+<p>With a steady stare she took in every detail of Nick's appearance, from
+the top of his head to the shoes he wore on his feet; and then she
+turned slowly to Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"Whom have we here?" she demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Dago John, he calls himself," was the reply.</p>
+
+<p>"The man you spoke of?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span>"Who is so strong that he could throw you over the fire into the bushes,
+and who did not harm you when he might have done so, after you had
+struck at him with your fist?"</p>
+
+<p>"The same."</p>
+
+<p>She turned her attention to Nick then.</p>
+
+<p>"Who are you?" she demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Just what you see, missus; no more and no less," replied Nick, speaking
+boldly, for he deemed that to be the surest way to her favor.</p>
+
+<p>"I see very little; nothing whatever that betokens the strength you are
+said to possess."</p>
+
+<p>"You can't always tell what's inside of a crib before you crack it," was
+the reply; and the woman smiled.</p>
+
+<p>"Where do you come from?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't giving out my past history, lady, if it's all the same to you,"
+said Nick coolly; and she frowned. Evidently she did not like this
+answer.</p>
+
+<p>"What errand brought you to this part of the country, and finally
+induced you to make your camp in the woods out there?" she asked,
+smiling again.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose you want the plain truth, lady?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," she replied, in an easy tone; "that is, if you put any value on
+your life."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, the truth is this: I have heard, here and there, a good deal
+about a certain person who is known as Hobo Harry, the Beggar King. I
+have heard that he has gathered around him a lot of my kind, and I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>
+reckoned that maybe he'd give me a show to be one of them. That's what I
+came here for, and that's why I camped out there in the woods."</p>
+
+<p>"And who are the three men who came with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody came with me. I came alone."</p>
+
+<p>"There were three other men there when Handsome found you? No?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Who are they?"</p>
+
+<p>"Handsome can tell you that as well, or better, than I. He did the
+questioning."</p>
+
+<p>"Why do you want to join the forces of Hobo Harry?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I'm tired of going it alone, and because I have heard that he
+takes good care of his followers."</p>
+
+<p>"What can you do?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can do anything that I am told to, once I have acknowledged a chief."</p>
+
+<p>"That is a good answer. It covers a good deal of ground. Now, who told
+you about Hobo Harry?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have heard about him in a good many places."</p>
+
+<p>"Who told you where to find him?"</p>
+
+<p>"A gun friend of mine, who croaked down in Indianapolis, a month ago or
+more. Jimmy the Sly he was called." (It was true that there had been a
+Jimmy the Sly, who was one of the many of the band who had been arrested
+and imprisoned; and after his release he had gone to Indianapolis, and
+died there, in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> a hospital. Nick knew this from his interview with the
+railroad president, and therefore he was not afraid to make use of the
+name.)</p>
+
+<p>"So you knew Jimmy the Sly, did you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Describe him to me."</p>
+
+<p>"He was tall and slender, with a pock-marked face, and the longest
+fingers I ever saw; and he had a wart on the side of his nose, and
+a&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"That will do. That is sufficient. How comes it that Jimmy never
+mentioned you to me?"</p>
+
+<p>"You'll have to ask Jimmy that, I reckon&mdash;and you might burn yourself if
+you undertook to do it. I reckon it's hot where Jimmy is, madam."</p>
+
+<p>She smiled at this. Nick could see that he was making a good impression
+upon her. He was still wondering if she were indeed the chief, or if she
+were only his representative. It was certain that he had had no
+expectation of finding a woman in this place.</p>
+
+<p>"And what do you wish me to do with you, now that you are here?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon that I'll have to leave that to you. I didn't come with my
+eyes shut. I guessed pretty well what I was up against. But I came here
+to be made one of you, and I hope you will give me a chance."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you know of Hobo Harry?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you think he is?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>"The head gazabo of this bunch."</p>
+
+<p>"What do you suppose he is like?"</p>
+
+<p>"Just at present writing, madam, he looks to me very much like a
+beautiful woman who has the grace of a siren and the courage of a lion."</p>
+
+<p>"You should be a Frenchman instead of an Italian."</p>
+
+<p>"I am neither one nor the other. I'm just a&mdash;a yeggman."</p>
+
+<p>"You were about to say something else."</p>
+
+<p>"I was going to say&mdash;a crook."</p>
+
+<p>"You have not been a yeggman always, have you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I never knew anybody who had been, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"You are not really a yeggman, or a hobo. Confess the truth now; aren't
+you under cover, and playing the r&ocirc;le for the purpose of being out of
+sight for a time?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm willing to say yes, if it pleases you."</p>
+
+<p>"What has been your line of work, Dago?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'm a fair penman; I'm a good mechanic; I could be a passable
+druggist if I tried, and I wouldn't shy at taking a hand at running a
+bank, if it was big enough for the risk."</p>
+
+<p>"I begin to think that you are all right, Dago."</p>
+
+<p>"You can betcher life that I'm all right, madam, if it comes to that.
+But I don't reckon that you'll take me on my say-so. You'll be wanting
+some sort of proof of me before you consent to take me into the fold."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span>"You are correct about that."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm ready for anything."</p>
+
+<p>"You have told me that you are a penman, which means that you could be a
+forger; you have said that you are a mechanic, which means that you
+could crack a crib if necessary; you called yourself a druggist, which
+means that you know how to use the chemicals, and the poisons, too, if
+necessary; and you would not refuse to tackle a bank job if one should
+come your way. Do you happen to have the mark of blood against you,
+too?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't suppose there is any mark that I haven't got."</p>
+
+<p>"That doesn't answer my question."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I wouldn't stay in a house if I wanted to get out when a live man
+stood in my way, if that is what you mean."</p>
+
+<p>The woman turned to Handsome quite suddenly.</p>
+
+<p>"What time do you start?" she asked of him; and he replied, as if the
+question were a continuance of their conversation:</p>
+
+<p>"I ought to start now&mdash;inside of ten minutes."</p>
+
+<p>"Very good," she said. "Take Dago with you. Break him in. Let him have
+the worst of it. If he makes good, all right. If he doesn't&mdash;shoot him."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Handsome cheerfully. "What about the others? There are
+two more out there near the tracks."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span>"I will attend to them. Go, now. Take this man with you. Give him all
+the rope he needs&mdash;but watch him. I'd sooner trust him with you than
+anybody else, anyhow&mdash;and I believe he is all right."</p>
+
+<p>"Come!" said Handsome, seizing Nick by the arm; and he pulled him
+through the door after him. But all the way to the door, Nick kept his
+eyes upon the woman, who was looking at him strangely, and with a
+curious smile on her face.</p>
+
+<p>Outside, when they had passed the sentinel, and were again in the part
+which led to the other glade, he stopped.</p>
+
+<p>"Wait a minute, Handsome," he said. "I want to ask you a question."</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't time now, Dago. Save it until later. We must get away from
+here at once. Do you remember where we left the boat?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Go there alone, and wait there for me. I won't be three minutes."</p>
+
+<p>He did not await a reply, but darted off to one side as soon as they
+reached the glade, and Nick saw him disappear inside one of the cabins
+before referred to.</p>
+
+<p>"I am in for it now, to the whole length of the tether," he told
+himself, as he stepped briskly forward toward the place where he knew
+the boat to be; and he was halfway across the glade when suddenly from
+one of the groups of men near a fire, one of them<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> leaped up and
+confronted him, with his hands upon his hips, a cigar pointed at an
+angle in the corner of his mouth, and a leering grin upon his face.</p>
+
+<p>"Where to now, my pal?" he demanded, standing in front of Nick, and thus
+stopping him.</p>
+
+<p>Nick looked at the man, and smiled. He did not answer. He guessed
+instantly why Handsome had left him to find his way to the boat alone.
+This was doubtless one of their tricks&mdash;to see what a new recruit would
+do under these circumstances. Possibly, too, he thought, the woman
+wished to see an exhibition of his strength, and they had for that
+purpose pitted one of their best bullies against him.</p>
+
+<p>He surveyed the fellow with a quick and comprehensive glance; and in
+that glance he saw that the man was a burly one, who evidently possessed
+great strength. But Nick did not care for that. He was only turning over
+in his mind in that instant what course it would be best for him to
+pursue. And the answer came to him when the bully repeated the question.</p>
+
+<p>"Where to, pard?" he demanded again, still with the sarcastic leer on
+his dirty face.</p>
+
+<p>"When you get back, I'll tell you!" exclaimed Nick; and at the same
+instant he darted a step forward and seized the man by the
+throat-and-hip hold of ju-jutsu, and the next instant had sent him
+whirling through the air as if he were a cartwheel.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span>He struck the ground ten feet away, and went rolling over and over among
+the bushes, where there happened to be a mass of cat brier, or creeping
+thorn; and the series of howls and curses he sent up was a wonder.</p>
+
+<p>A roar of laughter from every side proved to Nick that all had been
+watching for the outcome of that episode; but he looked neither to the
+right nor the left, but strode onward toward the boat.</p>
+
+<p>And then he heard a cry of warning from behind him, and he leaped aside
+just as the fellow he had thrown fired a bullet pointblank at him from
+close behind.</p>
+
+<p>As it was, the missile pierced his coat sleeve inside his arm.</p>
+
+<p>As Nick leaped aside he also turned.</p>
+
+<p>The hobo who had fired the shot was already running toward him, and now
+he was endeavoring with every effort in his power to discharge the
+weapon again; but for some reason the mechanism of the lock refused to
+work, and in an instant more Nick had leaped upon him and grasped him a
+second time.</p>
+
+<p>He was determined now that the fellow should have a lesson indeed; so
+while he held him at arm's length with one hand, he pummeled him with
+the other until his face was a mass of bruises; and then, when the
+yeggman was in a condition bordering upon insensibility, Nick raised him
+bodily from his feet, and hold<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span>ing him in his arms, ran with him down
+along the path toward the water.</p>
+
+<p>And reaching the edge of the swamp, he threw him out into the muddy
+water, headfirst.</p>
+
+<p>It was not deep, but it was filled with soft ooze, which filled the
+ears, and eyes, and nose, and mouth of the fellow, so that, when he rose
+to his feet, he was sputtering and spitting, and coughing and swearing
+when he could.</p>
+
+<p>The detective left the man to make his way out of the water to dry land
+as best he could, and turned coolly away to rejoin Handsome, who
+approached at that moment, grinning.</p>
+
+<p>"Well done, Dago," he said. "You served him just right. Come along."</p>
+
+<p>They entered the scow without more words, and Handsome poled it away
+from the shore, and along the waterway through the almost impenetrable
+darkness&mdash;but there was never a word said about the use of the
+blindfold.</p>
+
+<p>"How is this?" Nick asked, after a little. "Aren't you going to tie that
+handkerchief over my face again?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I ought to do it, I suppose, but it's too much trouble. Besides,
+you're all right. I can tell a man when I see one."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Nick. "It's your funeral; not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> mine. Only if the lady
+should raise a kick&mdash;what then?"</p>
+
+<p>"She would raise a kick, too, if she knew about it," replied Handsome
+dubiously. "But how is she going to know it? You are not likely to tell
+her, and I won't."</p>
+
+<p>"No," said Nick, "I won't tell her."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then we'll dispense with the handkerchief."</p>
+
+<p>They poled on in silence for a time after that; but presently Nick
+asked:</p>
+
+<p>"What's the lay to-night, Handsome?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't tell you that, Dago. You'll have to wait, and find out; and
+you'll have to do your own part, too; for if you flunk by so much as a
+hair, it's my duty to kill you."</p>
+
+<p>"Which I suppose you would do, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure I'd do it&mdash;why not? If you ain't what you seem to be, I'd as soon
+put a hole in you as dip this pole into the water. You hear me!"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure thing."</p>
+
+<p>"And that notwithstanding I like you. I reckon you're all right, and I'm
+going a great way toward proving what I think about it by not binding
+that handkerchief over your eyes now."</p>
+
+<p>"Are there any others in this thing with us, Handsome?"</p>
+
+<p>"You'll find out soon enough. The best way for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span> you is not to ask too
+many questions, but to be satisfied to do as you're told."</p>
+
+<p>They lapsed into silence after that, and there was no more said until
+after they had arrived at the bank where the scow was to be left.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose I can ask about those other guns that we left in the woods
+to-night, without giving offense, can't I?" asked Nick then.</p>
+
+<p>"That depends on what you want to ask about 'em," was the reply; they
+were now hurrying in the direction of the tracks.</p>
+
+<p>"I want to know if Hobo Harry is going to send for them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you hear her say so?" was the rejoinder; and then, when Nick
+laughed softly, Handsome turned on him with fury, and would have seized
+him had he not suddenly recalled the fact that his own strength was no
+match for that of the man beside him.</p>
+
+<p>But his anger disappeared as quickly as it came, and he joined in the
+laugh.</p>
+
+<p>"I gave it away that time, didn't I?" he said. "You were too cute for
+me, Dago. But it is dangerous knowledge, Dago. I'll tell you that."</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't give it away," replied Nick. "Any fool would have known that
+the woman was Hobo Harry."</p>
+
+<p>"Then there are a lot of fools in the outfit. You're wrong, Dago. Lots
+of 'em don't suspect it. They<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> think only that she is Hobo Harry's wife,
+or sister, or sweetheart, or something like that. There isn't half a
+dozen of us who really know for certain that Black Madge is Hobo Harry.
+And there! I've let the cat out of the bag again. But you're all right.
+It won't do no harm to tell you."</p>
+
+<p>"Not a mite," replied Nick; but he chuckled noiselessly all the same.
+That last admission made by Handsome was worth hearing.</p>
+
+<p>"Black Madge, eh?" he was thinking to himself. "Now I know why it was
+that there was something so strikingly familiar about the woman. Black
+Madge, eh? Well, well, who would have supposed that?"</p>
+
+<p>For Black Madge was a character well known in the criminal world, and to
+the police, although very little was known about her really. There was a
+picture in the Rogues' Gallery in New York that purported to be of her;
+but Nick knew now that it was not.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, he remembered that once upon a time he had seen Black
+Madge, who was the daughter of a Frenchwoman by an Italian father; Black
+Madge, who had already made an unenviable record for herself on both
+sides of the ocean.</p>
+
+<p>It was a long time before that when Nick Carter saw her. She was only a
+grown-up child at that time, but she was already a hardened criminal,
+nevertheless;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> and he recalled now the circumstance of his meeting with
+her.</p>
+
+<p>It was in Paris. He had gone to the prefecture of police to see the
+chief of the secret service, who was awaiting him, and had found the
+girl in the room with the chief, who was engaged in questioning her
+closely in reference to a crime that had been committed, and because it
+was thought that she knew the parties concerned. But she had given no
+information, and had been allowed to go; and after her departure the
+chief had said to Nick:</p>
+
+<p>"Monsieur Carter, some day that young woman will appear on your side of
+the water. I hope you thought to take a good look at her face."</p>
+
+<p>"I did," replied the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"Remember it, for some day you will have cause to do so, I do not doubt.
+She is a terror, and she has brains. The worst kind of a criminal. She
+should have been a man, for she has a man's daring, a man's
+recklessness, and a man's way of doing things. Black Madge, we call her
+here."</p>
+
+<p>Nick recalled all that conversation now, plunged into a reverie about it
+by Handsome's use of the name. All the time he had been in the room with
+her in that house in the swamp, he had felt that he ought to remember
+where he had seen those eyes before. Now, he counted the years that had
+passed since he saw her, and, to his astonishment, they were five.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span>"She was seventeen then, the chief told me," he thought, "that would
+make her twenty-two by now."</p>
+
+<p>And then it came back to him how strangely she had looked at him while
+he was leaving her presence, and he wondered if her recollection for
+faces was as good or even better than his own.</p>
+
+<p>"But," he argued, "it could not be possible that she would remember me
+from that one short glance she must have had of me at that time. And,
+besides, I was not disguised at all, and now I look no more like myself
+than&mdash;well, than she does."</p>
+
+<p>"What the devil are you so silent about?" demanded Handsome. They had
+reached the fence at the railroad track, and Handsome was leaning
+against it.</p>
+
+<p>"I was trying to figure out in my mind what sort of a lay we are on
+to-night," replied Nick. "I'm not used to starting out without knowing
+where I am going. I feel like a horse&mdash;with you for a driver."</p>
+
+<p>"Well"&mdash;Handsome laughed&mdash;"I won't use the whip unless you get
+skittish."</p>
+
+<p>"What are we waiting here for?"</p>
+
+<p>"We are waiting for our chauffeur with the automobile," grinned
+Handsome. "Nice road for an auto, isn't it?&mdash;bumping over those ties."</p>
+
+<p>"Hark!" said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm harking, my gun."</p>
+
+<p>"It does sound like an automobile, sure enough," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>"Didn't I tell you that we are waiting for one. Come on."</p>
+
+<p>He leaped the fence, and Nick followed him over; then they climbed the
+grade, and paused beside the track.</p>
+
+<p>And then, while they stood there, and the droning sound peculiar to
+automobiles came momentarily nearer and nearer, the detective began
+thoroughly to realize for the fist time that something really serious
+was afoot for the night.</p>
+
+<p>But he was not long left in doubt as to the character of the approaching
+vehicle, for in a moment more it swept around a curve in the railroad,
+and came to a stop immediately in front of them.</p>
+
+<p>And, strangely enough, it was an automobile arrangement, only that it
+was equipped with car wheels instead of with rubber tires; wheels that
+had flanges to fit the tracks. But it was provided with a gasoline
+engine, and Nick knew from the appearance of the apparatus that it was
+capable of great speed.</p>
+
+<p>When it came to a stop Nick saw that it already contained two men, one
+of whom was driving; but he got down from the seat under the steering
+wheel, and climbed into the rear of the machine, while Handsome took his
+place.</p>
+
+<p>"New man; Dago for a handle," said Handsome briefly, by way of
+introducing Nick to the others.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> What their names might be he evidently
+did not deem it important to mention.</p>
+
+<p>"Try-out?" asked one of the men, while Nick was climbing into the box of
+the machine.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome nodded curtly&mdash;and that was all that was said at the moment.</p>
+
+<p>It was significant, however, to Nick, for it meant a lot. It meant that
+these other men entirely comprehended the situation, and that all three
+of them were prepared to shoot him in the back at any moment when his
+conduct of the business in hand did not entirely satisfy them.</p>
+
+<p>But Nick was resolved not to be shot in the back that night. Whatever
+the business might prove to be upon which they were engaged, he was
+resolved to see it through to a finish, even to the extent of helping
+them burglarize a bank, if that was the lay.</p>
+
+<p>"To do a great right, do a little wrong," he muttered to himself.
+Whatever might be stolen or whatever damage might be done that night, he
+would charge up in his expenses, and see to it that the railroad people
+made it good later on, when his work should be done.</p>
+
+<p>In the meantime the railroad automobile had been gathering speed, and
+now it seemed to Nick to be little less than wonderful that it remained
+on the tracks at all, for if he was any judge of speed, he knew that
+they must be flying along at much more than a mile a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> minute&mdash;and he
+wondered what would happen if the headlight of a locomotive should loom
+suddenly before them&mdash;and then, just as the thought occurred to him,
+they rounded a short curve, and came to a sudden stop.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI.</h2>
+
+<h3>NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The instant the strange machine was brought to a stop&mdash;and it was done
+wonderfully soon, considering the speed at which they had been
+traveling&mdash;the three men leaped to the ground beside the track, and Nick
+was ordered to follow them.</p>
+
+<p>He did so, and then he was told to bear a hand; and, following
+directions that were given him, he seized hold of the boxlike tonneau.</p>
+
+<p>Almost in a twinkling of time after that the machine was lifted from the
+track in sections, and finally, still in sections, was carried to a
+highway near at hand, where it was put together again, minus the iron
+wheels. But there were other wheels concealed in that commodious body,
+and these were quickly taken out and adjusted.</p>
+
+<p>Within twenty minutes of the time when they came to a stop on the track,
+after rounding the curve, the machine was fitted with regular automobile
+wheels, and was ready to proceed along the highway.</p>
+
+<p>Nick saw in this arrangement much that had puzzled other men who had
+been on the job. He had no doubt from what he knew of automobiles that
+this machine was capable of sixty miles an hour, or even more than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span>
+that, on the highway; and, if that was true, it, of course, could make a
+half greater speed than that on rails.</p>
+
+<p>But he made no comment. That was not expected of him, and would have
+been resented had he attempted to do so; but he climbed to his place
+when he was told, and again they sped away toward some destination, the
+nature of which he did not know.</p>
+
+<p>Once he ventured to ask the man nearest him what time it was, and
+received a curt "Shut up!" by way of reply; so he remained silent after
+that.</p>
+
+<p>And after a while&mdash;less than half an hour&mdash;they drove into a village,
+and presently ran the machine around behind a church, where it was
+placed in one of the stalls of a shed.</p>
+
+<p>And still his three companions worked in utter silence. Beyond now and
+then a curt word uttered by Handsome, who seemed to be in command of the
+expedition, nothing at all was said.</p>
+
+<p>Nevertheless, each man there seemed to know exactly what to do; as if
+every move they made had been nicely planned out for them&mdash;and such Nick
+believed to be the case.</p>
+
+<p>When the machine was stored away, the men fell into line, Nick being
+shoved into position directly behind Handsome, and then, in Indian file,
+they moved silently forward toward a high fence that was near at hand.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span>They went over this one by one, Handsome waiting with patience until the
+last one was over, and then the march was taken up again.</p>
+
+<p>They passed now through the rear of a large yard, and before them loomed
+a brick building, which Nick figured must be a courthouse; and after a
+moment they made a half circuit around, and came to a stop between two
+buildings of brick, one of them being that one already mentioned.</p>
+
+<p>The night was dark now, for the moon had gone down, and there were no
+street lamps in that village evidently; or, if there were, they were not
+burned on nights when there was supposed to be a moon.</p>
+
+<p>But there was light enough for Nick to discover that they were close to
+the main street of the village; he could see the store windows on the
+opposite side; and it suddenly came to him that the building that was
+next to them&mdash;the second one&mdash;was a bank, and that they were about to
+rob it.</p>
+
+<p>He knew now what was expected of him; and again he determined to see the
+thing through to the end.</p>
+
+<p>It was not to prevent one robbery that he was engaged; but to prevent
+many. It was not to apprehend the participants in a minor job like this
+one promised to be, but to capture the head that directed many such
+robberies, and so stop them altogether.</p>
+
+<p>And still no word&mdash;not even a whisper&mdash;was spoken between the men. They
+worked on in utter silence, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> if their plans had been thoroughly
+conned until they were learned absolutely by heart.</p>
+
+<p>Nor did they pause in the yard next to the bank. There was scarcely a
+halt there; but they passed to the rear of the building, and followed
+one another over the high fence that was there, to the rear of the bank
+building.</p>
+
+<p>Keeping themselves well in the shadows, they crept forward silently to a
+rear door of the building, and here Handsome paused for a moment, and
+put down a canvas bag that he had been carrying all the way; and now he
+whispered in Nick's ear:</p>
+
+<p>"There are the tools, Dago. Let's see what kind of a cracksman you are."</p>
+
+<p>Nick did not need a second bidding. Having determined upon his course,
+he did not hesitate, but he seized the bag, pulled open the mouth of it,
+and, having selected such tools as he wanted, he applied himself to the
+task that had been set for him.</p>
+
+<p>A professional burglar of long experience could not have gotten that
+huge oak door open more quickly and silently than Nick Carter did, and
+Handsome gave him an approving pat on the shoulder.</p>
+
+<p>He was the first to enter the bank, Nick following, and the others
+coming behind them; and presently, after forcing another door, they
+stood crouching inside the bank itself.</p>
+
+<p>A dim light burned in a gas jet in the centre of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> large room, which
+was divided only by the wire screen which separated the customers' side
+of the rail from the clerks; and almost beneath the light, exactly where
+it could shine full upon the steel doors, was the huge safe of the
+institution.</p>
+
+<p>A person might not stand in front of that safe for a moment without
+being in full view from the street should any one happen to pass there.
+Nick saw that at a glance; but nevertheless Handsome silently placed a
+drill and a bottle of liquid in his hand, and motioned that he was to
+begin the dangerous part of the work.</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't you bring a screen with you, you chump?" demanded Nick, in a
+whisper. "If you had told me what the lay was, I'd have made one."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome nodded, evidently well pleased; and at the same time he
+produced a roll from under his coat, and gave it to the detective. Nick
+unrolled it, and found that it was merely a piece of burlap, rather more
+than a yard long, and about two feet in width, and with a roll of cord
+attached to each corner of it.</p>
+
+<p>He knew what that was intended for readily enough, and, taking it in his
+hands, he crept forward without another word, and quickly attached the
+four strings to objects which he selected as being situated about right
+for his purposes.</p>
+
+<p>In two minutes the screen was in place, and it afforded a perfect
+shelter from view from the street, and just the sort of one that would
+never be noticed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> from the outside at all, unless a person stopped at
+the window and deliberately peered inside&mdash;and that nobody was likely to
+do, unless something else first attracted attention.</p>
+
+<p>In fixing the screen in place so quickly and perfectly, Nick evidently
+won over not only Handsome, but the others; and now there was no more
+question of his doing the drilling alone. Each man took his own part of
+the work in silence, as if Nick had always been one of them; and,
+besides, now there was no time to be lost.</p>
+
+<p>Drilling through the steel doors of a safe is not an easy task, and it
+is not done quickly, although expert burglars carry tools these days
+which will cut anything.</p>
+
+<p>They took their turns at the drill, as they took them also with the
+acids and oil; and the work went on merrily until the holes were ready
+for the charges.</p>
+
+<p>And here again it seemed that Handsome was determined to try Nick out to
+the last, for he bent forward and whispered in his ear:</p>
+
+<p>"Prove one thing more, Dago, and you're made."</p>
+
+<p>"Want me to do the blowing?" asked Nick.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome nodded.</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Nick. "Light out, then."</p>
+
+<p>"But&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Get out, I say. If I do the blowing I'm boss for the time being. Git!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span>They did; and again, with the implements and the explosives at hand,
+Nick went to work; and, as before he worked rapidly and well&mdash;as if he
+were an experienced hand at that sort of employment.</p>
+
+<p>And then, when the charge was ready, Nick pulled up the heavy rope
+matting from the floor, and after doubling it again and again until
+there was a huge wad of it, he braced it with desks and chairs against
+the front of the safe; and when all that was done to his satisfaction,
+he lighted the fuse, and ran back to the rear hallway, where the others
+were watching and waiting.</p>
+
+<p>They had not long to wait after that. There was a lapse of perhaps a
+minute and a half, and then a dull, booming roar shook the building, and
+the burglars rushed forward.</p>
+
+<p>Now was the time when they were compelled to work rapidly, if ever.</p>
+
+<p>It was true that Nick had so muffled the sound of the explosion that it
+was hardly possible that the noise of it had roused anybody at all; but
+there was always a chance of somebody near at hand being wakeful or
+watchful.</p>
+
+<p>At any moment they might be interrupted&mdash;and no burglar likes to be
+interrupted. It always means a fight, in which somebody is likely to get
+killed, and burglars rarely do any killing unless they have to in order
+to escape.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>They rushed forward together; but now Nick purposely kept in the
+background. He had no idea of being taken himself if they should be
+interrupted; nor did he wish to give his companions an opportunity to
+kill any person who might interrupt them. It was all right from his
+standpoint to participate in the burglary, in order that he might
+ultimately catch all the thieves; but he did not wish to be a party to
+any fight that might come of it.</p>
+
+<p>But he was made to hold one of the bags while Handsome filled it from
+the inside of the safe.</p>
+
+<p>They pried open the inner compartments, and threw them indiscriminately
+upon the floor as soon as they were emptied; they jimmied open the steel
+boxes as readily as if they had been made of softest pine&mdash;and in twenty
+minutes after the explosion they were stealthily climbing the fence
+again, into the courthouse yard.</p>
+
+<p>And, so far as they could see, not a soul in the village had been
+awakened or alarmed.</p>
+
+<p>They returned to the shed, where they had left the automobile, by the
+same route they had covered in approaching the bank; the machine was
+backed out; they entered it, turned on the power, and sped away through
+the silent streets as they had come, with nobody the wiser for what they
+had done, the havoc they had wrought, and the wealth they had stolen.</p>
+
+<p>Down beside the road where they had made the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> change before, from the
+track of the railway to the highway, they paused long enough to secure
+the iron wheels, and here the change was made back to a railway machine.
+The car was lifted in sections to the tracks, and with everything
+adjusted they were soon flying down the shining rails at a frightful
+rate of speed, and in silence&mdash;for it seemed to be a rule among these
+men that there should be no talking.</p>
+
+<p>Mile after mile they covered in this way, and then the machine was
+slowed down, and came to a stop at the point where it had picked up
+Handsome and Nick at first, and here they got down, and, having taken
+out the plunder, stood beside the track until the machine had
+disappeared from view.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Dago, help me with the swag," said Handsome; and together they
+picked it up, and once more started for the outlaws' retreat in the
+middle of the impassable swamp.</p>
+
+<p>When they were in the boat, and almost ready to land where Nick had
+thrown the man into the water, Handsome turned to him, and whispered:</p>
+
+<p>"You're all right, Dago. I'll tell Madge so, too!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>When Nick Carter was shown a place to sleep that night&mdash;or, rather, that
+morning, for it was well toward daylight by the time Handsome and he
+returned to the outlaws' camp&mdash;he tumbled upon the bunk that was shown
+him, and he lost no time in doing so; nor did he open his eyes again
+until he felt a hand shaking him lustily, and a voice crying out to him:</p>
+
+<p>"Wake up, Dago! You're wanted!"</p>
+
+<p>He sprang up instantly; and, because he had laid himself down with
+nearly all his clothing still upon his person, he was not long in making
+himself ready. To have insulted the profession he had adopted by washing
+his face was not to be thought of.</p>
+
+<p>"Gee! But I'm hungry!" he said to Handsome, who was standing near,
+waiting for him.</p>
+
+<p>"Madge will give you something to eat. She is at her breakfast now," was
+the whispered reply. "She wants you."</p>
+
+<p>"Then," said Nick, "if I am going into the presence of a lady, and am
+expected to eat with her, I'll have to wash my face and hands. Show me
+where."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome laughed.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span>"I do it myself once in a while," he said. "Come with me."</p>
+
+<p>And he led Nick to a place along a path through the swamp where he
+succeeded in giving himself a good wash&mdash;for Nick had the satisfaction
+of knowing that the stain he had used was of such a quality that it
+would defy water. Alcohol alone would remove it.</p>
+
+<p>They found Madge on the doorstep, awaiting them; but Handsome paused at
+the edge of the clearing, and muttered:</p>
+
+<p>"I leave you here, Dago. I'm not in this. You're to have this interview
+alone."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," replied the detective, and was about to move on, when
+Handsome detained him by a gesture.</p>
+
+<p>"Put in a good word for me, Dago, if you get the chance," he whispered.
+"I have already said many a good one for you&mdash;and I made it as easy for
+you as I could all around."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Nick again.</p>
+
+<p>"And one more word, Dago. I forgot to tell you&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"What?"</p>
+
+<p>"Cremation Mike has got it in&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Who?"</p>
+
+<p>"Cremation Mike&mdash;he worked in a crematory once&mdash;has got it in for you.
+He's the chap you chucked into the soup, you know. He sneaked away after
+you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> left last night, so I'm told, and he swore black and blue that he
+would have your life for that act. He will, too. He's sure bad medicine,
+that fellow. He's a bad member, too. I just thought I'd give you the
+pointer."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome turned away then, and Nick went on alone to the piazza, where
+Black Madge was awaiting him.</p>
+
+<p>He stopped just before he put his foot upon the veranda, and waited for
+her to make some sign; and she approached quite near to him, looking him
+straight in the eyes.</p>
+
+<p>"Good morning, Dago," she said, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"Good morning, madam," he replied gravely.</p>
+
+<p>"You look quite like a gentleman this morning," she continued, laughing
+lightly. "Or, no, rather like a mountain bandit of Italy."</p>
+
+<p>"I could be either if I chose," he replied again, as gravely as he had
+spoken before.</p>
+
+<p>"I do not doubt it. I have been giving you considerable thought since I
+talked with you here last night. Come inside. You haven't had your
+breakfast, I suppose?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you shall breakfast with me. I was about to eat mine when I
+remembered you, and sent for you."</p>
+
+<p>"Madam is most kind."</p>
+
+<p>She led the way into the house, where a table was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> spread with good
+things, well cooked, too, they appeared to be; and she pointed toward a
+chair at the opposite side of the table.</p>
+
+<p>"Sit there," she said. "I declare, we are quite domestic."</p>
+
+<p>"So it would appear, madam. I am afraid that you are doing me too much
+honor, for one who has been so short a time among you."</p>
+
+<p>"Bah! I am glad to have somebody who can talk decently near me. I tire
+of all these ragamuffins who are my men. Sometimes I kill one of them
+just for the mere fun of ridding myself of the vermin."</p>
+
+<p>"Madam is incautious, perhaps."</p>
+
+<p>"Why so?"</p>
+
+<p>"Some day one of them might take it into his head to kill madam."</p>
+
+<p>"Then somebody will have to be mighty quick about it. I'm not so easily
+killed as all that. Tell me&mdash;have you guessed who I am?"</p>
+
+<p>"I am not a good guesser, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"On the contrary, I should suppose you to be a good one&mdash;an
+exceptionally good one. Answer me: Have you guessed who I am?"</p>
+
+<p>"I might make a guess now, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, drop that madam. I don't want you to madam me all the time. Who do
+you suppose I am?"</p>
+
+<p>"If I am to make a guess, I should suppose that you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> are that
+distinguished and elusive person whom the outside world refers to as
+Hobo Harry."</p>
+
+<p>She laughed long and heartily, stirring her coffee vigorously the while.</p>
+
+<p>"Upon my word, you are a good one," she said, still with laughter in her
+voice. "Yes, I am that distinguished and elusive person. There is no
+doubt about that. I have spent a long time in bringing this organization
+to perfection, Dago. What do you think of it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think it is a wonder."</p>
+
+<p>"Right you are, my man! It is a wonder. For example, what did you think
+of the operation that was performed last night?"</p>
+
+<p>"I thought it was carried out very perfectly. The men must have been a
+long time in laying their plans."</p>
+
+<p>She laughed again.</p>
+
+<p>"Not one of those men&mdash;not even Handsome&mdash;had ever seen that place
+before. They only obeyed my orders; nothing more. I made the plans
+myself. I told them exactly what to do, and when, and how to do it. It
+is all a question of mathematics, and of obeying orders."</p>
+
+<p>"It was perfectly done, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"There you go again. By the way, Handsome gives me an excellent report
+of you."</p>
+
+<p>"I had supposed as much, else I would not be here breakfasting with
+you."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span>"That is not why I sent for you; that has nothing to do with last
+night."</p>
+
+<p>"No?"</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to tell me where I have seen you before&mdash;and where you have
+met me before," she said swiftly, and with a sudden and dangerous
+narrowing of her eyes.</p>
+
+<p>If Nick had not had himself perfectly in hand he must have given a start
+then that would have betrayed him; as it was, he answered instantly, and
+as if the subject had also occurred to him:</p>
+
+<p>"For the life of me, madam, I cannot remember. I have tried to recall
+the time and place ever since I saw you last night; but it eludes me. I
+cannot tell."</p>
+
+<p>"It is well that you have answered as you have," she said, with a
+threatening cadence in her voice.</p>
+
+<p>"Why so, madam?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because I saw plainly in your eyes last night that you remembered to
+have seen me somewhere before that time. Had you denied it, you would
+have lied to me; and it is not healthy for people to tell me lies."</p>
+
+<p>"I can imagine that, madam. But since I have no reason to do so&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me what there is about me that is familiar to you, Dago."</p>
+
+<p>"It must be your great beauty that I remem&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"That will be about enough of that, thank you," she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> interrupted him
+coldly. "I know all about my beauty, and don't in the least need to be
+told about it."</p>
+
+<p>"One could not very well remember you at all without remembering your
+beauty," insisted Nick boldly. "It is the first thing about you that
+strikes one; and the second is&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Well&mdash;what? Possibly I will be more interested in that."</p>
+
+<p>"The fear you inspire, I think. You have what the French call a 'way'
+about you."</p>
+
+<p>She started perceptibly.</p>
+
+<p>"What do you know about the French?" she demanded; and Nick saw
+instantly that he had made a mistake in reminding her of her career in
+Paris. Now it was possible that she might recall where she had seen him.</p>
+
+<p>But he dismissed the idea as soon as it came to him, for he remembered
+again how perfectly he was disguised, and how impossible it should be
+for her to remember him after all these years, through the disguise.</p>
+
+<p>But now she was looking steadily at him, and for the moment she had
+forgotten to eat.</p>
+
+<p>"Who are you, Dago?" she demanded suddenly. "You are not what you seem."</p>
+
+<p>"Few of us are," returned the detective evasively.</p>
+
+<p>"Who are you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have told you, madam, as much as it is possible<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> to tell. You do not
+demand the past records of your followers. All that you insist upon is
+that they shall be faithful in the future."</p>
+
+<p>"Who are you?" she repeated again.</p>
+
+<p>"I am Dago John, madam, at your service."</p>
+
+<p>"But you have another name than Dago John."</p>
+
+<p>"I had another&mdash;once."</p>
+
+<p>"What was it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Madam does not suppose, when she asks the question, that it will be
+answered, does she?" Nick inquired boldly.</p>
+
+<p>"By Heaven, sir, do you dare to defy me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all. I merely feel sure that madam asked the question as a joke,
+knowing that it could not be answered."</p>
+
+<p>For a moment it seemed as if she did not know whether to be angry at him
+for his cool effrontery, or to laugh the matter off entirely, in
+admiration of his bravery. She decided upon the latter course evidently,
+for she did laugh&mdash;in a way that was not quite pleasant to hear,
+however; and she said:</p>
+
+<p>"Try to think where you have seen me before. Help me to remember. I want
+to recall it."</p>
+
+<p>"It is impossible, madam. I have already tried."</p>
+
+<p>"Is the memory that is associated with me pleasant or otherwise?"</p>
+
+<p>"It could not be but pleasant, since it was&mdash;you,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> he ventured; and she
+frowned. It was plain that she did not relish such compliments.</p>
+
+<p>And now she sat with her eyes fixed upon him, idly stirring her second
+cup of coffee, and seeming to look him through and through, while she
+cast her memory back over the storms of her life, not yet more than
+twenty-three years, all told, and attempted with all her strength of
+will to call up for recognition the ghost which his appearance had
+conjured.</p>
+
+<p>After a little she leaned forward, nearer to him, and her eyes, coal
+black, and blazing, fairly burned into his own; but he held his gaze
+steadily upon her, never once flinching from the scrutiny.</p>
+
+<p>And then, so suddenly that it startled him, she leaped to her feet,
+knocking her coffee to the floor, and she stood over him&mdash;but whether in
+anger or only in astonishment that she had remembered, he could not have
+told.</p>
+
+<p>"By all the gods!" she cried out. "I remember you now. It is your eyes
+that have haunted me, and now I remember where I have seen them. I
+remember. It was in Paris. It was at the prefecture of police. I was
+there. I was only a girl. I had just finished with the chief when you
+entered the room. I did not notice your name when it was announced, but
+now I remember you&mdash;at the prefecture of police in Paris! Tell me&mdash;tell
+me, I say, what you were doing there!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span>The detective knew that it would be folly to deny the charge that she
+made. He knew that she remembered now, perfectly well, and that nothing
+could disabuse her mind of the determination it had reached.</p>
+
+<p>Acting upon the impulse of the instant, therefore, and determined now to
+play out his r&ocirc;le as it should appear, Nick pretended instantly to be as
+greatly astonished as she was at the recollection, and the strangeness
+of it.</p>
+
+<p>He, too, leaped to his feet, imitating an astonishment as great as her
+own. He did not tip over his coffee, but he did manage to upset his
+chair, so that it fell backward on the floor; and then for the space of
+a moment they stood staring into each other's eyes, both&mdash;from all
+appearances&mdash;speechless with astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>And then, very slowly, she subsided into her chair again, still keeping
+her eyes upon him, and still evidently taxing her memory to the utmost
+to recall all the incidents of that meeting at the prefecture in Paris.</p>
+
+<p>"I remember now," she murmured at last, more to herself than to him. "It
+all comes back to me, bit by bit. Monsieur Goron was chief at the
+time&mdash;no? Yes. I remember. There had been a sudden death in the house
+where I lived&mdash;it was on the floor just beneath me&mdash;and Goron sent for
+me to question me about it. It was thought at first that Lucie had been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>
+murdered, and Goron thought that perhaps I would know about it. He had
+just finished questioning me when you entered the room&mdash;ah!"</p>
+
+<p>Her eyes blazed with a sudden fire of anger, and her lips tightened over
+her teeth.</p>
+
+<p>"When you entered the room Goron rose and shook hands with you. Why did
+he do that? Goron did not shake hands with criminals!"</p>
+
+<p>"Nor with his police spies, did he?" asked Nick, smiling and shrugging
+his shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>"But why did he shake hands with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because we were old acquaintances, madam."</p>
+
+<p>"And he called you by name. What was that name?"</p>
+
+<p>"Madam, for some time past I have deemed it best to forget it."</p>
+
+<p>"Nevertheless you shall remember it now."</p>
+
+<p>Nick shrugged his shoulders, and did not reply.</p>
+
+<p>"What was that name?" she demanded again.</p>
+
+<p>"I have told madam that I&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>She started from her chair, and ran across the room so suddenly that
+Nick was interrupted in what he was about to say; and she seized a rope
+that hung from the ceiling and stood with her hand upon it, grasping it.</p>
+
+<p>"If I pull this rope," she said coldly, "as many of my followers as hear
+it will rush to this place. You know what is likely to happen then if I
+loose them upon you. They are all like wild beasts, or like dogs,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> ready
+to tear each other at the slightest provocation. If I should point my
+finger at you&mdash;so&mdash;and say to them, 'Take him; he is yours,' your life
+would not be worth as much as the dregs in your coffee cup. Tell me,
+what that name was, or I will summon the men."</p>
+
+<p>The detective shrugged his shoulders, and leaned back in his chair,
+smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"It would be a foolish and a useless proceeding," he said calmly. "I
+should not tell them that name any more than I tell it to you. I will
+not tell it. It is of no moment here. It could do you no good to hear
+it, and to mention it might do me harm; therefore, I shall not mention
+it, no matter how often you order me to do so. It pains me to disobey
+you, madam, but you force me into the alternative, and I have no choice.
+Pull the rope if you will."</p>
+
+<p>Instead of pulling it, she released it, still staring at him, and she
+returned slowly to her chair.</p>
+
+<p>"You are a strange man," she murmured, "and a brave one. There is not
+another who would dare to defy me as you have done."</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps there is not another who has so much at stake," he replied
+quietly, but with perfect truth, as the reader knows.</p>
+
+<p>Again she knit her brows in perplexity; again the detective knew that
+she was concentrating her mind upon that incident at the prefecture,
+trying with all her power to recall the merest detail of it.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span>Nick remembered that his name had been mentioned aloud at that time; he
+recalled the fact that Goron, in rising to shake hands with him, had
+called him by name plainly enough. It was evident that she also
+remembered that much of the facts, and was now straining every energy
+she possessed to recall what that name was.</p>
+
+<p>And while she thought so deeply, her face gradually assumed an
+expressionless cast. She closed her lips firmly together. Her eyes
+became sombre. She seemed oblivious of his presence, and of her
+surroundings. For the moment she was back again in Paris, at the
+prefecture, in the presence of Goron, five years ago.</p>
+
+<p>After a little, without another change of expression, she shrugged her
+shoulders, and rose from her chair, and then, with an assumption of
+carelessness, she passed from the room upon the piazza, saying as she
+went:</p>
+
+<p>"Come. We will not bother any more about this for the present. We will
+take up the subject again another time, after we have both had
+opportunity to think it over. If you care for a cigar, Dago, there are
+some in that cupboard yonder. Help yourself."</p>
+
+<p>Now, it happened that Nick did care for a cigar. He had not had one in
+many a day, but had forced himself to be content with an old pipe. The
+prospect of a cigar was enticing, and so he took her at her word,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> and
+helped himself&mdash;turning his back to her as he did so, and so he did not
+see the strange smile which crossed her face as she passed through the
+door upon the piazza.</p>
+
+<p>He was a bit puzzled by this sudden change in her attitude and manner.
+He could not exactly account for it. Had she remembered? He could not
+tell.</p>
+
+<p>He realized, however, that he was in a predicament&mdash;that his position
+was precarious; for if she should remember&mdash;if she should recall the
+name of Nick Carter as connected with that incident, he knew that his
+own life would not be worth the snap of a finger, no matter how bravely
+he might fight, or how many of the foe he should overcome in the contest
+that would inevitably follow.</p>
+
+<p>For, scattered about in that stronghold in the swamp, there were no less
+than a hundred of her followers, and there was not one among them who
+would not kill at her bidding.</p>
+
+<p>She was standing upon the piazza, looking away through the woods, when
+he came out, and, without turning her head, she said to him:</p>
+
+<p>"Take that chair, and remain there until you have smoked your cigar. The
+men might take it into their heads to be jealous if you should go among
+them with it, and they should know that you, a new arrival, had
+breakfasted with me. I will return in a moment."</p>
+
+<p>She left him then, entering the house; and with no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> thought of immediate
+danger in his mind, Nick followed her suggestion, and leaned back in the
+chair, tilting it against the house, determined to enjoy that smoke to
+the utmost.</p>
+
+<p>After that it was difficult to tell exactly what did happen.</p>
+
+<p>He remembered afterward that he smoked on in enjoyment of the cigar for
+some minutes, and that he thought it somewhat rank, notwithstanding the
+fact that it had the appearance of being of excellent quality.</p>
+
+<p>And then suddenly the cigar flashed, exactly as if there had been three
+or four grains of gunpowder wrapped in it&mdash;and he was instantly
+conscious of an intensely bitter taste in his mouth.</p>
+
+<p>And then it seemed to him almost as if somebody had struck him, so
+strange were his sensations&mdash;and from that instant memory left him
+entirely.</p>
+
+<p>The woman had been watching him narrowly from the doorway; she was
+waiting for that flash from the end of his cigar, and when it came she
+passed out through the door swiftly, and caught him as he was about to
+fall from his chair to the floor of the piazza; caught him, and held
+him, and then deftly raised him to his feet, and half carried him inside
+the house before anybody&mdash;had a person been observant of the
+scene&mdash;could have realized that anything was wrong.</p>
+
+<p>She possessed great strength, this remarkable woman; for the instant she
+was inside the door, heavy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> as he was, she raised him in her arms, and
+carried him into an adjoining room, where she closed the door behind
+her, and deposited him upon a couch.</p>
+
+<p>And then, still working with great rapidity, she pulled aside a rug that
+was on the floor, and, having lifted a trapdoor, she again took him in
+her arms, and descended through the opening in the floor to the depths
+beneath it.</p>
+
+<p>After a little she reappeared, and this time there was a grim smile upon
+her face, while she replaced the rug over the trapdoor, and otherwise
+rendered the room the same as it had been before the incident happened.</p>
+
+<p>She passed coolly out upon the piazza, and for a time strode up and down
+it in deep thought; but at last she raised her head quickly, and called
+sharply to the sentinel who was pacing up and down in front of the
+cottage.</p>
+
+<p>"Send Handsome to me!" she ordered; and then she continued her pacing
+until Handsome appeared.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome belied his name terribly in the light of day, for an
+uglier-looking chap could not be imagined; and yet, withal, there was a
+gleam of humor in his eyes and at the corners of his mouth. She turned
+to him abruptly.</p>
+
+<p>"Where are the others of that bunch who were found with Dago?" she asked
+sharply.</p>
+
+<p>"Yonder," replied Handsome, jerking his thumb over his shoulder toward
+the glade beyond them.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>"What do you think about them, Handsome?" she asked again.</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't thought much about them," he replied. "They are about the
+usual sort, I believe; no better and perhaps no worse."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not so sure of that."</p>
+
+<p>"No?" he asked, vaguely surprised.</p>
+
+<p>"Handsome, I want you to take them, one by one, to the pool in the
+woods, strip them, and scrub them with soap, and water, and sand, if
+necessary. I want you to make sure that there is no suggestion of
+disguise about any of the three. Do it at once&mdash;and when it is done, no
+matter whether there is a question of disguise about any of them or not,
+bring them to me."</p>
+
+<p>Handsome departed without a word. It was plain that Black Madge was
+accustomed to obedience. It was plain also that her suspicions were
+thoroughly aroused; for now she paced up and down again restlessly, and
+continued so to pace until almost an hour later Handsome stood before
+her again.</p>
+
+<p>"Well?" she demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"Two of them were plainly disguised," he replied.</p>
+
+<p>"And the other?" she demanded, frowning.</p>
+
+<p>"The other, as plainly was not disguised."</p>
+
+<p>"And the two who were disguised&mdash;what of them?"</p>
+
+<p>"I cannot tell if they are known to each other.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> I cannot tell whether
+they are spies or not, only it is quite likely that they are."</p>
+
+<p>"And the third one? The one who wore no disguise?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think he is all right. He is the one called Pat. When he realized
+that the others who had been with him were in disguise, he flew at one
+of them, thinking that he had been followed himself, and I think would
+have killed the fellow if I had not been there to prevent it."</p>
+
+<p>Madge listened, with a shrug of her shoulders; then she said briefly:</p>
+
+<p>"Bring them here, Handsome. Bring the two who were disguised, first.
+Leave the other one alone until I send for him. What are the supposed
+names of these two?"</p>
+
+<p>"One is called Tenstrike, and the other calls himself the Chicago
+Chicken."</p>
+
+<p>"The Chicago Chicken," she said slowly. "Chick, for short, is it not? I
+think we are on the right track, Handsome. Bring that one here
+alone&mdash;first."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Chick had committed the folly of not being entirely thorough in the
+creation of his disguise; so also had Ten-Ichi; and the soap and
+scrubbing brushes, as employed by Handsome, had done the work of
+removing it.</p>
+
+<p>But Patsy? Well, it had not been necessary for Patsy to be quite so
+thorough, for his own particular person and features were sufficient
+disguise, with a few minor alterations and additions.</p>
+
+<p>For instance, at the risk of not having it wear off soon enough to suit
+his purposes, he had gone to a professional hair dyer, and had ordered
+his shock of hair indelibly dyed to a dirty brick-red; and he had put
+spots on his face, and the back of his hands, with nitrate of silver, so
+that the spots burned into the skin. No soap and water could remove
+these. They would only disappear with time; but Patsy had never traveled
+on a reputation for beauty, and he did not give the matter a thought
+beyond the immediate necessities.</p>
+
+<p>He had taken another precaution, also, just before he entered the woods
+to go to the place of meeting. He had stripped himself in a secluded
+place near the railway tracks, and he had rolled himself in the coal<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>
+dust around the track, griming the dirt into his body, so that when it
+came to the time that Handsome stripped him&mdash;well, it can be imagined
+how he looked.</p>
+
+<p>A little snuff rubbed thoroughly against his teeth had rendered them
+sufficiently discolored, and altogether he so thoroughly looked his part
+that Handsome, when he stripped him, had not the slightest doubt of his
+reality.</p>
+
+<p>But the frauds connected with Chick and Ten-Ichi were easily detected.</p>
+
+<p>Black Madge, while still seated at the table with the detective, had
+suddenly recalled the name that had long ago been mentioned in her
+presence by the chief of the Paris police. It had come to her in a flash
+that the name was Nick Carter&mdash;and that this man who was so calmly
+seated in her presence was Nick Carter.</p>
+
+<p>Madge knew a great deal more about Nick Carter than Nick supposed she
+did; she knew all about his household, and about his assistants. She
+knew their names as well as if they were followers of her own&mdash;and when
+Handsome, in mentioning the names of the other men, had talked about
+Tenstrike and the Chicken, she had connected the names at once.</p>
+
+<p>As for the other one&mdash;Pat&mdash;that had a significance also; but Pat is a
+very common name, and she did not do herself the honor to suppose that
+Nick Carter would bring all three of his assistants into the woods<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> with
+him in search of her. One, she thought, would have to be left behind to
+look after the business, and, therefore, she was all the more ready to
+believe that Patsy, since he was not in disguise, was one of her own
+kind, who had inadvertently fallen into the company of the detectives.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome and four other men accompanied Chick to the cottage, and when
+he stood before Madge she looked him over from head to foot with cold
+scorn.</p>
+
+<p>"So," she said venomously, "you thought to deceive me, did you&mdash;you and
+your master?"</p>
+
+<p>Chick made no reply, and, after a moment, she went on:</p>
+
+<p>"We have a way of ridding ourselves of such men as you are, when they
+come among us. It is not pleasant for them, but it serves as a lesson to
+others. Step inside the house. Take him inside, Handsome. Let the others
+wait out here, and if there is the slightest sound of a row inside the
+house let them enter it at once."</p>
+
+<p>When the three were in the room together, she said to Chick:</p>
+
+<p>"You observe that I know who you are?"</p>
+
+<p>Chick nodded&mdash;and he also smiled.</p>
+
+<p>She stamped her foot upon the floor under her, and continued:</p>
+
+<p>"Down there, beneath us, unconscious and chained to the wall, is Nick
+Carter. Even Handsome did not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> know that till now. He did not know that
+Dago John, who went with him last night to rob the bank, was no other
+than Nick Carter. But it is true, Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>"Gee!" breathed Handsome, his fingers twitching.</p>
+
+<p>"He is all right now, Handsome. He cannot hurt you. I have put him out
+of business&mdash;and I don't think we had better let the men know that Nick
+Carter has been among them. Let them wreak their vengeance upon this
+fellow, and upon the other&mdash;that little Jap. As for Nick Carter himself,
+I will take care of him. He will never come out of that cellar alive.
+And now, Chick, I want you to answer me a question."</p>
+
+<p>"You will save your breath if you do not ask it," replied Chick. "I am
+not answering questions just at present."</p>
+
+<p>"Not to save yourself, or your master?"</p>
+
+<p>"I know very well that nothing that I can say will have the least effect
+upon my fate, or upon Nick Carter's," he replied.</p>
+
+<p>"Very good," she replied slowly; and then to Handsome: "Take him away,
+Handsome. Take him out there to the men. Tell them who he is, and that
+they may do as they please with him. I think the quicksand bog would be
+as good a place as any for him; or the fire tree; but they may do as
+they please&mdash;so long as they kill him. Take him away."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span>Chick, realizing that it was all up with him, and that he might as well
+make a fight for it, leaped forward quickly, full at the woman,
+intending to seize upon her, and hold her as a shield; but even as he
+attempted to do so, the floor beneath him sank under him for the depth
+of two feet, and before he could recover his balance, Madge had thrown a
+table cover over his head, and in another moment Handsome had thrown him
+to the floor, and called the others to his assistance.</p>
+
+<p>And so Chick was tightly bound and borne away a captive&mdash;to what fate he
+could only imagine.</p>
+
+<p>"You need not bring the Jap here at all," Madge called after them. "Let
+my hoboes take him with them, along with this one; but do you bring the
+man Pat to me at once."</p>
+
+<p>And five minutes later Handsome reappeared with Patsy in tow, only that
+Patsy was not a prisoner&mdash;as yet.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, my man," said Madge coldly, "you will have to give a pretty
+straight account of yourself. You were found in bad company."</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, ma'am, don't I know the same? I've been apologizing to meself
+ever since I discovered it, an' if Handsome here had only left me alone,
+faith, I'd have settled wan part of me misgivings then and there, so I
+would. I had me doubts about the bunch from the beginning, ma'am, when
+they came a-sneakin' up<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> to me fire, and eatin' of me grub; and when
+that other gazabo dropped from the trees, sure, I was certain of it. I
+was after kapin' me eyes peeled all the time since then, your worship,
+but I thought it wasn't f'r the likes of me to be after makin'
+suggestions to y'r majesty, at all, at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Who are you, and what are you, Pat?" she asked, smiling upon him.</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, ma'am, it's nobody I am. I've never done anything worse than pick
+a pocket untel a short time ago, when I had the misfortune to get mixed
+up in a bit av a scrap&mdash;and the other feller didn't have the common
+dacency to get on his feet ag'in when it was over. He jest stayed there,
+so he did, and thinkin' that somebody would be axin' questions of me, I
+lit out. Ye wouldn't know a thing more about me if I should talk for a
+week&mdash;but, sure, if there's a question ye'd like to ax me, I'll be
+afther answerin' it to the best of me ability, so I will."</p>
+
+<p>"What brought you to me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Me legs&mdash;no less; begging y'r pardon for mentionin' it. They weren't
+purty to look at when Handsome stripped me&mdash;but we needn't mention that,
+aither."</p>
+
+<p>"But you came here in search of Hobo Harry."</p>
+
+<p>"I did. That same."</p>
+
+<p>"Who sent you here to find him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody. I had to go somewhere. I had been<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> readin' the papers, and I
+had seen a lot about Hobo Harry in 'em. All of the papers said that he
+was to be found around here somewhere, and that the divil himself
+couldn't catch him; and I says to mesilf, says I, sure that's the broth
+av a boy ye want to find, Pat&mdash;and here I am, ma'am."</p>
+
+<p>"Did you ever hear of Nick Carter?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have that."</p>
+
+<p>"Ever see him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I did that."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you know him, do you think, if you should see him again?"</p>
+
+<p>"I would that. It isn't three weeks since I saw him wid these two eyes
+as plain as I see y'r own beautiful face this minit. Sure, I'd know
+him."</p>
+
+<p>"Come this way, then."</p>
+
+<p>She went into the adjoining room, and they followed. There she pulled
+aside the rug again, and, having raised the trapdoor, descended, Patsy
+and Handsome following close behind her.</p>
+
+<p>The narrow steps took them into a spacious cellar, and, having passed
+through a partition by opening a heavy oaken door, they entered what
+appeared to be a prison room.</p>
+
+<p>Nick Carter was there. He had recovered consciousness, and was seated on
+a low stool against the wall. His arms were stretched wide apart, and
+each was held in position by an iron chain on either side<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> of him. A
+ring of these chains had been passed around each wrist, and locked
+there, and the chains were fastened to the stone walls by staples.</p>
+
+<p>Madge stopped directly in front of the detective, and glared at him,
+while he returned her fierce look with a half smile&mdash;for he had entirely
+recovered from the effects of the dose she had administered.</p>
+
+<p>She raised her arm and pointed toward the detective, but before she
+could utter a word, Patsy cried out:</p>
+
+<p>"That's him! That's him! Sure, ma'am, I'd know him among a thousand!
+He's got stain on his skin; I can see that; and he is disguised in other
+ways, ma'am, I can see that, too; but it's him. I'd take me oath to it,
+so I would."</p>
+
+<p>Madge smiled, and softly rubbed her hands together.</p>
+
+<p>"Carter," she said coldly, "do you know this man who recognizes you?"</p>
+
+<p>Nick shrugged his shoulders in disdain, for he understood perfectly well
+that Patsy had some well-defined plan in his head for doing as he did;
+and he replied:</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose he is somebody whom I have arrested at some time. It is only
+the worst criminals, like yourself, Madge, that I take the trouble to
+remember."</p>
+
+<p>She turned away with a toss of her head.</p>
+
+<p>"Come!" she ordered; and they followed her from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> the cellar room, and up
+the narrow stairs again, where she reclosed the trap.</p>
+
+<p>"Go back, Pat, and take your place among the others," she ordered him
+then. "You will be watched for a long time, and at the first break you
+make you will be knifed, or shot. It is up to you whether you make good
+in this community or not. Go now."</p>
+
+<p>When he had gone, she turned to Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"Handsome," she said slowly, "you can go now, too. Keep an eye on that
+Pat. At midnight to-night, come here to the cottage, for I want you to
+help me to carry the body into the woods to the quicksand pit. We will
+throw him there&mdash;Nick Carter, I mean."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. Shall you chuck him in alive?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; for he would find some way to crawl out and escape. I will put him
+out of the way first. It will be only a dead body that we will have to
+carry, but I don't want the men to know that Nick Carter has been among
+us until after he is dead. Then it will not matter."</p>
+
+<p>"Right you are," said Handsome; and he took his departure.</p>
+
+<p>But down in the cellar beneath them something had happened, for as soon
+as the party of three left him, Nick calmly and easily pulled the iron
+staples from the wall and stood upon his feet. The fact was that he had
+already succeeded in loosening them when he heard the approach of Madge
+and the others, and he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> had been afforded barely time to resume his
+position of helpless captivity when the door was opened and they
+entered.</p>
+
+<p>But now he was free, save for the short chains that were still fastened
+to his wrists, and the plank walls that rose between him and liberty.</p>
+
+<p>But the chains on each wrist were short, and the walls were only plank;
+and in Madge's eagerness and haste in fastening him there she had
+neglected&mdash;or she had not thought it necessary&mdash;to search him for his
+weapons.</p>
+
+<p>He knew now that there was very little time to spare, and that he and
+his three assistants were in a bad predicament.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.</h3>
+
+
+<p>In the meantime, Patsy had been in half a dozen different kinds of a
+brown study. He realized that now the entire situation depended solely
+upon him, and that the lives of his chief, and of Chick and Ten-Ichi,
+rested wholly in his hands.</p>
+
+<p>He stood, be it said, all alone, in the midst of a huge swamp, from
+which escape could only be had by means of a boat, and into which he had
+been conducted blindfolded. Around him were men, all ready at any
+instant to take his life for the merest excuse; and already the lives of
+his three friends were sacrificed unless he could do something&mdash;and that
+very speedily&mdash;to save them.</p>
+
+<p>In the cellar at the cottage he had not dared to look squarely at his
+chief, for fear that the inclination on his own part to make some sort
+of signal would be too strong for him to resist; and he had known that
+Madge was watching every act and motion, as a cat watches a mouse.</p>
+
+<p>When he left the cottage, and had gone as far as the edge of the glade,
+he halted, and waited there for Handsome, for he guessed that the man
+would be sent away directly; and when Handsome did come, Patsy said to
+him:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span>"Sure, Handsome, will ye tell me what is to be done wid the others?"</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't made up my mind about that yet," replied Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"And is it left to you that it is?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>"Faith, but that's fine. I wish it was left to me, so I do."</p>
+
+<p>"What would you do to them, Pat?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd skin 'em, begorra!"</p>
+
+<p>Handsome laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"Perhaps I will give you a chance," he said. "However, it is likely that
+they will go into the quicksand."</p>
+
+<p>"Where is that same, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Out in the swamp a bit. There is no getting out of it, and it tells no
+tales. Once a man is thrown into that, he sinks out of sight in a few
+minutes, and that is the last of him. It is our graveyard. There are
+about fifty in there now. The place is bottomless."</p>
+
+<p>"Cheerful, isn't it? Sure, man, it's unhealthy, it is; but I'll go and
+have a look at it. Where is it?"</p>
+
+<p>Handsome directed him how to find it, and he hastened away; but he
+paused before he started long enough to select a long, strong rope that
+he had seen near one of the cabins. This he carried with him, and
+disappeared among the trees.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span>Patsy was gone less than half an hour, but when he returned he was
+whistling; and then, after a little, he found an opportunity to linger
+around the place where Chick and Ten-Ichi were confined in one of the
+cabins.</p>
+
+<p>And presently he began to sing; at first in a low tone, and in
+unintelligible words; but his voice was good, and it attracted
+attention, even among that motley crew, and after a little, perceiving
+that they were listening, he sang the louder.</p>
+
+<p>If they had but known it, he was singing in Japanese, which Ten-Ichi had
+taught him to speak perfectly; and the words he uttered as he sang,
+translated, were:</p>
+
+<p>"There is a quicksand pit not far from here. They are going to throw you
+both into it. I have carried a rope to the quicksand pit. I have tied it
+to a tree near there. When you are thrown into the pit, spread out your
+arms. And also spread out your legs. Keep as still as possible so as not
+to sink too fast. I will be there as soon as I can do it. I will throw
+you the end of the rope. And with your own combined strength and mine,
+we can pull you out. I am not suspected, so I can do the act, all right.
+Keep up your pluck, and manage not to go into the pit head down."</p>
+
+<p>He sang this over and over several times until he was sure that Ten-Ichi
+had heard and understood, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> would convey the message to Chick, and
+then he sauntered away.</p>
+
+<p>Twice after that he tried to get near to the cottage to sing to Nick
+Carter; but each time he was stopped and turned back again; and at last
+he muttered to himself:</p>
+
+<p>"I'll have to wait till to-night for that part of it. After I have
+rescued Chick and Ten-Ichi I will have them to help me, and then it will
+be funny if we don't get the chief out of the pickle he is in."</p>
+
+<p>It was well toward evening, almost the hour of sundown, before Chick and
+Ten-Ichi were carried to the quicksand pit; and then a procession
+followed them. The hands and feet of the prisoners were not bound, for
+it was desired that they should flounder in the quicksand in order to
+hasten its work; and without ceremony they were hurled into the midst of
+it, one, and then the other.</p>
+
+<p>Patsy's only fear was that the horde of hoboes would throw sticks and
+stones at the helpless men in the sand pit; but he found that this was
+against orders, since the presence of such impedimenta would give the
+victims something to seize hold of; and the operation of sinking was so
+slow, and the hoboes had seen it so many times, that they had lost
+interest in it; so that almost at once after Chick and Ten-Ichi were
+thrown in they began to withdraw to their several occupations; and
+finally when only a group of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> four remained, Patsy, who was one of them,
+called out: "It's tired of this I am. Come on!" and, nothing loath, the
+others followed him away.</p>
+
+<p>But he was not long gone. Almost at once he found an opportunity to
+leave them, and, by making a detour, to hurry back again.</p>
+
+<p>Already when he had reached the pit a second time the two detectives had
+sunk almost to their armpits; but in an instant Patsy found the rope he
+had concealed, one end of which was fastened to a tree.</p>
+
+<p>The task which followed can better be imagined than described, and only
+for the great strength of the trio it must have been unsuccessful. But
+with Chick and Ten-Ichi straining for their lives at one end, and Patsy
+pulling on the other as best he could, they came forth inch by inch,
+until at last they stood, covered with mud, to be sure, but on solid
+earth.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, go around that way," said Patsy, speaking rapidly. "The cottage is
+over there, as you know. You'll have to cross a neck of the swamp in
+getting to it, but the chief is there, a prisoner. I have seen him. He
+is chained to the wall in the cellar. If you get a chance before I do,
+overcome that beast of a sentinel, who is walking up and down near the
+house. I'll go back through the glade, and I'll manage somehow to join
+you there, if I have to kill somebody in order to do it; and take these.
+They are extra ones.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> I swiped them." He handed them each a pistol as he
+spoke.</p>
+
+<p>Chance played into Patsy's hands when he returned to the glade. Two of
+the men had been quarreling, and they had taken the centre of the glade
+to settle their differences; and there a ring had formed around them&mdash;a
+ring which comprised almost every man of the outfit.</p>
+
+<p>The point was that the attention of everybody was diverted from Patsy,
+and, merely bestowing a single glance upon what was taking place, he
+hurried silently past them&mdash;it was almost dark now&mdash;and in a moment more
+had passed through the pathway to the clearing around the cottage.</p>
+
+<p>As he entered the clearing silently, he came directly upon the sentinel,
+who, after listening to the row in the glade for a moment, had just
+turned to retrace his steps; this made him assume a position with his
+back toward Patsy, and in an instant the young athlete had leaped upon
+his back and shoulders, and had seized him by the throat, so that he
+bore him to the ground in absolute silence.</p>
+
+<p>And even as he did that, Chick and Ten-Ichi dashed out of the woods and
+helped him; and Ten-Ichi, none too gentle, now that his anger was
+aroused, rapped the sentinel on the head with the butt of his pistol, so
+that he stiffened out and offered no more resistance.</p>
+
+<p>They had been thoughtful enough to bring the rope<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> with them, too, and
+it did not take long to tie the man; and then the three assistants of
+Nick Carter leaped forward toward the door of the cottage, realizing
+that at any instant they might be interrupted in their work, and knowing
+that the odds would be terribly against them if they were.</p>
+
+<p>They leaped upon the piazza&mdash;and as they did so the door opened directly
+in front of them, and Nick Carter appeared before them with the
+senseless form of Black Madge in his arms.</p>
+
+<p>For just one instant he started backward; and then he recognized his
+three assistants.</p>
+
+<p>"Quick!" he exclaimed. "Hold her, Chick!" and he put Madge into Chick's
+arms. "I have drugged her with some of her own stuff. There's plenty of
+it in the house. Get into the woods, all of you, over there"&mdash;and he
+pointed to the spot he wished them to go&mdash;"and wait for me. I'll be
+there in a moment."</p>
+
+<p>While they obeyed him, he turned back into the house; and from the edge
+of the clearing, where the others had concealed themselves, they
+presently saw a blaze flare up inside the house; then another, and then
+another, until there were many of them; and then Nick Carter dashed out
+of it again and ran toward them with all speed.</p>
+
+<p>"Look, now!" he said. "Watch that upper window, in the gable!"</p>
+
+<p>And looking as he commanded them to do, they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> presently saw, when the
+light had gained in brightness, the form of a woman standing there,
+outlined against the blazing fire; and if they had not known
+differently, there was not one of them who would not have sworn that it
+was Black Madge who stood there, surrounded by flames.</p>
+
+<p>"It is a dummy that I fixed up," whispered the detective. "It was done
+to keep the attention of the crowd away from us. Look! The men have
+discovered the fire!"</p>
+
+<p>The hoboes were rushing toward the scene in crowds now; and they saw the
+figure of the woman at the window in the gable instantly.</p>
+
+<p>A cry, then a shout, then a wail went up, for they thought it was their
+chief&mdash;Black Madge, otherwise Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, as she
+preferred to be known outside her own fraternity; and in that instant
+the crowd went mad.</p>
+
+<p>There was not a soul among them who did not rush to the rescue of their
+chief, believing that Nick's dummy at the window was she; and then
+danced and shouted, and yelled and screamed around that burning cottage,
+like so many madmen.</p>
+
+<p>"Come, now," said the detective. "This is our opportunity!"</p>
+
+<p>Like shadows they sped away through the trees. They skirted the glade,
+now without a sign of life within it; they hurried down the path among
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> alders toward the place where the boat was kept, and where there
+were now no less than four boats.</p>
+
+<p>But they took them all in order that none might be left for the
+pursuers, when it should occur to them to take up the chase; and then,
+with the strength of desperation, and guided by Nick, who had been twice
+over the route without being blindfolded, they made their way silently
+and swiftly through the maze of the swamp, to dry land at the other side
+of it.</p>
+
+<p>"We have not made good our escape yet," said Nick, as they climbed the
+grade of the railway. "If only a train would come along now, so we could
+flag it&mdash;hark!"</p>
+
+<p>Even as he spoke, a freight came around the curve toward them, and Nick,
+giving the unconscious form of Madge into the care of Chick, leaped out
+upon the track between the rails, and, at the risk of his life, stood
+within the glare of the advancing headlight and waved his coat for the
+engineer to stop.</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately it was a freight, and it was going rather slowly. The
+engineer saw the frantic appeal, and closed his throttle and applied the
+brakes.</p>
+
+<p>The party was taken aboard, and Black Madge was locked up in the jail at
+Calamont. She jeered at her captors, assuring them that she would be
+free again, and that when she was they had better remember who and what
+she was.</p>
+
+<p>Nick and his assistants then returned to New York,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> pretty thoroughly
+tired out by their experiences with Black Madge and her followers.</p>
+
+<p>The following day Nick Carter called upon the president of the E. &amp;
+S.&nbsp;W. R.&nbsp;R. Co., and told him the story of the capture of "Hobo Harry."</p>
+
+<p>"Also, I want to tell you," said the detective, "that I was one of the
+burglars that robbed the bank at Calamont. I see there is quite a stir
+about it. But I know where the loot is concealed, and if you will raise
+a hundred men for me I will go back and clean out that swamp, and not
+only return the property to the bank, but I will find almost all that
+has been stolen from different places for a long time."</p>
+
+<p>Arrangements were at once made to carry out Nick's plans, but the
+detective was not quick enough.</p>
+
+<p>The news of the arrest of Black Madge had spread through the surrounding
+country like wildfire, and, by the time Nick and his force of railroad
+employees reached the place, the gang had fled, and the people of the
+near-by towns, having formed vigilance committees, had swooped down on
+the stronghold in the swamp.</p>
+
+<p>Nick and his men, however, destroyed everything that remained, with axes
+and matches, and what they could not destroy in that way they blew up
+with dynamite, so that the place no longer offered a refuge for the
+hoboes.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X.</h2>
+
+<h3>ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.</h3>
+
+
+<p>It was about a week later that Nick Carter received a note from the
+president of the railroad which caused him great astonishment. It was
+brief and to the point. It read:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Can you call on me at once? Black Madge has
+escaped."</p></div>
+
+<p>That was all, but it was enough to stir the detective to action, and,
+taking Patsy, who happened to be in when the message arrived, along with
+him, Nick at once visited the office of the railroad.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Carter, it didn't take long for Black Madge to make good her
+threat, did it?" said the president as he rose and shook hands with the
+detectives.</p>
+
+<p>"I think," replied the detective, smiling, "that, considering the
+trouble we were put to in capturing her, it was a very short time for us
+to hold her. Now, what can I do for you, Mr. Cobalt?"</p>
+
+<p>"Do? Why, you can catch Black Madge again for us."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," said the detective, smiling. "Can I? Well, possibly."</p>
+
+<p>"You see," the president continued, "we have called<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> a hasty meeting of
+the board since the information of the escape of Black Madge came to us,
+and we have decided that no effort shall be spared to get that woman
+into custody again. At liberty, she is a constant menace to the welfare
+of the road, and of every town along the line, as well as of everybody
+who lives in those towns."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll admit that she's a bad one," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"We don't want her at liberty. With the following she has, she is a
+dangerous woman&mdash;much more dangerous than a man would be in her
+position."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know about that. But she is dangerous enough without argument
+about it."</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly. We want her caught. And we want you to catch her."</p>
+
+<p>"I imagine that this time, Mr. Cobalt, it will be rather a harder task
+than it was before."</p>
+
+<p>"Why so?"</p>
+
+<p>"She will be very much more on her guard now than then. And, besides,
+she knows enough about me to know that now I will most certainly hunt
+her down."</p>
+
+<p>The railway president was thoughtful a moment, and then he said:</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Carter, the very manner of her escape is a menace to us."</p>
+
+<p>"How is that?" asked the detective. "The first and, therefore, the only
+information I have had on the sub<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span>ject was that contained in your
+message, which told me merely that she had escaped. What is there that
+is particularly interesting about the manner of her escape?"</p>
+
+<p>"Then you have not heard about it, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have just informed you that I have heard nothing."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, to say the least, her escape was characteristic. Her hoboes did
+it for her."</p>
+
+<p>Nick raised his brows.</p>
+
+<p>"You don't say so!" he exclaimed. "Well, we might have expected
+something like that, I suppose. I regarded it as a little bit
+unfortunate that the arrest was made in the county where it was, for
+that compelled us to put her temporarily in the Calamont jail&mdash;and I
+thought at the time that the Calamont jail was a trifle close to her
+stamping ground. Now, suppose you tell me exactly what happened."</p>
+
+<p>"You know Calamont, of course?" asked the railway president, and the
+detective smiled broadly.</p>
+
+<p>"I know very little about it," he said, "with the exception that I
+assisted in the robbing of a bank that is located there."</p>
+
+<p>It was the president's turn to smile.</p>
+
+<p>"That was a queer experience for you, Carter, wasn't it? But the
+president of that bank is quite willing that you should rob it again on
+the same terms. You know we fixed him all up again, and my com<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span>pany
+promises to keep a large deposit there now. Altogether, they regard your
+descent upon the bank as a very fortunate experience for them."</p>
+
+<p>"No doubt. Now about that escape."</p>
+
+<p>"Calamont is a village of about three thousand inhabitants. That bank,
+for instance, is the only one there."</p>
+
+<p>"What has that&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Wait a moment. Calamont has suffered a great deal from the depredations
+of the hoboes, and now has a force of special constables, whose duties
+consist in arresting and taking to jail every tramp who crosses the
+borders of the village. The other night, when Madge made her escape, the
+jail was filled with them."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh," said the detective. "I begin to understand."</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly."</p>
+
+<p>"It was a put-up job on their part to get as many of their kind as
+possible in the jail for that night, and then to take their queen out of
+it; eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Precisely; and that is just what they did do. You see, the tramps began
+coming in early in the day. They made intervals between the times of
+their arrivals, and they appeared at different parts of the town, so
+that before anybody realized it, the jail was about filled with them.
+But they seemed not to know one another, and so the residents of the
+town went peacefully to sleep that night, as usual."</p>
+
+<p>"Well?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span>"Well, in the morning when they woke up, the jail had been
+gutted&mdash;literally gutted."</p>
+
+<p>"In what sense do you mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"In every sense."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me what you mean, please."</p>
+
+<p>"I mean that all the tramps who had been locked up there overnight had
+disappeared; that they had managed to break into the main part of the
+jail, and that when they went away they took Black Madge with them; and
+that before they went away they passed through the jail with axes and
+smashed everything in sight. They tore down partitions, they smashed
+doors, and where the doors could not be smashed, they destroyed the
+locks. They tied up the jailer, and threatened to kill him&mdash;I regard it
+as a wonder that they did not kill him."</p>
+
+<p>"So do I. Go on."</p>
+
+<p>"That is all there is to it. They went there, of course, with the
+deliberate intention of rescuing Black Madge&mdash;and they did it."</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose they must have taken to the woods north of the railway line;
+eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"You've guessed it, Carter."</p>
+
+<p>"That is a wild country up through there, Mr. Cobalt."</p>
+
+<p>"You bet it is. I used to go through there every fall on a hunting
+expedition, when I was younger.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> The country hasn't changed much since
+that time. It is as wild as if it were in an uncivilized country,
+instead of being surrounded by&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I understand. Then you do know something about that country up through
+there, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I used to boast that I knew every inch of it; but, of course, that
+wasn't quite so, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"Yet you remember it fairly well?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think so."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me something about it, for that is, I think, where I have got to
+search for the woman we are after."</p>
+
+<p>"There isn't much to tell about it, save that it is wild and uneven;
+that the formation is limestone, and the timber is largely red oak. The
+mountains&mdash;or hills, rather&mdash;are not high, but they are precipitous,
+rocky, impassable, full of ravines, and gulches, and unexpected
+depressions, and scattered around through that region there are
+innumerable caves, too."</p>
+
+<p>"That is bad," said the detective. "It will make it so much the harder
+to dislodge the hoboes."</p>
+
+<p>"So you have got your work cut out for you this time, and no mistake."</p>
+
+<p>"Could you suggest a competent guide for that region, Mr. Cobalt?"</p>
+
+<p>"Old Bill Turner&mdash;if he would go."</p>
+
+<p>"Who is he?"</p>
+
+<p>"An old hunter, who used to take me out with him,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> and who afterward
+served as guide for me. But he is an old man now."</p>
+
+<p>"Where does he live?"</p>
+
+<p>"In Calamont. You will have no difficulty in finding him. Ask the first
+man you meet in the street to direct you to old Bill Turner, and he will
+do it."</p>
+
+<p>"That part of it is all right&mdash;if he is not too old to go."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I think he can be induced to do it. Old Bill likes the looks of a
+dollar as well as any man you ever knew. You have only to offer him
+enough, and his rheumatism will disappear like magic."</p>
+
+<p>"Then that part of it is all right, too. I am to understand that I have
+the same free hand in the matter that I did before?"</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. Your directions are: Catch Black Madge and break up her
+gang."</p>
+
+<p>"And that, I suppose, is about all that you have to say to me at
+present."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; unless you have some questions to ask."</p>
+
+<p>"Not one, thank you. I will ask them of Black Madge&mdash;when I catch her."</p>
+
+<p>"Good! I hope it won't be long before you can ask them."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think it will be very long; only, she is a little bit the
+smartest woman I ever tried to handle."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI.</h2>
+
+<h3>PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.</h3>
+
+
+<p>When Nick Carter and Patsy left the office of the railway president,
+they strolled in silence down the street until they came to a
+restaurant, and, entering, they found a secluded table in one corner,
+where they seated themselves and gave the order for luncheon.</p>
+
+<p>When it was brought to them, and the waiter had departed, Nick said to
+his assistant:</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Patsy, we start about where we began on the other case, with the
+single exception that we have broken up the stronghold in the swamp. It
+is safe to say that Madge has no less than fifty men around her, and
+probably as many more. I should not be surprised if there were fully one
+hundred in the gang, all told."</p>
+
+<p>"Nor I."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I shall start for Calamont as soon as I have finished with the
+meal I am now eating."</p>
+
+<p>"And what do you wish me to do?"</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to do a serious thing, and a dangerous one, Patsy."</p>
+
+<p>"Good! That is what I would like to do."</p>
+
+<p>"I think that Black Madge rather liked you in your character of a young
+Irish crook; but I think also that she had some suspicion of you."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span>"There isn't any doubt of that."</p>
+
+<p>"And, therefore, it will be an extremely dangerous thing to do to return
+there, and still represent yourself as the same character."</p>
+
+<p>"Gee! Is <i>that</i> what you want me to do?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. Do you suppose it can be done?"</p>
+
+<p>"It can be tried."</p>
+
+<p>"You must not forget that they will look upon you with suspicion."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't forget that."</p>
+
+<p>"They will connect you with their misfortunes at once. Handsome,
+particularly, after being so nicely fooled by me, will be even more
+suspicious of you."</p>
+
+<p>"I think I can get around Handsome, all right. It is Madge I am shy of."</p>
+
+<p>"There will be one thing in your favor, Patsy, if you <i>do</i> undertake
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"If I <i>do</i> undertake it? Of course, I shall undertake it."</p>
+
+<p>"Then there will be one thing in your favor."</p>
+
+<p>"What is that, please?"</p>
+
+<p>"The very fact that you <i>do</i> go back among them in the same character in
+which you appeared before. I am inclined to think that now they would
+not take in a new man, no matter how well he might be recommended; but
+one that they have known before will stand a lot better chance with
+them."</p>
+
+<p>"I think so."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>"The very fact of your returning will go far to allay any suspicions
+they might have had about you formerly. It would never occur to them
+that if you were really a detective that time, you would dare to return
+to them in the same character."</p>
+
+<p>"You are right about that."</p>
+
+<p>"And, consequently, if you succeed in passing the investigation of the
+first few hours, you will be all right."</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to try it, anyhow."</p>
+
+<p>"Good, Patsy! But don't for a moment forget or neglect the danger you
+will be in every minute you are there."</p>
+
+<p>"I will not."</p>
+
+<p>"You will have to cook up a good story&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I have that all ready now."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you can start whenever you please. I shall not interfere with you
+in the slightest manner."</p>
+
+<p>"But I want a little further instruction, chief."</p>
+
+<p>"The only instruction I have to give you is this: Go there; get among
+them; become one of them, and one with them; pick up all the information
+about them that you can, with names and identifications, so that you
+will be a good witness against them when the time comes."</p>
+
+<p>"I can do that."</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to work independently of me entirely. Your only part of the
+game, so far as it is directly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> connected with my part of the work, will
+be to hold yourself in readiness to lend me a helping hand from the
+inside at any moment I may happen to want you."</p>
+
+<p>"Of course. That goes without saying. Are Chick and Ten-Ichi going to be
+in this?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. But I have not determined in what way as yet. You will have to be
+on the lookout for them. I may take one of them with me, and send the
+other in to follow you. Or I may send both after you, and go it alone
+myself. Or I may take them both with me. All that will depend upon what
+information I pick up when I get to Calamont."</p>
+
+<p>"I see."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Patsy, it is up to you. All that red you used on your hair before
+has not disappeared yet; but you had better go to a hair dyer's and get
+it fixed up over again. Then make yourself over once more into Pat
+Slick. I leave the rest to you. But as a last warning, I repeat&mdash;look
+out for that man Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I am not afraid of Handsome. He's a&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"He is a much smarter man than either of us gave him credit for. He is
+an educated man, who can represent the hobo so perfectly that you would
+never suspect that he has a college education. And he is devoted to
+Madge. Look out for him. He is her right-hand man, and he is dangerous.
+If he saw through you before, or had any idea that he did see through
+you, your life won't be worth a snap of your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> finger the next time you
+meet&mdash;unless you can manage to shoot first."</p>
+
+<p>"I know that, too. But he did not suspect."</p>
+
+<p>"I am not so sure of that. Madge had a little time to think things over
+while she was in the jail, and as soon as she got out, she and Handsome
+had a chance to talk things over. With their two heads together, they
+make about as dangerous a pair to play against as could be imagined."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. I'll stand pat&mdash;and bluff."</p>
+
+<p>"Be careful that they don't call you. That's all."</p>
+
+<p>"Is there any particular game afoot with the hoboes just now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not that I know of."</p>
+
+<p>"What specific charge are we after Madge for?"</p>
+
+<p>"No specific charge, save that she is accused of all the old ones. There
+is enough against her to send her to prison for the rest of her life,
+once she is caught."</p>
+
+<p>"I guess that's no pipe dream."</p>
+
+<p>"The railway people object to her being at liberty. That is about all."</p>
+
+<p>"And it is up to us to catch her?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's the idea."</p>
+
+<p>"What about the rest of the gang?"</p>
+
+<p>"If we can round up the entire outfit, that is what they want us to do.
+We are to get as many of them as we can, and make the charges after
+that. That is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> what you are going inside the ring for: to pick up all
+the information about the individual members of the gang that you can."</p>
+
+<p>"I see."</p>
+
+<p>"The battle cry is: Break up the gang! Root it out, so that it cannot
+grow again."</p>
+
+<p>"It is a pretty big proposition, chief; don't you think so?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is a big proposition, and no mistake. But I shall make my
+arrangements about that part of it, so that if we ever succeed in
+getting them rounded up, there will be no difficulty in carrying out the
+rest of it."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. Now, I suppose I have my instructions."</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And that's all?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And you don't expect to see me or to communicate with me again
+until&mdash;when?"</p>
+
+<p>"Until I see you inside the stronghold of the hobo gang."</p>
+
+<p>"That is all right. We'll meet there. I'll get there, and I'll find a
+way to make them believe in me."</p>
+
+<p>"I hesitate to send you on this business, Patsy. You have never in your
+life gone out to face quite as much peril as you will find in this
+expedition of yours now."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'll face it; and I'll overcome it, chief."</p>
+
+<p>"You're a good lad, Patsy. God bless you!"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't worry about me, chief; not at all. I will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> be all right. The hobo
+hasn't been born yet who can get away with me."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't forget that there are perhaps one hundred of them."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not forgetting it."</p>
+
+<p>"And that the worst and most dangerous of the lot is the man called
+Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll not forget that, either."</p>
+
+<p>Nick rose from the table and stretched out his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"Good-by, my lad," he said. "I don't know when we will meet again. A lot
+depends upon yourself. Even now I feel almost as if I ought not&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Don't say another word, please. I'm going to do what you have laid out
+for me to do. I wouldn't obey you now if you should change the order."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes, you would. But I won't change it."</p>
+
+<p>And so they parted there in the restaurant.</p>
+
+<p>And a little later Nick Carter took the train for Calamont.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII.</h2>
+
+<h3>BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.</h3>
+
+
+<p>When Nick Carter arrived at Calamont, he was disguised as a lumberman.
+It was not exactly the season of the year for lumbermen to enter the
+woods, unless they were measurers, who were engaged in preparing in
+advance work for the winter; so that was the character which Nick Carter
+adopted.</p>
+
+<p>Measurers go into the woods, measure trees on the stump, as it is
+called, blaze them with cabalistic marks, and otherwise prepare the way
+for the workers with the axes and saws who are to come later.</p>
+
+<p>It is well known that some of the most expert lumbermen in the world are
+French Canadians, and so Nick adopted this character, and he knew that
+as such he could wander at will around the woods and mountains of that
+region without danger of being suspected for what he really was.</p>
+
+<p>If any of the hoboes who made their headquarters in that region should
+see him, they would not be inclined to suspect what he really was, and
+the only actual danger he would stand in would be that they might be
+inclined to knock him on the head or shoot him from ambush in order to
+possess themselves of the few articles he had in his possession.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span>And for that very reason he adopted the disguise of a French Canadian
+lumberman, for it was rarely that they were supposed to have anything
+more than what they carried in sight on their backs.</p>
+
+<p>The month was September, and therefore warm. The leaves in some places
+were getting yellow and red, although there had been no frost; but oak
+leaves turn earlier than others.</p>
+
+<p>When he descended at Calamont Station, he stood there on the platform
+until the train had pulled out, and the other passengers who had arrived
+by it had departed their several ways. Then he approached the
+baggageman.</p>
+
+<p>"Me want find ze man named Beel Turner," he said slowly.</p>
+
+<p>"What's that?" asked the baggageman.</p>
+
+<p>"Me want find Beel Turner."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Bill Turner, is it? Well, go up that street there until you come to
+the post office. You'll like enough see an old, white-whiskered chap
+standing there, chewing tobacco. That'll be Bill Turner."</p>
+
+<p>"Beel Turner? He ees known here? No?"</p>
+
+<p>"Known here? Gee! He has lived here since the oldest inhabitant was a
+baby. He has always lived here. He is about a thousand years old, my
+man; but as strong and as lively as a kid yet. You'll find him somewhere
+around the post office."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>Nick thanked him in his broken English and strode up the street.</p>
+
+<p>Sure enough, when he arrived in the vicinity of the post office, he saw
+a white-whiskered man standing there, and he approached him at once.</p>
+
+<p>"You ees Beel Turner?" he asked modestly, sidling up to the man.</p>
+
+<p>"I be," was the response, while Bill Turner fixed his clear gray eyes
+upon the detective. "What might you be wantin' of me, stranger?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have&mdash;hush!&mdash;I have some money for you, Beel Turner. Can you take me
+where we can talk so that nobody will overhear us?"</p>
+
+<p>Turner eyed him suspiciously for a moment; then he turned abruptly away
+with the remark:</p>
+
+<p>"Come along with me, stranger."</p>
+
+<p>Nick walked beside him through the town to the very end of the main
+street. Then they turned into a roadway, which led up a steep hill for
+some distance, and which presently brought them to a modest cottage that
+was almost hidden under the brow of the hill.</p>
+
+<p>"Here is where I live," said Turner. "I live here all alone, 'cept a cat
+and two dogs. But the dogs hev got old like me, now, and they can't go
+out among the hills as they used to; although, bless you, I reckon I kin
+walk jest as fur as ever I could, if I try. Come in."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span>Nick followed him inside, and Turner offered him a rocker near the open
+window. The whole house was as neat and clean as if it had the care of a
+woman.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, mister," said Turner, "what hev ye got on yer mind?"</p>
+
+<p>"In the first place," replied Nick, in his natural voice, "I am not what
+I seem to be. I am not a lumberman, or a Frenchman&mdash;or a Canadian. I am
+a detective."</p>
+
+<p>"Sho! You don't say so. Well, that beats me. Sure, ye do it fine,
+mister. I would never hev suspected at all that you are not what you
+seem. But go on."</p>
+
+<p>"I have come here after that gang of hoboes who infest the neighborhood
+for fifty or sixty miles around this place. I am principally after the
+woman who is their chief. Do you know who I mean?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon ye must be referrin' to that there Black Madge and her gang."</p>
+
+<p>"That's right."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, yer up agin' a proposition. That's all I kin say about it."</p>
+
+<p>"I know that; and what I want of you is to get you to help me with that
+proposition, Bill Turner."</p>
+
+<p>"Ain't I too old?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a bit of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Is there good pay in it?"</p>
+
+<p>"The very best; and there is fifty dollars down for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> you right now&mdash;if
+you are inclined to do as I want you to do."</p>
+
+<p>Nick took a roll of bills from his pocket as he spoke, and laid it on
+the table before the avaricious glances of the old man.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, sir," said Turner slowly, "all I've got to say is this: If I can
+do what you want done, I'll do it. I want that money as bad as anybody
+could want it and not grab it right now where it is lying; but I have
+never had a penny in my life that I didn't get honestly, and I am afraid
+that I'm too old to do what you want done."</p>
+
+<p>"I tell you that you are not."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, in that case, I'll take the money and put it in my pocket&mdash;so.
+There! Now, go ahead. If the work is honest, and such as an honest man
+can do, I'll do it&mdash;if I ain't too old, and you say I ain't. But if the
+work ain't honest, I'll return your money. Now, what is it, mister?"</p>
+
+<p>"I want you first to promise that you will not reveal my identity. I
+must be Jules Verbeau to you to the end, and you must forget that I am
+not he in fact."</p>
+
+<p>"You kin consider that done, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Second, I want you to answer some questions for me."</p>
+
+<p>"Fire away."</p>
+
+<p>"How well do you know the hills and mountains,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> the ravines and gulches,
+the rocks and the caves around this region?"</p>
+
+<p>"As well as I know that dooryard in front of you," replied the old man,
+pointing through the window. "I know every inch of the country&mdash;every
+inch of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, another question which you will not understand at once: Do you
+know how to use a pencil, and is your hand steady enough to draw plans
+for me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir. I began life as a draughtsman; but that was when I was a
+boy."</p>
+
+<p>"That will suffice. Now&mdash;could you draw a plan of different parts of the
+mountains, so it would be plain enough for me to follow without your
+being present with me?"</p>
+
+<p>"That would depend upon you, sir. If you are a man who has some
+woodcraft in your make-up, I say yes. It would depend upon you."</p>
+
+<p>"We will consider that question answered, then. Now, have you any idea
+to what part of the mountainous region around here&mdash;say, within fifty
+miles of where we are seated&mdash;the hobo gang would select in which to
+hide themselves?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think I could guess it to a dot."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because there is one region up among those hills which is exactly
+fitted for them; and from which you couldn't drive them out with a
+thousand men. That's why!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span>"Good. That sounds as if it might be the place they would select. How
+far is it from here, as you would travel afoot."</p>
+
+<p>"A matter of thirty miles."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, can you draw me a plan of that region?"</p>
+
+<p>"I kin."</p>
+
+<p>"And how to get there?"</p>
+
+<p>"I kin."</p>
+
+<p>"And are there caverns there? Do you suppose those people are hiding and
+making their headquarters in caves?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, to both questions. The hills round that 'ere region are
+honeycombed with caves. Some of 'em is big, and some of 'em is little;
+but there's a lot of 'em there."</p>
+
+<p>"Good; and you know them well enough to give me a working plan of them?
+What a sailor would call a chart?"</p>
+
+<p>"You bet I do."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, another subject: Have you ever traveled away from here? Have you
+ever been to New York, for instance?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never in my life. I've always lived right around here. I don't suppose
+I have been ten miles away from here, except in the woods, in forty
+years. But in the woods I sometimes used to go a good ways."</p>
+
+<p>"I've no doubt of that. How would you like to make a visit to New
+York?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span>"I should like it very much&mdash;only it would cost such a lot, you know."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose your expenses were paid?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, that would be different."</p>
+
+<p>"How much, in cash, will you take for your whiskers, Mr. Turner?"</p>
+
+<p>"Now what the devil do you mean by that? Are you making fun of me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all. I was wondering if fifty dollars more, down, would induce
+you to shave off your whiskers."</p>
+
+<p>"Humph! Jest tell me what you are getting at and I'll answer you."</p>
+
+<p>"This: I want to disguise myself so that I look like you. I want to go
+out in the mountains as you would go out. While I am making believe that
+I am Bill Turner, I want you to take a trip to New York, and to live
+there, at my house, and take it easy, see all the sights, go to the
+theatres and the museums, and all that, until I return, and I want you
+to shave off your whiskers, and let me blacken your brows and otherwise
+make some changes in your appearance, so that if any of the people from
+Calamont should happen to meet you in the street down there they
+wouldn't say, 'Why, there is Bill Turner!' Would you consent to do
+that?"</p>
+
+<p>"For another fifty dollars down?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"I would. When do you want me to shave?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span>"I will tell you in good time. First, I want you to fix up those plans."</p>
+
+<p>"Hadn't I better git about it right now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. I think you had. And I will remain here with you while you do it
+in order that you may explain things to me as you work upon them."</p>
+
+<p>"That's a good idee, too. I can make you know them mountings as well as
+I do, in a short time. I knows 'em so well&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"That reminds me. Do you happen to know by sight, or have an
+acquaintance with, any of the members of that gang?"</p>
+
+<p>The old man shifted uneasily in his chair, and at last he replied:</p>
+
+<p>"I know one of them&mdash;purty well. He calls himself Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>"Good! What does Handsome know about you, Bill?"</p>
+
+<p>"He don't know nothin' about me, 'cept that I'm a woodsman, and that I'm
+too old to do him any harm. I helped him once, and once he helped me a
+leetle, and we're sort of friends. But I ain't never seen him but twice
+in my life, and then both times I met him in the woods, so I ain't never
+mentioned nothin' about him to other folks."</p>
+
+<p>"That's splendid! It is just what I hoped. It couldn't be better! I want
+you now to tell me what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> you talked about when you and Handsome met each
+other those two times in the woods."</p>
+
+<p>"That's easy. The first time, I was walking through the woods, up about
+where you are going&mdash;that is, it was in that region&mdash;when I heard
+somebody hollerin' fur help. At first I couldn't tell for the life of me
+where the hollerin' come from; but after a leetle I located it up on the
+side of one of them steep hills, and so I crawled up there. Well, when I
+got there, I found that a man had slid into a hole in the rocks, and
+that he couldn't git out nohow. If I hadn't happened along the chances
+are that he'd starved before he'd ha' been helped out."</p>
+
+<p>"And as it was&mdash;what?"</p>
+
+<p>"I helped him out. I didn't have no hatchet, but I had a good huntin'
+knife along with me, and I managed to whittle down a good-sized spruce,
+which I trimmed so's to make a sort of ladder of it. When that was done
+I lowered the butt end of it into the hole, and Handsome&mdash;that was who
+it was in the bottom of the hole&mdash;he climbed up so's I could get hold of
+him, and then I pulled him out. There wasn't much to that, was there?"</p>
+
+<p>"It saved his life."</p>
+
+<p>"Probably."</p>
+
+<p>"Wasn't he grateful?"</p>
+
+<p>"Suttingly."</p>
+
+<p>"What did you talk about after that?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span>"We sot down there a spell and chinned, that's all. He axed me who I
+was, and I told him. He axed me if I was long in these parts, and I told
+him allers. He axed me where I lived, and I told him about this cottage.
+That's all&mdash;only he said he was a hobo, and that he was called Handsome.
+I allowed that the people who called him that lied mightily; but I
+didn't say so jest then."</p>
+
+<p>"What more was talked about?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nothin'."</p>
+
+<p>"When was the next time you saw him?"</p>
+
+<p>"That was in the middle of the summer, and it was farther south&mdash;not far
+from the railroad tracks."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what happened then?"</p>
+
+<p>"That was the time he helped me."</p>
+
+<p>"How was that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't never tell you exactly how it was, but somehow I had got my
+foot wedged in the root of a tree, and I had been tryin' an hour to git
+it out, without success. The tree was hard, and I was just tacklin' that
+root with my knife&mdash;I'd have cut through it in about an hour, I
+reckon&mdash;when 'long comes that feller Handsome that I had saved from the
+hole in the rocks. He had an axe on his shoulder, and when he spied me
+he stopped, and laughed, and laughed until I got mad.</p>
+
+<p>"'Caught in yer own trap, ain't ye?' he axed me.</p>
+
+<p>"'I be,' says I. 'You've got a axe, and mebby you kin help me out o'
+it.'</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span>"Well, he did. He chopped the root in a jiffy, and I was free; but,
+bless you, I could 'a' done it myself with my knife in a hour, anyhow.
+All the same, I was grateful to him, and we sot down on a log and
+chinned for a while."</p>
+
+<p>"What about?"</p>
+
+<p>"He asked me what I was doing around there, and I told him that I was
+thinking of looking over the swamp below the tracks a leetle, with some
+idea of settin' traps there late this fall and winter, and he said as
+how he wouldn't advise me to do it. He said as how I wouldn't be likely
+to ketch the sort of animals I was after, and that some of the animals
+might ketch me; and, as I ain't exactly a fule, I ketched onto what he
+meant, and I ain't been nigh that place since. And then it turned out
+afterward as I thought it would, them hoboes had a hidin' place in that
+very swamp."</p>
+
+<p>"Right you are, Bill!" said Nick, laughing. "Is that all the
+conversation you had with Handsome?"</p>
+
+<p>"Every bit of it."</p>
+
+<p>"And you have never seen him since?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never. Hold on; he axed me that time if I had ever mentioned the fact
+of our fust meetin', and I told him I had not. He seemed pleased at
+that, and he told me never to mention it. I allowed that I didn't see no
+reason why I should, and he laughed at that and seemed entirely
+satisfied."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span>"That is excellent, Bill. Now, we will get at those plans. I don't want
+to lose any time."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you mind telling me why you axed me all about them two meetings?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not at all. When I go out into the woods in the character of Bill
+Turner, I am likely at some time to run across Handsome himself. I want
+to be posted, so that he won't know but what I am you. I don't want him
+to catch me; see?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. But do you suppose you kin fix yourself to look enough like me
+so's he won't know the difference when he sees you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>The old man shook his head.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't believe it," he said, "but maybe you can. How about the voice?
+Your voice ain't no more like mine than a&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I can do that, too," replied Nick, exactly simulating the voice in
+which the old man was speaking; and he looked around him in wonder, and
+then at the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"It does beat all!" he said at last. "I guess you're some too many for
+me, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Shall we get at those plans now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Right away."</p>
+
+<p>Turner brought out paper and pencil, and, having cleared the top of his
+table, he began to work.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>First he drew a large circle on the paper, and at one edge of it he made
+a cross.</p>
+
+<p>"That there cross is Calamont," he said. "Where we be now; and all
+that's inside of the ring I've made lies to the east of here, from
+nor'-nor'east to sou'-sou'east&mdash;and east. You understand?"</p>
+
+<p>"Perfectly."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, jest about in the middle o' that ring is the place where I think
+them fellers would hide. It's the best place for them."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me about it before you draw anything; or, rather, talk while you
+are drawing."</p>
+
+<p>"That's jest what I'm going to do. Now, you follow my pencil and pay
+attention."</p>
+
+<p>"Go ahead," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"When you leave here&mdash;if you start from Calamont, which I suppose you
+will&mdash;you start right about here. You take a general direction nor'east
+from here at first. You'll find a path through the woods after you git
+about two miles from here, and that path will lead you several miles.
+But about here it'll disappear, and you won't have nothin' to guide you
+'cept what I show you and tell you now."</p>
+
+<p>"Exactly," replied the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"Up here, at about the time you lose all trace o' the path, you'll come
+to a deep ravine. You want to follow up the middle of that, to the top.
+And when you git to the top of it you will think that you have run<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> up
+ag'inst a cliff, and there ain't no gettin' out of it without goin'
+back.</p>
+
+<p>"But that ain't so. There's a waterfall at the end of the ravine. It
+comes around a sort of a twist in the rocks, and if you ain't afraid of
+gettin' damp, you follow around there, and you will find as nice a piece
+of steps cut in them stones as you ever saw in your life. Indians cut
+'em more'n a hundred years ago, so I'm told.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, they take you to the top of that cliff. When you're up there, you
+find you're in another ravine, not so deep as t'other. Right here that
+would be," he added, making a mark with the pencil.</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"About a mile farther up that second ravine you want to leave it. You'll
+find a big dead oak that hangs out over it, and beside the dead oak
+there is a path up the side of the ravine. It is one of my own paths.
+You get up it by hangin' onto two things you find there for the purpose.
+I put 'em there more'n twenty years ago, mister."</p>
+
+<p>"Go ahead."</p>
+
+<p>"When you git to the top, you want to branch off this way&mdash;so. You'll
+find a clearin' about there, and off to the east you'll see some high
+hills. You want to make for them."</p>
+
+<p>"And those hills, I suppose, is my destination."</p>
+
+<p>"That's where the caves are. That's where you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> will find the gang if
+they are hiding anywhere in that 'ere region."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, tell me about the caverns. Tell me how to find them."</p>
+
+<p>"They're easy enough to find&mdash;some of 'em is; others ain't. Wait a
+minute."</p>
+
+<p>He pushed that paper aside, and took a fresh one.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, when you come to the hills, you will approach 'em at what we call
+the Dog's Nose. So named because that's what it looks like. It's a rock
+that sticks out right about here, and you can't miss it. It looks
+exactly like a dog's nose, stickin' out and smelling things.</p>
+
+<p>"You want to go right up under that there dog's nose; and when you git
+there you'll see a hole in the rock that ain't no bigger than the lower
+half of that window. It's a leetle bit of a hole, and it's as dark as a
+pocket inside it, too. Nobody, even if they found the hole, would ever
+think of going in there. It ain't invitin' to look at."</p>
+
+<p>"How did you happen to go into it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I didn't. I came out of it. I got lost in that cave for three days
+once, when I was a boy, and when I found my way out I came out of that
+hole. Nobody knows about that entrance but me, though I suppose lots of
+folks knows it's there."</p>
+
+<p>"And it communicates with the cave?"</p>
+
+<p>"It does. It'll take you to any part of the cave;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> and there is only one
+rule to follow in going through it. You'll want a light, though."</p>
+
+<p>"I've got the light. What is the rule?"</p>
+
+<p>"Always&mdash;no matter where you are in any of them caves, take the way to
+the right. Never take a gallery to the left, goin' in either or any
+direction. It's a rule that holds good in them caves. It's a sort of way
+that nature provided so's you could find your way through there; and I
+happened to discover what it was."</p>
+
+<p>"It all sounds very simple and easy."</p>
+
+<p>"And it is, if you've got the pluck and the sand. But it's a ticklish
+place. There is a good many places in there that I ain't never explored,
+and don't want to; and it's safe to bet that the hoboes ain't done it,
+neither. I reckon, mister, that that's about all I kin show you&mdash;hold
+on, though!"</p>
+
+<p>"What now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, there's one place up there which it might be handy for you to
+know about, and I don't think anybody but me knows about it, either."</p>
+
+<p>"What is that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, you might find occasion to want to hide yourself away while you
+are in there."</p>
+
+<p>"That is more than likely, Bill."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, just arter you pass through the hole that is under the Dog's
+Nose, and about twenty rods from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> there, you'll find a place where there
+is a bowlder sort of set into the rocks. You won't notice it unless you
+look for it, but it is there. Under it you'll find a small stone wedged
+fast. If you pull out that small stone, and then push on the big rock,
+it'll swing around like it was on a pivot, and you kin step inside the
+hole it leaves, and close up the door after you. You'll find an
+interestin' place in there, too, if you ever have occasion to use it,
+mister; and nobody will find you there, either."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The detective passed the remainder of that day, and much of the night,
+in old Bill Turner's company, and during that time they talked
+incessantly about the mountains to which Nick was going, about the
+caverns in those mountains, and the trails through them; and when the
+conversation was finished Nick felt that he could find his way without
+difficulty wherever he cared to go among them.</p>
+
+<p>When he saw that the old man was tired out, he sent him to bed, and
+himself dropped upon a couch in Turner's living room, where he slept
+like a top till morning.</p>
+
+<p>Soon after dawn they were both astir; and after they had eaten some
+breakfast, and Turner had made his usual pilgrimage to the post office,
+they began again upon the plans and went over them for the last time.</p>
+
+<p>And then came the task of making the changes in their personal
+appearance. This, to the layman, sounds like no easy task; but to Nick
+Carter it was merely the practicing of an art of which he was thoroughly
+a master.</p>
+
+<p>He had brought with him the things necessary to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> accomplish the changes;
+and when the old man returned from the village he set to work&mdash;first
+upon himself&mdash;for he knew that he must make his own disguise letter
+perfect if he hoped to deceive such a man as Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>He first made up his face, not with paints, but with stains that would
+not wash off, to represent the leathery, weather-beaten countenance of
+the old man; and here he was, perhaps, fortunate in the fact that the
+profusion of white whiskers worn by the old man rendered his face the
+easier to copy, and in reality concealed much of it from view.</p>
+
+<p>Then he adjusted the beard.</p>
+
+<p>But not as false beards are supposed to be adjusted. This was done
+almost hair by hair. That is, the beard was divided into tufts of hair,
+and each tuft was stuck on with a glue of Nick's own creation, so that
+there was no danger that it would drop off under any circumstances&mdash;and
+so that it could not be pulled off without drawing patches of skin with
+it.</p>
+
+<p>And this was as it should be, since if any one should suppose that the
+whiskers might be false, and should seize them and pull sharply upon
+them, they would resist the effort exactly as if the beard was natural.</p>
+
+<p>In height the two men were about the same. In figure, the old man was
+possibly somewhat stouter than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> Nick; but there was not enough
+difference to be noticeable.</p>
+
+<p>The detective occupied about three hours in making up that disguise, so
+particular was he about it; but when it was finished at last it was
+perfect. So perfect, indeed, that Turner regarded him in amazement; then
+came closer to look into his eyes, and at last he said:</p>
+
+<p>"I'm glad, Mr. Carter, that I didn't meet you on the street in that rig.
+It would have frightened me to death. I'd have been sure that I was dead
+and had met my own ghost, out for a walk."</p>
+
+<p>That night, when the train bound for the city passed through Calamont at
+half-past eleven, a man climbed aboard of it who&mdash;if anybody had noticed
+him particularly&mdash;it would have been supposed was the same French
+Canadian lumberman who had appeared there the day before.</p>
+
+<p>But there was no one there save the ticket agent, and he did not notice
+particularly. It is certain that he had no idea that in the black-haired
+man who went away was old Bill Turner.</p>
+
+<p>But so it was. Nick had made the old man up in a representation of the
+Frenchman; or at least near enough to it so that in the darkness the
+difference would not be noticed; and the old man, being made to appear
+young, really felt young, and he went away joyously.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span>In his pockets he carried letters; one was to Chick, and the other was
+to Joseph, his confidential servant, in case Chick should happen not to
+be at home when Turner arrived there.</p>
+
+<p>And those letters gave instructions that Turner was to be treated to
+everything he wanted, and that Chick and Ten-Ichi should take turns in
+showing him about the city. Nick assured them that they could help him
+quite as much in that way as if they were among the mountains with him,
+assisting him in the actual work.</p>
+
+<p>And the next morning&mdash;the morning after the departure of Turner&mdash;Nick
+took the old man's place in the customary stroll, or hobble would be a
+better word, to the post office.</p>
+
+<p>He stopped and talked with people as he met them, having posted himself,
+with the old man's aid, in what he was to say. And he stood around the
+post office steps for two hours, as Turner was in the habit of doing.</p>
+
+<p>He was trying out the part; trying it on the dog, so to speak. And he
+was thoroughly satisfied with the result.</p>
+
+<p>In his talks there in front of the post office he gave it out that he
+was going to take another trip into the woods; and as it was the season
+of the year when Turner had been in the habit of being absent, no
+surprise was felt. And that afternoon he literally pulled up stakes and
+started.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span>Once he was in the woods, Nick quickened his pace. He realized now that,
+figuratively, he had burned his bridges behind him, and that he must see
+the thing through to the end.</p>
+
+<p>He did not fear the consequences at all; he felt that there was only one
+chance of his failure, and that was in the shrewd eyes and keen
+intelligence of Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome had met Turner twice and talked with him each time. Nick knew
+Handsome well enough to know that the outlaw would have studied Turner
+very closely at those interviews; the question now was, would Handsome
+detect the fraud?</p>
+
+<p>Nick did not think it likely; and, anyhow, the risk had to be taken.</p>
+
+<p>That night the detective made himself a fire and camped in the woods; in
+the early morning he started on again.</p>
+
+<p>In due course of time he came to the ravine, and went up it to the top
+as the old man had directed him to do. And he went around the "rocks
+with a sort of a twist in them" until he found the steps that were cut
+in the stones, and so mounted to the top.</p>
+
+<p>Far up the second ravine he found the dead tree that hung over it, and
+the pathway up the side of the hill beside it; and that night he camped
+again in the woods.</p>
+
+<p>He had not far to go that second morning, after<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> he had eaten some
+breakfast, before he arrived at the Dog's Nose. It was ten o'clock in
+the morning when he got there.</p>
+
+<p>All that morning Nick had noticed signs that he was approaching the
+region where he would find the hobo gang. He had seen where trees had
+been chopped down and corded up for firewood; and there were many other
+signs that many men were in the vicinity.</p>
+
+<p>When he came to the shelter of the Dog's Nose, he stopped there, and,
+having fixed himself a temporary camp, resolved that he would remain
+there until night, for he had some hope that some of the hoboes would
+happen along, and that he could talk with them.</p>
+
+<p>That was his game; not to sneak upon them unawares, but to let it be
+known that he was in the neighborhood, so that Handsome would come to
+him. He wanted that ordeal over with Handsome as soon as possible.</p>
+
+<p>He was destined not to be disappointed. The afternoon was well advanced
+when Handsome suddenly stepped out of a cluster of balsams, and stood
+before him.</p>
+
+<p>He had approached as silently as an Indian; as if he had passed his life
+in woodcraft, and, indeed, Nick had no doubt that he had.</p>
+
+<p>For a moment he stood there near the balsams, silently regarding the
+detective; and Nick, perfectly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> acting the part of Turner, looked up and
+nodded, but said nothing.</p>
+
+<p>After a little Handsome strode forward, no longer taking care to remain
+quiet; and he seated himself on a log near Nick, and facing him, while
+at the same time he toyed with apparent carelessness with a revolver he
+held in his hand.</p>
+
+<p>"What brings you here, Turner?" he asked at last.</p>
+
+<p>"The season of the year brings me," was the reply. "I have come here
+every autumn at this time for more'n fifty years."</p>
+
+<p>"Indeed!" Handsome looked at him with new interest. "Is that true?" he
+asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't have any reason to lie to ye, would I?" asked Nick. "Old
+Bill Turner hasn't missed a year in fifty years in coming here, Mr.
+Handsome."</p>
+
+<p>"Then you must know these hills mighty well, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"I know every inch of 'em; every leaf that falls on 'em, almost. That's
+the way I know 'em."</p>
+
+<p>"And do you know about the places under the hills as well?"</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean the caves?"</p>
+
+<p>"I do."</p>
+
+<p>"I know 'em purty well&mdash;yes. There is some parts of 'em that nobody
+knows, I reckon; and while I&mdash;well, maybe I don't know all about 'em,
+and maybe I'd get lost in 'em now; only I don't think so."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>"What do you know about that hole up there, under that rock that is
+shaped like the nose of a dog?"</p>
+
+<p>"I know it's a hole. I reckon that's about all that anybody knows about
+it. It's a dark sort of a place. I ain't got no fancy for goin' into
+it."</p>
+
+<p>"Does it connect with the main part of the cavern?"</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe it does, and maybe it doesn't; but most likely it does; only I
+don't think that anybody would be after trying to find out."</p>
+
+<p>"You have never been through that hole, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't never been inside of it," replied Nick, with perfect truth.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome thought a moment, and then he asked suddenly:</p>
+
+<p>"Turner, who sent you up here?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody sent me; why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't the people of Calamont send you to find me and my followers?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nary a bit of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, now that you have seen me, and know that I am here, and therefore
+guess that others are here with me, what would you do about it if you
+should go back to Calamont now, and somebody there should ask you if you
+had seen me?"</p>
+
+<p>"Look here, Handsome, I don't meddle with other people's affairs. I want
+'em to leave mine alone, and consequently I leave theirn alone. You hear
+me speak!"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span>"But what answer would you make if that question was asked of you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I probably shouldn't answer at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose an answer was insisted upon?"</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't never found nobody yet who could make old Bill Turner answer a
+question if he didn't want to."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean that you would not wish to answer that question?"</p>
+
+<p>"Look here, Handsome, if you want me to promise that I won't tell on ye,
+why don't you say so? What you and your fellers do ain't none of my
+funeral, so long as you leave me alone. Do you think I came up here to
+spy on you?"</p>
+
+<p>"That is what I thought when I first discovered you."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, forget it. I ain't carryin' no tales. I'd 'a' been dead long ago
+if I had done that. Life's too short. I ain't never mentioned to nobody
+about the two times I have met you, and I ain't likely to, either. I
+ain't got time. You ain't robbed my house, and I don't care what you do
+as long as you leave me alone."</p>
+
+<p>Again Handsome was silent a while, and then he said suddenly:</p>
+
+<p>"Turner, would you like to go to our camp?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; that is, I ain't particular about it. You might think I was trying
+to spy on ye&mdash;or some of the men might, and that would make me mad."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span>"They won't think anything of the kind if I take you there."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. If you want me to go&mdash;I'll go."</p>
+
+<p>"Come along, then. You have got this far, and we've either got to trust
+you, or kill you. It will depend upon you which that will be."</p>
+
+<p>Keeping in his mind's eye the plans that Turner had made for him, Nick
+knew perfectly the route over which Handsome led him on the way to the
+camp, to which he had referred.</p>
+
+<p>It was a picturesque place. Turner had described it in detail to the
+detective, and had mentioned it as the most likely place for the outlaws
+to make their headquarters. He had said:</p>
+
+<p>"Ye see, mister, it's a sort of sasser in the mountings. There ain't
+only one way to git to it from the outside, and that is a purty hard
+one; so hard that half a dozen men could hold it agin' a thousand; and
+the other way to git to it is through the caves; and ye've got to know
+them galleries mighty well in order to find yer way through. I think
+you'll do it, because you act as if you had been in caves afore."</p>
+
+<p>The place was a "sasser" in the mountains, sure enough. On every side of
+it there were frowning cliffs, which rose hundreds of feet in the air;
+and these cliffs were as inaccessible from the outside as they were from
+the saucer itself. There was only one<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> pathway, and that was through a
+narrow fissure, barely wide enough for one big man to walk through it.</p>
+
+<p>And this latter could have been stopped up with rocks in half an hour,
+so that nobody could get through it.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome made the supposed Turner walk in front of him when they entered
+the fissure; and thus it was that they appeared on the opposite side of
+it; then Handsome took the lead.</p>
+
+<p>Already the hoboes had erected cabins of slabs and of logs; and many of
+them were still at work building others; but as with one accord they
+ceased to work when they saw Handsome approaching with the old man; and
+they stared at him.</p>
+
+<p>"Have you got another one, Handsome?" somebody called out to him; but
+Handsome deigned no reply, passing on in silence, and leading the way to
+a cabin that was larger and better than the others, and which stood
+exactly in the centre of the miniature valley.</p>
+
+<p>Nick guessed that this was the temporary home of Black Madge, and he
+was, therefore, not at all surprised when she stepped out upon the porch
+in front of it.</p>
+
+<p>She showed her white and even teeth, and smiled, in her own bold way, as
+Handsome approached her, with Nick in tow; and she asked, as soon as
+they were near enough:</p>
+
+<p>"Whom have we here?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span>"It is the old chap I have told you about, Madge," replied Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"Sent here to spy upon us, I suppose," she smiled scornfully. "Why
+didn't you shoot him at once instead of bringing him here?"</p>
+
+<p>Before Handsome could reply, Nick wheeled upon him.</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't I tell ye so?" he demanded, with a show of anger. "Didn't I tell
+ye so? Didn't I say that they be thinking that I was a spy; but you
+wouldn't have it so? Tell me that."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think he is a spy, Madge," said Handsome. "Remember that I have
+known him for a considerable time. And I have found him on the level."</p>
+
+<p>Madge shrugged her shoulders.</p>
+
+<p>"All right," she said. "That is, all right this time. Only now that he
+is here, he stays. Don't forget that."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I haven't forgotten that."</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody leaves this valley without my permission; not a single one."</p>
+
+<p>"They are all pretty well satisfied that you mean that, Madge."</p>
+
+<p>"Now, tell me what you brought the old man here for."</p>
+
+<p>"Because he knows every inch of the galleries inside those caves. I want
+to know about them myself, and I want the old man to teach me about
+them. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> time will come, Madge, when we will be mighty glad to know
+about those galleries."</p>
+
+<p>"Possibly so," she replied. "Do as you like with him; only
+remember&mdash;nobody leaves this valley without my permission. When I get
+the men thoroughly organized and so they will do what I want them to do,
+then I will turn loose upon the world one of the best&mdash;and the
+worst&mdash;criminal organizations that has ever been heard of. Do what you
+please with the old man. He looks old enough to have been dead long
+ago."</p>
+
+<p>"And as old as I am, madam, I've never before heard a woman speak so to
+me," said Nick, as if he were hurt by it.</p>
+
+<p>Madge turned to him quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"You mustn't mind what I say&mdash;always Turner," she said. "I have a habit
+of speaking harshly at times; but I am not unkind to those who are true
+to me. Do you happen to know a man who is named Nick Carter?"</p>
+
+<p>She asked the question suddenly, as if she expected the utterance of the
+name would make the supposed Turner start with surprise; but Nick looked
+at her quite calmly, and replied:</p>
+
+<p>"I know the name. He's a detective chap, ain't he? I heerd about him;
+something about that bank robbery."</p>
+
+<p>"Is he in Calamont now, Turner?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, ma'am; he ain't."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span>"You speak positively."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I know he wasn't there when I came out of town; and I didn't hear
+that he was expected there, nuther. And if he had been expected there
+I'd 'a' heerd it. There ain't nothin' goin' on in that town that I don't
+hear about."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know if he has been sent for?"</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't heerd nothin' about his bein' sent for, ma'am."</p>
+
+<p>"If, some day, I should decide to send you into the village to do some
+errands for me, do you suppose you could make some inquiries about Nick
+Carter for me, and at the same time forget all that you know about us,
+who are here?"</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon I could, ma'am."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll think about it. I may want to use you," she said; and turned away.
+But she stopped and turned toward them again, calling to Handsome, who
+went to her side; but Nick could hear the conversation that passed
+between them.</p>
+
+<p>"What about that fellow Pat?" she heard Madge inquire; and he could
+barely refrain from giving a start that might have betrayed him, for
+that question told him plainly that Patsy had already managed to arrive
+among the hoboes, and&mdash;that his fate still hung in the balance. He
+listened eagerly for Handsome's reply.</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't had a chance to examine him yet," he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> said. "You wished me to
+talk with him before I brought him to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Go and bring him here now. Leave Turner here with me until you return."</p>
+
+<p>"Get up there on the porch and sit down, Turner," he said. "Smoke your
+pipe if you wish to. The queen won't object. I'll be back in a moment."</p>
+
+<p>But when Handsome had hurried away to bring Patsy, and Nick had seated
+himself upon a rustic chair, Madge came and stood in front of him.</p>
+
+<p>"Turner," she said severely. "Tell me the truth now. What brought you
+into this neighborhood?"</p>
+
+<p>"The season of the year brought me," Nick replied to her as he had done
+to Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"Who sent you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Nobody sent me, ma'am."</p>
+
+<p>"Swear to that."</p>
+
+<p>"'Tain't necessary. I have said it."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know what would happen to you if I should find that you were
+acting as a spy?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose I could guess."</p>
+
+<p>"I'd have you burned at the stake, just as Indians used to burn their
+captives."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, ma'am, I reckon I've lived too long a time now to be much afraid
+of death. When a man has passed eighty, he ain't much afraid of things."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you as old as that?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>"Old Bill Turner is eighty-four, ma'am; but he don't look it, does he?"</p>
+
+<p>"No. I wish I could feel sure of you. I wish I could feel sure that you
+are not a spy."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, ma'am, it's my experience that we can't somehow help our feelings
+much. If you are in doubt about it, treat it as you would an
+earache&mdash;with silent contempt. Doubts, ma'am, are suthin' like boils;
+they're the devil and all while you've got 'em; but they do get well
+arter a while. You ain't got no call to doubt old Bill Turner, as I
+knows on."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll talk with you again, Turner. In the meantime, see that you walk in
+a straight line."</p>
+
+<p>"I can't do that no more. My old feet ain't so steady as they used to
+be. But I'll do the best I can."</p>
+
+<p>"We can't ask anybody to do more than that. Now keep silent. Here comes
+Handsome with another man who I fear may be a spy."</p>
+
+<p>Patsy, with his hair a brick-red, and with spots and freckles on his
+face that were a sight to see, came forward at that moment, led by
+Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>His hands were tied together behind his back, and he looked as if he had
+been treated rather badly. However, there was a grin upon his face as he
+approached, and ducked his head in what was intended to be a polite bow
+to the queen of the outlaws.</p>
+
+<p>"So you have come back again?" she demanded of him abruptly.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span>"Yes, I'm back, your honor&mdash;I mean, ma'am," he replied, grinning the
+more.</p>
+
+<p>"Where have you been while you were away, then? Tell me that?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, sure, your majesty, I was a-runnin' most of the time. When the
+fire broke out down there, and the divil to pay generally, they all
+thinkin' as how it was y'rsilf that was bein' burrnt to death inside the
+cottage, I helped all I could until it was found out that it wasn't you,
+at all, at all, but a dummy that had been fixed up to look like you. And
+then when the hull bunch of the spalpeens went crazy and tried to find
+out what had become of you, it wasn't long until I found out that I was
+all alone in that place, the rest having gone in search of you. And
+after that I thought it wasn't healthy for me around there."</p>
+
+<p>"I think you're a spy, Pat," she said coldly.</p>
+
+<p>"Divil a bit of it. Who says so? Don't you belave it!"</p>
+
+<p>"Why did you not stay with the rest of the men, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"Divil a wan of me can tell that same, now. I clean forget. I think I
+was scared out of me two wits. If I had been a long time wid yez, instid
+of bein' there only wan day, sure I'd have remained, so I would. But I'd
+been there so little that I thought it wasn't healthy for me. That's
+all."</p>
+
+<p>"What made you come back now?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span>"Sure I heard that ye'd escaped from your jailers, and I knowed that
+you'd be after protecting me. Didn't you tell me that I was all right?
+And, thinks I, if I can find 'em now, sure the quane will be after
+takin' care of me; and here I am."</p>
+
+<p>"When I heard that you had returned, I made up my mind to have you
+shot!"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, glory be to gracious! Don't be after doin' that same, your honor!
+Faith, why should ye be after shootin' the likes of me? I ain't done
+nothin' at all."</p>
+
+<p>Patsy, with a perfect assumption of fright, fell upon his knees before
+the woman and raised his hands beseechingly to her.</p>
+
+<p>And for a moment she looked down upon him with cold contempt in her
+eyes. It was evident to Nick, who was watching the scene narrowly, that
+she was coldly calculating the chances of letting him live, and that a
+breath upon the scales either way would decide her.</p>
+
+<p>For a long time she remained in the same attitude, and then she raised
+her head and spoke to Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"When one in my position is in any doubt," she said coldly, "there is
+only one thing to do, and that is to give myself, not the other person,
+the benefit of the doubt. That is what I have decided to do, Handsome.
+Take him away."</p>
+
+<p>"What shall I do with him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Take him back to the cabin where he was tied up,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> and tie him up again.
+To-night, when the fires are lit, we will convene a court and try him. I
+will be the judge at that trial, and after it is over we will probably
+hang him. I see no other way. Take him away. Go."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV.</h2>
+
+<h3>BLACK MADGE GIVES JUDGMENT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>It was a strange scene upon which the light of a huge camp fire shone
+that night, in the mountain retreat of the outlaws.</p>
+
+<p>A stake had been set in the ground, and to this Patsy was tied, so that
+all could see him plainly. Somewhat to one side, on a huge rustic chair,
+made by one of the men, the queen was seated in state, ready to act as
+judge at the trial that was to begin, and Cremation Mike was selected as
+prosecuting attorney.</p>
+
+<p>A jury of twelve of the men had been drawn, only it was a foregone
+conclusion that they would bring in their verdict according as the queen
+should direct.</p>
+
+<p>Handsome acted as master of ceremonies, and around them was gathered the
+entire membership of Black Madge's hobo gang&mdash;as villainous a looking
+crew as might be imagined.</p>
+
+<p>As yet, no one had been appointed to defend Pat, and now Madge raised
+one hand, when she was ready to begin the trial, and she announced:</p>
+
+<p>"There is no one who has offered to act as attorney for the prisoner.
+This trial will afford you some amusement, my men. We will have a good
+time out<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> of it, anyhow, before we hang him. I will appoint counsel for
+him."</p>
+
+<p>They were all silent, waiting, and presently she spoke again.</p>
+
+<p>"I will name the old man there, Bill Turner, as counsel for the defense.
+Will you defend the man, Turner?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll try to, madam, though I don't know anything about the case. He may
+be guilty for all I know. What is he charged with?"</p>
+
+<p>"With being a spy."</p>
+
+<p>"If you want me to defend him, I'll do my best."</p>
+
+<p>"Go ahead, then. Let the trial begin," she ordered.</p>
+
+<p>The prosecution took up the case; that is, Cremation Mike got upon his
+feet and began to make a speech to the jury. He said:</p>
+
+<p>"We've got proof enough that the man is a spy, ain't we, mates? We all
+know what happened down there in the swamp, the time that Nick Carter
+got among us, and carried away Black Madge almost before our eyes, and
+we none the wiser for it. We know how Nick Carter set the cottage afire
+after drugging Madge, and how then he fixed up a dummy in one of the
+windows, so that we would think that she was burning up. We know that,
+don't we, mates?</p>
+
+<p>"And don't we know that there were four men who came to our camp in the
+swamp at the same time, and who came together? Wasn't one of that four
+Nick<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> Carter himself? And were not two others of that same four Nick
+Carter's assistants? And who was the fourth one of that four? Why, it
+was that cove there, tied to the stake, and waiting for you to hang him.</p>
+
+<p>"Would he have been in that sort of company if he hadn't been made out
+of the same kind of cloth? Didn't he come there with that other outfit?
+Didn't we prove&mdash;that is, didn't Madge prove that one of the four was
+Nick Carter; that another of the four was his assistant, who is called
+Chick? And that still another of the four was another assistant, who is
+called Ten-Ichi?</p>
+
+<p>"And don't you know that Nick Carter has got still another assistant,
+and that his other assistant is named Patsy? Haven't you heard of that?
+It is true. And so is this fellow's name Pat&mdash;or Patsy. It is all the
+same.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, again, didn't they come here together? Didn't Handsome find them
+camping in the woods, waiting for a chance to get to our camp, and
+didn't this fellow tell him the first one of the bunch that he was
+looking for Hobo Harry, the Beggar King&mdash;and ain't Hobo Harry and Black
+Madge one and the same? I tell you, there ain't any doubt that the man
+is a spy, and that he ought to be hanged.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, do you guns remember what happened the night of the fire, the time
+when Nick Carter got away<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> with Madge, and took her to jail? I'll remind
+you of it. Don't you remember that when we found the other two out, they
+were sent to the quicksand pit? I was one of those who helped to throw
+them into the quicksand pit. Did you ever hear of anybody's getting out
+of that pit alive? I never did until that incident; but I have found out
+since that both those assistants, Chick and Ten-Ichi, are alive and
+kicking, down in New York, this very day.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, who got 'em out of that quicksand pit, then? Why, this fellow!
+That is where he was, and what he was doing while we were fighting the
+fire, and don't you forget it! We was all too busy to remember about the
+men we had chucked into the sand; but he didn't forget. For why? Because
+he was one of them himself, and because he had determined all along to
+go to that pit as soon as ever he could, and get them out of it.</p>
+
+<p>"How'd he get 'em out, you ask? I don't know. I only know that he did
+get 'em out somehow, for they are out. I know that for certain."</p>
+
+<p>Nick, in the character of Turner, leaped to his feet.</p>
+
+<p>"I object!" he cried out. "This man ain't tryin' this case fair. I don't
+know who he is, and I don't keer a cuss; I only know that you app'inted
+me to defend him, and I'm a-goin' to do it till you tell me to stop. I
+object, ma'am, to the course he is adoptin'. It ain't fair. He's making
+a lot of statements the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> which he ain't got a shadow of proof about. I
+don't know anything about that air fire he speaks about, 'ceptin' what
+I've heerd down at Calamont. But we ain't got the fire here as a
+witness; and we ain't got the quicksand here as a witness; and we ain't
+got the two men as he says was saved from it here as witnesses. And
+unless he can produce witnesses to testify to what he says about them
+air escapes, I move that the hull speech he made be strucken out, your
+honor. Let him call his witnesses to the stand, and swear 'em, or swear
+at 'em. Let him do suthin, 'cept standing up there and shootin' off his
+mouth."</p>
+
+<p>Madge smiled grimly. She was getting more enjoyment out of this affair
+than she had anticipated.</p>
+
+<p>"Call your witnesses, Mike," she said.</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't got none, Madge, to swear to what I have said, but every one
+here knows it is the solemn truth. I don't need no witnesses. However,
+I'll put Handsome on the stand fur a minute, about the way the bunch
+arrived at our camp, if you say so."</p>
+
+<p>"I think it would be a good idea. It would be more regular."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, Madge. Handsome, take the stand. Hold up your right hand,
+and swear that you'll tell the truth. That's all right. Now, did you
+hear what I said about your findin' that outfit in the woods north of
+the track?"</p>
+
+<p>"I did."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span>"Wasn't it the dead-level truth?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was."</p>
+
+<p>"The hull four was there, warn't they?"</p>
+
+<p>"They were."</p>
+
+<p>"And they was all strangers?"</p>
+
+<p>"They were."</p>
+
+<p>"You never seen any one of them afore that time, had you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never."</p>
+
+<p>"And, later, wasn't it found out that three of 'em were spies?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was."</p>
+
+<p>"And wasn't one of the spies Nick Carter himself?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And weren't the other two his assistants?"</p>
+
+<p>"They were."</p>
+
+<p>"Didn't they confess it?"</p>
+
+<p>"They did."</p>
+
+<p>"And weren't they afterward thrown into the quicksand pit to die?"</p>
+
+<p>"They were."</p>
+
+<p>"Did they die there?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't think they did."</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you know that they escaped?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm reasonably certain of it."</p>
+
+<p>"How did they escape?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know that."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span>"Isn't it your opinion that this galoot here&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"I object!" shouted Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, well," exclaimed Mike, in disgust, "ask him some questions
+yourself, then."</p>
+
+<p>"I will. Handsome, when did you first see them four in the woods north
+o' the track?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I don't know. Before dark that night."</p>
+
+<p>"Was they together?"</p>
+
+<p>"Part of the time."</p>
+
+<p>"Only part o' the time? What do you mean by that?"</p>
+
+<p>"They didn't come there together."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, didn't they? Where was you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I was hiding, and watching them."</p>
+
+<p>"So you saw 'em all when they arrived there, did you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Who got there first?"</p>
+
+<p>"This man&mdash;Pat."</p>
+
+<p>"Did the others appear to know him?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; but they didn't appear to know each other, either."</p>
+
+<p>"But if they were spies, and you afterward proved that they were, and if
+they got there, and found Pat already there, it would be natural that
+they should act as if they didn't know each other, wouldn't it, in order
+to deceive him?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose so."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span>"Have you ever seen anything suspicious about the prisoner?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; only his disappearance after the fire and the arrest of Madge."</p>
+
+<p>"P'r'aps he kin explain that."</p>
+
+<p>"He can't. He has tried already. You heard him. I don't call that an
+explanation, but it is probably the best he can give."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you be afraid to trust him now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Personally? I don't think I would."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, personally, you don't think that he is a spy?"</p>
+
+<p>"No; but I don't <i>know</i> that he isn't."</p>
+
+<p>"That'll do. I don't want to ask you any more questions." He turned to
+Cremation Mike. "Have you got any more witnesses?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"No," with a grin. "I don't need no more."</p>
+
+<p>"Maybe not. But I've got one witness."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! Have you. Who is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to put the prisoner on the stand."</p>
+
+<p>But Madge was plainly tired of the amusement already. She rose in her
+place, and her eyes were flashing darkly.</p>
+
+<p>"We will stop this farce here and now," she said. "It won't do any good,
+anyhow. I can see plainly enough that there are some here who believe he
+is a spy. I am a good deal of that opinion myself; and as there is a
+doubt in my mind, I'll just settle the thing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> right now. Jury, you can
+find the man guilty. That's what he is, probably."</p>
+
+<p>"Guilty," said the jury, with one voice, and grinning.</p>
+
+<p>"Prisoner," continued Madge, "you have got until to-morrow morning, at
+nine o'clock, to live. At that time the boys will take you to some
+convenient tree, and hang you by the neck until you're dead&mdash;and that
+settles it."</p>
+
+<p>Things looked dark for Patsy. It was quite evident that Black Madge was
+in deadly earnest in what she had said. One life more or less was
+absolutely nothing to her, and if there was the breath of a suspicion
+against one, it was, from her standpoint, better to put that one out of
+the way at once than to run any sort of risk by permitting him to live.</p>
+
+<p>Nor did the hoboes who had gathered there to hear and to witness the
+trial hesitate to voice their sentiments about it by loud cheering when
+Madge uttered the sentence of death. It would be a hanging, indeed, and
+it did not make much difference to them who was hung. It has been said
+before that they were much like wild beasts, or dogs, who are without
+any quality of compassion.</p>
+
+<p>When Nick walked away from the scene of the trial near the fire, he
+found that Handsome was beside him, and then, before either uttered a
+word, Madge joined them.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span>She was smiling as if she were well pleased with her evening's work, and
+she said to the detective:</p>
+
+<p>"You did well, Turner. One would suppose that you had at some time been
+a lawyer."</p>
+
+<p>"I'd 'a' got the man free if I'd had a fair judge and jury," replied
+Nick boldly, stroking the white whiskers he wore.</p>
+
+<p>Madge frowned. Then she laughed aloud.</p>
+
+<p>"I like you for your boldness," she said. "But have a care that you do
+not find yourself suddenly in the same predicament, Turner."</p>
+
+<p>"I'd be inclined to shoot myself afore I came to trial, if I should,"
+Nick retorted.</p>
+
+<p>They had reached Madge's cabin by this time, and now they mounted to the
+porch, and Nick pulled out an old pipe that Turner had given him, filled
+it, and lighted it.</p>
+
+<p>The detective was determined in his own mind that before the dawn of
+another day he would find some way to save Patsy; but how it was to be
+done he had no idea.</p>
+
+<p>He did not know yet what disposition they intended to make of him. For
+all he knew they might send him into one of the cabins and lock him up
+for the night. But he did know that unless he acted, Patsy would be
+murdered at sunrise the following morning, and he did not intend to
+permit that to happen.</p>
+
+<p>"Miss Madge," he said, after a pause, during which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> he had smoked in
+silence, "if it is all the same to you, I'd like to know what you intend
+to do with me to-night. I'm an old man, and I'm sorter 'customed to
+going to bed rayther early, so, if you don't mind, and you'll tell me
+where I'm to sleep, I think I'll turn in."</p>
+
+<p>Instead of replying directly to him, Madge turned to Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"What shall we do with him?" she asked. "You are responsible for his
+being here. I think I will turn him over to you."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Handsome, rising. "I'll take him to my own cabin.
+He'll be safe enough there. I'll be back in a minute, Madge."</p>
+
+<p>Nick followed him across the floor of the little valley to a hut that
+was at the opposite side of it, and close to the cliff&mdash;and Nick knew at
+once, from his recollection of the plan he had studied, that he was
+quite near to the entrance to the cavern.</p>
+
+<p>The cabin consisted of only one room, in which two bunks had been
+roughly built, and, after lighting a candle, Handsome indicated one of
+these, and said:</p>
+
+<p>"You can sleep there, Turner. Turn in when you like. To-morrow we will
+explore the caves together."</p>
+
+<p>"Right you are," said Nick, yawning widely. "I shan't need any rocking
+this night. My old legs are tired out for sure."</p>
+
+<p>Two minutes after the departure of Handsome, Nick blew out the candle,
+and for a time he stretched<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> himself in the bunk, lest Handsome should
+return to see that all was right. But it was speedily evident to the
+detective that Handsome had no suspicion whatever of him, and had,
+therefore, left him to his own devices.</p>
+
+<p>But Nick knew that it could not be very long before the outlaw would
+return to seek his own rest and repose, and that he must, therefore,
+determine upon what he was to do before he should return.</p>
+
+<p>Ten minutes he lay there, and then he rose slowly and cautiously from
+the bunk and crept to the door which had been left open, and peered out.</p>
+
+<p>The fires were still blazing merrily, and many of the men were gathered
+around them. Some of the men were playing cards, and the others were
+engaged in various ways. At all events, they one and all seemed to have
+forgotten his existence, and that was what he chiefly desired.</p>
+
+<p>Nick knew in which cabin Patsy was a prisoner. He could see it from the
+doorway where he was standing, almost opposite him at the other side of
+the valley. The distance in feet from his own position was about the
+distance of a city block&mdash;two hundred feet.</p>
+
+<p>The old silver watch, the size of a turnip, which Turner had carried
+forty years or more, was in his pocket, and by the light of the stars
+Nick managed to see the time&mdash;ten o'clock.</p>
+
+<p>"There is no time like the present," he mused to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> himself, while he
+hesitated in the doorway. "If I wait until all is quiet, I will stand
+all the more chance of being discovered; and, besides, it won't be long
+until Handsome returns here, and after he has come and crawled into his
+bunk it will be next to impossible for me to get out of here without
+rousing him&mdash;unless I should drug him, and that will not do at all.
+Handsome is altogether too fly for that. He would know that he had been
+drugged.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, if it wasn't for these white whiskers, I could creep around the
+edge of the bottom of the cliff to the cabin where Patsy is, without
+being noticed; and I dare not take them off&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>He stopped there. There was absolutely no use in conjecturing upon the
+"ifs" of the question, and so, after another moment, during which he
+studied the lay of the land intently, he slipped noiselessly out at the
+door and around behind the cabin, and from there crept on his hands and
+knees to the bottom of the cliffs. And there he discovered what he had
+been unable to see in the imperfect light. The grass there was quite
+tall, where it had not been trampled by the feet of the motley crew that
+infested the place, and he found that by lying at full length and
+pulling himself slowly along on his stomach he would be able to conceal
+himself almost entirely from view.</p>
+
+<p>Nick made that half circle of the small valley, crawling in that way,
+and entirely without being dis<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span>covered; and in that manner he arrived
+directly in the rear of the cabin where Patsy was a prisoner.</p>
+
+<p>But here a new difficulty confronted him. There was a guard in front of
+the door, and that guard, strangely enough, was Cremation Mike.</p>
+
+<p>The cabin in which Patsy was a prisoner was built of roughly hewn logs,
+the crevices and chinks being stopped with mud and clay. The ground
+beneath it was hard&mdash;rocky, in fact; so there was no possibility of
+digging under the logs without tools to do it, and even then it would
+have taken too much time to accomplish it.</p>
+
+<p>Nick turned his attention to Cremation Mike. He was seated upon a
+convenient stump, smoking a short pipe. His back was toward the door of
+the cabin, and he was about ten feet from it. The door itself had been
+fastened by passing a freshly cut sapling across its front, and slipping
+either end of it into rustic slots that had been hastily fashioned for
+the purpose.</p>
+
+<p>It was plain that there was only one way to get Patsy outside of that
+cabin, and that was to overcome Cremation Mike; and, having determined
+upon this, Nick crept forward as silently as a shadow, and so rounded
+the corner of the cabin, and presently came up half standing, directly
+behind the unsuspecting outlaw.</p>
+
+<p>Nick did not wish to kill the man, but he did want to knock him out so
+effectually that he could not in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span>terfere in what was to follow, and
+therefore he had picked up a piece of round, smooth stone, which he had
+wrapped in his handkerchief.</p>
+
+<p>And now, with this improvised weapon, he struck Cremation Mike sharply
+on the back of his head, with the result that Mike pitched forward, and
+would have fallen to the ground had not Nick managed to catch him. Then
+he laid him down gently upon the ground, and turning swiftly, opened the
+door of the cabin.</p>
+
+<p>"Quick, Patsy!" he called in a sharp whisper. "It is I. Nick. Come."</p>
+
+<p>Patsy, who had not been bound, it seemed, leaped to the door with a low
+exclamation of surprise and pleasure.</p>
+
+<p>"Bully, Nick," he whispered. "I thought it was all up with me that time.
+And do you know, it never once occurred to me that the old man might be
+you. The disguise is perfect."</p>
+
+<p>"Come," said Nick. "There is no time for words now. Follow me, and do
+exactly as I do. I want to get back to my own sleeping place before my
+absence is discovered, if it is possible to do so. But, first, is there
+any sort of a chair or stool inside that cabin?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. A stool."</p>
+
+<p>"Bring it out, if you know where to put your hand upon it."</p>
+
+<p>Patsy brought it in a twinkling, and, placing it against the stump, Nick
+propped the senseless form<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> of Mike upon it, so that from the front it
+appeared as if he were seated there quite naturally.</p>
+
+<p>"He will come around presently," said Patsy, "and miss me."</p>
+
+<p>"Let him. That is what I want him to do," replied Nick. "Come on, now."</p>
+
+<p>He dropped upon his knees again, and, with Patsy following, they crept
+around through the grass again along the edge of the cliff, and at last
+reached the cabin from which the detective had started.</p>
+
+<p>But he did not stop here. He made at once for the entrance to the
+cavern, which was near at hand, and passed inside, with Patsy following
+closely behind him; and then with his electric flash light, he led the
+way along the corridor of the cave&mdash;for it was his object to find that
+hiding place to which Turner had directed him in case he found it
+necessary to hide.</p>
+
+<p>"Keep to the right always in that cave, no matter which way you are
+going," Turner had told him with emphasis, and remembering that now,
+while he wondered if, after all, there were two corridors to the cavern,
+he followed the rule, and almost on a run&mdash;for the passage was quite
+smooth before them&mdash;he led the way through.</p>
+
+<p>They came at last to the bowlder to which Turner had referred, and Nick
+removed the small stone from beneath it. And then he pushed upon it as
+Turner<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> had directed, with the result that the rock swung open before
+them, leaving an aperture through which they could easily pass.</p>
+
+<p>But Nick did not enter. Instead he thrust a candle and a box of matches
+into Patsy's grasp, and said to him:</p>
+
+<p>"Remain here until I come for you, even if you get hungry. I don't know
+any more about what is ahead of you than you do. I only know that you
+will be safe there. We have no time to talk now. I will shut this rock
+behind you."</p>
+
+<p>Then he turned and sped away.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV.</h2>
+
+<h3>NICK'S CLEVEREST CAPTURE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Nick Carter made his way as rapidly back through the cavern as he had
+gone through it with Patsy; but when he arrived at the entrance he came
+to a stop, and then went ahead again very slowly.</p>
+
+<p>He had no idea how long a time he had been gone, nor what might have
+happened during his absence. But when he peered out upon the valley,
+everything was apparently in the condition in which he had left it. If
+there had been any change at all, it was only that fewer of the men were
+gathered around the fires. Otherwise everything was the same.</p>
+
+<p>And so, with all the swiftness he could muster, he crawled to the cabin
+which Handsome had given him to occupy, entered it cautiously, and,
+finding it empty, crawled into the bunk that had been allotted to
+him&mdash;tired, but rejoiced to think that he had succeeded so well where
+there had been such small chance of success.</p>
+
+<p>And it so happened that he had barely laid himself down and composed
+himself to wait for developments, when a great cry went up, which was
+immediately followed by other shouts and loud curses&mdash;and Nick knew that
+the escape of Patsy had been discov<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span>ered, and that he had returned just
+in time to avoid the consequences.</p>
+
+<p>Almost immediately following upon the utterance of the shouts, the door
+of the cabin flew open, and Handsome leaped inside, his eyes ablaze, and
+his whole form quivering with rage&mdash;and he carried a flash light, which
+he threw at once into the detective's face; into the face of the man he
+supposed to be Bill Turner.</p>
+
+<p>Nick could see that the instant the light fell upon him Handsome seemed
+greatly relieved; and then, before the outlaw could utter a word, Nick
+cried out in the voice of old Turner:</p>
+
+<p>"What&mdash;what's all that row about, Handsome?" and he blinked his eyes as
+if he had just been awakened.</p>
+
+<p>"It's lucky for you that you don't know what it's about!" was Handsome's
+rejoinder. "Get out of that, Turner, and come along with me."</p>
+
+<p>"But, what's the matter?" demanded Nick, sliding out of the bunk. "What
+has happened?"</p>
+
+<p>"That fellow Pat has escaped&mdash;that's what!" was the reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Sho! You don't say so! Well, well, well! When did he do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't found out yet. Come along. I thought at first that maybe you
+had had a hand in it&mdash;but I see you did not."</p>
+
+<p>"What! Me?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span>Every hobo that belonged to the gang had gathered in the centre of the
+place near where the mock trial had been held, and they were talking
+earnestly together. Cremation Mike, with one hand held at the back of
+his head, was the centre of the group&mdash;or rather of the throng.</p>
+
+<p>But Handsome burst unceremoniously through the crowd and confronted
+Mike, Nick following at his heels.</p>
+
+<p>Black Madge forced her way through it at the same time from the opposite
+side.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Mike," said Handsome savagely. "Tell me how this happened."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know. All that I know is, I got a crack on the head from
+behind. When I woke up, the bar had been ripped off the door and the
+bird had flown. That's all I know."</p>
+
+<p>"How long ago did it happen?"</p>
+
+<p>"How do I know that? Unless some one can tell how long I've been
+unconscious. But I'll bet my hat that it ain't ten minutes. I don't
+think it's three minutes. He can't be far away, and"&mdash;grinning&mdash;"he
+can't get away. He can't go through the pass, because the guards are
+there; I posted them myself; and the only way in which he could hope to
+get out is through the cave, and I don't believe he could find his way
+through there. I know that I wouldn't try it myself. I'd rather stay
+here and be hung."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span>Madge interrupted the conversation here.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you think that he got out of the cabin without aid?" she asked of
+Mike. "Do you believe that it was he who struck you, Mike?"</p>
+
+<p>"I do, Madge. I'm sure of it."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, you weren't keeping good guard, that's all."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I never thought it was possible for him to get out of that cabin.
+It may be that I dozed. I didn't suppose I did, but&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"But," said Madge icily, "the point is this: The boys shall not be
+disappointed in the hanging bee they were to hold in the morning. It is
+up to you, Mike, to find the prisoner. If you don't find him in time,
+you shall hang in his place&mdash;that's all. I mean it."</p>
+
+<p>Cremation Mike's face turned to the color of chalk, for he realized that
+she did, indeed, mean what she said. For a moment he stood there
+trembling, and then he seized a lantern which one of the men was
+holding, and cried out:</p>
+
+<p>"Come along, whoever will help me. I know that he can't have gone far.
+He ain't had time. I know it. Come along."</p>
+
+<p>"Wait," said Handsome coolly; and he turned to Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Turner," he said, "I begin to think that it is fortunate that you came
+here when you did."</p>
+
+<p>"I am sure of it," said Nick in reply.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span>"You know that cave from end to end, don't you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think I do."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, you shall act as guide."</p>
+
+<p>"All right. I'm ready."</p>
+
+<p>But this short conversation had called the attention of Madge to the
+supposed old man, whom she had for the moment forgotten, and now she
+turned savagely upon him.</p>
+
+<p>"I believe that you are at the bottom of this," she said, her eyes
+blazing.</p>
+
+<p>Before Nick could make any reply, Handsome broke in.</p>
+
+<p>"That is nonsense, Madge," he said. "I know it. As soon as there was an
+alarm&mdash;as soon as Mike yelled out that the prisoner had escaped, I
+legged it for the cabin, and I found Turner just waking up from his
+sleep. He had no hand in it. He couldn't."</p>
+
+<p>"It's lucky for you," said Madge, still eying Nick sharply.</p>
+
+<p>"Will you guide us through the cave, Turner?" demanded Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"Sure."</p>
+
+<p>"Then, come on."</p>
+
+<p>"Hold on a minute," said Nick. "Don't you think it would be a good idea
+to send some of the men to guard the other entrances? If the prisoner
+hasn't had time to get through the cave yet, and if he should happen to
+find one of the ways out on the other side,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> he'd run right into the
+arms of whoever was on the watch."</p>
+
+<p>"Good!" said Handsome. "We know of two outside entrances. How many do
+you know about?"</p>
+
+<p>"Four," replied Nick. "Four, not counting the hole under the Dog's Nose.
+That may be an entrance; but one man can guard that."</p>
+
+<p>"Where are those entrances?"</p>
+
+<p>Glibly Nick described how they might be found, using the exact language
+that had been used by the old man in his description of them; and after
+a short delay four men were sent away to each of the entrances, on a
+run, with instructions to remain on guard before them until they should
+be relieved.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," said Nick, when they had gone, "we know that the prisoner can't
+escape. We know it's only a matter of time when he'll be
+caught&mdash;therefore, we needn't hurry. Don't you agree with me, Handsome?
+He can't get out of the cave at any of the entrances, without being
+captured or shot down, an', o' course, he can't come back this way
+without meetin' with the same fate. Ain't that right?"</p>
+
+<p>"I guess it is," agreed Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>"Ain't that right, Miss Madge?" asked Nick again, turning to her.</p>
+
+<p>"It sounds entirely reasonable," she replied. "There has been only one
+mistake made from the start of this affair, and that is that Pat was not
+shot down when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> he first showed himself here. As it stands now, he has
+temporarily made his escape. I am satisfied, now, that he is a spy, and
+I commission each one of you to shoot him down without mercy, on sight.
+I shall go with you into the cave to search."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you wish me to direct the search?" asked Nick, still standing
+quietly before her.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. What have you to suggest?"</p>
+
+<p>"This: There be four entrances outside o' the one here in this little
+valley. I should divide the men into four parts. I kin direct each party
+so that it won't have no difficulty in followin' the cavern and
+searching it thoroughly to the entrance. I'll take one o' the parties.
+How many men are there here now?"</p>
+
+<p>"Let me see," replied Madge. "Sixteen have gone away to guard the
+entrances, and four will have to remain here on guard. That takes away
+twenty. We still have eighty left."</p>
+
+<p>"Good. That'll give us twenty in each party. Now, madam, it's for you to
+say who'll lead them. Tell me who the leaders will be, and I'll instruct
+'em at once."</p>
+
+<p>She picked out four of the men, and ordered them to step forward; and,
+one by one, Nick directed each of them how to proceed after he had
+passed the entrance of the cavern with the men who were to follow him;
+and he made the directions so explicit that there was not one who had
+any doubt about being able to follow them.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span>It was as Nick had suspected it would be; that Madge did not yet trust
+him far enough to give him the sole leadership of one of the parties,
+but she directed that Handsome should go with him&mdash;and at the last
+moment, when they were ready to start, and after the other three parties
+had entered the cavern, she decided to accompany Nick's party herself.</p>
+
+<p>"I may as well go along," she said. "I would like to learn something
+about the interior of that cavern myself, and I don't know a better way
+to learn it than to go with you."</p>
+
+<p>And so it was that presently the detective found himself in the cavern,
+leading twenty-two persons, for the extra two were Madge and Handsome.</p>
+
+<p>And the course that Nick had selected for himself was the one that would
+take him past the hiding place where he had left Patsy; for it was no
+part of his plan that he should give the others even a chance of an
+accident of finding that hiding place.</p>
+
+<p>It had been shortly after eleven o'clock when Nick returned to the cabin
+after assisting Patsy in his escape; it was now after midnight.</p>
+
+<p>There were torches and lanterns in abundance scattered among the four
+parties that were searching; and, in the directions that Nick had given
+each party, he had taken good care that they should become thoroughly
+lost if possible. He had an object in this, as will be seen.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span>The way through the cave along the route which the detective had
+selected to follow was smooth and even, as we already know; but Nick
+made it as long and as rough as possible by taking the party off into
+some of the side galleries as they proceeded.</p>
+
+<p>He was looking for a place where he might lose some of them, and at
+least where he might, before the expedition was finished, succeed in
+separating them.</p>
+
+<p>What he chiefly desired was to finally get either Madge or Handsome
+alone with him.</p>
+
+<p>It was two hours later before they finally passed the bowlder behind
+which was the entrance to the hiding place where Patsy was concealed;
+but not one of the party so much as glanced toward it; and Nick led the
+way on past it to the exit&mdash;and that exit was not the hole under the
+Dog's Nose, but a larger one at some distance from it.</p>
+
+<p>There they found the four men who had been sent hither, and they
+reported that they had seen nothing; and cautioning them to remain on
+guard, Nick led his party back into the cave again.</p>
+
+<p>And then, after a few moments, he pretended suddenly to find that fifth
+entrance&mdash;the hole under the Dog's Nose&mdash;and there four other men were
+waiting&mdash;and they had seen not a thing to suggest the proximity of the
+prisoner who had escaped.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," said Nick, "I think we'd better s'arch them side galleries more
+thoroughly. If you'll return with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> me to the entrance from the valley,
+we'll start over again, and go into and through every one o' 'em. We'll
+divide our party into smaller groups o' three and four, and in that way
+we kin cover all of them at the same time. What do you say?"</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Madge, still looking upon him with suspicion. "But
+Handsome and I will remain with you, Turner."</p>
+
+<p>"That is what I hoped you'd do," replied Nick; but he spoke with a
+meaning which she did not understand.</p>
+
+<p>They followed the plan suggested by the detective. That is, they
+returned to the entrance from the valley, and there Nick divided his
+followers into six parties, thus arranging that four of the parties
+should contain four searchers each, one of them should contain three,
+and his own immediate party should consist of himself, with Handsome and
+Madge.</p>
+
+<p>To the leaders of each of these subparties he gave the necessary
+directions, with the result that he sent them off as they arrived at
+their respective galleries, and after a little he found himself alone
+with the two chiefs of the outlaws.</p>
+
+<p>"There ain't much for us to do now," he said. "There ain't much more
+searching as we kin do. There's only two galleries left for us to
+explore 'less we find some hiding place that's remained unknown until
+now."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span>"And that isn't likely, is it?" asked Madge. Her voice was still filled
+with suspicion against him.</p>
+
+<p>"You know as much about that ere as I do," he replied.</p>
+
+<p>But they searched each of the galleries without any result, and Nick
+finally directed the route so that at last they paused to rest directly
+in front of the movable rock behind which was the entrance to the place
+where Patsy was concealed.</p>
+
+<p>And Nick seated himself so that his own back was against that rock, for
+he did not care to run the chance that Handsome might lean against it
+hard enough to move it&mdash;at least, not until he was in every way prepared
+for that part of the drama.</p>
+
+<p>Madge was tired by this time, and she showed it. She leaned against the
+rocky wall and sighed deeply; and Handsome furnished the cue for the
+next scene&mdash;so perfectly that Nick could not have ordered it otherwise
+if he had tried.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm dry," said Handsome, yawning. "This is dry work, Madge. Don't you
+think we had better give the thing up for a time and wait. Pat will be
+starved out after a little. He'll have to come out and get caught."</p>
+
+<p>"If he ain't lost in the galleries," suggested Nick; and Madge replied:</p>
+
+<p>"No; we won't give it up. If you are dry, Handsome, suppose you go to
+the camp and get something<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> for us all. I wouldn't mind having something
+myself."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do it," said Handsome, rising. "Wait here."</p>
+
+<p>He was off like a shot, for now he felt that he knew the route
+sufficiently well through the caverns to find his way without
+difficulty; as, indeed, he did. And he had a lantern to light his path.</p>
+
+<p>Nick sat quietly until Handsome was well out of hearing, and then,
+purposely, he leaned very hard against the rock behind him&mdash;so hard that
+it moved, and he nearly fell upon his back inside the opening.</p>
+
+<p>With a well-simulated cry of surprise, he leaped to his feet, and stood
+staring, and Madge did the same.</p>
+
+<p>"A secret hidin' place!" cried out the supposed old man&mdash;and he pushed
+the rock farther in, thus making the opening even larger.</p>
+
+<p>Then he stooped forward toward it.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello in there!" he called lustily, for he wished to warn Patsy of what
+was taking place, and at the same time to instruct him what to do. "Come
+out of that, you&mdash;Pat! There are two of us here, and one is Madge
+herself. Come out of that!"</p>
+
+<p>"You fool!" exclaimed Madge.</p>
+
+<p>"Come out of that!" repeated the detective, pretending not to hear her.
+"Come out of that, or we'll come in after you!"</p>
+
+<p>There was no reply, and Nick turned to her.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span>"Come along," he said. "We'll go inside and find him."</p>
+
+<p>She had a revolver in her hand, and now she stepped quickly forward, for
+there was nothing of the coward about Black Madge. There was not a thing
+on earth that she feared.</p>
+
+<p>She stepped forward so quickly that she had passed inside the barrier of
+rock before Nick&mdash;as he intended she should&mdash;and then, as he stepped
+after her, he seized her quickly from behind&mdash;seized both her arms, and
+pulled them behind her with a suddenness that made her drop her weapon
+to the rocky floor.</p>
+
+<p>As he pulled her backward, she tried to cry out, but he had anticipated
+that, and already he had grasped her so that he could press one of his
+hands for an instant over her mouth, and at the same moment he called
+out:</p>
+
+<p>"Quick, Patsy! On your life! There isn't an instant to spare!"</p>
+
+<p>And Patsy was ready and fully prepared.</p>
+
+<p>He had approached them through the darkness at the first note of warning
+from Nick, and was in reality only a few feet distant when they entered
+the rocky passage; so that when the detective seized upon Madge and
+pulled her backward, Patsy was ready to leap forward and to give his
+aid.</p>
+
+<p>When Nick's hand was pressed over her mouth to stop the cry that rose to
+her lips, Patsy was there to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> seize her, also; and he did it; and,
+although she struggled fiercely, she was quickly overpowered, and a gag
+was thrust into her mouth.</p>
+
+<p>Then they tied her, hand and foot, with cords with which Nick had
+provided himself, and together they carried her far back into the recess
+behind the rock.</p>
+
+<p>"There is a big room here," said Patsy. "And it is stocked with
+provisions, and a stream of pure water trickles through it. One could
+live here a month without going out."</p>
+
+<p>"Good!" said the detective. "Carry her in there. Then when we have made
+her safe, we will wait for Handsome, and serve him in the same manner.
+And after that, I have got a plan which will work the whole thing out to
+a finish."</p>
+
+<p>Madge was glaring at him venomously all this time, for she could not
+speak. But her eyes were terrible to see in their utter ferocity.</p>
+
+<p>She knew now what the game was that had been played against her. She
+knew now that the man she had supposed to be old Bill Turner was all the
+time no other than Nick Carter himself.</p>
+
+<p>She could have bitten her tongue out with rage and chagrin. She fairly
+writhed in the ecstasy of her impotent anger.</p>
+
+<p>But they laid her gently upon the rocky floor, where there were some
+blankets over leaves&mdash;it was evident that Bill Turner had used this
+place as a retreat of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> his own, and had provided it for that purpose,
+like a schoolboy who finds a cave and makes a cache&mdash;and then Nick spoke
+to her.</p>
+
+<p>"You see, Madge," he said, "it is all up with you and your gang; or very
+nearly so. We are going out now to capture Handsome, and bring him here
+to keep you company. After that I will show you a trick that will make
+you green with envy, and that will finish up this hobo business of yours
+once and forever. Come on, Patsy."</p>
+
+<p>They left her there and returned to the entrance.</p>
+
+<p>"Now," said the detective, "there is only one way to make Handsome fall
+into the trap. We must leave this entrance open for him to discover when
+he returns. He will first miss us. Then he will see the hole behind the
+rock. Then he will step forward to look inside. Then no doubt he will
+call out. I will stand here and remain silent; and then Handsome will do
+one of two things&mdash;he will either come inside to search for Madge and
+me, or he will set up a yell for the others to come to him."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose he brings some of the men back with him?" asked Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"We have got to chance that."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what are we to do when he steps inside this hole&mdash;for he will do
+that?"</p>
+
+<p>"You stand over there in that niche," replied Nick.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> "When he steps
+inside the very nature of the place will bring his back toward me. I
+will tap him on the back of the head with my fist and knock him into
+your arms. You are to grab him with your arms around him, and hold him
+so that he cannot get at a weapon, and until I can get my fingers on
+him. That is all. Now, ready and wait."</p>
+
+<p>They had some time to wait; longer than Nick expected, and he began to
+fear that Handsome would bring some of the men back with him; but at
+last they saw the glimmer of his light as he approached, and Nick knew
+by the sounds he heard that Handsome was returning alone.</p>
+
+<p>Presently he appeared. He was calling out softly, for he could not
+understand why he had not been answered&mdash;and the light he carried
+prevented him from seeing the hole behind the rock until it was directly
+in front of him.</p>
+
+<p>And then he came to a sudden stop, and gazed at it in astonishment.</p>
+
+<p>"Gee!" Nick heard him exclaim. "Dogged if they haven't found a hole
+here. And they have gone into it, too. I wonder if that old cuss knew
+about it all the time?"</p>
+
+<p>He remained in doubt for a moment what to do; and then, as Nick had
+predicted, he stepped softly forward, and, holding his light aloft,
+peered through the opening.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span>But Nick had chosen his place of concealment well, and Handsome could
+not see him.</p>
+
+<p>Then Handsome called out:</p>
+
+<p>"Madge! Bill! Where the devil are you?"</p>
+
+<p>There was no reply, and he waited a moment before he called again. Then
+he repeated:</p>
+
+<p>"Madge! Madge!"</p>
+
+<p>When no reply came to this second call, he stood for some time in doubt,
+as if he thought of calling assistance to him before he entered that
+dark and unknown place; and once Nick thought he half turned, as if he
+had decided to summon some of the others.</p>
+
+<p>But he evidently thought better of this, for he turned about resolutely
+again, and boldly stepped into the opening. Two such steps brought him
+exactly into the position where the detective wanted him, and as soon as
+he had achieved it, Nick struck him with his fist.</p>
+
+<p>With a half-articulated cry, Handsome pitched forward and fell into the
+grasp of Patsy, who was ready for him; and then, when he would have
+struggled, other arms&mdash;Nick's&mdash;seized him from behind, and another blow
+fell upon him, striking him behind the ear, and rendering him half dazed
+for the moment.</p>
+
+<p>And then Nick, knowing that Patsy could hold him, turned about and
+closed the rock door of the retreat; and before Handsome had recovered
+his senses suf<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>ficiently to offer any resistance, the two detectives had
+bound him so securely that he could not move.</p>
+
+<p>"Take his feet," ordered Nick, then. "We will carry him back into that
+chamber, to keep Madge company."</p>
+
+<p>While they were doing that, Handsome managed to recover his powers of
+speech&mdash;for, now that the rock door was closed, Nick did not think it
+necessary to gag the man&mdash;and his powers of speech in this particular
+instance were something frightful to listen to.</p>
+
+<p>He was still swearing when they dropped him, none too gently, upon the
+floor of the cavern not far from Madge; and then Patsy lighted two
+bracket lamps with which the place was provided, while Nick smilingly
+removed the gag from Madge's mouth.</p>
+
+<p>And where Handsome had worn out his vocabulary of curses, Madge took it
+up, and completed it in masterly style, and there was really nothing for
+either of the detectives to say for a long time. But her breath was gone
+after a while, and she lapsed into sullen silence, closing her remarks
+with the request:</p>
+
+<p>"At least give me something to drink out of that bottle that Handsome
+went after."</p>
+
+<p>Nick could really do nothing less, and he complied; and the liquor
+seemed to restore some of her accustomed coolness, for she looked at
+Nick with an ugly gleam in her black eyes, and said:</p>
+
+<p>"You are Nick Carter again, aren't you?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span>"Again?" replied Nick, laughing. "I was always Nick Carter. I was so
+interested in that last interview I had with you, Madge, that I couldn't
+stay away; and now, when you condemned my assistant to death, you
+hastened the reckoning. That is all."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll condemn you to death yet&mdash;and watch you die, too!" was her
+retort.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI.</h2>
+
+<h3>NICK MAKES BAD MEDICINE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Handsome had also recovered from his paroxysm of rage by this time, for
+he was one who had the gift of knowing when he was beaten, and the logic
+to accept a situation when he knew that it could not be avoided.</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon you've got the drop on us, Carter," he said. "You've played
+the game mighty well, too. There is one thing about it that I would like
+to know, though, if you will tell me. Will you?"</p>
+
+<p>"What is it?" asked the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"I want to know if you have been old Bill Turner from the beginning. I
+want to know if it was you whose acquaintance I made in the first place,
+the time I was pulled out of the hole in the rocks, or if it was old
+Bill himself."</p>
+
+<p>"That was the old man himself," replied Nick, smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"And the second time I met him; was that him&mdash;or you?"</p>
+
+<p>"That was the old man, also."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, all that I can say is that you have played the part so devilish
+well that I find it hard to believe even now that you are not what you
+appear to be."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>"You're a fool!" said Madge spitefully.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I admit the impeachment, Madge. There isn't any doubt of it. I'm a
+fool, all right."</p>
+
+<p>"And you are up against it rather hard just now, Handsome; you and
+Madge," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"I know that, too. I'm no fool as far as that is concerned. What are you
+going to do about the rest of the gang?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'm going to capture the whole bunch," was Nick's rather astonishing
+reply.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see how you are going to do it," retorted Handsome. "There is a
+cold hundred of them, all told&mdash;and every entrance to the cave is
+guarded. You attended to that yourself."</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly, I did; because I foresaw this very moment."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, all that I can say is that you can see a cussed sight farther
+into a stone fence than I can."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll show you how it is done, if you are interested," replied the
+detective. "But, first, I am afraid that I will have to ask you to step
+out here a moment, into the other part of the cave, always remembering
+that if you make any kind of a break, down you go with a cracked skull;"
+and Nick leaned forward and loosened the cords around his ankles.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I know when my hands are in the air, Carter. If I make any breaks
+it will be because I think I see a chance of winning. What do you
+want?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>He rose stiffly to his feet as he asked the question; and Nick looked
+him in the eye as he replied:</p>
+
+<p>"I want you to remember, in the first place, that I am more than twice
+or three times as strong as you are, and that if you offer to give me
+any trouble I shall hurt you; and hurt you so badly, too, that you won't
+get over it right away. I am going to take you into the other part of
+this cavern, toward the door where we entered. I am going to free your
+hands, and then I shall ask you to put on these old togs that Turner has
+left here for a change of clothing in case he got wet&mdash;for I want these
+that I am wearing for Patsy. After you have made the change I shall tie
+you up again, and then you will see&mdash;what you will see. But, remember,
+if you refuse to obey me on the instant that I give an order, down you
+go, and I will take the clothing off your senseless body, instead of
+letting you do it, and keep well. Now, are you ready?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>Nick took him into the adjoining part of the cave, and held the light on
+him while he made the necessary change; for Nick had found some extra
+clothing of Turner's in the cave; and when that was done he tied
+Handsome up again, more securely than ever, and placed him on the floor
+again.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Patsy," he said, "you and I will make a change. You will play the
+part of old Turner, and I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> will play the part of Handsome. It is
+necessary for what we have to do."</p>
+
+<p>Nick first dressed himself in the outer clothes that Handsome had
+removed; and then he sent Patsy into the other part of the cave to put
+on the clothing he had taken off&mdash;the suit that he had worn as old
+Turner; and, while Patsy was making the change, he was himself busily
+engaged in removing the white beard and hair that he had been wearing.</p>
+
+<p>It will not be necessary to describe in detail this operation; it is
+sufficient to say that the two detectives worked steadily for a long
+time; and that when at last they were through with what they were doing,
+Nick had assumed the personality of Handsome, and Patsy was transformed
+into what Nick had been&mdash;old Bill Turner.</p>
+
+<p>When everything was in readiness, he saw to it once more that the bonds
+which held his two prisoners were sufficiently secure, and that there
+was no possibility of their escaping; and he went so far as to fasten
+them to the opposite walls, so that they could not crawl within reach of
+each other, and make use of their teeth; and then he turned to Patsy,
+who was now, to all outward appearance, old Bill Turner.</p>
+
+<p>"Come along, Bill," he said, exactly imitating the voice of Handsome&mdash;so
+that Handsome grinned in spite of himself. "We have got a lot to do yet,
+and it will be daylight before we know it."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span>They passed outside then, into the corridor of the cavern, and when Nick
+had shut the big rock in place over the entrance, he wedged the small
+stone under it, so that it could not be moved from the inside.</p>
+
+<p>"There," he said. "Even if they should get loose, which is not at all
+likely, they could not get out. And if they yell themselves hoarse,
+nobody could hear them. Come on. We've got a lot of work cut out for
+us."</p>
+
+<p>"What is there to do first?" asked Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"The first thing is to return to the cabins in the valley, and find out
+what time it is. Oh, there is a watch in those clothes. Look at it. What
+time is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Half-past two," replied Patsy, imitating the broken voice of the old
+man to perfection.</p>
+
+<p>"That's good, Patsy. I refer to your imitation. You will not have to use
+it much&mdash;possibly not at all; but it is as well to be perfect in your
+part all the same. I think we will have time enough for what we have to
+do if we hurry."</p>
+
+<p>He led the way rapidly then, back to the valley, where some of the
+searchers had already returned, and he found them grouped around the
+exit, when they issued from the cave.</p>
+
+<p>But when they attempted to address him, believing him to be Handsome, he
+returned no reply, for he had seen Handsome ignore them utterly many
+times; but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> it was Cremation Mike who stepped forward in front of them
+as they approached the cabin in which Madge was supposed to live.</p>
+
+<p>"Any luck?" he demanded surlily.</p>
+
+<p>"No," replied Nick, stopping for a moment.</p>
+
+<p>"Look here, Handsome, if that fellow is gone for good, do you suppose
+that Madge will do what she said she would?"</p>
+
+<p>"What was that, Mike?"</p>
+
+<p>"Hang me in his place?"</p>
+
+<p>"I shouldn't wonder if she did."</p>
+
+<p>"Say, Handsome, can't you say a word for me with her? Where is she? Can
+I see her?"</p>
+
+<p>"You had better keep away from her," suggested Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"No; I want to see her. Take me to her, will you?"</p>
+
+<p>"All right. Come along," replied the detective, and so Cremation Mike
+fell in behind them, and followed them into the cabin where Madge was
+supposed to be.</p>
+
+<p>But they were no sooner inside the house with the door closed than Nick
+wheeled in his tracks, and grasped Mike by the throat, and then struck
+him with his fist over the temple. The result was that Cremation Mike
+sank to the floor without a sound, and was speedily bound and gagged.</p>
+
+<p>"That's one," said the detective grimly. "There are a good many more,
+Patsy."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>"Do you expect to get them all, one by one, in that way?" asked Patsy.
+"It will take a week to do that."</p>
+
+<p>"No; I have a better plan than that. Wait."</p>
+
+<p>Nick knew of Madge's fondness for trapdoors, and also that she always
+kept a large supply of liquors on hand with which sometimes she treated
+her men, or some of them. He had no doubt that somewhere in that cabin
+he would not only find the liquors he wanted, but also drugs.</p>
+
+<p>There was a trapdoor in the floor of the largest room in the cabin, and
+under it was a shallow cellar wherein were several cases of liquors. The
+robbery of freight cars had always kept the hoboes well supplied with
+such articles.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, I'm going to make the hoboes a punch," he said to Patsy. He was
+searching through a cupboard while he spoke, and from there he produced
+a large bottle of laudanum. "I will have to use this," he continued. "It
+is the only thing here which will do at all, and as it has an
+excessively bitter taste, I will have to make a punch in order to
+conceal it. But it will do the work I want done better and more safely
+than anything else."</p>
+
+<p>"You'll have to use a washtub for the punch, to make enough for all of
+them," said Patsy. "And is there enough laudanum?"</p>
+
+<p>"Plenty; and there is a couple of pails. They will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> do as well as a tub.
+Now help me. We have lemons, and sugar, and everything that we require,
+here in this cupboard. But first, let's drop Cremation Mike into the
+cellar with the cases."</p>
+
+<p>They did that, and replaced the trapdoor; then they sliced lemons&mdash;all
+that they could find; they found a pot of cold tea, and this they dumped
+into the mess with the laudanum; and upon all this, bottle after bottle
+of the whisky was poured into the pails until they were filled to the
+brim.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Patsy," said the detective, "remember that you are old Bill
+Turner. I want you to go out among the men right now, and tell them that
+Madge and Handsome have fixed them all up a punch, and if they will form
+in line and pass in front of the door of this cabin, each one of them
+can have two drinks of it. And it would be a good idea if you should act
+as if you had already taken your own two&mdash;or several. It will give them
+confidence."</p>
+
+<p>"I can do it," replied Patsy, and he went out.</p>
+
+<p>After a little Nick heard the murmur of voices before the cabin, and he
+stepped to the door and opened it; and then he found that the men,
+without an exception, save those who were on guard at different
+places&mdash;he found that eighty men had formed in line, and were ready for
+the treat that had been promised them.</p>
+
+<p>He carried out the two pails and stood them on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> porch; and then with
+a dipper in one hand and a goblet in the other, he called out:</p>
+
+<p>"Come up slow, now; one by one. Don't be in haste. Remember there are
+two drinks each, for you, and no more. These two pails will just about
+do it. I'm doing the trick for Black Madge, who happens to be busy just
+now."</p>
+
+<p>And so they began the procession past him; and so he doled out the
+concoction he had arranged for them, and watched them gulp it down with
+evident relish; and he called out when he served the first drink:</p>
+
+<p>"The orders are that each one of you, as soon as you have had your two
+drinks, shall go to your quarters and turn in. You are wanted to rest
+up, so that we can begin this search again, and find that fellow we are
+after. Come on, now. When you have taken your medicine, go to your bunks
+and turn in&mdash;all of you!"</p>
+
+<p>And they came. Then they took their medicine, and so nicely had Nick
+calculated the quantity that would be required that there was scarcely a
+pint of the concoction left when they were through.</p>
+
+<p>Many of them stopped long enough to beg for a third drink of it, and
+only once did Nick grant that request&mdash;to a big fellow for whom two
+might not be sufficient.</p>
+
+<p>And within thirty minutes after that last one had passed the porch, that
+camp was as quiet as a church.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII.</h2>
+
+<h3>A WHOLESALE ROUND-UP.</h3>
+
+
+<p>"Patsy," said the detective, when they re&euml;ntered the cabin, after
+watching their punch consumed almost to the dregs, "this is about the
+biggest capture I was ever in."</p>
+
+<p>"But we are not through yet, chief," replied the assistant, stroking the
+white beard he wore so naturally that Nick laughed aloud. "There are
+sixteen more men at liberty yet, and we have got the whole bunch to tie
+up. Don't forget that there are four men stationed at each of the
+outside entrances to&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I haven't forgotten it. We will serve them in the same way. All we
+have to do is to manufacture one more pail of punch. So here goes. And
+as for tying them up, that will hardly be necessary."</p>
+
+<p>"Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"They are good for twelve hours of solid sleep at the very least. Many
+of them will not waken in twenty-four hours."</p>
+
+<p>"And maybe some of them will never wake up. How is that?"</p>
+
+<p>"It is a chance that we had to take; but by restricting them to two
+drinks each, I figured that there would be no danger. No; I think we are
+all right.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> Now, help me make this extra pail of punch. After that we
+will carry it through the cavern to the different parties of four each."</p>
+
+<p>"Suppose they get suspicious, and won't drink it?"</p>
+
+<p>"No danger of that, my lad."</p>
+
+<p>When the punch was made, they divided it into two lots, each carrying
+half, and, thus equipped, they again entered the cavern, this time just
+as daylight was beginning to appear.</p>
+
+<p>The first party they selected to serve was the one farthest away, and
+the detective discovered that they were grumbling because they had not
+been relieved.</p>
+
+<p>But when he appeared with the pail of punch, and told them what had
+happened&mdash;that every one had been served with the same thing&mdash;they
+forgot their sorrows and had their share as the others had taken theirs.</p>
+
+<p>And here, in order to make doubly sure, Nick had given each of the
+drinks a larger dose of the sleeping draught than he had served in the
+valley. As soon as the men had drunk what was given them, and had been
+refused more, he left them, followed by Patsy, and returned through the
+cave to another entrance.</p>
+
+<p>And here again the operation was repeated in the same manner, an idea of
+suspicion never once entering the head of any of the men; they were far
+too eager for the drink which the thoughtfulness of their mistress had
+provided for them.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span>"They'll be suspicious when they begin to feel drowsy all at once,"
+suggested Patsy, as they moved away.</p>
+
+<p>"Let them," replied Nick. "We won't be there, and not one of them will
+be able to go very far before he drops in a stupor. I have fixed it, all
+right."</p>
+
+<p>They found the second party as eager as the first, and one of them
+already the worse for too many drinks from a bottle he had had in his
+pocket; but they took the medicine that Nick portioned out to them as
+the others had done, and they in turn were left alone to drop off to
+sleep as they would; for they had been awake all night, and now it was
+broad daylight. They figured that they deserved some sleep.</p>
+
+<p>At the third entrance the four men were already asleep&mdash;all but one of
+them, and he was drowsing; and Nick, in his character of Handsome,
+pretended to be angry at first. He pretended to refuse to give them the
+punch that had been sent to them until they begged so hard that he
+finally relented.</p>
+
+<p>"Why," said Patsy, when they left them, and took their way toward the
+fourth, and last, place&mdash;the hole under the Dog's Nose, near the place
+where Handsome and Madge were prisoners, "it's all as easy as living on
+a farm."</p>
+
+<p>"And not half so interesting," laughed the detective.</p>
+
+<p>They walked past the movable rock behind which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> the two prisoners were
+confined without so much as devoting a glance to it, for they were both
+intent upon accomplishing this last installment of capture through the
+medium of the laudanum; and here they found the four men who were on
+duty, just about ready to mutiny because they had not been relieved.</p>
+
+<p>But the presence of Handsome&mdash;or the man they believed to be
+Handsome&mdash;quieted them at once, for they stood in wholesome dread of him
+and his anger; and when they understood what had been brought to them,
+they were ready for anything.</p>
+
+<p>And so it was that in their turns they took their medicine as the others
+had done. When they had swallowed it, Nick said to them:</p>
+
+<p>"Stretch out, now, you fellows, where you are. I'll let you sleep for a
+while, at least. I'm going to sit here and smoke. I am tired myself.
+Turner, sit down. We'll keep watch here for a spell."</p>
+
+<p>The men did not require a second invitation, but speedily took advantage
+of the permission&mdash;and it was surprising how soon the laudanum took
+effect upon them.</p>
+
+<p>Ten minutes had not elapsed before the four were sleeping soundly, and
+snoring as if they never expected to awake again.</p>
+
+<p>"I think we can go now," said Nick, at last, rising.</p>
+
+<p>"What is the next trick to be done?" asked Patsy.</p>
+
+<p>"Let me see," replied Nick. "It's thirty miles from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> here to Calamont.
+How far is it to the railway track in a direct line? That is the way you
+came, isn't it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"How far is it?"</p>
+
+<p>"About four miles, possibly. I can make it in an hour."</p>
+
+<p>"Then skip. This is the nearest point to start from. Get to the track as
+soon as you can. Flag the first train that comes along, no matter what
+it is. Get aboard it, and go to the first station. Get off there, and
+use the telegraph operator. Have him wire to Mr. Cobalt, the president
+of the road, exactly what has happened. Ask Cobalt to send a special
+train to us from the nearest point. We will want about twenty officers
+to take charge of all these prisoners, and he had better send along some
+chains with padlocks on them. You can figure that out yourself. We will
+want to make chain gangs of these men, so that they can walk to the
+railway, but so that they are chained together and cannot escape. You've
+got the idea?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"Go, then, and see how quickly you can get the officers here, and we can
+get this crew away from here."</p>
+
+<p>"And you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll stay here. Skip, now. Don't talk any more."</p>
+
+<p>"Have I got to carry these whiskers with me?" grinned Patsy.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span>"You'd better not stop to remove them now. I put them on to stay. Go!"</p>
+
+<p>And Patsy went.</p>
+
+<p>Nick remained where he was for a while, thinking deeply, and altogether
+satisfied with what he had accomplished; but after a little he rose, and
+took his way back into the cave, intending to see what Handsome and
+Madge were doing, and if they were making any effort to free themselves.</p>
+
+<p>But after he had re&euml;ntered the cave, and had covered the twenty rods
+that intervened between it and the movable rock, he stopped in
+astonishment and stared.</p>
+
+<p>The rock was pushed wide open.</p>
+
+<p>With a bound he darted forward and entered the place, but only to find
+that Madge and Handsome had both disappeared. Their bonds were lying
+upon the floor of the cavern, but they were no longer there themselves.</p>
+
+<p>Nick did not wait to see more than that then.</p>
+
+<p>He turned away on a run, and darted through the galleries with all the
+speed he could summon under the circumstances&mdash;and he came out into the
+valley, where the sun was shining, directly behind his two escaped
+prisoners, for they had not preceded him by more than a minute,
+evidently.</p>
+
+<p>With one wild spring he was upon them, and as Handsome turned to defend
+himself, Nick hit him with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span> his fist, so that he sent him reeling across
+the grass, where he fell senseless to the earth.</p>
+
+<p>But in the meantime Madge had turned with a scream of rage, and when she
+saw the real Handsome fall helpless, she broke into a run toward her own
+cottage, for she had no weapon to use now, Nick having deprived them
+both of their guns.</p>
+
+<p>But the detective ran after her, and, just as she was about to leap upon
+the porch, he succeeded in seizing her, and in pulling her back again
+toward him.</p>
+
+<p>She turned upon him then like a fury; but with a laugh he sprang under
+her extended arms, and seized her around the waist; and then he lifted
+her from her feet, and, still laughing, he ran across the grass to the
+cabin in which Patsy had once been a prisoner, and in another moment he
+had tossed her inside, closed the door and fastened it.</p>
+
+<p>For a long time he could hear her storming in there, but he had to hurry
+back to Handsome, who was still down and out when he got to him, but who
+presently revived.</p>
+
+<p>But he had all the fight taken out of him, and he allowed himself to be
+bound again securely, after which Nick led him to Madge's cabin, and
+tied him to one of the rustic chairs on the porch.</p>
+
+<p>Including Black Madge and her first lieutenant, Handsome, there were one
+hundred and two prisoners turned over to be dealt with by the law when
+Patsy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span> returned to the place in the hills, having piloted the officers
+who were sent by special train to complete the capture.</p>
+
+<p>Black Madge did not see the detective again to speak to him; but she
+sent him a note, in which she said:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I haven't done with you yet, Nick Carter. I will
+never forgive you for fooling me as you did. I shall
+manage to get my liberty again, somehow, some time,
+and when I do, it will be for the purpose of
+wreaking vengeance on you. And I will get even some
+day, never fear."</p></div>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>BLACK MADGE'S THREAT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Nick Carter had entirely forgotten Black Madge's threat when he was
+forcibly reminded of it one morning by the following letter which he
+found on his breakfast table:</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"<span class="smcap">Nick Carter</span>: One month ago&mdash;how time flies&mdash;I wrote
+to you that I hadn't done with you yet; that I would
+never forgive you, and that I would get even some
+day.</p>
+
+<p>"That was a month ago. I thought when I wrote that
+it might take a year&mdash;but they are easy marks in
+this State.</p>
+
+<p>"It was my hope after you captured me and all my
+followers, that I would have a chance to see you
+again, and to talk to you before I was taken away to
+prison. You would say probably that I wanted to
+boast; for a threat, after all, is only another kind
+of boasting. But it wasn't so, Nick Carter; I wanted
+to tell you what you had succeeded in doing; and
+this is it:</p>
+
+<p>"You have succeeded in creating in me a passion
+which supersedes all others in my nature&mdash;the
+passion of hatred. Twice now you have foiled me;
+twice you have been successful in arresting me, and
+the latter of these two times you not only destroyed
+the organization which I had created, and rendered
+it utterly im<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span>potent for my future uses, but you
+destroyed almost at one blow every ambition that I
+had through that organization and by reason of it.</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't know that, and you couldn't appreciate
+it; and it wouldn't matter at all to you if you had;
+neither has it anything to do with the purport of
+this letter.</p>
+
+<p>"I know you will say that I am a fool to take the
+trouble to warn you, but I would be less than a
+woman, and much less than the bad woman I am, if I
+did not take this opportunity of exulting over the
+chance that is now promised to me to get square with
+you.</p>
+
+<p>"Heretofore my every effort has been centred upon
+playing on my fellow men; heretofore I have had only
+two thoughts in pursuing my career; one was to
+create an organization of which I was the supreme
+head, and the other was to secure by the operation
+of that organization all the money that it was
+possible to obtain.</p>
+
+<p>"I have always been a thief with a system. My
+robberies have all been committed after careful
+planning; you know that because of the one you
+helped to commit yourself. But now I have only one
+ambition left&mdash;to get square with you. I haven't
+decided yet how I shall do it, or when, or where it
+shall be done. If I had so decided I would not tell
+you, so it makes no difference.</p>
+
+<p>"But I have been a hard student, Nick Carter, of
+many things. I have had good instructors in the
+science of mixing and using poisons; there is no
+person living to-day, man or woman&mdash;yourself
+included&mdash;who is a better marksman than I am with
+firearms;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> there is no person, man or woman, who is
+more adept to-day in the use of all weapons than I
+am. This is not boasting; it is fact.</p>
+
+<p>"Moreover, I have the power to appear in many
+guises&mdash;disguises you might call them. In one or
+more of them&mdash;perhaps in many of them&mdash;I shall
+appear to you, and when you are least expecting it I
+shall strike.</p>
+
+<p>"Don't think by that that I mean to strike you dead.
+That would not be making you suffer enough; but I
+shall find other and better ways in which to
+strike&mdash;ways that will make you suffer and realize
+what you did when you made me your enemy, and made
+me hate you as I do.</p>
+
+<p>"And another thing; I have already set to work to
+bring together, as rapidly as I can find them,
+people who have criminal records and who have reason
+to hate you as I do; people whom you have pursued as
+you have pursued me; those whom you have sent to
+prison; those whose careers you have interrupted;
+those you have threatened; and those who have cause
+for holding a grudge against you.</p>
+
+<p>"I have sought many of those, and I have found many.
+I am still seeking others, and I shall find more;
+and when I have got together enough of them, and
+have selected from that number those whom I deem
+most available for my purpose and competent to carry
+out my directions as I shall give them, I shall
+organize them into a Band of Hatred, the sole object
+of which shall be your undoing and, ultimately, your
+death.</p>
+
+<p>"You have preyed too long already upon that class<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span>
+of humanity to which I belong, and from our
+standpoint your position is much the same as is our
+position from yours.</p>
+
+<p>"You know me well enough, Nick Carter, to know that
+from this moment forward you will never be safe from
+danger for one moment of your life; whether you are
+sleeping or waking; whether you are afloat or
+ashore; whether you are quartered in the seclusion
+of your own study at home, or are abroad upon the
+streets of the city.</p>
+
+<p>"You know that I do not threaten idly. You know that
+I am a woman with a purpose. You know that I am
+intelligent, educated, and determined. You know that
+I am a woman to be feared.</p>
+
+<p>"I have thought this matter all over, and decided
+upon it during those hours when I was locked in the
+cabin up there in the hills, after you had drugged
+the men of my company, and succeeded in capturing us
+all.</p>
+
+<p>"When I was taken to prison I knew that it would be
+only a short time before I would be able to make
+good my escape. How I have succeeded in
+accomplishing it does not matter. I have found one
+key in my experience that never fails to open prison
+locks, if it is properly applied; the fact that it
+is made of gold is sufficient explanation, and gold
+I had in plenty, for I have always been successful,
+and even now I have hoards concealed in different
+places which will supply me with funds more than
+sufficient to carry out to the bitter end this
+campaign of vengeance upon which I have determined.</p>
+
+<p>"I think that is all.</p>
+
+<p style="margin-bottom: 0em;"><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span>"I shall leave here for New York City an hour after
+this letter is put in the mail. When you will see me
+first I do not know.</p>
+
+<p style="text-align: right; margin-top: 0em;"><span class="smcap">Black Madge."</span></p></div>
+
+<p>The detective read this remarkable letter twice from beginning to end,
+and then he passed it in silence across the table to Chick, who was
+seated opposite to him.</p>
+
+<p>And Chick also read it twice in silence, and as silently returned it.
+Nick, realizing that Ten-Ichi and Patsy would also fall under the
+sweeping hatred of Black Madge, tossed it over to them with the
+direction that they read it also.</p>
+
+<p>There was not one among them who felt like making any comment upon the
+letter, or its contents, at least until their chief had spoken; but
+presently, with a gesture to Chick, which meant that he was to follow
+him as soon as he had finished his breakfast, the detective left the
+table and went to his study.</p>
+
+<p>It was only a few moments after that when Chick entered the room,
+smiling.</p>
+
+<p>"I hope, Nick," he said, dropping into a chair near the window and
+lighting a cigar, "that you enjoyed the reading of that letter from
+Madge?"</p>
+
+<p>The detective was silent a moment before he replied, and then quite
+slowly he said:</p>
+
+<p>"So far as I am personally concerned, Chick, the letter or its contents
+has no more effect upon me than the snapping of your fingers, but I will
+confess that I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> am in some dread concerning what she might do to you,
+and to Ten-Ichi and Patsy."</p>
+
+<p>Chick leaned back in his chair and laughed aloud.</p>
+
+<p>"If you will excuse me for saying so," he remarked, "that is utter
+nonsense. Of course, the boys downstairs and I are quite capable of
+taking care of ourselves."</p>
+
+<p>"I don't doubt that," said Nick, "but that is not exactly the point."</p>
+
+<p>"What is, then?"</p>
+
+<p>"You have forgotten one part of her letter," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"What part?"</p>
+
+<p>"That part wherein she speaks about making me suffer, rather than
+attempting to do me physical harm."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! I haven't forgotten it."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you understand what she means by that, Chick?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>"Let me hear if you do."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, she probably means that it would be her first effort to make you
+suffer by injuring those whom you love&mdash;in other words, by doing
+something or other to one of us. But forewarned is forearmed, and,
+anyhow, I don't think it behooves any of us to be afraid of a woman."</p>
+
+<p>"This is a case," said Nick, "where a woman is much more dangerous than
+a man. A man would fight<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> out in the open; a woman will fight in the
+shadow; or, at least, such a woman as that will. She is a pretty bad
+one, Chick, and a grave foe."</p>
+
+<p>Chick nodded.</p>
+
+<p>"It is always best," continued the detective, "to give your enemy or
+your adversaries credit for every advantage they possess. Black Madge is
+a wonderfully smart woman, and is unprincipled and implacable as she is
+smart. She will halt at nothing to carry out her design of vengeance,
+and just as sure as you are sitting there, Chick, we will presently feel
+the surety of that threat."</p>
+
+<p>Chick flicked the ashes from his cigar, and then strode across the room
+to the window, where he stood for a moment looking out.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't see exactly what we are going to do to head her off before she
+begins," he said presently.</p>
+
+<p>"There is nothing to do," replied Nick gloomily.</p>
+
+<p>"Upon my word," said Chick, laughing, "one would think that you were
+more than usually affected by that letter from Madge. Do you really take
+it so seriously as all that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I take it seriously," replied the detective, "because I so well
+understand what the woman means, and she means just what she says.
+Instead of going on evenly and living the life we have been living, we
+must not be for an instant off our guard from this day on, until she is
+again behind the bars, and I hope the next<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> time I arrest her it will be
+within the limits of the State of New York, where I can place a watch
+over her so that she will not escape."</p>
+
+<p>"And I hope so, too," said Chick.</p>
+
+<p>"And now, in the meantime," continued Nick, smiling, "since we have this
+letter and know what she is about to do, I think we will meet her
+halfway, and not wait for her to open the ball. Since she is at liberty,
+we will set about capturing her at once."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE BAND OF HATRED.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Down on the East Side of New York, in Rivington Street, and some
+distance east of the Bowery, on the second floor of one of the oldest
+buildings in the city, a remarkable meeting was being held during the
+night that followed the receipt of Madge's letter by Nick Carter.</p>
+
+<p>In a room on this floor, which was brilliantly lighted by four gas jets
+blazing from the chandelier, nine people were seated. They were gathered
+along two sides of the room, in which was a centre table, and behind
+this table was Black Madge.</p>
+
+<p>Before her on the table were various sheets of letter paper, which she
+had turned from a pad one after another as she made notes upon them, and
+in her hand she held a pencil which ever and anon flew rapidly over the
+paper while she recorded such information concerning those who were
+present with her as she cared to remember.</p>
+
+<p>They had been present in that room for upward of an hour, and during
+that time Madge had questioned each one of the eight who faced her
+concerning the statements they had made, and which she had noted.</p>
+
+<p>Now she leaned back in her chair, and, holding one of the sheets of
+paper in her hand, she said:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span>"Stand up, Scar-faced Johnny, and answer the questions I shall ask you."</p>
+
+<p>One of them, a short, stocky, red-headed, brutalized being, who was
+almost as broad as he was long, leaped to his feet, thrust his hands
+deeply into his pockets, and with his chin stuck forward aggressively,
+waited.</p>
+
+<p>"You hate Nick Carter, do you, Johnny?" Madge asked.</p>
+
+<p>"I hate him like poison."</p>
+
+<p>"And you would kill him if you could?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'd cut his throat in half a minute if I was sure of not being caught."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell me again why you hate him so."</p>
+
+<p>"Ain't he sent me twice to prison? Once for four years and once for
+three. And the last time he done it didn't he hand me a welt alongside
+of the jaw that I'll never forget? A man can't hit me like that and have
+me love him afterward. You just show me the way to do it, Black Madge,
+and I'll lay him out cold&mdash;so cold that he'll never get over it again.
+All I want is a chance."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Madge, "take your seat.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Slippery Al, you stand up. What's your line of graft, Slippery?"</p>
+
+<p>Slippery, who was tall, and sallow, and lean, and unkempt, and who
+looked consumptive and otherwise unwholesome, grinned sheepishly, as he
+replied:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span>"I reckon my name ought to answer that question. I slips in and I slips
+out where I can and when I can, and picks up anything that's lying
+around."</p>
+
+<p>Madge laughed scornfully.</p>
+
+<p>"You don't look as if you had sense enough to hate anybody or anything,"
+she said.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, I hate Nick Carter, right enough," was the unhesitating reply.</p>
+
+<p>"Why do you hate him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because he sent my father and my mother and my two brothers to prison,
+and they're all there now, and they weren't doing a thing that
+interfered with him in any way."</p>
+
+<p>"What were they doing?" asked Madge.</p>
+
+<p>"Well, if you want to know it straight, Black Madge, they was running a
+little counterfeit plant of their own&mdash;making dimes and quarters and a
+few half dollars for some of us to blow in when we couldn't find the
+real rhino."</p>
+
+<p>"Running a counterfeit plant, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's it, marm."</p>
+
+<p>"And Nick Carter sent them all to prison, did he?"</p>
+
+<p>"He did that."</p>
+
+<p>"How does it happen that he didn't send you along with them?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I managed to slip out just in time," said Slippery, with one of
+his sheepish grins; "but he sent a bullet after me when I was running
+away that singed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> the hair over my right ear, and taking it all in all I
+hate him about as much as anybody."</p>
+
+<p>"Not enough to kill him if I should ask you to do it, do you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Madge, when it comes to killing, that ain't in my line; but if
+you want me to lead him on somehow where somebody else could do the job,
+I think I'd be about the covey that could do it."</p>
+
+<p>"That'll do for you. Sit down, Slippery."</p>
+
+<p>"What's your name?" she added to the man who was next him.</p>
+
+<p>A dark, beetle-browed, heavy-jawed, coarse-featured man, who looked as
+if he was as powerful as a giant, rose slowly to his feet, and replied
+in a surly tone, and with an ugly glitter in his eyes:</p>
+
+<p>"I have got about forty names; leastwise, the police say I have; but
+they as knows me best calls me Bob for short; sometimes they fixes it up
+a little by calling it Surly Bob. But I think that Bob will do for you."</p>
+
+<p>"What have you got against Nick Carter, Surly Bob?" asked Madge,
+smiling. She liked the looks of this hard-featured individual. He was
+just brutal enough in his appearance to satisfy her ideas of what a man
+should be.</p>
+
+<p>Bob deliberately took a huge chew of tobacco into his mouth before he
+replied, and then, with a slow and almost bovine indifference, he
+responded:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span>"I don't know as it makes much difference to you, Black Madge, what I
+hate him for as long as I do hate him, and I'm bound to get square with
+him some day, whether I do it in connection with this organization that
+you're getting together or on my own hook without the help of any of
+you," and he glanced defiantly around. "It's enough that I do hate him.
+He's done enough to me to make me hate him. It's enough that if I had
+him alone in this room to-night one of us would never leave it alive
+unless he got the best of me without killing me, for I would certainly
+do him if I got half a chance.</p>
+
+<p>"But I'll tell you one thing about him that maybe it will do some of you
+good to hear, for I give you fair warning that you want to give Nick
+Carter a wide berth unless you can manage somehow to catch him foul.
+He's about as strong as three horses, and if he ever succeeds in getting
+his grip on you you're gone. I'm about as tough as they make them, but
+I'm a wee baby in Nick Carter's hands, and don't any of you forget it."</p>
+
+<p>"Tell us the story," said Madge.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, it ain't no story; it's just a short account. We ran into each
+other once near the front door of a bank I had gone into after hours and
+without the permission of the president and board of directors. When I
+picked myself up from the middle of the street after he grabbed me there
+was a crack in the top of my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> skull which didn't get well for three
+months. That's all I've got to say about it, but I want to add this: If
+that fellow Slippery Al, who says killing ain't in his line, but leading
+astray is, wants to bring Nick Carter my way, and will fetch him along
+so as I can get him foul, I'll fix him for keeps, and no questions
+asked."</p>
+
+<p>And Surly Bob sat down.</p>
+
+<p>He had no sooner taken his seat than the individual next to him sprang
+up without waiting to be asked to do so. If you had encountered this
+individual along Broadway or on Fifth Avenue in New York City, you might
+not have devoted a second glance to him; but if you had, and still had
+not studied him closely, you would not have thought him other than a
+gentleman.</p>
+
+<p>His features were handsome or would have been handsome were it not for
+the crafty and shifty expression of his eyes and the otherwise
+insincerity that was manifest in his face. Among his companions of the
+underworld he was known far and near as Gentleman Jim.</p>
+
+<p>By profession he was what is known as a confidence man, although it was
+said of him that he had the courage to take any part that might be
+required of him in preying upon the world at large.</p>
+
+<p>He had been known to assist, and to do it well, at a bank robbery. He
+had once lived for some time in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> Chicago as a highwayman. It was said of
+him that in his youth he had begun his career of crime by rustling
+cattle in the far West, and that he was as quick and as sure with a gun
+as any "bad man" of that region.</p>
+
+<p>His attire was immaculate and in the height of fashion. He was clean
+shaven, and he wore eyeglasses which gave to him somewhat of a
+professional look, and which he had been heard to say were excellent
+things to hide the expression in a man's eyes.</p>
+
+<p>In stature he was tall, rather broad, and extremely well built. In
+short, Madge looked upon him when he rose with undoubted admiration in
+her eyes, as if she believed that here was a man who could be anything
+he chose to be in the criminal world.</p>
+
+<p>When he spoke it was in an evenly modulated tone of voice which might
+have done excellent service in a drawing-room; and, moreover, his voice
+was pleasant to listen to.</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose you would like to hear from me, as well as from the others,
+Madge," he said slowly. "I haven't got very much to say, except that I
+don't take much stock in boasted hatreds. Where I was raised, and where
+I began my career&mdash;and I am not particularly proud of that career&mdash;when
+we hated anybody we rarely said much about it, but I will say this to
+you, and to the others who are here: I am very glad that this
+organization is being perfected. I am very<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> glad that some concerted
+action is to be taken against this man, Nick Carter, who has come pretty
+near putting us all out of business. You all know who I am, and some of
+you have got a pretty good idea what I am. Nick Carter knows about as
+much about me as any of you, which, after all is said, is next to
+nothing at all. But I have been on a still hunt for Mr. Nick Carter for
+some time, and when I get him in a position which Surly Bob calls foul,
+I shan't wait to send to any of you for assistance. I'll do the rest
+myself."</p>
+
+<p>"And now you," said Madge, fixing her eyes upon the individual who was
+seated next to Gentleman Jim "Rise in your place and tell us your name,
+and make us a little speech, as the others have done."</p>
+
+<p>"My name is Cummings&mdash;Fly Cummings, I'm called. Some of the bunch here
+knows me and some don't. Those that do know me don't need to be told
+anything about me, and those that don't know me are just as well off.
+I'm in business for myself, and always have been. The world owes me a
+living, and it's been paying it pretty regular ever since I was sixteen
+years old, and I'm now coming sixty-two. I'm like the others here in one
+respect: I've got a grudge against the man we've been talking about.
+I've never been able to make him feel it, because I've always fought
+mighty shy of him rather than get within his reach; but when I heard
+that this here movement had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> been started going by you, Madge, and the
+word was passed around among the guns downtown that you wanted a few of
+us that hated Nick Carter to come to the captain's office and form a
+little organization, it struck me that it was just about the right thing
+to do. I've heard what Surly Bob had to say, and I know that Surly isn't
+the sort of chap that's in the habit of talking through his hat. If
+Surly Bob had it in for me I'd patronize the New York Central Railroad,
+and take a train out of town right away.</p>
+
+<p>"I've heard what Gentleman Jim had to say, and if Jim was looking for my
+gore to-night, I'd take a steamer across the ocean or commit suicide,
+because I'd know I couldn't get away from him in any other way.</p>
+
+<p>"I've heard what Slippery Al had to say, and while Slippery ain't of
+much account, he's about the nastiest toad that ever picked a pocket,
+and I wouldn't care to have him down on me.</p>
+
+<p>"And as for Scar-faced Johnny, well, Johnny is a bad one, too. I ain't
+making any threats particularly, Madge, but I'm willing to join this
+organization, or I wouldn't be here, and I want to say now that when
+you're fixing up the business, and arrange for the signals so that we
+can summons each other when we want them, I'll do my part to the tune of
+compound interest; and I guess that'll be about all from me."</p>
+
+<p>The sixth man of the party, who was the next to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> get upon his feet, had
+the stamp of prison life all over him. His face bespoke the pallor which
+is acquired in no other place in the world, and the vicious, shifty,
+sneaking gleam in his eyes spoke well of the craftiness which is the
+result of long confinement under the domination of brutal guards and
+turnkeys.</p>
+
+<p>So recently had he escaped from prison, apparently, that his hair was
+still cropped short to his skull, and one almost expected when looking
+at him to see the stripes of prison garb upon him.</p>
+
+<p>"I am Joe Cuthbert," he said slowly, in a tone so low that it could
+scarcely be heard. "I wouldn't have come here to-night at all if I
+hadn't been assured on the level that it would be perfectly safe to do
+so. I don't think there is any one of you in this room except Madge
+herself who knows me, but you will all hear from me later on as sure as
+I'm alive and can escape arrest.</p>
+
+<p>"You may have been told since you came here that I have just escaped
+from prison, or if you haven't been told it, and know how to read, you
+have probably seen the rewards for my recapture. You will know, too,
+that I was sent up for croaking another chap, or, as they call it in the
+courts, for murder. I want you all to know that I served eight years.
+Eight years of hell, and that I've come out of there with the
+determination of getting square with the man that sent me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> up. That man
+was Nick Carter; and that's all I've got to say."</p>
+
+<p>There was a moment of utter silence after this announcement, which had
+in it many of the elements of the dramatic.</p>
+
+<p>There was not a person in that room who had not seen the inside of a
+prison, and many of them had served as many as four years, while others
+had been in prison many times for short terms.</p>
+
+<p>But to have just escaped from prison after having been confined for
+eight long years seemed to them the climax of the possibilities of
+hatred.</p>
+
+<p>But the moment passed, and Madge fixed her eyes upon the seventh of the
+group, who slowly rose to his feet and said:</p>
+
+<p>"After what we've just heard, Madge, it doesn't seem that anything that
+I can say can add to the intensity of feeling that pervades this
+distinguished assembly. I regard it as quite an honor to be among those
+who know so well how to hate. As for me, I have also been inside a
+prison, to which this man Nick Carter sent me. I had been mixed up in a
+little diamond robbery from one of the big firms in this town. I don't
+know but maybe some of you heard about it; it was called the taking of
+the pear-shaped diamonds, and at the time that happened I was in love
+with a very beautiful girl, and was outwardly leading a very respectable
+life. It's enough for me to say now that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> when the exposure that
+followed Nick Carter's investigation of that case, and through it the
+exposure of all my previous criminal record, which before that time I
+had been able to conceal, the girl went back on me, and would have
+nothing more to do with me. Now she is married to another man, and while
+I don't blame her any, I do blame the man that exposed me, and if any of
+you people that are gathered here can help me in getting square with him
+I'll be eternally grateful. My name is Eugene Maxwell."</p>
+
+<p>There was only one other individual left in this collection who had not
+as yet spoken, and now, although Madge fixed her eyes instantly upon
+him, he remained in his chair as he was, with immovable, sphinxlike
+countenance and gloomy eyes. He was a tall, spare, rather well-dressed
+figure, when he rose at last in reply to her spoken request, and he
+stood, half leaning upon a cane which he held in his two hands, and bent
+a little toward her as he spoke.</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't any name, so far as anybody knows," he said slowly, and with
+distinct and deliberate enunciation. "It has pleased my friends always
+to bestow a title upon me. Until to-night I have always worked alone,
+and have rarely made myself known to any of the inhabitants of the
+underworld, and if any of you here have ever happened to be told about
+The Parson, you will know who I am."</p>
+
+<p>There was a distinct stir in the room when he ut<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span>tered this name or
+title, for The Parson had always been more or less a mystery, and one
+that was much envied by thieves generally. He was a confidence man of
+the higher type; the sort of man who would go into strange cities or
+villages or communities, and represent himself to be a professional man;
+sometimes a minister; sometimes a priest; again a rabbi; and it was his
+graft to solicit and collect contributions for charitable purposes upon
+forged recommendations and letters which he had prepared in advance.</p>
+
+<p>His success in this line had been enormous, and his work had always been
+done in the dark and alone, until six years before this particular
+occasion, having done it once too often, Nick Carter had trailed him
+down and captured him.</p>
+
+<p>He continued:</p>
+
+<p>"I was always very successful in my line of graft until Nick Carter got
+after me, and while I didn't get quite so long a term as our friend
+Cuthbert, I was sent up for five years, and served four years and three
+months of it. I want to say to you now that every night and every
+morning of my life during those four years and three months I cursed
+Nick Carter and everybody and everything that belonged to him. That's
+why I'm here. I take part in this little scheme that Madge has concocted
+to down that fellow with the greatest pleasure I have ever known. If you
+should happen to be in want of funds any time&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span>"I'll supply the funds," interrupted Madge.</p>
+
+<p>"All the same, if you should happen to be in want of funds at any time,
+all you've got to do is to whisper it to The Parson and I'll put my hand
+down in my pocket and supply the dollars, for I've got a few left, and I
+know where there are a lot more to be obtained."</p>
+
+<p>He resumed his seat slowly, rested his chin upon the head of his cane
+between his hands, and the gloomy look came over his face again like a
+mask.</p>
+
+<p>And now Madge stood up behind the table, resting her hands upon it, and
+leaning a little bit forward as she spoke.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm a proud woman, my friends," she said. "I'm a young woman, too,
+being not yet twenty-four, and a good hater. I am part Spanish and part
+French. I was raised in Paris, and learned all that I know about my
+business over there. The first time that I ever saw Nick Carter in my
+life was in the office of the Prefecture of Police in the room of the
+Chief of the Secret Service. I was seventeen years old at the time when
+the chief had sent for me to question me about the death of a woman
+which had occurred in the house where I lived on the floor above me, and
+about which, fortunately, I knew absolutely nothing.</p>
+
+<p>"But Nick Carter came into the chief's office while I was there. I had
+only a fleeting glance of him at the time. I left the room almost as
+soon as he entered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> it. I did not see him again for five years, at which
+time he came in disguise to the thieves' headquarters where I was
+staying. I recognized him that time by his eyes, but nevertheless he
+captured me and sent me to jail.</p>
+
+<p>"I escaped from that jail before I came to trial, and did it through the
+help of my friends. Somewhat later than that he hunted me down a second
+time, but I escaped, and I have sworn now to be even with him, and that
+is why I have brought you here together. You will please to stand up
+now, raise your right hands, and repeat after me in taking the oath of
+The Band of Hatred."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX.</h2>
+
+<h3>A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.</h3>
+
+
+<p>A strange series of accidents began the night of the day following the
+receipt of the letter, and Nick Carter had no doubt whatever that it was
+the first act to be played in the drama of vengeance which Black Madge
+had inaugurated against them.</p>
+
+<p>It was rather a simple thing of itself, and did no damage to amount to
+anything. The fact was that during the night some malicious person had
+placed under the front steps in the areaway of his house a barrel that
+had been filled with cotton waste saturated with oil. It was only
+necessary after that to apply a match to the inflammable material to
+start an incipient conflagration. Had the house itself not been built of
+granite, and&mdash;save the doors and windows and other trimmings&mdash;been
+practically fireproof, the result would have been disastrous; as it was,
+however, beyond badly scorching the door, and cracking a few of the
+stones by reason of the intense heat that was generating, no damage was
+done.</p>
+
+<p>But the fact had been sufficient to remind Nick Carter and his three
+assistants that Madge had not threatened idly, and that already she had
+undertaken to carry out the substance of some of her warning.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span>At midnight the day following the fire in the areaway a blazing bomb was
+hurled through the window of the second story of Nick Carter's house,
+and rolled to the middle of the floor, where it blazed furiously, and
+would undoubtedly have done a great deal of damage had it not so
+happened that the housekeeper was present at the time, for Nick had a
+guest that night, and she had been called late to prepare the room for
+him.</p>
+
+<p>The day following this one, about four o'clock in the afternoon, Joseph
+discovered a dynamite cartridge containing a pound and a half of the
+explosive in the vestibule at the front door. The fuse of this cartridge
+was already alight and would have reached and exploded the percussion,
+or detonating cap, if Joseph, for some reason unknown, had not gone to
+the front door at that moment. He was not called there, and had not
+heard anybody in the vestibule, or on the steps, and Joseph forever
+insisted after this incident that it was an intervention of Providence.</p>
+
+<p>This last incident was extremely serious, for had the cartridge been
+exploded it must have torn away the entire front of the house, and have
+done enormous damage, even if it had taken no lives.</p>
+
+<p>Friday night of that week at about half-past eight o'clock in the
+evening Chick and Patsy were walking up Madison Avenue together, and
+when they arrived at the corner of Thirtieth Street, and were about to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span>
+turn toward Fifth Avenue, a shot was fired at them from across the
+street.</p>
+
+<p>Fortunately the bullet did not strike either of them; and, although they
+both immediately pursued the would-be assassin, he was evidently
+prepared to avoid them, for he leaped upon a bicycle and sped away so
+swiftly that there was no hope of overtaking him. They only saw that he
+was tall and slender, and that was all.</p>
+
+<p>The Saturday morning following an express wagon stopped at Nick Carter's
+house and delivered a package addressed to the detective, which was
+marked: "Fragile. This side up, with care."</p>
+
+<p>Joseph carried it to the detective's study, placed it upon the table,
+and was about to leave the room when Nick stopped him.</p>
+
+<p>"What is that, Joseph?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"An express package, sir, which just came for you."</p>
+
+<p>"Who brought it, Joseph?"</p>
+
+<p>"The express wagon, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"Bring it over here. Let me see it."</p>
+
+<p>Joseph took the package in his hand, carried it over to place it on the
+desk in front of the detective, who regarded it with a smile, while
+strangely enough his mind went back to the number of attempts to injure
+him that had been made during the week that was now nearly past.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span>"Did you sign for it, Joseph?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir."</p>
+
+<p>"I am expecting no package." said the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"No, sir," said Joseph, not knowing what else to reply.</p>
+
+<p>"I think, Joseph," said the detective, "that if you will take it to the
+basement, or, rather, to the laundry, and draw one of the tubs there
+full of water, it would be a good idea to put the package to soak for
+five or six hours before we open it."</p>
+
+<p>"Really, sir," said Joseph. "Why?"</p>
+
+<p>"Joseph, if that package had come here as it has a week or ten days ago,
+I should have opened it without a second thought, but, under the
+circumstances and considering all that has happened of late, I deem it
+wise to use every precaution. Take the package down and soak it as I
+have directed."</p>
+
+<p>Some hours later, when the detective recalled the incident to mind, he
+and Chick went to the basement together, found the package, and with a
+great deal of care opened it&mdash;from the bottom.</p>
+
+<p>It was found to contain an infernal machine of the most approved
+pattern, loaded with broken glass, slugs of lead and old iron, and an
+assortment of nails, old keys, and bullets.</p>
+
+<p>"A very pretty little present to send a fellow," said Nick, smiling
+grimly. "I rather think it is a lucky<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> thing, Chick, that it occurred to
+me to give it a good soaking. I wonder what the woman will do next?"</p>
+
+<p>Sunday evening when the detective entered his room he found Joseph
+writhing on the floor in evident agony, brought about by the contents of
+what had been a box of candy, and Nick instantly guessed that another
+attempt had been made upon his life, this time to poison him.</p>
+
+<p>But Joseph fortunately had only nibbled at one of the pieces, and,
+beyond an hour's suffering for his foolishness, was not injured.</p>
+
+<p>It appeared, when Nick questioned him, that a boy had handed the box of
+candy in at the door, saying, when Joseph appeared to receive it, that
+it had been ordered by the detective himself, and was to be placed in
+his study for him; and the boy had had the temerity to raise the lid of
+the box when he delivered it, wink slyly at Joseph, and exclaim:</p>
+
+<p>"See! aren't they dandy? I tasted one; they're fine."</p>
+
+<p>And then he had run away, laughing.</p>
+
+<p>Joseph had seen the candy, and, being fond of it, could not resist the
+temptation also to take a taste of it when he placed the box upon his
+master's table.</p>
+
+<p>That same night, at half-past eleven o'clock, Nick was seated at the
+desk in his study, which is located on the third floor in the rear of
+his house. He was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> engaged in looking over some notes relative to an old
+case which he wished to recall to mind.</p>
+
+<p>The shade at the window was lowered, but the light was in such a
+position that it threw his shadow against the curtain and outlined his
+head upon it almost perfectly.</p>
+
+<p>Suddenly he was startled by the report of a gun, and the next instant a
+bullet crashed through the glass of his window and buried itself in the
+opposite wall of the room.</p>
+
+<p>Later on, when he investigated the incident, he found that the bullet
+had passed directly through the shadow of his head as it was cast upon
+the window shade, the person who fired it evidently supposing that his
+head was directly behind that shadow; but the fact that the light was at
+one side of the room, and had therefore thrown the shadow somewhat back
+of where he was actually seated, saved his life.</p>
+
+<p>Further investigation disclosed the fact that the bullet had been fired
+from the rear of one of the houses in the block directly behind where
+the detective lived. It was not discovered how the would-be assassin had
+secured his position on the roof.</p>
+
+<p>But this accumulation of accidents&mdash;so called for want of a better
+term&mdash;was altogether too much for the serenity and the composure of the
+detective and his assistants.</p>
+
+<p>It was evident that Madge had determined to make<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> his life miserable if
+it could be done, and when Nick recalled the substance of the letter she
+had sent him he decided in his own mind that the bullet had not really
+been intended to take his life, but only to warn him of the dangers that
+were hovering over him every minute that he lived.</p>
+
+<p>In the meantime&mdash;or, rather, during the time that has already been
+mentioned&mdash;the detective and his assistants had not been idle. There had
+not been a day or a night when he and Chick and Patsy and Ten-Ichi had
+not been engaged in searching some part of the city for Black Madge, or
+for some trace of her.</p>
+
+<p>They had visited the dens in the lower part of the city; they had
+questioned the policemen and the stool pigeons of the detective bureau,
+and they had even gone so far as to communicate directly with crooks who
+were known to them for information concerning the woman.</p>
+
+<p>But none had been forthcoming. Black Madge was keeping herself as
+thoroughly under cover as if she were still in the prison in that other
+State from which she had escaped.</p>
+
+<p>But after this occurrence of Sunday night, when the bullet was shot
+through the window at the detective, he determined to make no more
+half-hearted efforts to find Madge, but to set out at once that very
+night in search of her; and accordingly he put away his papers and
+called Chick into the room with him.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span>"Chick," he said, "do you happen to know anything about Mike Grinnel's
+place?"</p>
+
+<p>"I only know," said Chick, "that he is said to keep one of the worst
+dives in the city, and that it is located somewhere in Rivington Street.
+I am not sure about it, because I have never had occasion to go there.
+The only thing I do know about it is that it is said to be a great
+Sunday night resort for thieves and crooks of all classes."</p>
+
+<p>"Right," said Nick. "That coincides with what I have heard. I have never
+been there, either, Chick but I am going there to-night&mdash;now. The
+question is, do you want to go with me?"</p>
+
+<p>"I sure do," replied Chick.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>CHAPTER XXI.</h2>
+
+<h3>CURLY JOHN, THE BANK THIEF.</h3>
+
+
+<p>Mike Grinnel's place in Rivington Street was at that time one of those
+monstrosities which were permitted to exist within the limits of New
+York City nobody knows how. During the day and the early part of the
+evening it was to all appearances merely an ordinary saloon, and if a
+stranger were passing it he would regard it as a likely place to enter
+if he required refreshment.</p>
+
+<p>But when the hours deepened into the night, the place gradually assumed
+more and more the aspect which might be labeled dangerous. Men and women
+drifted in together and talked in low tones at tables arranged along the
+side of the room, and as the time continued toward midnight, and passed
+it, the air of respectability gradually disappeared until it was
+entirely gone.</p>
+
+<p>By eleven o'clock the place was usually thronged by people who seemed to
+know each other in a furtive sort of way, and who sometimes would call
+others by name across the room.</p>
+
+<p>At one o'clock the front doors were closed and locked; the curtains were
+tightly drawn so that not a ray of light was permitted to escape into
+the street, blinds were pulled up to make this fact doubly secure,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span> and
+this was when the place really began to live and thrive in its true
+character. Then also was when Mike Grinnel himself came out of his
+shell, and assumed personal charge of the affairs of the place; for Mike
+Grinnel had a reputation among the crooks and thieves who were his
+customers, and if an incipient row started at any time among his guests
+he had only to look with his frowning brow in their direction to quell
+it.</p>
+
+<p>The way into this dive of Grinnel's after the legal hours, and when it
+was supposed to be closed, was, strangely enough, through a house from
+the other side, and of course it followed that only the initiated&mdash;those
+who were known to the man at the door&mdash;could pass.</p>
+
+<p>When Nick Carter and his first assistant left the house that particular
+Sunday night to go to Mike Grinnel's, the principal question was how
+they were to get inside the place at all.</p>
+
+<p>Nick had no doubt in his mind whatever that if Black Madge were in town
+that she would be one who would most certainly visit Mike Grinnel's dive
+Sunday night, for that was the red-letter night of the week at that
+place among the inhabitants of the underworld.</p>
+
+<p>He knew that she would feel perfectly secure against intervention there.
+He knew that she would have perfect confidence in the espionage which
+Mike Grinnel exercised in his place for the safety of his customers,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span>
+for it was his boast that no thief or criminal of any sort had ever been
+arrested in his place and taken from it by the officers.</p>
+
+<p>And, therefore, Nick felt sure that if he could but gain admission and
+Black Madge were in the city, which he did not doubt, he would find her
+there.</p>
+
+<p>To enter a place of this kind one must be actually introduced; that is,
+vouched for by some frequenter of it. It will not suffice for one to
+apply at such a place, and state merely that he knows so-and-so and is
+all right; he will be turned down hard. But Nick Carter was never
+without resource in a matter of this kind, and, therefore, when he left
+the house with Chick, instead of going directly to Mike Grinnel's they
+took their way to police headquarters, where, as he knew would be the
+case, he found the inspector.</p>
+
+<p>"Inspector," he said, "I noticed in the paper yesterday morning that
+Curly John had been arrested by one of your men and brought to
+headquarters on suspicion of being connected with that Liverpool bank
+robbery three months ago."</p>
+
+<p>"That's correct," said the inspector. "Do you know anything about the
+case?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a thing in the world," said Nick, laughing; "but I want to use
+Curly John. I want to use him very badly. I want you to lend him to me
+for to-night, if you will."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span>The inspector could only stare his amazement. He had known Nick Carter a
+good many years, but never before had he received a request of this kind
+from him.</p>
+
+<p>"I guess you will have to say that again, and say it slow, Nick; I don't
+think I understand you."</p>
+
+<p>The detective laughed heartily. Then he began at the beginning and told
+first about the letter he had received from Black Madge containing the
+threats, and then one by one related the incidents that had happened to
+him and to his household during the week that was past. In conclusion,
+he said:</p>
+
+<p>"Now, inspector, I am convinced that if Black Madge is in the city of
+New York, she is now at this very moment seated at one of the tables at
+Mike Grinnel's place. I want to go there to find out. If she is there I
+want to know it. If she is there and I can manage to find out where she
+goes when she leaves there, that is all I care to know to-night."</p>
+
+<p>"But how can Curly help you?" asked the inspector.</p>
+
+<p>"Curly can help me in this way: I know something about his reputation
+and his career. I came across him once several years ago in reference to
+an old case of mine with which he had nothing to do, but concerning
+which he gave me some valuable information. I found that Curly John was
+all right at that time, and, as people of his profession regard it,
+pretty much on the square. I want you, if you will, to ring the bell<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span>
+and order him brought up here and let me talk to him."</p>
+
+<p>"That's easy," said the inspector, and he did as requested.</p>
+
+<p>Five minutes later when Curly John entered the room he paused when he
+was just inside of the door, and fixed his eyes intently upon Nick
+Carter, and then, with scarcely a glance at the inspector, who had
+summoned him, he addressed himself directly to the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"I know you," he said. "I remember you perfectly well, Mr. Carter, and I
+wouldn't be afraid to bet that it was you that sent for me right now. I
+hope you've come to get me out, for I give you my word that I know no
+more about that Liverpool crib-cracking business than you do, and that's
+what they're holding me for just now."</p>
+
+<p>"Curly," said Nick, "you gave me some assistance once in a case I had
+after I assured you that you would not betray a pal in doing it, and
+that I would do a certain favor for you afterward. Did I keep my word
+with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"You kept it for fair, Mr. Carter. I ain't forgot it, neither."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Curly, I have come here to-night to get you to do another favor
+for me, but first answer me one question."</p>
+
+<p>"All right, sir. What's that?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span>"Do they let you in at Mike Grinnel's Sunday night prayer meetings?"</p>
+
+<p>"They sure do, Mr. Carter."</p>
+
+<p>"If you were at liberty at this minute, isn't that the first place you
+would point for?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's about the size of it."</p>
+
+<p>"And you would have no trouble in getting inside?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not the least in the world."</p>
+
+<p>"If the inspector will consent to let you go will you take me there&mdash;me
+and this young man beside me, who is my assistant&mdash;on condition that I
+make you a solemn promise that I will make no arrest while there; that I
+will in no way interfere with Grinnel's business, or with any of his
+customers who are there, and that unless you reveal the fact yourself it
+will never be known that I was inside the place?"</p>
+
+<p>Curly John scratched his head in perplexity.</p>
+
+<p>"That's a pretty big contract you ask of me, Mr. Carter," he said.
+"What's the game?"</p>
+
+<p>"The game is, Curly, that I am very anxious to find out if a certain
+person is in the city. If that person is in the city that person will be
+at Grinnel's to-night, I know."</p>
+
+<p>Curly scratched his head some more.</p>
+
+<p>"And suppose, Mr. Carter, that person is at Grinnel's to-night, what do
+you expect to do to that person?"</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span>"To use your own words," replied Nick, "not the least thing in the
+world."</p>
+
+<p>"Then what do you want to go there for?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have already told you that. I want to find out if that person is in
+the city."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you giving me this on the square?" asked Curly John.</p>
+
+<p>"Absolutely on the square."</p>
+
+<p>"And you won't make any trouble?"</p>
+
+<p>"Not a particle of trouble of any kind."</p>
+
+<p>"You nor that chap over there who is with you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Neither of us. You have my word for that."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what about what's to come after it? Do you intend to follow that
+person down and do the arresting afterward?"</p>
+
+<p>"I will promise you, Curly, that there shall be no arrest of any kind or
+of any person arising out of the visit to Grinnel's place to-night
+within twenty-four hours from this moment."</p>
+
+<p>Curly scratched his head a third time very intently and seriously, and
+at last asked:</p>
+
+<p>"Don't any of them coves over there know you, Mr. Carter?"</p>
+
+<p>"I suppose," said Nick, smiling, "that every one of them knows me, and
+that many of them know Chick as well."</p>
+
+<p>"And so that's Chick, is it? I have heard about him. Well, now, Mr.
+Carter, let me ask you this:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> You just now said that unless I told it,
+not a soul would know that you were there at that place to-night if I
+took you there. Now, how do you reconcile that with the fact that they
+all know you?"</p>
+
+<p>"In this way, Curly: That I shall ask you to wait here a few moments
+after you give your consent, while Chick and I step into the next room
+and make some alteration in our appearances with things that the
+inspector will loan me from his cabinet."</p>
+
+<p>Curly sneered.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! this is a disguise business, is it? Well, Mr. Carter, do you think
+that the guns down there at Grinnel's are such blamed fools as not to
+see through a racket of that kind?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! I can fool them, all right," said Nick, "if you consent. Now,
+Curly, I have given you a promise once before in my life, and lived up
+to it literally. I have made you one now, and I will live up to it
+literally. The inspector will let you go and will send for you in case
+he should want you again. You get your liberty, and I get what I want.
+And now, Curly, it's up to you. Will you do it?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, by thunder, I'll do it! Go into the next room and get ready. When
+you're ready, I am. And I will introduce you and Chick there as a pair
+of old pals of mine from the other side of the water."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXII" id="CHAPTER_XXII"></a>CHAPTER XXII.</h2>
+
+<h3>AT MIKE GRINNEL'S DIVE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>When Curly John knocked at the door of the Sunday-night entrance to Mike
+Grinnel's dive in a peculiar manner, that was evidently full of
+significance to the one behind it, it opened instantly, and the burly
+form of the bouncer of the establishment was discovered.</p>
+
+<p>His face, which might have been a stone mask for all the expression it
+manifested when he first appeared, beamed with joy, however, when he
+discovered Curly John, and thrust out his big hamlike fist with
+undoubted enthusiasm.</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Curly," he said. "I thought you were in limbo."</p>
+
+<p>"And so I was," replied Curly, "until they discovered that they didn't
+want me."</p>
+
+<p>"Make up their minds that you wasn't in that little affair, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's the size of it, Red. Here's my two friends that I brought with
+me. Some one you don't know, and they ain't either of them known inside,
+either. Do you let them pass?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure, Curly. I lets them pass, if you say so."</p>
+
+<p>"Come, lads," said Curly, without vouchsafing any<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> further statement to
+the guard at the door; and so it was that the way was open for the two
+detectives to enter upon the mysteries of that infamous retreat where it
+was the proprietor's boast that no police officer had ever appeared
+without his own expressed permission.</p>
+
+<p>The big room where the patrons congregated on Sunday night was
+comfortably filled when Nick Carter entered it with his two companions.</p>
+
+<p>In all that place there were only two tables unoccupied, and one of
+those was almost directly in the centre of the room. Curly led the way
+to it at once, and the three seated themselves around it while the bank
+burglar sent out his order for the refreshments that were required.</p>
+
+<p>Nick and Chick had made the necessary changes in their appearance; and
+each assumed the outward character and general aspect of a person who
+would be likely to frequent such a place as Grinnel's.</p>
+
+<p>Nick Carter was always a thorough believer in the maxim that too much
+disguise was worse than none at all, and therefore, when the occasion
+required that he should assume one, it was his habit to do as little
+real disguising as possible, and therefore, with the exception of giving
+himself a black eye, and blocking out a couple of his teeth, fixing his
+face so that it appeared as though there was a couple days' growth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> of
+beard upon it, and donning a rough-looking costume, he was unchanged.</p>
+
+<p>In a place like Mike Grinnel's no man thought of taking off his hat
+unless his head was too warm, and therefore Nick kept his on with the
+brim pulled down well over his eyes.</p>
+
+<p>The mere fact that the two detectives were in the company of Curly John
+was sufficient voucher for their personalities, and it did not occur to
+anybody, not even to Mike Grinnel himself, to question them.</p>
+
+<p>They were there; they were with Curly John; he had brought them, and
+that was enough. And, although there were many expressions of welcome
+spoken and called out to Curly John when he passed into the room and
+took his seat at the table, nobody in all that throng offered to
+approach him, for it was an unwritten law of the underworld that a man
+who reappears for the first time among his associates after imprisonment
+is left alone to make his own advances when he is pleased to do so.</p>
+
+<p>As for the two strangers who accompanied him, their presence did not
+concern the others, so long as Curly John vouched for them.</p>
+
+<p>If they thought anything about it at all, they assumed that the burglar
+was preparing for another professional trip, and that the two strangers
+were interested in his plans. They all regarded it as none of their
+affair, and in the underworld it is the rule of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> life to mind your own
+business, and let other people do the same.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as the detective had taken his seat&mdash;which he was careful to do
+in such a position that he could command a view of the greater part of
+the room without perceptibly turning his head&mdash;he began, little by
+little, and one by one, to study the people who were there.</p>
+
+<p>At first he paid no attention whatever to the men; but, since it was a
+fact that more than half of the guests, or patrons, or whatever you
+please to call them, were women, and as there were at least sixty
+persons present, it was some time before his eyes rested upon the face
+that he sought.</p>
+
+<p>But Madge was there without question. She had not thought it necessary
+to attempt any disguise of any sort, and her bold, black eyes were
+roving restlessly about the room when Nick Carter encountered them.</p>
+
+<p>But his own were so thoroughly shaded by the wide brim of the slouch hat
+he wore that he did not believe that she knew he was looking at her.</p>
+
+<p>In this manner he studied her for some time, and discovered that she was
+furtively watching Curly John and the two who had come there with him.</p>
+
+<p>It was apparent to the detective that Black Madge had not overcome her
+old habit of suspecting everybody; and the mere fact that there were two
+strangers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> present in the room, even though they were accompanied by one
+of the old habitu&eacute;s of the place, was to her a warning that they might
+not be all right.</p>
+
+<p>It had been Nick's intention to make no demonstration of any kind while
+he was inside Grinnel's dive; it was his purpose to go there and observe
+all that he could, and then to go away again without having exchanged a
+word with any one except Curly, unless it should become absolutely
+necessary.</p>
+
+<p>He intended&mdash;if he should succeed in finding Madge there&mdash;to trust to
+luck and his own ingenuity to follow her when she would leave the place,
+and so discover where she was living, and by that means he could keep
+his eye upon her for several days thereafter, and ultimately could round
+up the gang of crooks which he had no doubt she had organized.</p>
+
+<p>But Madge, although she had no idea that either of the strangers might
+be Nick Carter, did not intend that these two men should leave that room
+without passing through some sort of inspection which would serve to
+identify them for what they might be.</p>
+
+<p>While every one else in that place was thoroughly satisfied about them,
+because of their presence with Curly, this fact cut no ice with Black
+Madge, and always suspicious, she was instantly suspicious of them when
+they entered.</p>
+
+<p>Therefore, a very short time had elapsed after the detectives took their
+seats at the table, before she left<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> her own place, and crossed the
+sawdust-covered floor swiftly to Curly's table.</p>
+
+<p>There she slapped him on the shoulder, as a man might have done, and
+with a laugh, which called the attention of every other person in the
+room to what she was doing, as she intended it to do, she exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p>"Hello, Curly. It does me good to see you back among us again. How did
+you put out the lamps of those chaps up in Mulberry Street, so that they
+let you out?"</p>
+
+<p>Curly, who was wise in his day and generation, jumped to his feet and
+shook hands heartily with Black Madge; for he guessed instantly that it
+was not to greet him that she had crossed the floor, but rather to gain
+a closer view of his companions, and by standing erect he could keep her
+a little distance without appearing to do so.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh! they just found out they didn't want me," he replied. And then,
+realizing that something was expected of him by the others in the room,
+at least, if not Madge herself, he jerked a chair around toward her, and
+added: "Sit down, Madge, won't you, and have something?"</p>
+
+<p>"Sure," she replied, laughing again, and dropping negligently into the
+chair.</p>
+
+<p>"What kind of a game are you playing now, Madge?" asked Curly, after he
+had motioned to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> waiter to approach; and then, pausing long enough
+to give the order, he added: "Last I heard of you you were behind the
+mosquito bars resting up a bit."</p>
+
+<p>Madge laughed again. She seemed to be full of laughter to-night, but it
+was an uneasy, imperfect, and significant sort of laughter that Nick
+Carter had heard from her lips before, and which he, therefore,
+understood. He realized, now, that it was important that he should
+proceed with great caution.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, yes," she said. "Nick Carter did that for me. But I'm out again,
+just the same, and now my lay is to get square with Nick Carter."</p>
+
+<p>"You don't say so," said Curly, shifting uneasily in his chair, and
+forgetting himself so far as to cast one furtive glance in the direction
+of the detective. "What are you going to do to him?"</p>
+
+<p>"Ask me that after I've got him where I want him," replied Madge, fixing
+her bold eyes full upon Nick Carter's face; and then, slowly removing
+them, and swinging her body half around until she again faced Curly, she
+added insinuatingly:</p>
+
+<p>"Aren't you going to introduce me to your friends, Curly?"</p>
+
+<p>Curly shook his shoulders. He was on safe ground, now, ground where he
+felt perfectly at home; for it was never necessary to indulge in
+introductions in that walk of life, not even when they were asked for,
+but he replied:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span>"Sure, Madge. These are my two friends, and I guess that'll be about
+enough. You can call them by any name you want to, and they'll both
+answer you."</p>
+
+<p>"Under cover?" she asked.</p>
+
+<p>"A little," admitted Curly.</p>
+
+<p>"Are they dumb, or tongue-tied, or have they temporarily lost their
+voices; or, are they only bashful? I should think that two full-grown
+men such as they are might be able to speak for themselves."</p>
+
+<p>"It ain't always good taste to speak for yourself," said Curly, with an
+uneasy laugh. "They might do it once too often."</p>
+
+<p>Madge's suspicions were plainly aroused. She remained silent for a
+moment after that, and then, leaning forward, she rested her arms upon
+the table, and with her face thrust well forward over them, again stared
+into the detective's face.</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know who you are like?" she asked coolly.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes," replied Nick, just as coolly as she had spoken, "I have heard it
+said often, but if you will take my advice you won't mention the name
+aloud. It might excite some of the people here."</p>
+
+<p>She laughed.</p>
+
+<p>"That's just what I mean to do," she said, with a tightening of her
+lips. "They need excitement; that's what they live on. It's what we all
+live on. It's what we come here to get. Excitement is the backbone and
+muscle and sinew of our beings. And do you know<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> that I think I could
+startle them all mightily right now if I should call something out to
+them which is on my mind to say?"</p>
+
+<p>She reached out her left hand, and seized Curly by the shoulder, pulling
+him over to her, and then, in a tone which only the three who were
+present with her could hear, she went on, her voice deadly calm:</p>
+
+<p>"Did you think, Nick Carter, that you could fool Black Madge? Did you
+think that you could come here into this same room where I am without my
+knowing instantly who you were? Don't you know that your very presence
+in the same room with me would make itself known to my sensibilities by
+reason of the very hate I bear you?"</p>
+
+<p>She paused a moment and laughed uneasily. And then she continued:</p>
+
+<p>"Don't you know, Nick Carter, that you have walked directly into a trap,
+from which you cannot escape? And were you not aware before you came
+here that if your identity became known your life wouldn't be worth a
+moment's purchase? If you so much as quiver an eyelid, Nick Carter, I
+will call out your name, and point you out as a spy, and you know what
+that will mean in Mike Grinnel's dive."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXIII"></a>CHAPTER XXIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>BLACK MADGE'S DEFIANCE.</h3>
+
+
+<p>It was a crucial moment for each of the three men who were seated at
+that table, and it affected each of the three quite differently.</p>
+
+<p>Chick was concerned only for the safety of his chief, for even then it
+did not occur to him that Black Madge had taken sufficient interest in
+himself to identify him, and that doubtless she still regarded him as
+really a friend of Curly's.</p>
+
+<p>Curly was plainly frightened, as well as utterly astounded. It had never
+occurred to him that the disguise of Nick Carter, which had seemed to
+him to be perfect, would be, or could be, so readily penetrated; and he
+realized, for the moment, at least, that he was in as much danger as
+Nick Carter himself, for if it should be known to the others&mdash;or should
+suddenly be made known to them&mdash;that Nick Carter was in that room, they
+would not only kill the detective, but they would also murder the man
+who had dared to bring him there.</p>
+
+<p>Black Madge was as thoroughly aware of this fact as was Curly himself,
+and she did the latter justice to believe that somehow he had been
+imposed upon by the detective, just as Nick had sought to impose<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> upon
+all of them; in a word, she did not blame Curly for the existing
+situation.</p>
+
+<p>As for the situation itself, she was delighted with it, for it had
+thrust Nick Carter into her power much more quickly and certainly than
+she had ever supposed it could be done.</p>
+
+<p>She had not been seated at the table with them a full minute before she
+was perfectly assured in her own mind that the man opposite her was Nick
+Carter, and it did not occur to her to doubt that the other man was one
+of his assistants&mdash;it made no difference to her which one.</p>
+
+<p>And now, while she threatened the detective with death if he should make
+any overt omission, she was eagerly casting about in her mind how to get
+him entirely into her power to do with as she would without alarming the
+others that were present there.</p>
+
+<p>She knew that Nick Carter understood and realized the danger as
+thoroughly as she did; but she also knew that he was extremely
+resourceful whenever danger threatened, and that she might only count
+upon him as captured and overcome entirely when he was bound and gagged,
+or dead, before her.</p>
+
+<p>As for Nick, when Madge uttered the threat to him, he returned her gaze
+steadfastly, at the same time reaching out a little farther with the
+hand that was resting upon the table, and then he replied, quietly and
+in the same low tone that she had employed:</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span>"I took every one of those things into consideration, Madge, when I came
+here. Now, I want to know if you intend to shout out that name, and give
+the alarm, as you have threatened to do, or if you will sit there
+quietly where you are, pretending to be interested in the drink in front
+of you, and talk it over calmly."</p>
+
+<p>She shrugged her shoulders, and again leaned back in her chair, but at
+the same time drawing it a little nearer to the table.</p>
+
+<p>"As you please," she said. "I don't care to precipitate matters and
+break up the party here unless you force me to do so&mdash;at least, not just
+yet."</p>
+
+<p>"Madge," said Nick, "you think that you have me in your power. You
+believe that by shouting out my name I would be killed. That is
+doubtless quite true, but before that killing was accomplished I should
+have done a little execution on my own account, and Chick, who is here
+beside me, is quite ready to do his part. As for Curly, he is an
+innocent party in this affair, so we won't consider him at all, although
+you must admit that he would have to take the consequences of bringing
+me here, which would be far from pleasant."</p>
+
+<p>She nodded, and smiled at him fiercely, and then she replied:</p>
+
+<p>"Go on. You were about to tell me that in the sleeve of that arm, which
+is extended toward me over<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> the table, you hold a weapon with which you
+could kill me before I could give the alarm a second time. Very well I
+know it, but all the same I am not afraid of it, Nick Carter, any more
+than I am afraid of you, and you know that I have never been that."</p>
+
+<p>"I know," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Go on, then," she repeated. "What do you want to talk about? Since you
+wish to talk things over calmly, what did, you come here for, anyhow?"</p>
+
+<p>"I came," said Nick, "believing that you were in the city, and knowing
+that I would find you here if you were, I came because I was determined
+to find out where you were, and to put a stop to your career."</p>
+
+<p>She started savagely, but Nick held up his hand and hushed her.</p>
+
+<p>"I am not going to make any arrests in this place, Madge. I am not going
+to interfere with Mike Grinnel's business, or with his reputation for
+affording security to his patrons. If every person in this room was my
+friend instead of my enemy, you, Madge, would be as free to depart in
+peace when you get ready to do so as you would have been had I not come
+here."</p>
+
+<p>"That all sounds very fine," she said, "if only I cared to believe it."</p>
+
+<p>"Believe it or not, as you please, it is the truth."</p>
+
+<p>"And what did you come here for?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have told you that already. I came to find you."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span>"And, having found me, to let me go away in peace?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have said that also, I believe."</p>
+
+<p>"Nick Carter," she exclaimed, laughing scornfully, "you are not a good
+liar."</p>
+
+<p>"I never lie," replied Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," she said, "I will speak my little piece, now that you are
+through. You are here, and there are two locked doors between you and
+the street, and there are between twenty and thirty men in this room now
+who would rather be killed than let you escape if they knew you were
+here. I might as well confess to you that eight of those men belong to
+me. That is, they obey my orders. Now, what are you going to do about
+it?"</p>
+
+<p>"I think," replied Nick quietly, and smiling back at her, "that, with
+your permission, I will order another round of drinks."</p>
+
+<p>She pushed back her chair petulantly from the table, and half started to
+rise from it, but Nick Carter's voice, low, but sharp, halted her.</p>
+
+<p>"Stop, Madge," he said; "keep your seat. This thing has gone too far for
+either of us to attempt to fool the other. You might as well understand
+that if there is to be any row precipitated, I will do the
+precipitating."</p>
+
+<p>She blazed her eyes at him for an instant, and then parted her lips with
+the evident intention of shouting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> out his identity. And, while he did
+not move to prevent her from doing so, the steady gaze of his eyes
+somehow overcame her, and she closed them again without making a sound.</p>
+
+<p>"That is better, Madge," he said. "This is a case of diamond cut
+diamond, only for the moment my diamond is a little harder and sharper
+than your own. Take my advice, and sit where you are."</p>
+
+<p>Curly and Chick had both been absorbed spectators and listeners to this
+little scene between the detective and Black Madge.</p>
+
+<p>Chick had, of course, made himself ready at any instant to act, no
+matter what sort of action might be required.</p>
+
+<p>But Curly was distinctly in a quandary. He knew that it was no fault of
+Nick's that the discovery had been made, and he also knew that if she
+was forced to keep silent the identity of Nick Carter would not be
+discovered by the others present.</p>
+
+<p>If the thing should come to a row, every instinct of Curly's life and
+profession would force him to take the side of the underworld as against
+Nick Carter, and his impulse would be that way, too. But his strongest
+desire at that moment was to prevent an exposure at any cost. It was for
+this reason that he now intervened.</p>
+
+<p>"Madge," he said, "listen to me for a minute."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span>"Hello, Curly," she said, turning her head lazily toward him, "it isn't
+necessary for you to butt in on this affair."</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to butt in, Madge, just the same. Now, listen to me."</p>
+
+<p>"Go on, then."</p>
+
+<p>"You know where I stand, Madge, and there ain't no reason why I should
+explain how all this came about; or, if you think there is, there ain't
+going to be any explanation offered anyhow, but the point about it is
+this: It wouldn't be healthy for you, nor for any of us, if you should
+yell out a certain name in this present community, and I want to tell
+you right now that I won't stand for your doing it. It's up to you to
+keep still, Madge, and mind your own business, for while I should be
+with the boys as against Nick Carter to the bitter end, if it actually
+came to a fight, at the same time I'd blame you for the fight, and
+although you're a woman you would be the first one I'd look for out of
+this bunch. Now, I've spoken my piece, and you can go on with yours."</p>
+
+<p>This was a development which Madge had not anticipated, but Curly had
+spoken so plainly to the point, and his premises were so well taken and
+so logical from his standpoint, that she could offer no objection.</p>
+
+<p>If she could have left the table for a moment; if she could have had
+time to think, or if she could have secured an opportunity to exchange
+half a dozen sen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span>tences with any one of the members of her Band of
+Hatred, it would have been different, and she might have planned for the
+overthrow of the detective.</p>
+
+<p>As it was, the circumstances had arrived at such a condition that
+leaving her chair would be equivalent&mdash;so far as her companions were
+concerned&mdash;to the calling out of Nick Carter's name.</p>
+
+<p>Madge knew Curly John, and she knew him for a man who never made idle
+threats. His reputation among his fellows was that he spoke very rarely,
+and said very little when he did speak, but that what he said was always
+to the point, and that he always meant what he uttered.</p>
+
+<p>And so she saw the tables rather turned upon herself. Instead of Nick
+Carter being in her power, she was temporarily in his.</p>
+
+<p>The situation had its ludicrous side. Each was in a sense the prisoner
+of the other, for, while Nick Carter could not hope to escape from that
+room unless she gave him permission to leave it, she could not rise from
+the chair upon which she was seated without risking death unless he
+permitted it.</p>
+
+<p>If only she could have conveyed the shortest kind of a message to Mike
+Grinnel, or have signaled some word to Slippery, or to Surly Bob, or
+Gentleman Jim, or Fly Cummings, or Cuthbert, or Maxwell, or The Parson,
+all of whom were in that room at the time, everything would have been so
+easy for her.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span>But she could not leave her chair; neither could she signal to any of
+these.</p>
+
+<p>Nick Carter's eye was upon her; his arm was extended across the table,
+and she knew the potency of that arm, as well as something about the
+strength and fund of resource of the detective.</p>
+
+<p>But the situation was unbearable. She felt that she could not endure it,
+and that in some manner it would have to be brought to a close, and at
+once.</p>
+
+<p>And so she leaned still further back in her chair, gradually tilting it
+until it rested poised upon the two rear legs.</p>
+
+<p>And then, with a sudden motion, and at the same instant uttering a
+scream, which rang shrilly through the room, she threw herself directly
+backward, at the same time kicking up her feet and so striking them
+fiercely against the under side of the table.</p>
+
+<p>The weight of her body and the force with which she struck the table
+instantly overturned it, bottles, glasses, and all, so that it crashed
+to the floor in utter confusion.</p>
+
+<p>And at the same instant every one in that room leaped to their feet and
+reached for their weapons.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXIV"></a>CHAPTER XXIV.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE CELLAR.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The action of Black Madge was so sudden and so unlooked for that it came
+as an entire surprise, even to Nick Carter, and the act which overturned
+the table, coming as it did from a position directly opposite his own,
+sent the table full upon him, and spilled the contents that had rested
+upon it into his lap.</p>
+
+<p>More than that, in spite of his effort to resist the force of the
+attack, his chair was overturned backward, and he found himself the next
+instant sprawling upon the floor.</p>
+
+<p>But even if he was for an instant put out of business by the incident,
+there were other things connected with it which worked to his
+assistance.</p>
+
+<p>Always in a resort of this kind, where there is ever the least
+likelihood of police interference, there are many arrangements prepared
+for instantly turning off the lights, and it is the first impulse of
+every person who finds himself in such a place to "dowse the glim"
+instantly upon the raising of a disturbance, if it is possible to do so.</p>
+
+<p>Again, when there is the sudden noise of crashing glass and the
+appearance of confusion in such a place at such a time, it never can be
+determined at once what<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> the cause of it is, and, as discretion is
+always the better part of valor, and certainly is counted so among the
+denizens of the underworld, there were at least a dozen men in that room
+at the time who leaped for the switch to turn off the lights the instant
+that Madge upset the table.</p>
+
+<p>Mike Grinnel himself happened to be standing where one of the switches
+was within reach of his hand, and so it happened that before Nick
+Carter's chair could reach the floor the place was in total darkness.</p>
+
+<p>Nick was not unaccustomed to experiences of this kind. It was by no
+means the first time that he had been present in a resort like this one
+when the lights had been turned off, and it is safe to say that he never
+in his life entered a room where such a thing was likely to occur
+without studying his surroundings carefully the moment he was inside,
+and determining then and there what course he would pursue if such an
+event should occur.</p>
+
+<p>Consequently, although Madge's action came as an utter surprise to him,
+he was nevertheless prepared for it. And so was Chick.</p>
+
+<p>When the detective found himself falling, and knew that his chair must
+topple over, the thought instantly came to him that Chick would escape
+the greater part of the confusion resulting from it&mdash;and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span> he knew that
+he could rely upon Chick's activity and resource as thoroughly as upon
+his own.</p>
+
+<p>Nick managed to seize the edge of the table with his hands while
+falling, and exerting the great strength of his arms to the utmost, he
+literally picked it from the floor and hurled it over his head, while he
+was practically lying on his back.</p>
+
+<p>Then, kicking the chair from under him, and half rolling over&mdash;realizing
+in that instant that Madge could not possibly get upon her own feet as
+quickly as he could on his&mdash;he leaped to his knees, and threw himself
+forward across the now empty space which the table had occupied, and so
+managed to seize the skirt of Black Madge's dress.</p>
+
+<p>One jerk of his strong arms pulled her toward him, and the next instant
+he had seized her, and by passing one arm around her neck clapped his
+hand over her mouth, thus preventing her from calling out.</p>
+
+<p>Although she struggled fiercely, clawing with her hands, and kicking
+with her heels, and attempting vainly to scream, the confusion in the
+room was so great that no one was conscious of what she was doing, save
+Nick Carter himself, who held her.</p>
+
+<p>And Nick knew that behind the bar, almost midway in its length, there
+was a small door, which connected with some sort of an apartment back of
+it. What that apartment was, he did not know, other than that he had
+seen Grinnel pass out and return through that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> small door twice since he
+entered the place; and he concluded that it must be sort of a retiring
+room, possibly a private office of the proprietor.</p>
+
+<p>The door was not tall enough for a man to pass through standing in an
+upright position, and it was considerably narrower than an ordinary
+door; but all the same, to Nick's idea, it offered a safe and secure
+retreat for the moment, if he could but succeed in reaching it.</p>
+
+<p>What was beyond it, he did not know. But it was enough for him, that, if
+he could get past it before the lights were turned on again, he at least
+would be out of that crowded room, and have time to catch his breath,
+and determine what it was best to do.</p>
+
+<p>He regarded Chick as entirely competent to take care of himself.</p>
+
+<p>Therefore, the instant that he seized upon Madge, and stopped her
+screaming by clapping his hand over her mouth, he pulled himself to his
+feet, and, holding her struggling form firmly, he carried her safely
+across the space which intervened between him and the end of the bar&mdash;a
+space which he knew would be practically clear of impedimenta at the
+moment.</p>
+
+<p>Nick figured that Grinnel, having turned off the lights, would stand
+silently with his hand upon the switch ready to turn them on again in an
+instant.</p>
+
+<p>If he could only succeed in carrying Madge behind that bar and through
+the door already described be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span>fore the lights were turned on, much would
+be accomplished.</p>
+
+<p>The detective reached the end of the bar in safety, and, feeling the
+back of it with his body, glided around behind it to the spot where he
+knew the small door to be located, and then, releasing his left hand
+from the woman he carried long enough to reach for the latch of the
+door, he pulled it open, passed through, and closed it behind him.</p>
+
+<p>With the hand that was still free he pulled a pair of handcuffs from his
+pocket, and, before Madge could escape him, he snapped them upon her
+wrists behind her back and dropped her to the floor, at the same time
+pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and tying it firmly&mdash;much too
+firmly for her comfort&mdash;around her jaws.</p>
+
+<p>His next act was to produce his flash light and turn it upon the door,
+where, to his delight, he discovered that it was only necessary to drop
+a heavy iron bar into place to secure it; and this bar passed entirely
+across the door, and rested in iron slots at either side of it.</p>
+
+<p>He also noticed in that instant that the door was an extremely heavy
+one, and that the partition through which it opened was a substantial
+one. Without doubt, the room had been prepared by Mike Grinnel himself
+with great care as the means of a safe and sure retreat for him in the
+event of a raid upon his place.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span>The detective discovered, also, that there was a gas jet in the room,
+and he turned this on, and lit the gas at once.</p>
+
+<p>Madge was in the meantime using every effort in her power to pull the
+handkerchief from her face, so that she could cry for help, but now with
+light sufficient to see what he was about, the detective lost no time in
+securing her so firmly that she was entirely helpless.</p>
+
+<p>To her baleful glances of utter hatred, he paid not the slightest
+attention, but he began at once to examine the room with great care,
+knowing well that there should be another means of entrance to and
+egress from it than the one he made use of. For Mike Grinnel, skilled as
+he was in the habits of the people he dealt with, would never have built
+for himself a den from which there was no escape after once he had
+entered it. Although there was no sign of a second door to be seen
+anywhere, Nick did not despair of finding one, and he began his search
+by first pulling out a sideboard which stood against the wall, and
+looking behind it.</p>
+
+<p>He next had recourse to a couch, under which he searched for a trapdoor,
+but found none; and then his attention was attracted to an iron safe,
+not quite so high as his head, which stood in one corner of the room.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span>An iron safe is not a thing which is easily moved from its position, but
+Nick seized upon it, nevertheless; nor was he surprised when he found
+that it was so perfectly balanced on the wheels that supported it that
+it moved readily enough in response to his efforts.</p>
+
+<p>And behind it was the door he sought. It was not over three feet high,
+and thirty inches in width, but there was a latch upon it, mortised into
+the wood, and there was a hole in the door, through which was passed a
+small steel chain that was attached to a rung fastened to the iron safe.
+This, of course, was intended to use for pulling the safe back into
+position after the door had been made use of, and the fugitive, whoever
+he might be, had made his escape.</p>
+
+<p>Nick pulled open the door, thus making it ready for his use, and then
+quickly returned to Black Madge's side. He raised her in his arms,
+carried her to the little door, and, having unceremoniously thrust her
+headfirst through it, crawled after her, closed the door, and pulled the
+safe into place again with the aid of the chain.</p>
+
+<p>He found himself now in a narrow corridor, faced by rough bricks on
+either side of him, evidently constructed between the party walls of the
+two buildings, and ten feet in front of him he perceived a flight of
+steps leading downward.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span>Again picking Madge up in his arms, he hurried down the narrow stairs to
+the bottom, and there came upon an iron door, fastened with a spring
+lock on the inside, which he therefore easily opened.</p>
+
+<p>Passing through this, and closing it behind him, so that the lock
+snapped again, he found himself in the cellar beneath the building that
+adjoined the one in which Mike Grinnel's dive was located. Across the
+cellar, and at the far end of it, was a flight of wooden stairs.</p>
+
+<p>Nick regretted at that moment that he did not remember what sort of a
+place was located next to Grinnel's, but he realized the imperative
+necessity of getting out of the building into the street as quickly as
+possible, no matter how he accomplished it, and therefore, when he
+carried his captive up those stairs to the top of them, and found there
+only an ordinary wooden door locked against him, he lost no time in
+kicking it open, and passing through.</p>
+
+<p>When he did so, and when he came out in the room above, it happened that
+the battery of his own light gave out, and before he could determine his
+surroundings he was in utter darkness.</p>
+
+<p>This lasted, however, only a moment, and he was in the act of hastening
+forward toward the front of the house, when, with startling suddenness,
+the whole place flashed into brilliant illumination, and he found<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span>
+himself standing at one end of what looked like a Chinese laundry, while
+directly in front of him, and not many feet distant, was Mike Grinnel
+and three of the men from his place, confronting him, with drawn
+revolvers in their hands.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXV" id="CHAPTER_XXV"></a>CHAPTER XXV.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE MAN IN THE BED.</h3>
+
+
+<p>The detective knew in that instant that he could no longer hope to save
+his prisoner; that is, to escape with her, and that the chances were
+about a thousand to one against his own escape.</p>
+
+<p>That Mike Grinnel was thoroughly incensed, and that he was determined
+that the detective should never get out of that place alive, was
+apparent in the cold glitter of his eyes, as he looked at Nick across
+the barrel of his revolver.</p>
+
+<p>And Nick knew how Grinnel had succeeded in heading him off. He could see
+in his mind just what the surprise was in the saloon when the lights
+were again turned on and it was discovered that one of the strangers who
+had come there with Curly had disappeared, and had taken Black Madge
+with him.</p>
+
+<p>Grinnel, knew, of course, that there was only one way out of that place,
+which was through the private door back of the bar into the little room
+which he used as an office, and thence through that other door behind
+the safe, through the narrow corridor, down the stairs into the cellar,
+and then up again into the back end of the Chinese laundry.</p>
+
+<p>And Grinnel had lost no time in summoning to his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> aid three of his most
+trusted adherents, and hastening with them to the laundry, where he was
+ready to head off the detective's retreat.</p>
+
+<p>It had not been difficult for them to get there and be ready for him
+before he could reach the place with his burden; for he had used up a
+great deal of time in searching out the secret door behind the safe, and
+in finding his way through the cellar.</p>
+
+<p>And, moreover, Mike Grinnel was a man of expedient. Having arranged this
+method of escape for himself, if the necessity of it should arise, he
+had also prepared the laundry with lights to turn on or to extinguish as
+he might desire; and, therefore, having reached the laundry and prepared
+himself and his followers for the coming of the detective, they had only
+to wait silently in the darkness until they heard him approaching, when
+Mike switched on the lights.</p>
+
+<p>It was a moment fraught with peril, and with unnumbered possibilities.
+At such times there is always an instant of inaction; an instant when
+neither party concerned knows quite what to do.</p>
+
+<p>But the detective, as it happened&mdash;with the possible exception of Mike
+Grinnel himself&mdash;was the first to recover.</p>
+
+<p>The detective was carrying Madge in his arms; and now, at the risk of
+injuring her, realizing that it was the only way by which any
+possibility of escape could be offered to himself, he raised her over
+his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> head at the very instant that the turning on of the lights revealed
+his enemies, and threw her with all his strength at Mike Grinnel's burly
+figure.</p>
+
+<p>Of course, not one of the crooks dared to use his weapon, lest Black
+Madge herself be shot, and it was upon this idea that the detective
+acted as much as any other.</p>
+
+<p>Nor did it occur to Mike Grinnel that this other, whom he had seemed to
+have now guessed must be Nick Carter, would resort to any such measure
+as he had, and, therefore, he was not prepared.</p>
+
+<p>The body of Madge, flying the short distance across the room, struck
+Grinnel squarely on the chest, and thus forced him backward against two
+of the men who were with him; and so in that instant four people all
+together were huddled in a heap upon the floor, and only one of Nick's
+visible enemies remained standing.</p>
+
+<p>And the instant that Nick threw Madge at them, he leaped forward and
+seized the switch, which was almost at Grinnel's shoulder, where he had
+been standing; and, with a twist of his wrist, he turned off the lights
+as suddenly as they had been turned on.</p>
+
+<p>At the same instant he had taken into consideration the position of the
+one man of the enemy who was left erect, and no sooner had he turned the
+switch than he leaped forward toward the spot where he knew that man to
+be standing.</p>
+
+<p>Nicely calculating the distance, he struck out a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> savage blow with his
+right hand, and he heard this last one of his enemies go down in a heap
+upon the floor.</p>
+
+<p>And then the detective leaped over him toward the door which he had seen
+during that brief interval of illumination, passed through it, and
+pushed it shut behind him.</p>
+
+<p>He knew now that he was in the front room of the laundry. He knew that
+there should be tables and benches there, and it was only the work of an
+instant for him to reach out and feel around until he seized upon one,
+and then, exerting his great strength, he pulled it over in front of and
+against the door he had closed.</p>
+
+<p>A faint light shone into that room from the street, and Nick instantly
+leaped for the front door of the shop, reaching it only to find that it
+had been locked when the others entered.</p>
+
+<p>But the door was of glass, and, hesitating not an instant, he seized a
+chair and hurled it into the street, thus making a hole through which he
+had no difficulty in passing.</p>
+
+<p>The next instant he was outside, and for the moment, at least, safe. But
+the detective knew that he was by no means free from pursuit as yet,
+although he had no intention of fleeing very far; and, as he was about
+to turn away, he remembered that he had left<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> Chick inside the saloon
+surrounded by rascals of every kind.</p>
+
+<p>It was not in the nature of Nick Carter to desert any one under such
+circumstances, much less his favorite, Chick.</p>
+
+<p>While he hesitated, he heard a noise behind him in the laundry that was
+made by Grinnel and his three followers, attempting to escape from the
+predicament into which he had thrown them.</p>
+
+<p>He remembered then that Grinnel and his men must have come out of the
+dive by the front door or by the hall-door entrance, in order to have
+reached the laundry when they did, and he figured in that instant that
+it was more than likely that in doing so they had not thought to fasten
+the door behind them, or had purposely, perhaps, left it unlocked in
+order that they might be able to return with all the more speed to the
+safety and seclusion of the dive.</p>
+
+<p>He heard them pounding against the door against which he had pulled the
+heavy bench, and he knew that at least three or four minutes must elapse
+before they could make their escape; and in that moment he decided to
+return to the saloon at whatever cost, if it were possible for him to
+get there.</p>
+
+<p>A few quick bounds brought him to the front door of the dive&mdash;that door
+which swung so ceaselessly to and fro during the legal hours of its
+business. He knew, although he tried it softly, that it was securely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span>
+locked against him, and he passed on to the hall door of the house,
+which was just beyond it. This, as he had guessed might be the case, was
+not fastened, and he pushed it open and passed beyond it.</p>
+
+<p>He found himself in a hallway in black darkness, and while he paused for
+a moment to listen, not a sound of any kind came to his ears, a fact
+which led him to determine that either Chick had already been done for
+by the frequenters of the dive, or else that he had been made a
+prisoner, and was lying somewhere, bound and gagged, awaiting the return
+of Grinnel.</p>
+
+<p>Nick now crept along the hall until his hand came in contact with a
+balustrade; and here he paused, uncertain whether to proceed through the
+hall to the rear of the building, which he knew should give an entrance
+to the saloon, or to ascend the stairs and temporarily hide himself in
+the neighborhood of the house. Everything considered, this latter course
+was distinctly the best one, since, doubtless, it would never occur to
+Mike Grinnel or to any of those who were concerned with him in this
+incident, that Nick Carter would have the temerity to return to the same
+house from which he had just escaped.</p>
+
+<p>Therefore, if safety were the only incentive for Nick Carter, to act
+upon this was the very best course he could have adopted. But Nick was
+ever one who considered his own safety last. His whole impulse now was
+to do the best that could be done to get<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> Chick out of the predicament
+into which he had been thrust; and he considered that to be the very
+method he had adopted.</p>
+
+<p>Nick knew the characteristics of the people against whom he was pitted
+well enough to understand that the moment they realized that he had
+escaped them they would simply return to the saloon of the dive to
+discuss it&mdash;and doubtless, also, to call to severe account those who
+were responsible for the affair.</p>
+
+<p>Such a discussion would not take place until two things had
+happened&mdash;until they were satisfied utterly that Nick Carter had escaped
+them, and also that they had Chick so thoroughly in their power that he
+could not hope to escape.</p>
+
+<p>And so the detective ascended the stairs softly, and as silently as a
+shadow. He had no means of knowing, of course, the character of the
+rooms on those floors, or their location; but, nevertheless, the
+circumstances were such that he had to take desperate chances, and
+therefore when he reached the landing he felt with his hands silently
+along the wall until he came to a door, which he felt slowly down until
+he touched the knob. This he turned, trying to open the door which
+resisted him, showing that it was locked.</p>
+
+<p>There is a way to force a door&mdash;that is, an ordinary door&mdash;and at the
+same time make very little noise. It is done&mdash;if the door opens
+inward&mdash;by seizing the knob firmly with both hands, having turned it,
+and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> then by bracing the body with one knee pressed firmly against the
+door directly under the knob. In this position, if it is assumed by a
+strong man, every effort may be centred upon one sudden impulse forward,
+which, while there is no visible or perceptible impact, will place all
+of the muscular force and weight of the man directly upon the point
+where the latch or lock of the door is located; and it is a very
+substantial lock which will not give way under this sort of pressure
+when it is correctly applied. Nor is there any perceptible noise, more
+than that of the tearing out of the slot which holds the bolt of the
+lock.</p>
+
+<p>When this door gave way before the detective it admitted him to a square
+room at the rear of the house&mdash;a room in which a lamp, turned low, was
+burning; and as he closed the door behind him and pulled a chair in
+front of it to hold it shut, he saw a figure of a man, who had been
+sleeping fully clothed on a bed in one corner of the room, start to an
+upright posture, staring and apparently alarmed.</p>
+
+<p>"Who&mdash;&mdash;" the man started to exclaim, but the detective interrupted him
+with a sharp command.</p>
+
+<p>"Shut up," he ordered, "if you let out a peep you will be the worse for
+it."</p>
+
+<p>Without a word, the man sank back upon the pillow, apparently not in the
+least alarmed now, and evidently believing that the person who had
+entered his room was only another like himself, who, having gotten<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> into
+some sort of trouble, was fleeing from his pursuers; and by all
+precedents, if the man was pursued to that room, it would be infinitely
+better for its permanent occupant to appear to be still sleeping
+soundly, than to have any of the aspect of a confederate, and so he
+closed his eyes again as if he were still alone.</p>
+
+<p>Nick waited a moment at the door, listening for sounds outside, and
+while he stood there he heard the hall door from the street open, and
+presently close again, and he could distinguish the tramping of feet
+along the hall as several persons passed to the rear of the house,
+evidently on their way to the saloon again.</p>
+
+<p>As soon as these noises had ceased, he knew that he was for the moment
+at least safe from pursuit. He piled other things against the door, and
+then deliberately crossed the room to the lamp and turned it up, after
+which he strode over to the bedside.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, my friend," he said to its occupant, "I'll have to ask you to wake
+up for about three minutes."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," was the simple response. "What do you want? Who are you,
+anyway? And what in blazes do you mean by bursting into my room in this
+way?"</p>
+
+<p>"First," said Nick, "I want to know who you are, and whether you belong
+here or not?"</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, you make me tired," grunted the man on the bed. "I'm Phil, the head
+day bartender downstairs."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span>"All right, Phil," said Nick, smiling. "Get up on your feet, where I can
+look at you, and where you can answer a few questions for me."</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, what's eating you?" growled the bartender. "I ain't been to bed
+more than an hour. Let me sleep."</p>
+
+<p>Instead of replying, the detective reached out his hand, and, seizing
+Phil by the shoulder, jerked him from the bed to the floor, stood him on
+his feet, and then seated him forcibly upon one of the wooden chairs
+near at hand&mdash;so forcibly that his jaws snapped together like the
+cracking of a nut.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, will you be good?" asked Nick, smiling grimly.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, curse you," was the surly reply. "What do you want?"</p>
+
+<p>"I want to talk to you."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, talk on, can't you? I'm listening. Who are you, anyhow?"</p>
+
+<p>"I'll tell you who I am," answered the detective, "and after I have done
+so, perhaps you will consent to listen to me. I am Nick Carter, the
+detective, and I want to make a little bit of use of you right now,
+Philip."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXVI"></a>CHAPTER XXVI.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE CRIMINAL'S COMPACT.</h3>
+
+
+<p>"How long have you been here in this room?" asked the detective sharply.</p>
+
+<p>"I told you about a minute ago," was the surly reply. "About an hour."</p>
+
+<p>"Where were you before you came here?"</p>
+
+<p>"That's none of your infernal business."</p>
+
+<p>"I want to know if you were downstairs in the saloon?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, I wasn't, if that will satisfy you."</p>
+
+<p>"Have you been there at all to-night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, I was there about three hours ago."</p>
+
+<p>"Was Black Madge there when you were there?"</p>
+
+<p>A cunning leer came into the fellow's face before he answered, and then
+he replied by asking another question.</p>
+
+<p>"Who's Black Madge?" he demanded.</p>
+
+<p>"You know well enough who Black Madge is," insisted the detective; "and,
+Phil, if you keep a civil tongue in your head and answer my questions as
+I ask them, it will be all the better for you. If you do not&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what then?"</p>
+
+<p>"If you do not, there are several little things con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span>nected with your
+career which will make it unpleasant to have the inspector up at
+headquarters question you about."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I ain't a-goin' to give away anybody downstairs, no matter what
+happens," said the bartender.</p>
+
+<p>"I'm not asking you to give anybody away. I merely asked you to answer
+my questions."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, go ahead and ask them. I will answer them if I can."</p>
+
+<p>"Was Black Madge in the saloon downstairs when you were there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. She was."</p>
+
+<p>"Has she been in the habit of coming here frequently of late?"</p>
+
+<p>"I can't tell you for certain about that. You know, I'm on duty in the
+daytime, and people of her kind come only at night."</p>
+
+<p>"Answer my question," said the detective sternly. "You know the answer
+to it, and you understand that I know you do."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I guess she's been in most every night for the last week."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know where she lives?"</p>
+
+<p>"No."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you know any of the gang that is traveling with her?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes; I guess I know most of that bunch."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, Phil, I want you to tell me their names;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span> every one of them. That
+is, every one that you are certain forms one of her gang."</p>
+
+<p>"There ain't anything certain about it, Carter. I'll tell you that on
+the level. All I know about her and her gang is guesswork. But if I was
+asked to mention them I should say that, judging from appearance, there
+is about eight of them. Besides, Madge has got something up her sleeve,
+but what it is I haven't an idea. It looks to me, though, as if they
+were getting ready to crack some pretty big crib, and make the haul of
+their lives. Now, if you're on to that lay, and your only purpose is to
+prevent them doing it, so that I ain't telling you anything that will go
+for putting them behind the bars, I will be on the level and tell you
+all I know."</p>
+
+<p>"You will have to tell me, anyhow, Phil," returned Nick quietly. "If you
+don't do it willingly, I know of more than one way to compel you to do
+it. However, you may rest easy upon the point you have made. I am not at
+the present moment seeking to put any of them behind the bars; only
+Black Madge herself. She has got to go there, whether you talk to me or
+not."</p>
+
+<p>"Well," said the bartender, "she don't cut any ice with me, anyhow.
+She's too stuck up for my kind."</p>
+
+<p>"All right," said Nick; "tell me the names of those eight men."</p>
+
+<p>"There's Slippery Al, Surly Bob, Gentleman Jim, Fly Cummings, Joe
+Cuthbert, Eugene Maxwell, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span> The Parson. Oh, and there's Scar-faced
+Johnny; I forgot him. Now, I'll leave it to you, Carter, if that ain't a
+likely bunch."</p>
+
+<p>"And they were all in the room downstairs to-night," murmured the
+detective meditatively.</p>
+
+<p>"What!" exclaimed the bartender in astonishment, "do you mean to say
+that you have been inside that saloon to-night?"</p>
+
+<p>"Certainly."</p>
+
+<p>"Would you mind telling me how you got there?"</p>
+
+<p>"Never mind all that, Phil. That is not what I am here for&mdash;to explain
+things to you. Do you know where Black Madge lives, or where she can be
+found besides in this saloon?"</p>
+
+<p>"I don't know anything about her more than I've told you."</p>
+
+<p>The detective looked around the room for a moment, and discovered that
+one of its articles of furniture was a tall, old-fashioned pier glass,
+which reflected the full length of a person who stood before it. Then he
+turned around and commanded the bartender to stand on his feet, studied
+his appearance carefully, and then he shook his head.</p>
+
+<p>"It won't do," he muttered.</p>
+
+<p>"What won't do?" asked Phil.</p>
+
+<p>"I was considering the possibility of making myself up in your likeness,
+and of venturing in that disguise to go to the saloon," replied the
+detective.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span>"What! right now?" asked Phil.</p>
+
+<p>"Yes."</p>
+
+<p>"And you don't think you could do it, eh?"</p>
+
+<p>"No, Phil. You're too tall and too big. I never could make myself up to
+look like you in the world. I will have to think of some other way."</p>
+
+<p>Phil was thoughtful for a moment, while the detective was absorbed in
+his own study of the situation, and then he looked up suddenly and
+exclaimed:</p>
+
+<p>"Why don't you send me downstairs for you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Because," replied Nick, "the moment you got there you would call up the
+whole gang, and have them up here after me inside of a minute."</p>
+
+<p>"I wouldn't, either, Carter. Not if I agreed not to."</p>
+
+<p>"I can't trust you, Phil."</p>
+
+<p>Again that cunning leer came into the dissipated face of the bartender,
+and he said quickly:</p>
+
+<p>"You can trust me, if you pay me enough for it."</p>
+
+<p>"A bribed man is usually the first to betray," said Nick.</p>
+
+<p>"Not if the bribe is big enough, Carter."</p>
+
+<p>"Do you mean to say that I can trust you to go down into the saloon and
+to come back here presently and tell me exactly what the situation is?"</p>
+
+<p>"You can, if you pay me enough. I told you that before."</p>
+
+<p>"It isn't the question of pay, Phil; that is, the amount of pay. I would
+be willing to give you almost<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> anything if I thought you would perform
+exactly what I want done, and return to me with the information I
+desire, without saying or doing anything to betray my presence here."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'm your huckleberry, if you want me to do it. All you've got to
+do on your part is to cough up the dough."</p>
+
+<p>The detective, who always went well supplied with funds, took a roll of
+bills from his pocket, and slowly counted out one hundred dollars,
+which, without a word, he handed to the bartender.</p>
+
+<p>"I am going to take you at your word, Phil," he said slowly, "and that
+is the first installment only of what I shall give you if you perform
+the service well and thoroughly, and do exactly as I instruct you to do,
+no more, and no less."</p>
+
+<p>"And if I do it all as you tell me to do, how much more do I get?"</p>
+
+<p>"Listen, and I will tell you."</p>
+
+<p>"I'm listening, you bet your life."</p>
+
+<p>"I came here to-night, Phil, with my first assistant, Chick; he is
+downstairs somewhere now, probably bound and gagged and thrown under a
+table, or behind the bar, or locked up in a closet. I want you to go
+down there, and find out exactly what has become of Chick, and what has
+happened to him. I want you to pick up all the information you can about
+what has<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> happened there to-night&mdash;that is, what they are saying about
+it. You will have to remain there perhaps half an hour to accomplish
+this, and all of that time you must be extremely careful not to let it
+appear that you know anything about me at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, and after that, what am I to do?"</p>
+
+<p>"When you know what has become of Chick, and where he is now, figure out
+the best way in which we can set him at liberty at once, or, if you can
+manage to do it before you return to me, do it. If you succeed in
+setting him at liberty yourself within the next half hour, I will,
+before the sun goes down to-morrow, give you nine hundred dollars more,
+and that will be a pretty good nest egg for you, Phil."</p>
+
+<p>"I'll do the job, you needn't fret."</p>
+
+<p>"Wait, there is another thing."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, sir?"</p>
+
+<p>"If you find that you cannot liberate him yourself without assistance,
+you are to return to me at once, and we will plan together how it can
+best be accomplished. When we have done that, if through your aid I
+succeed in getting Chick safely away from here, you shall have the nine
+hundred plunks extra just the same."</p>
+
+<p>"On the level, Carter?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, on the level, Phil. I mean every word I say."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, I'm the huckleberry that can do it."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span>"Wait, Phil, before you start, there is one more thing still."</p>
+
+<p>"What! another?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes. This. After we have gotten safely out of this pickle, and the
+place has quieted down, it will be up to you to find out for me where
+Black Madge hangs up her clothes. It is important, Phil, that I should
+get that woman back into the prison where she belongs."</p>
+
+<p>"I ain't no stool pigeon," grumbled the bartender.</p>
+
+<p>"Neither am I asking you to be a stool pigeon," said the detective.
+"What I want you to do is simple enough. I am not laying any plans
+against any of the regular frequenters of this place. It's only Black
+Madge I want, and you have confessed already that you don't like her.
+Now, it's up to you if you want to go through this whole job, and do it
+right. And, Phil, if you will stick to me and see the whole game through
+the way I have outlined it to you, another thousand goes with the first
+one."</p>
+
+<p>"Geewhiz! do you mean that?"</p>
+
+<p>"I certainly do."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, then, I'm game for the whole layout, and I will see it through to
+the end, but I don't want you to forget, Carter, that, if anything ever
+comes of it so that my part in this business is found out by any one of
+that crowd down there now, male or female, I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span> wouldn't give a snap for
+my chances of being alive twenty-four hours afterward."</p>
+
+<p>"They won't find it out through me," said the detective. "If they find
+it out at all it will be through you. And there's one thing more you
+must remember, Phil, and that is if you betray me you will be in a whole
+lot worse fix than you would be if your friends downstairs discover your
+treachery. For if you do betray me, I will never let up on you, Phil,
+until I see you behind the bars for a term of years that will make you
+an old man before you come out again."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXVII"></a>CHAPTER XXVII.</h2>
+
+<h3>THE GLARE OF A MATCH.</h3>
+
+
+<p>When the bartender had taken his departure, Nick found a cigar in one of
+his pockets, and seated himself to smoke quietly until Phil should
+return. But when more than half an hour later the cigar was consumed,
+and he had thrown it aside, he began to feel a sense of uneasiness that
+the man should be gone so long a time.</p>
+
+<p>However, he realized that it was no easy task that Phil had undertaken,
+and that he might well occupy an hour or more in accomplishing it.</p>
+
+<p>He had no more cigars to smoke, but he seated himself resolutely in a
+chair, determined to wait with patience until his messenger should
+return.</p>
+
+<p>There was a small clock, ticking away merrily on the mantel, at the far
+end of the room, and the detective watched it while the minute hand
+worked its way slowly around the dial, until an hour, then an hour and a
+quarter, and, finally, an hour and twenty minutes had elapsed since the
+departure of the bartender.</p>
+
+<p>His impatience was now so great, and his natural distrust of the
+confederate he had employed was so prominent in his mind that he left
+his chair, having<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> first extinguished the light, and, going to the door,
+opened it softly and peered outside.</p>
+
+<p>The hallway was in utter darkness, the same as when he was there last,
+and, although he listened intently, he could not hear the suggestion of
+a sound from the lower regions of the house. After waiting a few moments
+longer, he tiptoed forward cautiously to the stairs, and descended them,
+being careful to step as closely as possible to the spindles of the
+balustrade, in order that they might not creak beneath his weight, and
+thus alarm others in the house. In this way he gained the lower floor.</p>
+
+<p>Nick was somewhat handicapped without his flash light, but he remembered
+quite distinctly the location of the sound he had heard two hours
+earlier, when the party from the laundry had followed him in, and passed
+through the hallway to a rear door. Now he sought that door by following
+carefully along the wall until he came to it.</p>
+
+<p>But, although he searched diligently for many minutes, he could not find
+so much as a suggestion of a door anywhere.</p>
+
+<p>He remembered then that in all probability there was no perceptible door
+at all; that the door which was there somewhere was concealed in the
+wainscoting in some way, or otherwise hidden from casual observation. To
+have maintained a door of entrance to the saloon from that hallway would
+have rendered it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span> entirely unnecessary for Grinnel to keep up his
+private entrance to the saloon from the other street. Nick's only method
+of finding it now was to light a match, and this he hesitated to do, not
+knowing what warning its glare might convey to others.</p>
+
+<p>But there was no alternative, and presently he began his search by
+lighting matches one after another, permitting them to flare up
+sufficiently for a moment's vision, and then throwing them quickly to
+the floor, after the manner adopted by burglars when they were engaged
+in robbing a house before the pocket flash light was invented.</p>
+
+<p>He was not long in discovering the entrance he sought. The walls along
+the hallway were not plastered; they were merely built up with matched
+boards, which had stood there unpainted for so long a time that they had
+achieved a veneer of filth and dirt which made them look, in the flare
+of the match, like mahogany.</p>
+
+<p>But he could easily see where there was a keyhole cut into one of these
+boards, and, although around it there was no other evidence of a door,
+he knew that if he could turn the tumblers in that lock it would be
+revealed to him.</p>
+
+<p>He went to work with his picklock, and, as he supposed, the instant the
+bolt of the lock was shot back the door opened easily and noiselessly in
+his grasp, and from beyond it he could at once hear the murmur<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span> of
+distant voices; also very far ahead of him, and beneath what was
+evidently another door, he could perceive a gleam of light.</p>
+
+<p>He stepped through, and closed it after him, but, realizing that it was
+more than likely that he might wish to leave in a hurry, he left it
+unlocked.</p>
+
+<p>And now he tiptoed forward to the door beneath which the light shone,
+and, getting upon his hands and knees, held his ear down where he could
+hear with more distinctness.</p>
+
+<p>The effect was almost the same as if he were inside the saloon.
+Strangely enough, also, it was Madge's voice that came to him first, for
+it appeared that she was seated near that very door, and by the answers
+that were returned to her, Nick knew that no less a person than Mike
+Grinnel himself was her companion. And they were speaking in low tones,
+but, nevertheless, every word they uttered could be heard distinctly by
+the detective.</p>
+
+<p>It was in the midst of their conversation, evidently, that Nick began to
+listen, and Madge was saying:</p>
+
+<p>"I swore then, Mike, that I would be even with him, and that if I ever
+succeeded in getting out of that prison where he put me I would never
+rest another minute until Nick Carter was placed beyond the power of
+injuring anybody."</p>
+
+<p>"You bit off a little more than you could chew,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> didn't you, Madge?"
+asked Mike Grinnel, in his slow, even voice, in which he never permitted
+a sign of emotion.</p>
+
+<p>"No, I didn't," she retorted. "I made some mistakes, maybe. I shouldn't,
+for instance, have written him the letter I did."</p>
+
+<p>"What was the letter, Madge?"</p>
+
+<p>"Like a fool I wrote him a threatening letter, in which I told him to
+look out for me. That was my vanity, I suppose. I wanted him to know
+that I was on his track. I wanted to worry him; to give him something to
+think of, and a lot of things to look out for."</p>
+
+<p>"Well, what then, Madge?"</p>
+
+<p>"It was then, Mike, that I began to get the guns together, Slippery Al,
+and Gentleman Jim, and the others, and, of course, I made this place our
+headquarters."</p>
+
+<p>"That, Madge, is just what you shouldn't have done. That's what I'm
+finding fault with you about now.</p>
+
+<p>"Well," she said, "it's done, and it can't be helped; and Nick Carter
+has been here, and he's gotten away again; but, all the same, we've got
+Chick in our power, and if I do to him as I feel like doing now, he will
+regret the day that he ever took my trail."</p>
+
+<p>"If you leave him where he is now, Madge, he'll do that," said Grinnel,
+laughing softly.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span>"Why, what would happen to him there?" she demanded quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"For one thing the rats would probably eat him up before very long, and
+it wouldn't be the first meal of that kind they've had down there,
+either."</p>
+
+<p>"You didn't tell me where you put him," said Madge.</p>
+
+<p>"I don't tell anybody exactly where that place is, Madge. It's a little
+hole that I've dug out underneath the cellar of this house; if it was
+anywhere in the old country it would be called a dungeon; as it is, I
+call it the grave&mdash;people who go there have a habit of never coming out
+again."</p>
+
+<p>The detective was anxious to know what had become of Phil, the
+bartender. It was evident that the man had done nothing to betray the
+detective, since these two were talking so quietly just inside the door
+where Nick was listening.</p>
+
+<p>The next words, while they did not exactly reassure him, made him think
+that, after all, the bartender might be carrying out his contract by
+attempting to set Chick at liberty himself.</p>
+
+<p>"Is that where you sent Phil a few moments ago?" she asked. "Down there
+to the dungeon where you put Chick?"</p>
+
+<p>The detective could hear Grinnel chuckle and then reply:</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, Madge, I sent him down there to fasten the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> young fellow up, so
+that there would be no chance of his getting loose. You see, he was
+senseless when we chucked him in there, and I forgot to make him fast,
+as a sailor would say, but there are staples in the wall down there, and
+there are chains fastened to those staples, and there are nice little
+steel bracelets at the end of those chains, that fit beautifully around
+a man's ankles. I sent Phil down to lock them fast."</p>
+
+<p>"I thought nobody knew where that place was except yourself," said Madge
+quickly.</p>
+
+<p>"Oh, Phil's all right. I have to have some confidence in my men here, or
+I couldn't run the place."</p>
+
+<p>"All the same," the detective heard her murmur, "I'd rather you had left
+Chick to me. They're a slippery lot, those detectives, and I shall be
+uneasy&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>The detective heard no more of what was said, for at that instant he was
+greatly startled by hearing a sound behind him, and evidently beneath
+him, the consequence being that he paid no further attention to the
+conversation beyond the door.</p>
+
+<p>Indeed, he drew back away from it, and softly rose to his feet, in order
+that he might be thoroughly prepared for anything that should happen;
+and while he stood there he was conscious of a cold, damp draught of air
+blown into his face&mdash;air that smelled as if it might come from the
+cellar&mdash;and he was somehow conscious that a trapdoor had been lifted,
+while the next<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> moment he was aware that somebody was climbing through
+it into that narrow hallway&mdash;somebody who was not more than ten or
+twelve feet away from him. How he had wished for his little flash light
+then.</p>
+
+<p>Once he imagined that he could hear a faint whisper, and a sharp,
+warning hiss for silence immediately following it.</p>
+
+<p>Then it came back to him suddenly, all that he had heard Mike Grinnel
+say to Madge about the dungeon in the house, and the bartender's errand
+to it.</p>
+
+<p>He thought then that the people who had raised themselves through the
+trap&mdash;and he was sure that there were two of them&mdash;must be Phil and
+Chick, the latter having been liberated by the former; and, acting upon
+the impulse of the moment, he struck a match and held it into the faces
+of the two men. The glare of the match shone directly into the face of
+Chick.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span></p>
+
+<h2 class="newchapter"><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXVIII"></a>CHAPTER XXVIII.</h2>
+
+<h3>BLACK MADGE CAUGHT IN A TRAP.</h3>
+
+
+<p>But the flaring up of the match also developed another rather startling
+fact, and that was the presence of Curly, who, with the bartender, Phil,
+was standing directly behind Chick.</p>
+
+<p>The light also discovered Nick Carter to the others, as it discovered
+them to him, and, although it burned but a moment, it was a revelation
+to all the parties concerned. It was Phil, the bartender, who acted more
+quickly than the others in this somewhat confusing moment of the
+encounter, for, with admirable presence of mind, he stepped quickly
+forward, and, reaching out his hands, managed to pull the others toward
+him until their heads were so close together that the faintest whisper
+could be heard, and then he said:</p>
+
+<p>"Follow me along the corridor into the front hall. We can talk there."</p>
+
+<p>They did so, and presently they stood together in the front hallway
+beside the stairs beyond the hidden doorway which Nick had discovered.
+And, during the time they occupied in getting to this point, Nick, who
+realized that the disguise he wore was no longer of any importance,
+busily engaged himself in removing it, or, at least, the facial part of
+it, so that, although in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span> the dark they could not see him, he had
+restored himself, nevertheless, to his proper person.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, Curly," said the detective, "tell me what this all means. I don't
+understand it at all."</p>
+
+<p>"Let me talk," interrupted Phil. "It's this way, Carter: When you
+escaped from the barroom through the little door into the boss' sanctum,
+you had no sooner gone than Grinnel switched on the lights again, and
+your absence was discovered. Then it was that the whole bunch lit on to
+Curly and Chick here, with both feet, downed them, trussed them up, and
+when Chick was taken to the cellar below, to feed the rats, if he had
+been left there long enough, Curly was fired along with him. I tell you,
+right now, Carter, it's all up with Curly in this place. He never can
+make himself good with this bunch again as long as he lives, and it's up
+to him to light out now, for good and all, unless he wants to turn up
+his toes and go to the morgue."</p>
+
+<p>The detective turned to Curly again, and once more struck a match so
+that they could all see the faces of one another.</p>
+
+<p>"Is that straight, Curly?" he asked.</p>
+
+<p>"That's about the size of it, Mr. Carter."</p>
+
+<p>"Then," said Nick, "am I to understand that the occurrences of this
+evening have released me from my promise to you to make no arrests in
+this place,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span> or any arrest of any one who is now in this place within
+twenty-four hours?"</p>
+
+<p>"Yes, sir, the promise is all off. You can do as you've a mind to. It
+would suit me to a T if you would gather in the whole push."</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you, Curly," said Nick. "That statement of yours lets me out of a
+peck of trouble, for having given the promise, of course I would not
+break it, and I could not quite see how we could carry this thing
+through to a finish without."</p>
+
+<p>He was silent for a moment after that, and then he asked:</p>
+
+<p>"Can I rely upon you, Curly, to stand by me through what is to come?"</p>
+
+<p>"To the last ditch, Mr. Carter," was the emphatic response.</p>
+
+<p>"And you, Phil&mdash;what about you?"</p>
+
+<p>"Well," was the slow reply, for the man was evidently considering his
+words with very great care, "I guess my usefulness in this place is just
+about over. When the boss finds out that Curly and Chick have both
+gotten out of the dungeon below, he will know mighty well who it was
+that let them out, and that will mean yours truly for the dead wagon in
+about fifteen minutes; so I think, Carter, that I'd better tie up to you
+while I've got the chance. I am not a crook myself, and never have been
+one, although I have con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span>sorted with them, and been companions with them
+for a good many years."</p>
+
+<p>"And will you see the thing through to the finish, Phil?" asked Nick
+again.</p>
+
+<p>"I will do just as Curly said he would do. I'll stand by you to the last
+ditch."</p>
+
+<p>"Are you all ready to obey my orders, exactly as I shall give them?"
+asked Nick again, slowly.</p>
+
+<p>"We are," came the unanimous response.</p>
+
+<p>"In this case," said the detective, "I am going to make a desperate
+effort to find out what a bold stroke will do, and here is my plan: We
+will go back together to that door before which I was standing a moment
+ago, which, I conclude, from its character, is rather a flimsy&mdash;&mdash;"</p>
+
+<p>"It is that," said Phil.</p>
+
+<p>"And after we get there we will stand silently for a moment, each one of
+you preparing for the signal which I shall give. When I say, 'Now,' I
+will throw myself against the door, and burst it open, and as I do so,
+and leap into the room, you three are to follow me, one after the other,
+as quickly as possible.</p>
+
+<p>"You, Phil, will make directly for the electric switch, and you will see
+to it, no matter what happens, that the room is not plunged in darkness.</p>
+
+<p>"You, Curly&mdash;by the way, have you any weapons about you?"</p>
+
+<p>"I have got two guns in my pocket, all right."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span>"Very well; you, Curly, the moment you get into the room, will draw your
+two guns, and level them at the crowd.</p>
+
+<p>"After that all you have to do is to follow the lead of Chick and
+myself, and protect yourselves until the fight is over&mdash;if there is a
+fight."</p>
+
+<p>"I reckon I can do that, too, Mr. Carter," said Curly.</p>
+
+<p>"I haven't a doubt of it, Curly. I want you to remember not to shoot too
+quick, and under no circumstances to shoot to kill, unless it is
+absolutely necessary; as a matter of fact, I don't expect that we will
+have much trouble, for when they see us in the room, fully armed, and
+hear the first words that I shall utter, I think we will have no
+difficulty in carrying our point."</p>
+
+<p>There was nothing more said then, and Nick turned away, and led them
+quickly back again to the door, near which he had heard the conversation
+between Black Madge and Mike Grinnel.</p>
+
+<p>For a moment they stood there, waiting to get their breath, and to
+prepare their muscles and sinews and nerves for the ordeal to which they
+were about to be put; and then from the detective came a low and
+emphatic&mdash;"Now!"</p>
+
+<p>The instant that the detective shouted out this word, he plunged
+forward, throwing his shoulder heavily against the flimsy door, already
+mentioned, so that it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span> was burst from its lock and from its hinges at
+the same time, and was sent flying halfway across the room.</p>
+
+<p>But even before the clatter which followed the crash had subsided, Nick
+Carter, with a pistol in either hand, had leaped across the threshold,
+and with one more bound arrived at the spot directly beside Mike
+Grinnel.</p>
+
+<p>Turning the weapon about while he approached, he brought the butt of it
+down, with a resounding whack, upon Grinnel's skull, sending him
+tumbling to the floor, and then he straightened up, with both arms
+extended, and the muzzles of his pistols wavering from form to form of
+the astonished throng in the room, and he cried out:</p>
+
+<p>"Hands up, every one of you. I am here after just one person. The rest
+of you I don't want, unless somebody interferes with me, and if you do
+interfere there are enough outside of this house, without doubt, to take
+you all in."</p>
+
+<p>When he leaped across the threshold, the others followed him, as he had
+directed, and, having already cautioned Chick in a whisper to look out
+for Madge, and feeling sure that the others would do their respective
+duties, as he had directed, Nick had no fear whatever of the result.</p>
+
+<p>A collection of criminals assembled as these were are always glad to
+hear that there is only one among<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> them who is "wanted," for each one
+seems instinctively to know that he is not "it." And Nick Carter knew
+the criminal class so well that he was certain that this announcement
+would prevent any immediate attack upon him by the twenty or thirty men
+who were gathered there.</p>
+
+<p>Having heard this statement, and having, also, taken due notice of his
+suggestion that there were plenty of re&euml;nforcements outside the
+building, although it will be remembered that the detective had not
+explained how far outside they were, and remembering that a considerable
+time had elapsed since Nick Carter left that room before, they were one
+and all willing to wait a moment before beginning what might be an
+unnecessary attack, which would be sure to send many of them to prison
+before it was over. And so they waited, casting furtive glances at one
+another, many of them with their hands upon their weapons, and all of
+them ready to fight, if need be, but quite as ready to avoid a fight, if
+it were policy to do so.</p>
+
+<p>"Now, listen to me," said Nick Carter. "I came here to-night to get
+Black Madge, and I know by the sounds I have heard behind me since I
+entered the room just now that she has got a pair of bracelets on her
+that she doesn't like to wear. I am going to take her away with me, and
+she is going to be sent back to the prison from which she escaped, and
+if there is anybody in this crowd that interferes with me, or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span> offers to
+do so, it will be very much the worse for that person.</p>
+
+<p>"On the other hand, if I am not interfered with, we shall go away
+quietly with Madge, and what the rest of you may do after that does not
+concern me. You have my word for it, and you all know that when Nick
+Carter gives his word, he keeps it. Now, answer me, somebody, and let
+him speak for all. Does what I say go?"</p>
+
+<p>A voice from the far end of the room replied instantly:</p>
+
+<p>"I say it goes, for one."</p>
+
+<p>"Then answer, all of you," said the detective.</p>
+
+<p>"It goes. You bet it goes."</p>
+
+<p>In their eagerness to answer his request, they came near to all shouting
+at once.</p>
+
+<p>"Thank you," said Nick, smiling. "Now, I have one more word to say, and
+then we will take our departure. There are eight men here whose names I
+will call, and I want them each to take this as a warning from me. They
+are Scar-faced Johnny; a man called Slippery Al; Surly Bob, whose career
+I know; Gentleman Jim, who, for the good of his health, ought to take a
+vacation on the other side of the ocean; Joe Cuthbert; Eugene Maxwell;
+Fly Cummings; and, last, but not least, is the man who is known as The
+Parson, and that same Parson had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> better get himself out of New York as
+quickly as possible.</p>
+
+<p>"I am speaking now to those eight whose names I have mentioned. I know
+that you have all joined in with an organization created by Black Madge.
+I know, or think I know, the purpose of that organization. I will give
+all of you twenty-four hours to get out of the city of New York, and if
+any one of you is found inside of the limits of the city after that
+time, look out for squalls."</p>
+
+<p>There was a low murmur around the room following upon this speech by the
+detective, but whether in protest or approbation, the detective did not
+concern himself to discover.</p>
+
+<p>With calm deliberation, he turned his back upon them all, and motioned
+to Chick, who had Madge securely handcuffed to his own wrist, to precede
+him through the door.</p>
+
+<p>Then he motioned to Curly and to Phil to pass through it also.</p>
+
+<p>And, then, stepping himself to the door, he turned about upon the
+threshold, and faced the crowd once more.</p>
+
+<p>"One last word to you all," he said. "He among you who hurts Curly John,
+or Phil, the bartender, for this night's work, or attempts to do so,
+hurts me. I bid you good night."</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span>It is only necessary to add that, within forty-eight hours of that time,
+Black Madge found herself again in the prison of that State for which
+she had expressed such abounding contempt, and that, at her trial, which
+followed soon after, she was sentenced to serve ten years in the State
+prison, where she is at this day.</p>
+
+<p class="center" style="margin-top: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 1.5em;">THE END</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"The Temple of Vice" is the title of <span class="smcap">New Magnet
+Series No. 1223</span>, by Nicholas Carter. It is a story
+that will thrill you throughout its reading.</p></div>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<p class="center">NICK CARTER STORIES</p>
+
+<h2>New Magnet Library</h2>
+
+<p class="center">Not a Dull Book in This List</p>
+
+<p class="center">ALL BY NICHOLAS CARTER</p>
+
+
+<p>Nick Carter stands for an interesting detective story. The fact that the
+books in this line are so uniformly good is entirely due to the work of
+a specialist. The man who wrote these stories produced no other type of
+fiction. His mind was concentrated upon the creation of new plots and
+situations in which his hero emerged triumphantly from all sorts of
+troubles and landed the criminal just where he should be&mdash;behind the
+bars.</p>
+
+<p>The author of these stories knew more about writing detective stories
+than any other single person.</p>
+
+<p>Following is a list of the best Nick Carter stories. They have been
+selected with extreme care, and we unhesitatingly recommend each of them
+as being fully as interesting as any detective story between cloth
+covers which sells at ten times the price.</p>
+
+<p>If you do not know Nick Carter, buy a copy of any of the New Magnet
+Library books, and get acquainted. He will surprise and delight you.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><i>ALL TITLES ALWAYS IN PRINT</i></p>
+
+<ol style="list-style-type: decimal; padding-left: 6em;">
+<li value="901">&mdash; A Weird Treasure</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Middle Link</li>
+<li>&mdash;  To the Ends of the Earth</li>
+<li>&mdash;  When Honors Pall</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Yellow Brand</li>
+<li>&mdash;  A New Serpent in Eden</li>
+<li>&mdash;  When Brave Men Tremble</li>
+<li>&mdash;  A Test of Courage</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Where Peril Beckons</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Gargoni Girdle</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Rascals &amp; Co.</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Too Late to Talk</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Satan's Apt Pupil</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Girl Prisoner</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Danger of Folly</li>
+<li>&mdash;  One Shipwreck Too Many</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Scourged by Fear</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Red Plague</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Scoundrels Rampant</li>
+<li>&mdash;  From Clew to Clew</li>
+<li>&mdash;  When Rogues Conspire</li>
+<li>&mdash;  Twelve in a Grave</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Great Opium Case</li>
+<li>&mdash;  A Conspiracy of Rumors</li>
+<li>&mdash;  A Klondike Claim</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Evil Formula</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Man of Many Faces</li>
+<li>&mdash;  The Great Enigma</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Burden of Proof</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Stolen Brain</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Titled Counterfeiter</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Magic Necklace</li>
+<li>&mdash; 'Round the World for a Quarter</li>
+<li>&mdash; Over the Edge of the World</li>
+<li>&mdash; In the Grip of Fate</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Case of Many Clews</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Sealed Door</li>
+<li>&mdash; Nick Carter and the Green Goods Men</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Man Without a Will</li>
+<li>&mdash; Tracked Across the Atlantic</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Clew from the Unknown</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Crime of a Countess</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Mixed-up Mess</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Great Money-order Swindle</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Adder's Brood</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Wall Street Haul</li>
+<li>&mdash; For a Pawned Crown</li>
+<li>&mdash; Sealed Orders</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Hate that Kills</li>
+<li>&mdash; The American Marquis</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Needy Nine</li>
+<li>&mdash; Fighting Against Millions</li>
+<li>&mdash; Outlaws of the Blue</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Old Detective's Pupil</li>
+<li>&mdash; Found in the Jungle</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Mysterious Mail Robbery</li>
+<li>&mdash; Broken Bars</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Fair Criminal</li>
+<li>&mdash; Won by Magic</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Piano Box Mystery</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Man They Held Back</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Millionaire Partner</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Pressing Peril</li>
+<li>&mdash; An Australian Klondike</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Sultan's Pearls</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Double Shuffle Club</li>
+<li>&mdash; Paying the Price</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Woman's Hand</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Network of Crime</li>
+<li>&mdash; At Thompson's Ranch</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Crossed Needles</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Diamond Mine Case</li>
+<li>&mdash; Blood Will Tell</li>
+<li>&mdash; An Accidental Password</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Crook's Double</li>
+<li>&mdash; Two Plus Two</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Yellow Label</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Clever Celestial</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Amphitheater Plot</li>
+<li>&mdash; Gideon Drexel's Millions</li>
+<li>&mdash; Death in Life</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Stolen Identity</li>
+<li>&mdash; Evidence by Telephone</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Twelve Tin Boxes</li>
+<li>&mdash; Clew Against Clew</li>
+<li>&mdash; Lady Velvet</li>
+<li>&mdash; Playing a Bold Game</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Dead Man's Grip</li>
+<li>&mdash; Snarled Identities</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Deposit Vault Puzzle</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Crescent Brotherhood</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Stolen Pay Train</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Sea Fox</li>
+<li>&mdash; Wanted by Two Clients</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Van Alstine Case</li>
+<li>&mdash; Check No. 777</li>
+<li>&mdash; Partners in Peril</li>
+<li>&mdash; Nick Carter's Clever Prot&eacute;g&eacute;</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Sign of the Crossed Knives</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Man Who Vanished</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Battle for the Right</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Game of Craft</li>
+<li>&mdash; Nick Carter's Retainer</li>
+<li>&mdash; Caught in the Toils</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Broken Bond</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Crime of the French Caf&eacute;</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Man Who Stole Millions</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Twelve Wise Men</li>
+<li>&mdash; Hidden Foes</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Gamblers' Syndicate</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Chance Discovery</li>
+<li>&mdash; Among the Counterfeiters</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Threefold Disappearance</li>
+<li>&mdash; At Odds with Scotland Yard</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Princess of Crime</li>
+<li>&mdash; Found on the Beach</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Spinner of Death</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Detective's Pretty Neighbor</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Bogus Clew</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Puzzle of Five Pistols</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Secret of the Marble Mantel</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Bite of an Apple</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Triple Crime</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Stolen Race Horse</li>
+<li>&mdash; Wildfire</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Herald Personal</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Finger of Suspicion</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Crimson Clew</li>
+<li>&mdash; Nick Carter Down East</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Chain of Clews</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Victim of Circumstances</li>
+<li>&mdash; Brought to Bay</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Dynamite Trap</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Scrap of Black Lace</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Woman of Evil</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Legacy of Hate</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Trusted Rogue</li>
+<li>&mdash; Man Against Man</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Demons of the Night</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Brotherhood of Death</li>
+<li>&mdash; At the Knife's Point</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Cry for Help</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Stroke of Policy</li>
+<li>&mdash; Hounded to Death</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Bargain in Crime</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Fatal Prescription</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Man of Iron</li>
+<li>&mdash; An Amazing Scoundrel</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Chain of Evidence</li>
+<li>&mdash; Paid with Death</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Fight for a Throne</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Woman of Steel</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Seal of Death</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Human Fiend</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Desperate Chance</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Chase in the Dark</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Snare and the Game</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Murray Hill Mystery</li>
+<li>&mdash; Nick Carter's Close Call</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Missing Cotton King</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Game of Plots</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Prince of Liars</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Man at the Window</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Red League</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Price of a Secret</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Worst Case on Record</li>
+<li>&mdash; From Peril to Peril</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Seal of Silence</li>
+<li>&mdash; Nick Carter's Chinese Puzzle</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Blackmailer's Bluff</li>
+<li>&mdash; Heard in the Dark</li>
+<li>&mdash; A Checkmated Scoundrel</li>
+<li>&mdash; The Cashier's Secret</li>
+<li>&mdash; Behind a Mask</li>
+</ol>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p style="text-align: center; margin-top: 1em; margin-bottom: 0.3em; font-weight: bold; font-size: 400%;">READ</p>
+
+<p>When you want real recreation in your leisure hours, read! Read the
+<span class="smcap">Street &amp; Smith Novels</span>!</p>
+
+<p>They are the cheapest and most interesting reading matter published in
+America to-day. No jazz&mdash;no sex&mdash;just big, clean, interesting books.
+There are hundreds of different titles, among which you will find a lot
+of exactly the sort of reading you want.</p>
+
+<p>So, when you get tired of rolling around in your Lady Lizzie or
+listening to the blah-blah of your radio, hie yourself to the nearest
+news dealer, grab off a copy of a good detective, adventure or love
+story, and then READ!</p>
+
+<p>Read the <span class="smcap">Street &amp; Smith Novels</span>. Catalogue sent upon request.</p>
+
+<p class="center"><b>Street &amp; Smith Corporation</b><br />
+<b>79 Seventh Avenue&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;New York City</b></p>
+
+<p style="margin-top: 2em; font-size: 60%;">Printed in the U.&nbsp;S.&nbsp;A.</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class="blockquot">
+<p style="margin-top: 3em;">[Transcriber's Note: The original edition of this work did not contain a
+table of contents. A table of contents has been created for this
+electronic edition.</p>
+
+<p>The advertisement containing a list of other Nick Carter stories has
+been moved from the front of the book to the back.</p>
+
+<p>The following typographical errors present in the original edition have
+been corrected.</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter II, a period was changed to a comma after "who he was".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter V, a missing period was added after "take me into the fold"
+and after "near the tracks".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter VII, "dregs in you coffee cup" was changed to "dregs in your
+coffee cup".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter XIII, "she heard Madge inquire" was changed to "he heard
+Madge inquire".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter XIV, "lying at full lngth" was changed to "lying at full
+length".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter XVI, "He rose stifly" was changed to "He rose stiffly".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "but he sent a
+bullet after me".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter XXII, "that wake of life" was changed to "that walk of life".</p>
+
+<p>In Chapter XXVI, a missing period was added after "too stuck up for my
+kind".</p>
+
+<p>No other changes have been made to the original text.]</p>
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman at Bay, by Nicholas Carter
+
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+</body>
+</html>
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman at Bay, by Nicholas Carter
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: A Woman at Bay
+       A Fiend in Skirts
+
+Author: Nicholas Carter
+
+Release Date: September 26, 2008 [EBook #26704]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN AT BAY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Steven desJardins and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+A WOMAN AT BAY
+
+OR
+
+A Fiend in Skirts
+
+BY NICHOLAS CARTER
+
+Author of "Out of Crime's Depths," "Reaping the Whirlwind," "An Artful
+Schemer," etc.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+STREET & SMITH CORPORATION
+PUBLISHERS
+79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York
+
+Copyright, 1907
+By STREET & SMITH
+
+A Woman at Bay
+
+All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
+languages, including the Scandinavian.
+
+Printed in the U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+TABLE OF CONTENTS
+
+I           THE KING OF THE YEGGMEN.               5
+II          THE YEGGMEN'S CAMP FIRE.              22
+III         THE "KING'S" LIEUTENANT.              31
+IV          THE OUTLAW'S HOME.                    40
+V           NICK'S WONDERFUL STRENGTH.            49
+VI          NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK.              67
+VII         THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT.          76
+VIII        THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.         94
+IX          THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.           104
+X           ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.            114
+XI          PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.           121
+XII         BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.           128
+XIII        BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.            146
+XIV         BLACK MADGE GIVES JUDGMENT.          165
+XV          NICK'S CLEVEREST CAPTURE.            182
+XVI         NICK MAKES BAD MEDICINE.             201
+XVII        A WHOLESALE ROUND-UP.                210
+XVIII       BLACK MADGE'S THREAT.                218
+XIX         THE BAND OF HATRED.                  226
+XX          A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.              241
+XXI         CURLY JOHN, THE BANK THIEF.          249
+XXII        AT MIKE GRINNEL'S DIVE.              257
+XXIII       BLACK MADGE'S DEFIANCE.              266
+XXIV        THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE CELLAR.       275
+XXV         THE MAN IN THE BED.                  284
+XXVI        THE CRIMINAL'S COMPACT.              294
+XXVII       THE GLARE OF A MATCH.                303
+XXVIII      BLACK MADGE CAUGHT IN A TRAP.        311
+
+
+
+
+A WOMAN AT BAY.
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE KING OF THE YEGGMEN.
+
+
+Four men were seated around a camp fire made of old railroad ties, over
+which a kettle was boiling merrily, where it hung from an improvised
+crane above the blaze.
+
+Around, on the ground, were scattered a various assortment of tin cans,
+some of which had been hammered more or less straight to serve for
+plates, and it was evident from the general appearance of things around
+the camp that a meal had just been disposed of, and that the four men
+who had consumed it were now determined to make themselves as
+comfortable as possible. The kettle that boiled over the fire contained
+nothing but water--water with which one of the four men had jocularly
+said he intended to bathe.
+
+These four men were about as rough-looking specimens of humanity as can
+be imagined. Not one of them had been shaved in so long a time that
+their faces were covered with a hairy growth which suggested full
+beards; indeed, their faces looked as if the only shaving they had ever
+received, or rather the nearest approach to a shave, had been done by a
+pair of scissors, cropping the hair as closely as possible.
+
+The camp they had made was located just inside the edge of a wood
+through which a railway had been built, and it was down in a hollow
+beside a brook, so that the light of their fire was effectually screened
+from view, save that the glow of it shone fitfully upon the drooping
+leaves over their heads.
+
+The four men were tramps--hoboes, or yeggmen, of the most pronounced
+types, if their appearance went for anything at all.
+
+Their conversation was couched entirely in the slang of their order; a
+talk that is almost unintelligible to outsiders.
+
+But, strangely enough, the four men were not hoboes at all; neither were
+they yeggmen; and the lingo they talked so glibly among themselves,
+although perfect in its enunciation, and in the words that were used,
+was entirely assumed.
+
+For those four men were Nick Carter, the New York detective, and his
+three assistants, Chick, Patsy, and Ten-Ichi, a Japanese.
+
+The president of the E. & S. W. R. R. Co. had sent for Nick Carter a
+week before this particular evening, and as soon as he and the detective
+were alone together in the president's private room, he had opened the
+conversation abruptly with this question:
+
+"Carter, have you ever happened to hear of a character known as Hobo
+Harry, the Hobo King?"
+
+"I have," replied the detective. "I have heard about him in a vague sort
+of way. I have no particular information about him, if that is what you
+mean."
+
+"No; I merely wished to know if you were aware that there is such a
+character."
+
+"Yes. I have heard of the fellow."
+
+"Do you know what he is?"
+
+"A yeggman, isn't he?"
+
+"He is the king of all the yeggmen. He is the master mind, the
+controlling spirit of all the outlawry and lawlessness that goes on from
+one end of our big railroad system to the other. Hobo Harry costs us, in
+round numbers, anywhere from three to ten thousand dollars a month."
+
+"Really?" asked the detective, smiling.
+
+"Yes--really. This is no joke. There isn't a bit of thievery, however
+petty it may be, or a scheme of robbery, however grand and great, which
+they do not turn their hands to under the guidance of Hobo Harry--and we
+have about got to the end of our patience."
+
+"I suppose," said Nick, "that all this means that you want me to find
+Hobo Harry for you. Is that the idea?"
+
+"That is precisely the idea. Do you suppose you can do it?"
+
+"I can, at least, make the effort."
+
+"I should tell you one thing before you become too sanguine."
+
+"Well, what is it?"
+
+"Hobo Harry is largely a mystery. There are those--detectives, I
+mean--who insist that he does not exist at all, save in imagination."
+
+Nick nodded.
+
+"They say that he is only a figurehead; that he is only a name; that he
+is in reality an imperceptible, intangible idol, whom hoboes worship,
+and to whom they refer as their common leader, while, in reality, there
+is no real leader at all."
+
+"It is possible that they are correct in that idea," said the detective
+slowly.
+
+"It is possible, but it is not likely. There is too much system about
+their operations. I am at the head of a great system, and I know how
+such things are done. I am confident that the operations of these
+thieves--these yeggmen--could not have been carried on so successfully,
+and so systematically, without a head--a chief; and so I, for one,
+believe thoroughly in the existence of Hobo Harry."
+
+"Well?" asked the detective. "What does all this lead to?"
+
+"I am coming to that. I have had every railroad detective in my employ
+searching for Hobo Harry for months--I might say for almost a year, and
+without success. I have employed two of the largest and best--so
+called--detective agencies in the country to assist me. The result has
+in every case been the same."
+
+"What were the results?"
+
+"There have been any number of hoboes and yeggmen arrested; many of them
+have been sent to prison; some of them have gone up for long terms; we
+have proved the cases of robberies against them often enough--but the
+point is, that the robberies have gone merrily on afterward, just the
+same."
+
+"Go on," said the detective, nodding his head.
+
+"Eight separate times we have had, as we supposed, Hobo Harry himself in
+our clutches. Each of those eight separate times the prisoner who was
+supposed to be Hobo Harry has confessed that he was that individual,
+and----"
+
+"And so you have arrested eight Hobo Harrys, eh?"
+
+"That is about the size of it. But the point is----"
+
+"The point is that not one of the eight was really Hobo Harry."
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"Very good. Go ahead with your story."
+
+"In each case, after the arrest, as we supposed, of Hobo Harry himself,
+the robberies and thefts along the line have received an impetus; they
+have increased in number, and in volume--and also in seriousness. These
+yeggmen do not confine themselves to breaking into freight cars and
+stations along the line of the road. They burglarize post offices, and
+even country banks. They pillage houses. They turn their hands and
+their talents to anything and everything where there is hope of reward
+for them. The thing has got beyond endurance."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"We want you, Carter, to find Hobo Harry himself--if you can."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"The matter was discussed thoroughly at a meeting of our board of
+directors yesterday, and it was determined at that meeting that if you
+could find Hobo Harry and arrest him, and, having arrested him, could
+convict him and send him to prison, and, having done that, could prove
+to our entire satisfaction that the man is Hobo Harry, your reward will
+be fifty thousand dollars, spot cash. Only, you must understand, we must
+be certain that your man is the real article."
+
+"Hobo Harry, the King of the Beggars, eh?"
+
+"Yes. Beggars, you know, is supposed to be the name of their
+organization."
+
+The detective nodded.
+
+"Will you take the case, Carter?"
+
+"I suppose so--if there isn't a time limit set upon it."
+
+"You may take your own time; that is, of course, if it is not too long."
+
+"It will require some time to do the thing thoroughly."
+
+"I suppose so. Well, have it your own way; only succeed. That is all the
+railroad people desire--success."
+
+"I will get your man; only I won't promise to do it in a day, or a week,
+or a month. I won't set a time."
+
+"All right. You shall be your own master in the case."
+
+"I will have to be that--absolutely. After I leave this office, when my
+interview with you is finished, you will not see me again until I have
+got Hobo Harry in my clutches. You will not communicate with me, or
+attempt to do so, and I will not communicate with you."
+
+"That is a little hard, isn't it, Carter? We would like to know, from
+time to time, how you are getting on, and what you are doing."
+
+"That is precisely what you will not do."
+
+"All right. Have it your own way. But what about the other men that are
+now on the case, Carter?"
+
+"Leave them on it. Add more of them. Appear to increase your vigilance
+in other quarters. If there are fifty detectives on the case now, add
+fifty more if you wish. I would prefer that you should do so rather than
+not. The more the better."
+
+"But suppose that one of them should nab the real Hobo Harry while you
+are seeking him. You would lose the reward."
+
+"I will take my chances about that. The point is that I must work
+absolutely independent of all others who are on the case, and that
+nobody outside of yourself and the board of directors of your company
+must know that my services have been called into the matter. Will you
+agree to that?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Increase your vigilance on every side, if you can. If you do so, you
+will assist me."
+
+"I suppose," said the president slowly, "that it is your plan to become
+a yeggman yourself, in pursuing this case."
+
+"It does not matter how I may accomplish it, does it?"
+
+"No; I was merely going to say that that very thing has been tried four
+separate times; once with more or less success. But I ought to warn you
+that two of the four who attempted it lost their lives; a third is a
+cripple for life, minus a leg; and only the fourth, who ended by
+arresting the wrong man, after all, had any degree of success. And now
+he is frightened almost into imbecility, for his life has been sworn
+away by the yeggmen, and he expects to be murdered every time he goes
+out alone."
+
+"All the same," said the detective, "that will not deter me."
+
+"You will want money for your expenses, Carter. If you will tell me how
+much----"
+
+"I will present my bill of expenses along with my demand for the fifty
+thousand dollars reward," the detective interrupted quietly.
+
+By more closely questioning the president of the railroad, Nick learned
+that the depredations and robberies committed by Hobo Harry's gang had
+been remarkable in their extent and thoroughness; and that every effort
+to break up the gang had been in vain.
+
+Whenever one of the yeggmen was arrested and sent to prison, two new
+ones, even more proficient in their thievery, seemed ready to spring up
+in his place; and so the thing had gone on and on until the people who
+had been robbed so often became desperate.
+
+And then it was determined to call Nick Carter into the case.
+
+Of Hobo Harry himself, nothing whatever was known beyond the fact that
+there was such a character, and that he was the head and front of the
+hobo gang--their chief, to whom absolute and implicit obedience was
+accorded. His power over them seemed absolute.
+
+Whether it was because of fear of him, or for love of him, it was,
+nevertheless, true that not one of the fraternity of hoboes who had been
+arrested could be prevailed upon to betray the master. Neither threats
+nor offers of bribery had any effect upon them.
+
+Hobo Harry remained as entirely in the dark as ever; and even in the
+cases of the eight men to whom the president of the railroad had
+referred as having confessed that each of them was Hobo Harry
+himself--they had each seemed to get a queer sort of enjoyment in
+posing, even for a time, as their dreaded chief.
+
+As the president explained to Nick, there were many among the detectives
+who had been detailed upon the case who insisted that there was no such
+person as Hobo Harry. It was their belief that the name was merely a
+fictitious one, to which the hoboes, one and all, had agreed to give
+obedience.
+
+But the president of the railroad did not believe this; neither did the
+detective. The completeness of the organization of the gang was a
+sufficient negative to such a statement. To have a perfect organization
+there must be a chief; a head; a ruling power.
+
+By investigating the case a little further before actually starting out
+upon it, Nick discovered that the yeggmen had carried their depredations
+even into whole villages. In one town--Calamont--the place had been
+literally gutted in a single night.
+
+The yeggmen had descended upon it in such numbers that the inhabitants
+were terrified, and could only protect themselves by barricading their
+doors, and remaining with their guns and other weapons in their hands,
+while they watched the looting of their bank and post office. And there
+had been other occasions as bad as that one.
+
+Sometimes the yeggmen traveled in small groups; sometimes they worked
+in twos or threes, but often they went about in large bands which had
+been known to include as many as fifty or even more.
+
+Had the outrages been confined to one community the inhabitants would
+have risen in their might and, by organizing vigilance committees, could
+have driven them out--possibly. But they were not confined to
+communities at all; they extended all along the line of the railroad,
+and the descent of the robbers seemed always to have been arranged far
+ahead--and perfectly planned by a master mind at that.
+
+These descents always happened when it was known that there were large
+sums of money, either in the banks that were robbed, or when the post
+offices that were broken open were better provided than usual with cash.
+
+At every place where there was a siding along the line of the railroad,
+freight cars had been broken open, and denuded of their contents; and
+this often happened when there was one or more night watchmen on hand
+for the purpose of preventing that very thing.
+
+But in each case the watchman had been overpowered, and either beaten
+into insensibility or maimed--and in at least one instance--killed.
+
+And hence it was that the railroad company was willing to pay well for
+the apprehension of the chief of these marauders.
+
+All of this information Nick Carter gleaned before he formed any
+definite plans for his campaign.
+
+Roughly speaking, there was a stretch of main line of the railroad over
+which, or rather along which, the yeggmen seemed to be most active. This
+principal thoroughfare for their nefarious trade was approximately five
+hundred miles long; and it was here where the greatest and the most
+persistent outrages were committed.
+
+There were branches of the line, too, along which they worked; but off
+the main line the organization seemed to lose some of its power for
+concentration of force.
+
+After Nick had pieced together all the information that could be gleaned
+without being actually at the scene of the trouble, he called his three
+assistants together in consultation with him. For he had determined to
+make use of all of them in this case. Indeed, that was the only method
+by which he believed that he could entirely succeed at it.
+
+To them he related the circumstance of his connection with the case,
+after which he told them all he had been able to learn about it; and in
+conclusion he said:
+
+"Now, lads, there is only one way by which we can hope to succeed in
+this undertaking, and that is, we must become hoboes ourselves."
+
+The three nodded almost in unison.
+
+"If we decide to do that," continued the detective, "we must do it
+thoroughly. We must do as General Grant did when he decided, against the
+wishes of his generals, to invest Vicksburg--be cut off from his base of
+supplies; and that is what we must do."
+
+"I don't think I understand exactly what you mean," said Patsy, who was
+paying close attention; for Patsy liked the plan inconceivably.
+
+"I mean," replied Nick, "that when we start out to become hoboes, we
+must become so in fact, and not in appearance merely. It is easy enough
+for any one of us to make ourself up as a tramp, or a hobo, or even a
+yeggman, and to play the part; but in this case we must do more than
+that: We must be the part."
+
+"But that 'base of supplies' business--what do you mean by that?"
+insisted Patsy.
+
+"I mean that when we start out on this case, there will be no returning
+here until we have lodged Hobo Harry behind the bars. We are going to
+live as hoboes, and do as hoboes do, carrying out a real robbery or so,
+on our own hooks, taking care, of course, that one or more of the real
+article shall know about it."
+
+"And taking care also," interjected Chick, "that we keep track of what
+we steal, so that it, or its value, may be returned to the owners later
+on."
+
+"Of course, Chick; that goes without saying. Now, there is another
+thing."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"At the present time there are no less than fifty detectives, some from
+Pinkerton's, and some from other places, engaged upon this case. If we
+play our parts as we should play them, we are bound to run into some of
+those chaps sooner or later. If we do that----"
+
+"Well?" asked Patsy.
+
+"We must continue to play our cards to the end, no matter what
+happens--even to the extent of being arrested, and possibly tried for
+the offenses that have been committed. If one of us should get caught,
+he must play his part even then, for the protection of the others who
+are still on their jobs; for if that one should confess himself a
+detective, the usefulness of the others would be past."
+
+"That is clear enough," said Ten-Ichi.
+
+"It sure is," said Patsy. "It isn't very pleasant, either. Although it
+will be some fun to work on the opposite side of the fence for once."
+
+"How do you mean?" asked Ten-Ichi.
+
+"Why, we are always chasing down criminals, aren't we? Now we will have
+some fun in letting others chase us while we play the criminal. Say,
+chief?"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"We will have a chance to learn a little about that other side of the
+fence. We will discover how it feels to be chased, instead of doing the
+chasing."
+
+"Yes," said the detective; and Patsy turned then to Ten-Ichi.
+
+"I'll make you a bet," he said. "I'll bet you anything you like, on the
+basis of two to one, that I don't get nabbed while we are on this lay."
+
+"That's a go," smiled Ten-Ichi, "for I think you will be the very first
+one to go under."
+
+"How much do you want to bet?"
+
+"Never mind the betting part of it, lads," Nick interrupted them. "The
+point is, that each of you is to do his utmost to carry out his part to
+the end, no matter what happens. Now, if you please, all step this way.
+I have a map here that I wish to show you."
+
+He spread the map upon the table, and upon it he showed them the five
+hundred miles of railway along which they were to work; and presently he
+put his finger upon the name of a town along the line, and he said:
+
+"Here is a place called Calamont. It is, roughly speaking, two hundred
+and fifty miles from New York. Some time ago Calamont suffered greatly
+by the descent of the hoboes upon it. It has not quite recovered from
+the effects of that time yet, although several months have elapsed since
+the occurrence. Do you see it, all of you?"
+
+They admitted that they did.
+
+"Right here," he continued, drawing his pencil with which he was
+pointing a little to the eastward, "is a patch of woods through which
+the railway runs. There are about twenty acres of woodland there, and
+the road passes through the centre of it."
+
+They nodded, and he went on:
+
+"To the south of the railroad, through the woods, is a swamp. It is
+almost an impassable swamp, I am told. I will have more to say about
+that part of it presently. Understand, do you?"
+
+They did understand.
+
+"To the north of the tracks, through the woodland and beyond it, the
+country is hilly and almost mountainous. There is a limestone formation
+there. There are deep ravines and gulches, high cliffs and precipices,
+and, although I stated in the first place that there is only about
+twenty acres in the woodland, I meant to say in that particular patch of
+woods to which I first drew your attention."
+
+"Yes," said Chick.
+
+"As a matter of fact, the country all around this region is wild and
+unsettled. It is much too rough to settle, and there are woods and
+forests everywhere. Just beyond these woods, to the northward, the
+forest is almost unbroken for several miles, save that there is a narrow
+clearing to separate this particular bit of woods from those beyond it."
+
+"Well?" asked Chick, who was paying close attention.
+
+"To the south of the tracks it is almost the same, save that the
+country is flat and low. As a matter of fact, the railroad passes across
+the spur which lies between the rough country to the north and the flat,
+swampy country to the south.
+
+"I have not been able to gain any very exact information about those
+swamps, but from the best opinions I can get, I should assume that it is
+a sort of another Dismal Swamp down there. Men and cattle, horses and
+sheep have been known to wander in there, and never return. Presumably
+they were lost in the swamps or----"
+
+"Or else eaten up by the yeggmen," suggested Patsy.
+
+"Precisely. But it is a wild country. Now"--he rested one finger upon
+the map--"right here at the point where my finger rests, two weeks from
+to-morrow, at or near the hour of darkness, I will meet each of you. You
+will find me just north of the track; or, if any of you get there before
+I do, you will wait there for me, and for the others. Whoever arrives
+first must build a fire. We part to-night, here, now. You must each
+leave the house separately, and become lost to the world--you must each
+become a hobo in the meantime, in your own particular way. Fix
+yourselves up as you please, and go where you please--only go
+separately. And keep your appointment for two weeks from to-morrow.
+That's all."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+THE YEGGMEN'S CAMP FIRE.
+
+
+Each of the detective's three assistants understood thoroughly that Nick
+Carter's reason for directing them to do as he did was that they might
+each have learned the parts they had to play thoroughly by the time the
+actual work of it should begin.
+
+And not only that, they would have had two weeks during which to wear
+off the newness of habit and apparel; and by the time they arrived at
+the place of meeting, each would have become sufficiently schooled in
+his part to play it quite naturally.
+
+And there was still another reason which Nick hoped they would take
+advantage of, although he said nothing about it: That was that they
+would make acquaintances among such of the ilk as they happened to meet.
+Such acquaintances might be of value later in the game.
+
+When Chick left the house, about two hours after the interview with
+Nick, he had his traveling bag in his hand, and he went direct to the
+railway station, where he took a train for the West--for a city far
+beyond the line of the road upon which Nick Carter's campaign was to be
+worked out. It was his intention to start from there.
+
+Ten-Ichi took his departure a little sooner than Chick, and he was
+dressed as usual, also. Outside the house, on the curb, he stopped for a
+few moments, and appeared to be thinking; and then he started down the
+street on foot, and disappeared.
+
+Patsy was the last to go, except the chief himself, who was smilingly
+watching these departures from an upper window of the house. He had said
+no more than he did to them purposely, for he was curious to see how
+each would go about it. He knew that each one of his assistants was
+entirely proficient in his way, but he also knew that each had a way of
+his own for doing things.
+
+When Patsy left the house he also hesitated in front of it for a moment;
+and then he walked rapidly away up the street, and disappeared.
+
+And that was all that Nick cared to see; he wished to feel assured that
+each had departed on his own hook, and that it was their intention to
+work singly. He had left the map for them to study in the library after
+he left them alone together, and he had no doubt that each would be
+fully competent to find the place of appointment when the time should
+come.
+
+He was the last to leave the house, of course. There were many
+directions to give before he finally took his departure. Joseph had to
+know how to account for his absence from home to those who might inquire
+too particularly about him; and the absence of the three assistants had
+to be accounted for also.
+
+Having arranged that, and provided himself with everything which he
+regarded as needful, he selected one of his own disguises--one that he
+was fond of, and which will appear more particularly later on, and with
+that in a small satchel which he expected ultimately to rid himself of,
+he went out, and away also.
+
+And from that moment we will skip to the time of the opening paragraphs
+of this story, which was two weeks and one day later--to the time when
+we behold the camp fire made of railway ties, with the four hoboes
+grouped around it, having enjoyed their evening meal and now ready to
+smoke and rest; for if there is anything in the world which a hobo
+really enjoys, it is rest.
+
+It was only a little bit after dark--and the night was not a dark one at
+that. Already the moon was shining down upon the world.
+
+But around the immediate vicinity of the camp fire it seemed quite dark
+by contrast, and the light thrown back by the trunks of the trees
+rendered the scene a picturesque one.
+
+Nick Carter had purposely been the last one to arrive at the trysting
+place, if such it may be termed; but he had been a close observer of the
+arrival of the others, nevertheless; and he accomplished that by
+arriving in the vicinity early in the day, and by later climbing among
+the boughs of one of the trees, from which perch he was enabled to
+watch the coming of his assistants.
+
+Patsy came first. His eagerness led him to do that, and Nick had
+expected it; and as the detective watched his youngest assistant he was
+pleased to see the manner in which he made his approach.
+
+Had Nick Carter, concealed in the boughs of the tree, been an enemy,
+instead of a friend, he could not have had one suspicion aroused by
+Patsy's manner.
+
+The young fellow was most disreputable in appearance. His hair, and it
+was his own, too, he had managed to dye to brick-red hue. His face and
+his hands were grimy, and there was a considerable growth of beard upon
+the former. He wore good shoes--just out of a store, they appeared to
+be, and he carried a string of three other pairs, equally new, in one
+hand. His coat was much too large for him, and he had turned the sleeves
+back at the wrists for convenience. His hat had once been a Stetson; it
+had also quite evidently been a target for a shotgun.
+
+When Nick first spied him he was walking along the track, whistling; but
+directly opposite the place of meeting he stopped, and, after a moment,
+he dived quickly over the fence into the woods, and approached with care
+the place which he finally selected for the fire.
+
+And there he scraped some dried boughs together, made his fire, brought
+an old tie from the track to aid it, arranged his crane of green sticks,
+and, from a bundle that he carried slung upon one shoulder, he produced
+the kettle, a package of meat, some bread, and other articles, with
+which he began the preparation of his supper.
+
+A little later a second figure appeared so suddenly out of the gathering
+gloom that neither Patsy, at the fire, nor Nick, in the tree, had any
+idea of its near approach.
+
+"Hello, pal!" he said gruffly; and Patsy wheeled like lightning, with a
+gun already half drawn, to face him.
+
+"Hello yourself!" he growled, not too cordially, and eying the newcomer
+suspiciously. "Who are you lookin' for?"
+
+The other came slowly forward without deigning to reply to this direct
+question, and without so much as glancing again at Patsy; but he slung
+his own bundle on the ground, and, after a moment, stalked away in the
+gathering darkness again.
+
+Presently he returned with another tie, which he dropped near the fire;
+and then he looked sullenly toward Patsy.
+
+"Share up, or chuck it alone?" he demanded, thrusting his hands deep
+into his pockets.
+
+"What you got?"
+
+"As much as you have, and as good as you have."
+
+"All right. I'm agreeable. Chuck it down."
+
+Half an hour later, when it was almost dark, a third one appeared.
+
+He was shorter and slimmer than the others, and the best dressed one of
+the three, although he was disreputable enough in all conscience.
+
+He came noisily over the fence from the track, and the two at the fire
+could hear him long before he reached them. But they made no move.
+Anybody who approached them with as much noise as that was not to be
+dreaded, it appeared.
+
+When he arrived within the circle of the firelight, he stopped and
+strangely enough began to laugh; and he laughed on, boisterously,
+amazingly, in fact; he laughed until there were tears in his eyes, and
+until he had to hold to a sapling near him for support.
+
+"Aw, what's eatin' you?" called out one of the men from the fire. "What
+you see that's so funny; must be in your own globes. Come along inside
+if you wants to, and don't stand there awakin' up the dead."
+
+"I ain't got any chuck of my own," he called back to them. "I was
+laughing to think how near I came to getting it--and didn't."
+
+"Well, there's enough here for three--'r four, for that matter. Come in
+and set down, pal."
+
+And it was not until the meal was cooked, and spread out upon all sorts
+of improvised arrangements, that the fourth member of the party
+appeared--and he made his arrival in a most surprising manner.
+
+He dropped literally among them, seemingly from the clouds--or the
+tree--just as they were beginning to eat; and he squatted beside them,
+and, reaching out without a word, helped himself to a hunk of the
+toasted meat, which he began to tear viciously with his teeth.
+
+"Nice guy, ain't he?" said Patsy, leering at the one with whom he had
+agreed to share.
+
+"Looks as if he might have come over in the steerage of a cattle ship,
+inside a rawhide, don't he?" assented the other, who was Chick. But
+neither Chick nor Patsy was at all assured that this new arrival was
+their chief, and they determined to play their parts to the end, or, at
+least, until they were absolutely certain.
+
+In reality Nick Carter looked like a Sicilian bandit in hard luck. He
+certainly looked the Italian part of it, all right; but even among his
+rags there was some display of color, which an Italian is never happy
+without.
+
+When the other referred to him in this slighting way, he raised his eyes
+sullenly toward them, and he also released his hold upon the food he was
+eating long enough to finger the hilt of his knife suggestively; for
+Nick was aware of the fact that not one of the three was sure of his
+identity, and he preferred not to make himself known just yet.
+
+"Me understands da Inglis you spik," he muttered, in a sort of growl.
+"Better hava da care wota you say dees times. I hava da bunch uh banan
+in da tree ifa you want more chuck. Go getta it--you!"
+
+He drew his knife quickly and leveled the point of it at the one whom
+the others had already christened 'Laughing Willie'; but Ten-Ichi,
+nothing daunted by the implied threat, only shrugged his shoulders, and
+went on eating.
+
+"Go getta da banan, or I slice you up fora de chuck," repeated the
+supposed Italian, rising slowly from his seat by the fire and advancing
+toward Ten-Ichi; but he had not taken a step before he found himself
+looking into the muzzle of a pistol, and Patsy, in his capacity as host
+over the meal, said sourly:
+
+"Sit ye down, dago, or I'll make a window of your liver. We're three
+friends enjoying a feast, and you're welcome to part of it if you want
+it, but if you make any more breaks, out you go--feet first, if you
+prefer it that way."
+
+The Italian subsided with a grunt, and the meal continued undisturbed
+until all but Ten-Ichi, who appeared to have been really very hungry,
+had drawn back from the fire; and then it was that Chick made the remark
+about his hurrying that was mentioned in the beginning of this story.
+
+But Nick had in the meantime managed to make it known to the others who
+he was, although he had said no word in reference to it. They each one
+of them knew that there might still be others concealed in the trees or
+somewhere near at hand watching them. There was no telling how many
+pairs of eyes had observed them when they entered the wood. Yeggmen are
+as cautious and as careful about what they do in the lonely places among
+their brethren as the cave man used to be in primitive times.
+
+For they prey upon one another, those men, as readily as they prey upon
+society. Among them it is always merely a question of the survival of
+the fittest--and the fittest is always the quickest, and the strongest,
+or the most alert.
+
+It was not likely that they would have this firelight to themselves for
+a very long time, and they knew it; and, in fact, it was not ten minutes
+after their meal was finished, and their pipes were alight, before, like
+shadows, three other men suddenly loomed beside the fire, as if they had
+sprung out of the ground.
+
+And they stalked forward from three sides at once--came forward as if
+they owned the woods.
+
+But not one of our four friends, already seated there, made a motion or
+uttered a word. They smoked stolidly on, but with their eyes alert for
+anything that might happen.
+
+And then, out of the darkness around them, appeared three more figures,
+and then two more; and the eight, who had seemed to come together,
+grouped themselves with their backs to the fire, and gazed sullenly and
+silently down upon the four they found there.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+THE "KING'S" LIEUTENANT.
+
+
+The moment was an ominous one, and no one was better aware of the fact
+than Nick Carter. Everything depended now upon the perfection which his
+three assistants had attained in the parts they were to play.
+
+The sudden coming of the eight yeggmen, arriving as they had, so closely
+together, could not be the result of mere chance, and Nick had no doubt
+that they were in reality members of the very gang he was seeking. For
+the detective had determined in the beginning that the headquarters of
+the gang was somewhere in this vicinity. Everything in his first
+investigations pointed to that. And if their headquarters were located
+near that wood, or below the track in the swamp, it was certain that
+they kept outposts stationed where the arrival of newcomers could be
+reported at once.
+
+Thus the appearance of Nick Carter on the scene, and the coming of the
+others soon after his arrival, had doubtless been reported, and their
+actions carefully watched from the very beginning.
+
+The detective was intensely glad now that his own actions, and those of
+his friends, had been so perfect--that is, perfect in the sense of
+creating the impression in the mind of a possible observer that they
+were strangers to one another. He knew perfectly well that if a watch
+had been kept upon them there could be no doubt in the minds of the
+watchers that the four men grouped around the fire were unknown to one
+another.
+
+But here were eight burly men grouped around them, each standing in a
+position so that he could make himself extremely dangerous on the
+instant should he choose to do so. And there was no telling how many
+more might be concealed out there in the darkness of the woods around
+them.
+
+It is not the fashion among yeggmen to welcome an addition to their
+party, no matter whether that addition is composed of one or of many.
+Sullen silence is the rule at first, during which each man studies the
+others. Suspicion is always the first impulse at such meetings. Their
+attitudes are exactly that of strange dogs which encounter each other
+for the first time, and walk round and round, with the hair on their
+backs raised, and with their tails straight out, every nerve on a
+tension, and every impulse prepared for mortal combat.
+
+And people who have watched dogs while they go through with these
+mannerisms know that it requires only a few moments for them to
+determine whether they will be friends or foes, or if they will only
+politely tolerate the presence of each other on the scene.
+
+So Nick Carter sat silent, making no movement, save to puff vigorously
+at the short pipe he was smoking; and so the others of his party did
+likewise; for the forces of the newcomers were much stronger.
+
+This tableau--if tableau it could be called, continued for five minutes,
+and then one of the late arrivals cast aside the stub of a cigar he was
+smoking, and broke the silence.
+
+"Where might you hoboes be from?" he demanded, in an even tone, and
+without a gesture of any kind.
+
+Nobody made any reply whatever to this question, and after a moment he
+spoke again.
+
+"Which one of you is the leader of this outfit?" he asked.
+
+Again nobody replied to him; the assistants kept silent because they
+well knew that their chief would answer if he considered it wise to do
+so; and Nick remained silent merely because he did not consider that it
+was yet time to speak.
+
+And now the spokesman of the other party addressed himself directly to
+Nick Carter, as being, doubtless, the fiercest and most
+villainous-looking one of the bunch.
+
+"You heard me, didn't you?" he demanded.
+
+"Yes; I heard you," was the calm reply.
+
+"Hello! You can talk United States, can't you?"
+
+"Quite as well as you, if necessary," was the cool response.
+
+"You look like a dago."
+
+"What I look like, and what I am, is none of your business--unless you
+show some authority for questioning me."
+
+"Ho, ho, ho, ho! Hear him, my coveys! What do you think of that?" And
+then to Nick again: "What sort of authority do you expect me to show?"
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders, knocked out the ashes of his pipe, rose
+slowly to his feet, and stood facing the other calmly, as he responded:
+
+"There is only one kind of authority, signor, in a party like this. You
+know what that is. I don't know you any more than I know these other
+guns around here. It may all be a put-up job, for all I know. I don't
+much care if it is. I am quite willing to fight you all, one at a time,
+if necessary--and with guns, or knives, or fists, as you please. I come
+here, and I get into a tree and wait. Why? Because I have been told of
+this place, and that always there is somebody around here. I thought I
+would see who the somebody was before somebody saw me. So I get myself
+into a tree. Pish! And then not only one, but two, and three arrive on
+the scene; and then eight more come. If you want to know who I am, and
+are brave enough to fight me, and man enough to lick me--then you'll
+know. If not--mind your own affairs, and leave me to attend to mine."
+
+It was a long speech, and the others listened in absolute silence to
+the end of it. But the instant Nick ceased speaking, the man to whom he
+had addressed his remarks drew back his arm with a sudden motion, and
+drove his huge fist forward with the quickness of a cat.
+
+Any other person than Nick Carter might have felt the force of that
+treacherous blow. Even he might have done so had he not been expecting
+it, and, therefore, been entirely ready for it.
+
+But the bony fist of the man struck only the empty air, for Nick
+sidestepped in a manner that would have made Jim Corbett, in his
+palmiest days, green with envy; and the battering-ram flew past his ear
+harmlessly.
+
+And then the man who had delivered it, before he could recover from the
+effect of his own effort, found himself seized in a viselike grip,
+raised from his feet, and hurled backward straight over the fire, and
+beyond it, so that he sprawled at full length among the bushes.
+
+He leaped to his feet with a curse, and his hand flew to his hip pocket
+in search of a weapon; but he did not draw it forth again, for he found
+himself looking into the muzzle of an ugly-looking forty-four.
+
+"Drop it!" Nick ordered sharply. "I didn't hurt you, when I might have
+done so easily. Are you satisfied?"
+
+The anger of the man seemed to pass as quickly as it had arisen, and he
+grinned as he slowly resumed his former position beside the fire.
+
+It was quite true that he was not hurt; it was equally true that he knew
+that this stranger might have hurt him severely had he chosen to do so,
+and have been entirely excusable for doing it too.
+
+"All right, pard, you pass," he said. "What's your handle?"
+
+"I'm called Dago John by them as know me. What's yours?"
+
+"Hand---- The guns call me Handsome, by way of shortening it. Shake?"
+
+"Yes," said Nick; and they clasped hands for an instant. Then Handsome
+added:
+
+"Who might these gazaboes be?"
+
+"Search me, Handsome," growled Nick, resuming his seat, and beginning to
+refill his pipe. "If they ain't a part of your outfit, they sure ain't a
+part of mine."
+
+Handsome wheeled upon Chick then.
+
+"Who are you?" he demanded, "and where are you from?"
+
+"I'm the 'Chicken'; they know me around Chicago, if they don't here.
+Maybe you've heard of me; but it don't make any difference whether you
+have or not. I'm the Chicken, all right; and it's Chick for short."
+Chick did not so much as move an eyelash while he made this retort; but
+his questioner was plainly affected.
+
+"The Chicken!" he exclaimed. "The Chicken is dead. We got it straight.
+Shot by----"
+
+"Shot by a cop, eh? That's the story, and it goes, all right. Only it
+happens that it wasn't the Chicken as was shot; cause why? The Chicken
+is here."
+
+"Who was it, then?"
+
+"It was a pal of mine. A likely gun he was, too. I jest changed hats
+with him when he slid under. The rest of the clothes didn't make no
+difference. They thought he was the Chicken--and it didn't hurt him any
+to have 'em think so, while it helped me a lot."
+
+"All right, Chicken," said Handsome, extending his hand a second time.
+"I know about you. You're all right. Who are these other two?"
+
+"Search me, Handsome. I reckon we're all strangers."
+
+Handsome turned to Ten-Ichi.
+
+"What's your handle, covey?" he growled.
+
+Ten-Ichi's answer was a peal of demoniac laughter; and he laughed on and
+on interminably, slapping his thighs and flinging his arms around him
+after the manner of a man who is warming himself, until the faces of the
+others around him developed broad grins--and until the man who called
+himself Handsome brought him to with a sudden thrust of his arm which
+nearly took the breath out of the lad.
+
+"What's eatin' you, you loon?" he demanded.
+
+"I was laughing," replied Ten-Ichi, now as solemn as an owl.
+
+"You don't say so! Were you? What at?"
+
+"You. It is so funny that you should be called Handsome."
+
+Handsome grinned with the others.
+
+"Well," he said. "What's your name? Out with it!"
+
+"I'm Tenstrike--Ten, for short. That's what."
+
+"All right, Ten; you pass. You're harmless, I guess--unless you let out
+that laugh of yours at the wrong time. I would advise you not to do
+that. And _you_?" He turned now to Patsy, with a sudden whirl of his
+body. "You were the first of this bunch to get here. Who are you?"
+
+"Sure," said Patsy, with a slow drawl, "I'm an Irishman, and me name
+doesn't matter to you. It's enough that they call me Pat. If ye don't
+happen to like it, sure you can call me Tim, or Mike, or Shamus, or any
+old thing that suits ye. And what am I here for, is it? Sure, I'm on a
+still hunt for a man I want to find. Mebby ye're after knowin' him."
+
+"Maybe I am. Who is he?"
+
+"Faith, I wish I knowed that. He calls himself Hobo Harry--that same!"
+
+A dead silence followed upon this unlooked-for announcement. The
+boldness of it surprised Nick, startled Chick, and frightened Ten-Ichi,
+lest unpleasant results should come of it. But it was evident that
+Patsy knew his ground, and had prepared for this very moment, for he was
+cool and smiling, and he appeared to enjoy hugely the effect that his
+words had had upon the others.
+
+It was Handsome who finally broke the silence that ensued; and he
+replied:
+
+"That's a name, Pat--if that's your own handle--which isn't spoken
+lightly around these parts. What do you want with him?"
+
+"By your l'ave, mister, I'll tell that to him when I find him. In the
+meantime, if youse be afther mindin' yere own business, it wouldn't
+hurrt ye any. Ye seem to be making of yerself a sort of highcockalorum
+elegantarium bosski. If ye tell me that ye know Hobo Harry, an' will
+take me to him, so's I can tell me story to him, mebby I'll answer ye;
+but not unless."
+
+Again there was silence; and this time it was Nick who brought it to an
+end.
+
+"Handsome," he said sharply, "who's this other bunch? What I want to
+know is, are they wid you?"
+
+"They are," was the quick reply. Then he wheeled quickly to Patsy again,
+and added:
+
+"Come with me--you--if you want to see the chief. I'll take you to him.
+The rest of you can wait where you are."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+THE OUTLAW'S HOME.
+
+
+A dead silence reigned around that camp fire for several moments after
+the two departed; but then the seven strangers who were left seated
+themselves in various attitudes, filled their pipes--or lit the stubs of
+half-smoked cigars, produced from their pockets; and after that, little
+by little, conversation was indulged in.
+
+The night was warm and balmy. There was no reason why any of them should
+seek other shelter than the boughs of the trees which already covered
+them; but Nick knew from the manner in which Handsome had left them that
+he expected to return, and that there was some other place near by to
+which he intended to take them--if the chief should say the word. And he
+saw now that Patsy, by rare forethought, had prepared for that very
+emergency.
+
+More than an hour had passed before Handsome made his appearance again;
+and then he loomed suddenly beside the camp fire, as silently and as
+stealthily as an Indian. Even Nick Carter, who was on the alert for his
+approach, did not hear him coming.
+
+"I'll take you now!" he said briefly to Nick. "The others can wait."
+
+Without a word more he turned away again, and Nick, leaping to his feet,
+followed him in silence through the darkness.
+
+The night was almost black in there among the trees, although the moon
+was shining above them; but nevertheless Nick had no difficulty in
+following his guide.
+
+They made directly for the railway tracks, and crossed the fence that
+intervened; but when they reached the top of the grade, Nick's guide
+halted and faced him.
+
+"You said you are Dago John," he said slowly. "Who might Dago John be,
+pard?"
+
+"They call me Dago John because I look like an Italian, I suppose,
+although I am not one," replied the detective. "But I try to carry out
+the idea. If you have worked your way through the South at all, maybe
+you've heard of Sheeny John. It will do as well as Dago John. A name
+doesn't make much difference."
+
+"It makes a sight of difference here, my friend. What's your lay?"
+
+"Anything that I can turn my hand to--or my brains."
+
+"You have an education?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Can you write a good hand?"
+
+"It's my one fault that I can--too good a one."
+
+"Have you looked through the screens?" (Been in prison.)
+
+"Never yet--to stay there. What do you want to know all this for?"
+
+"I've been telling the main guy about you."
+
+"What about me?"
+
+"I told him of your strength, for one thing. There isn't another man in
+our outfit who could lift me off my feet the way you did it."
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"I could have done it as easily if you had been twice the man you are,"
+he said contemptuously.
+
+"There is no doubt of that. I don't bear you any ill will for it,
+either. Neither does the boss."
+
+"And who may he be, Handsome?"
+
+"Don't you know, Dago John?"
+
+"Maybe I do, and again maybe I don't."
+
+"Didn't you come here looking for him?"
+
+"Maybe so."
+
+"Well, who were you looking for?"
+
+"Maybe the same one that the other fellow was looking for--maybe not."
+
+"That's all right. You can come along, I guess. But I warn you to have a
+care what you say to him."
+
+"Say to who?"
+
+"To Hobo Harry. He isn't one to be trifled with."
+
+"Say, Handsome, on the level now, _is_ there such a person?"
+
+"Sure there is. You'll find that out all right, too, before you are much
+older. Didn't you come up here to get into the gang? Isn't that what you
+are here for?"
+
+"Sure thing; but, on the level, I didn't think that I could do it so
+easy."
+
+Handsome laughed as if he were intensely amused.
+
+"If you think that you are in it now, you are very much mistaken," he
+said, with a shrug. "We don't take men into the bosom of our family
+quite as easy as that. But with us there is always room for a good man,
+and he always has a chance to prove whether he is good or not. That is
+the sort of chance you are going to get."
+
+"Will you tell me about it?"
+
+"I will if you will agree to teach me that hold by which you threw me
+over the fire into the bushes a little while ago."
+
+"Sure thing, Handsome. I'll teach you that, and a lot of others as well,
+if you wish. That is one of the ju-jutsu tricks."
+
+"I've heard about that. It's all right, all right."
+
+"Sure thing. Now, where are we going? Are we to stay here all night,
+Handsome?"
+
+"Not quite."
+
+"Tell me what is expected of me, then; where we are going?"
+
+"I am to take you to the chief; to Hobo Harry himself, for he happens
+to be here to-night. It is only once in a while that he is here, too;
+but it happens that he is to-night. He is to interview you.
+Otherwise--that is, if he were not here, you would have to hang around
+on the outside until he showed up to pass upon you in person."
+
+"I see."
+
+"He is the only man in the whole bunch who has a right to do that. I've
+got to blindfold you after we get across the fence on the swamp side of
+the tracks."
+
+"All right."
+
+"I suppose you would like to know what you are up against before I take
+you into the old swamp, wouldn't you?"
+
+"Sure thing, Handsome."
+
+"Well, it's just this: If you don't pass muster with the boss, you'll
+never come out again. There are deep holes in that swamp, Dago."
+
+"Oh, I don't doubt that; but what do you mean by passing muster?"
+
+"I mean just this, and nothing more: If you are not what you appear to
+be, and what you say you are, it's a slit across the windpipe for yours;
+see?"
+
+Nick did see, and he nodded understandingly.
+
+"I reckon I'll pass, all right," he said negligently. "If you are ready,
+I am."
+
+They descended the embankment, and climbed the fence on the swamp side
+of the tracks; and then, as soon as they had penetrated a short
+distance into the wood, Handsome stopped again, and, drawing a huge
+bandanna from his pocket, proceeded to bind it around the detective's
+eyes securely.
+
+"Now," he said, "can you do the lockstep?"
+
+"Never tried it," said Nick.
+
+"Sure about that?"
+
+"Never learned--never had to."
+
+"Well, you'll have to learn it now--unless you wish to fall into the
+swamp. Get up close to me, and take hold of my sides under my arms. Then
+follow in my footsteps as nearly as you can."
+
+"I say, Handsome, you've got some education yourself."
+
+"Never mind that now. We're not going into pasts just at present."
+
+"All right. Lead the way. I'm ready."
+
+Nick's eyes were so securely bandaged that he had not the least idea
+where they were going, or where his footsteps tended; but even had he
+been without the bandage he could hardly have told that, for the deeper
+they penetrated into the swamp, the darker it became, and only those who
+were perfectly familiar with the pathway could pass that way in safety
+in the night.
+
+There were times when Nick's feet slipped from the precarious footing,
+and he slid into the water up to his knees; and once he went in to his
+waist; but Handsome was always ready to seize upon him and support him
+to dry land again at such times.
+
+And their way wound round in a serpentine course. They climbed over
+fallen and moss-grown logs; they slushed through shallow water; they
+crawled on their hands and knees under embankments and rocks, and at
+last, at Handsome's order, they stepped into a boat of some kind which
+the latter pushed away from the bank with a pole.
+
+After that a long time passed while the boat was propelled steadily
+onward with the pole, sometimes gliding under trees that hung so close
+to the water that they were obliged to get flat down inside the scow to
+avoid them; and they wound around many curves and twists, until at last
+they stopped, and Handsome removed the bandage from Nick's eyes.
+
+They were beside a high bank, and directly ahead of them, through the
+trees, the detective could see the lights of many gleaming fires; and he
+could also discern the shadowy forms of men grouped around them, engaged
+in different occupations.
+
+"Now, keep your mouth shut, and your eyes and your ears open," was
+Handsome's warning, as he led the way from the scow, and signed for Nick
+to follow him. "If anybody speaks to you, don't answer; and when you get
+in the presence of the chief, answer questions, and don't ask any."
+
+"Right you are, pardy," was Nick's reply; and then he followed his
+conductor through the trees toward the fire.
+
+They came out presently upon an open glade in which a dozen camp fires
+were burning. At some of these men were engaged in eating; others were
+preparing to eat; and still others had finished their meal, and were
+lying around in various attitudes, smoking. Some were playing cards by
+the light of the fires. Nick judged, in the rapid estimate he made, that
+there were in all at least twoscore of men gathered there.
+
+He saw, too, that around this circular glade there were sheds built, and
+some of these had lights behind the brush or canvas fronts. Two of them
+had board fronts, and he judged that they were used when the weather was
+too inclement, or too cold, to remain in the open.
+
+As they passed through the circle of light cast by the fires, many of
+the men looked up lazily toward them; but beyond one stare, no attention
+was paid to them; and they passed on into the gloom beyond.
+
+Here they traversed a narrow but well-beaten pathway through the thick
+growth of alders, and presently came out upon a second glade that was
+larger than the first; and higher and dryer, too.
+
+But that was not what attracted the detective.
+
+In the very centre of this patch of clearing was a house; or a cottage,
+it would more properly be called; but it was large, and apparently
+comfortable. The roof extended down in front of it and over a wide
+piazza, where Nick could see that two men and a woman were seated.
+
+But directly in front of the piazza, a man--one of the hoboes, without
+doubt, to judge from his appearance--was pacing regularly up and down,
+with the precision of a sentinel; and he carried a rifle in the hollow
+of his arm, which, as soon as Handsome and Nick appeared, he raised and
+pointed at them, while Nick could hear the click of the lock as he
+raised the hammer.
+
+Handsome threw up both hands, holding them high over his head, and Nick
+did the same; and thereupon the gun was lowered, and, still with their
+hands held high, the two men advanced.
+
+There was not a word spoken; the sentinel resumed his pacing up and
+down, as if there had been no interruption; and Nick's guide approached
+the edge of the piazza, still with his hands raised.
+
+One of the men who were seated there rose and stepped forward; then he
+peered long and earnestly at the two men, and then he said:
+
+"You may advance. Go inside."
+
+And as they crossed the piazza, and stepped inside the house, the woman
+of the group rose and followed them, closing the door behind her; and
+Nick Carter wondered if Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, was a woman.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+NICK'S WONDERFUL STRENGTH.
+
+
+When Nick Carter gazed upon the woman who stood before them, with her
+hands clasped behind her, he thought that he had never seen another like
+her. She could not by any stretch of the imagination have been called
+beautiful; she was too masculine in her appearance for that--that is,
+the expression of her face, her manner, and the position she assumed
+were masculine; but the suggestion of it ended there.
+
+She was as tall or taller than the detective, and her complexion was as
+dark as the hue to which he had stained his own. Her eyes were large,
+and round, and full, and fierce, and she held her head, with its crown
+of dead-black hair, as if she were monarch of all she surveyed. And the
+strangest part of it all was that she did not appear to be more than
+twenty years old.
+
+With a steady stare she took in every detail of Nick's appearance, from
+the top of his head to the shoes he wore on his feet; and then she
+turned slowly to Handsome.
+
+"Whom have we here?" she demanded.
+
+"Dago John, he calls himself," was the reply.
+
+"The man you spoke of?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who is so strong that he could throw you over the fire into the bushes,
+and who did not harm you when he might have done so, after you had
+struck at him with your fist?"
+
+"The same."
+
+She turned her attention to Nick then.
+
+"Who are you?" she demanded.
+
+"Just what you see, missus; no more and no less," replied Nick, speaking
+boldly, for he deemed that to be the surest way to her favor.
+
+"I see very little; nothing whatever that betokens the strength you are
+said to possess."
+
+"You can't always tell what's inside of a crib before you crack it," was
+the reply; and the woman smiled.
+
+"Where do you come from?" she asked.
+
+"I ain't giving out my past history, lady, if it's all the same to you,"
+said Nick coolly; and she frowned. Evidently she did not like this
+answer.
+
+"What errand brought you to this part of the country, and finally
+induced you to make your camp in the woods out there?" she asked,
+smiling again.
+
+"I suppose you want the plain truth, lady?"
+
+"Yes," she replied, in an easy tone; "that is, if you put any value on
+your life."
+
+"Well, the truth is this: I have heard, here and there, a good deal
+about a certain person who is known as Hobo Harry, the Beggar King. I
+have heard that he has gathered around him a lot of my kind, and I
+reckoned that maybe he'd give me a show to be one of them. That's what I
+came here for, and that's why I camped out there in the woods."
+
+"And who are the three men who came with you?"
+
+"Nobody came with me. I came alone."
+
+"There were three other men there when Handsome found you? No?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who are they?"
+
+"Handsome can tell you that as well, or better, than I. He did the
+questioning."
+
+"Why do you want to join the forces of Hobo Harry?"
+
+"Because I'm tired of going it alone, and because I have heard that he
+takes good care of his followers."
+
+"What can you do?"
+
+"I can do anything that I am told to, once I have acknowledged a chief."
+
+"That is a good answer. It covers a good deal of ground. Now, who told
+you about Hobo Harry?"
+
+"I have heard about him in a good many places."
+
+"Who told you where to find him?"
+
+"A gun friend of mine, who croaked down in Indianapolis, a month ago or
+more. Jimmy the Sly he was called." (It was true that there had been a
+Jimmy the Sly, who was one of the many of the band who had been arrested
+and imprisoned; and after his release he had gone to Indianapolis, and
+died there, in a hospital. Nick knew this from his interview with the
+railroad president, and therefore he was not afraid to make use of the
+name.)
+
+"So you knew Jimmy the Sly, did you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Describe him to me."
+
+"He was tall and slender, with a pock-marked face, and the longest
+fingers I ever saw; and he had a wart on the side of his nose, and
+a----"
+
+"That will do. That is sufficient. How comes it that Jimmy never
+mentioned you to me?"
+
+"You'll have to ask Jimmy that, I reckon--and you might burn yourself if
+you undertook to do it. I reckon it's hot where Jimmy is, madam."
+
+She smiled at this. Nick could see that he was making a good impression
+upon her. He was still wondering if she were indeed the chief, or if she
+were only his representative. It was certain that he had had no
+expectation of finding a woman in this place.
+
+"And what do you wish me to do with you, now that you are here?"
+
+"I reckon that I'll have to leave that to you. I didn't come with my
+eyes shut. I guessed pretty well what I was up against. But I came here
+to be made one of you, and I hope you will give me a chance."
+
+"What do you know of Hobo Harry?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"What do you think he is?"
+
+"The head gazabo of this bunch."
+
+"What do you suppose he is like?"
+
+"Just at present writing, madam, he looks to me very much like a
+beautiful woman who has the grace of a siren and the courage of a lion."
+
+"You should be a Frenchman instead of an Italian."
+
+"I am neither one nor the other. I'm just a--a yeggman."
+
+"You were about to say something else."
+
+"I was going to say--a crook."
+
+"You have not been a yeggman always, have you?"
+
+"I never knew anybody who had been, madam."
+
+"You are not really a yeggman, or a hobo. Confess the truth now; aren't
+you under cover, and playing the role for the purpose of being out of
+sight for a time?"
+
+"I'm willing to say yes, if it pleases you."
+
+"What has been your line of work, Dago?"
+
+"Well, I'm a fair penman; I'm a good mechanic; I could be a passable
+druggist if I tried, and I wouldn't shy at taking a hand at running a
+bank, if it was big enough for the risk."
+
+"I begin to think that you are all right, Dago."
+
+"You can betcher life that I'm all right, madam, if it comes to that.
+But I don't reckon that you'll take me on my say-so. You'll be wanting
+some sort of proof of me before you consent to take me into the fold."
+
+"You are correct about that."
+
+"I'm ready for anything."
+
+"You have told me that you are a penman, which means that you could be a
+forger; you have said that you are a mechanic, which means that you
+could crack a crib if necessary; you called yourself a druggist, which
+means that you know how to use the chemicals, and the poisons, too, if
+necessary; and you would not refuse to tackle a bank job if one should
+come your way. Do you happen to have the mark of blood against you,
+too?"
+
+"I don't suppose there is any mark that I haven't got."
+
+"That doesn't answer my question."
+
+"Well, I wouldn't stay in a house if I wanted to get out when a live man
+stood in my way, if that is what you mean."
+
+The woman turned to Handsome quite suddenly.
+
+"What time do you start?" she asked of him; and he replied, as if the
+question were a continuance of their conversation:
+
+"I ought to start now--inside of ten minutes."
+
+"Very good," she said. "Take Dago with you. Break him in. Let him have
+the worst of it. If he makes good, all right. If he doesn't--shoot him."
+
+"All right," said Handsome cheerfully. "What about the others? There are
+two more out there near the tracks."
+
+"I will attend to them. Go, now. Take this man with you. Give him all
+the rope he needs--but watch him. I'd sooner trust him with you than
+anybody else, anyhow--and I believe he is all right."
+
+"Come!" said Handsome, seizing Nick by the arm; and he pulled him
+through the door after him. But all the way to the door, Nick kept his
+eyes upon the woman, who was looking at him strangely, and with a
+curious smile on her face.
+
+Outside, when they had passed the sentinel, and were again in the part
+which led to the other glade, he stopped.
+
+"Wait a minute, Handsome," he said. "I want to ask you a question."
+
+"There isn't time now, Dago. Save it until later. We must get away from
+here at once. Do you remember where we left the boat?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Go there alone, and wait there for me. I won't be three minutes."
+
+He did not await a reply, but darted off to one side as soon as they
+reached the glade, and Nick saw him disappear inside one of the cabins
+before referred to.
+
+"I am in for it now, to the whole length of the tether," he told
+himself, as he stepped briskly forward toward the place where he knew
+the boat to be; and he was halfway across the glade when suddenly from
+one of the groups of men near a fire, one of them leaped up and
+confronted him, with his hands upon his hips, a cigar pointed at an
+angle in the corner of his mouth, and a leering grin upon his face.
+
+"Where to now, my pal?" he demanded, standing in front of Nick, and thus
+stopping him.
+
+Nick looked at the man, and smiled. He did not answer. He guessed
+instantly why Handsome had left him to find his way to the boat alone.
+This was doubtless one of their tricks--to see what a new recruit would
+do under these circumstances. Possibly, too, he thought, the woman
+wished to see an exhibition of his strength, and they had for that
+purpose pitted one of their best bullies against him.
+
+He surveyed the fellow with a quick and comprehensive glance; and in
+that glance he saw that the man was a burly one, who evidently possessed
+great strength. But Nick did not care for that. He was only turning over
+in his mind in that instant what course it would be best for him to
+pursue. And the answer came to him when the bully repeated the question.
+
+"Where to, pard?" he demanded again, still with the sarcastic leer on
+his dirty face.
+
+"When you get back, I'll tell you!" exclaimed Nick; and at the same
+instant he darted a step forward and seized the man by the
+throat-and-hip hold of ju-jutsu, and the next instant had sent him
+whirling through the air as if he were a cartwheel.
+
+He struck the ground ten feet away, and went rolling over and over among
+the bushes, where there happened to be a mass of cat brier, or creeping
+thorn; and the series of howls and curses he sent up was a wonder.
+
+A roar of laughter from every side proved to Nick that all had been
+watching for the outcome of that episode; but he looked neither to the
+right nor the left, but strode onward toward the boat.
+
+And then he heard a cry of warning from behind him, and he leaped aside
+just as the fellow he had thrown fired a bullet pointblank at him from
+close behind.
+
+As it was, the missile pierced his coat sleeve inside his arm.
+
+As Nick leaped aside he also turned.
+
+The hobo who had fired the shot was already running toward him, and now
+he was endeavoring with every effort in his power to discharge the
+weapon again; but for some reason the mechanism of the lock refused to
+work, and in an instant more Nick had leaped upon him and grasped him a
+second time.
+
+He was determined now that the fellow should have a lesson indeed; so
+while he held him at arm's length with one hand, he pummeled him with
+the other until his face was a mass of bruises; and then, when the
+yeggman was in a condition bordering upon insensibility, Nick raised him
+bodily from his feet, and holding him in his arms, ran with him down
+along the path toward the water.
+
+And reaching the edge of the swamp, he threw him out into the muddy
+water, headfirst.
+
+It was not deep, but it was filled with soft ooze, which filled the
+ears, and eyes, and nose, and mouth of the fellow, so that, when he rose
+to his feet, he was sputtering and spitting, and coughing and swearing
+when he could.
+
+The detective left the man to make his way out of the water to dry land
+as best he could, and turned coolly away to rejoin Handsome, who
+approached at that moment, grinning.
+
+"Well done, Dago," he said. "You served him just right. Come along."
+
+They entered the scow without more words, and Handsome poled it away
+from the shore, and along the waterway through the almost impenetrable
+darkness--but there was never a word said about the use of the
+blindfold.
+
+"How is this?" Nick asked, after a little. "Aren't you going to tie that
+handkerchief over my face again?"
+
+"No. I ought to do it, I suppose, but it's too much trouble. Besides,
+you're all right. I can tell a man when I see one."
+
+"All right," said Nick. "It's your funeral; not mine. Only if the lady
+should raise a kick--what then?"
+
+"She would raise a kick, too, if she knew about it," replied Handsome
+dubiously. "But how is she going to know it? You are not likely to tell
+her, and I won't."
+
+"No," said Nick, "I won't tell her."
+
+"Well, then we'll dispense with the handkerchief."
+
+They poled on in silence for a time after that; but presently Nick
+asked:
+
+"What's the lay to-night, Handsome?"
+
+"I can't tell you that, Dago. You'll have to wait, and find out; and
+you'll have to do your own part, too; for if you flunk by so much as a
+hair, it's my duty to kill you."
+
+"Which I suppose you would do, eh?"
+
+"Sure I'd do it--why not? If you ain't what you seem to be, I'd as soon
+put a hole in you as dip this pole into the water. You hear me!"
+
+"Sure thing."
+
+"And that notwithstanding I like you. I reckon you're all right, and I'm
+going a great way toward proving what I think about it by not binding
+that handkerchief over your eyes now."
+
+"Are there any others in this thing with us, Handsome?"
+
+"You'll find out soon enough. The best way for you is not to ask too
+many questions, but to be satisfied to do as you're told."
+
+They lapsed into silence after that, and there was no more said until
+after they had arrived at the bank where the scow was to be left.
+
+"I suppose I can ask about those other guns that we left in the woods
+to-night, without giving offense, can't I?" asked Nick then.
+
+"That depends on what you want to ask about 'em," was the reply; they
+were now hurrying in the direction of the tracks.
+
+"I want to know if Hobo Harry is going to send for them?"
+
+"Didn't you hear her say so?" was the rejoinder; and then, when Nick
+laughed softly, Handsome turned on him with fury, and would have seized
+him had he not suddenly recalled the fact that his own strength was no
+match for that of the man beside him.
+
+But his anger disappeared as quickly as it came, and he joined in the
+laugh.
+
+"I gave it away that time, didn't I?" he said. "You were too cute for
+me, Dago. But it is dangerous knowledge, Dago. I'll tell you that."
+
+"You didn't give it away," replied Nick. "Any fool would have known that
+the woman was Hobo Harry."
+
+"Then there are a lot of fools in the outfit. You're wrong, Dago. Lots
+of 'em don't suspect it. They think only that she is Hobo Harry's wife,
+or sister, or sweetheart, or something like that. There isn't half a
+dozen of us who really know for certain that Black Madge is Hobo Harry.
+And there! I've let the cat out of the bag again. But you're all right.
+It won't do no harm to tell you."
+
+"Not a mite," replied Nick; but he chuckled noiselessly all the same.
+That last admission made by Handsome was worth hearing.
+
+"Black Madge, eh?" he was thinking to himself. "Now I know why it was
+that there was something so strikingly familiar about the woman. Black
+Madge, eh? Well, well, who would have supposed that?"
+
+For Black Madge was a character well known in the criminal world, and to
+the police, although very little was known about her really. There was a
+picture in the Rogues' Gallery in New York that purported to be of her;
+but Nick knew now that it was not.
+
+Nevertheless, he remembered that once upon a time he had seen Black
+Madge, who was the daughter of a Frenchwoman by an Italian father; Black
+Madge, who had already made an unenviable record for herself on both
+sides of the ocean.
+
+It was a long time before that when Nick Carter saw her. She was only a
+grown-up child at that time, but she was already a hardened criminal,
+nevertheless; and he recalled now the circumstance of his meeting with
+her.
+
+It was in Paris. He had gone to the prefecture of police to see the
+chief of the secret service, who was awaiting him, and had found the
+girl in the room with the chief, who was engaged in questioning her
+closely in reference to a crime that had been committed, and because it
+was thought that she knew the parties concerned. But she had given no
+information, and had been allowed to go; and after her departure the
+chief had said to Nick:
+
+"Monsieur Carter, some day that young woman will appear on your side of
+the water. I hope you thought to take a good look at her face."
+
+"I did," replied the detective.
+
+"Remember it, for some day you will have cause to do so, I do not doubt.
+She is a terror, and she has brains. The worst kind of a criminal. She
+should have been a man, for she has a man's daring, a man's
+recklessness, and a man's way of doing things. Black Madge, we call her
+here."
+
+Nick recalled all that conversation now, plunged into a reverie about it
+by Handsome's use of the name. All the time he had been in the room with
+her in that house in the swamp, he had felt that he ought to remember
+where he had seen those eyes before. Now, he counted the years that had
+passed since he saw her, and, to his astonishment, they were five.
+
+"She was seventeen then, the chief told me," he thought, "that would
+make her twenty-two by now."
+
+And then it came back to him how strangely she had looked at him while
+he was leaving her presence, and he wondered if her recollection for
+faces was as good or even better than his own.
+
+"But," he argued, "it could not be possible that she would remember me
+from that one short glance she must have had of me at that time. And,
+besides, I was not disguised at all, and now I look no more like myself
+than--well, than she does."
+
+"What the devil are you so silent about?" demanded Handsome. They had
+reached the fence at the railroad track, and Handsome was leaning
+against it.
+
+"I was trying to figure out in my mind what sort of a lay we are on
+to-night," replied Nick. "I'm not used to starting out without knowing
+where I am going. I feel like a horse--with you for a driver."
+
+"Well"--Handsome laughed--"I won't use the whip unless you get
+skittish."
+
+"What are we waiting here for?"
+
+"We are waiting for our chauffeur with the automobile," grinned
+Handsome. "Nice road for an auto, isn't it?--bumping over those ties."
+
+"Hark!" said Nick.
+
+"I'm harking, my gun."
+
+"It does sound like an automobile, sure enough," said Nick.
+
+"Didn't I tell you that we are waiting for one. Come on."
+
+He leaped the fence, and Nick followed him over; then they climbed the
+grade, and paused beside the track.
+
+And then, while they stood there, and the droning sound peculiar to
+automobiles came momentarily nearer and nearer, the detective began
+thoroughly to realize for the fist time that something really serious
+was afoot for the night.
+
+But he was not long left in doubt as to the character of the approaching
+vehicle, for in a moment more it swept around a curve in the railroad,
+and came to a stop immediately in front of them.
+
+And, strangely enough, it was an automobile arrangement, only that it
+was equipped with car wheels instead of with rubber tires; wheels that
+had flanges to fit the tracks. But it was provided with a gasoline
+engine, and Nick knew from the appearance of the apparatus that it was
+capable of great speed.
+
+When it came to a stop Nick saw that it already contained two men, one
+of whom was driving; but he got down from the seat under the steering
+wheel, and climbed into the rear of the machine, while Handsome took his
+place.
+
+"New man; Dago for a handle," said Handsome briefly, by way of
+introducing Nick to the others. What their names might be he evidently
+did not deem it important to mention.
+
+"Try-out?" asked one of the men, while Nick was climbing into the box of
+the machine.
+
+Handsome nodded curtly--and that was all that was said at the moment.
+
+It was significant, however, to Nick, for it meant a lot. It meant that
+these other men entirely comprehended the situation, and that all three
+of them were prepared to shoot him in the back at any moment when his
+conduct of the business in hand did not entirely satisfy them.
+
+But Nick was resolved not to be shot in the back that night. Whatever
+the business might prove to be upon which they were engaged, he was
+resolved to see it through to a finish, even to the extent of helping
+them burglarize a bank, if that was the lay.
+
+"To do a great right, do a little wrong," he muttered to himself.
+Whatever might be stolen or whatever damage might be done that night, he
+would charge up in his expenses, and see to it that the railroad people
+made it good later on, when his work should be done.
+
+In the meantime the railroad automobile had been gathering speed, and
+now it seemed to Nick to be little less than wonderful that it remained
+on the tracks at all, for if he was any judge of speed, he knew that
+they must be flying along at much more than a mile a minute--and he
+wondered what would happen if the headlight of a locomotive should loom
+suddenly before them--and then, just as the thought occurred to him,
+they rounded a short curve, and came to a sudden stop.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK.
+
+
+The instant the strange machine was brought to a stop--and it was done
+wonderfully soon, considering the speed at which they had been
+traveling--the three men leaped to the ground beside the track, and Nick
+was ordered to follow them.
+
+He did so, and then he was told to bear a hand; and, following
+directions that were given him, he seized hold of the boxlike tonneau.
+
+Almost in a twinkling of time after that the machine was lifted from the
+track in sections, and finally, still in sections, was carried to a
+highway near at hand, where it was put together again, minus the iron
+wheels. But there were other wheels concealed in that commodious body,
+and these were quickly taken out and adjusted.
+
+Within twenty minutes of the time when they came to a stop on the track,
+after rounding the curve, the machine was fitted with regular automobile
+wheels, and was ready to proceed along the highway.
+
+Nick saw in this arrangement much that had puzzled other men who had
+been on the job. He had no doubt from what he knew of automobiles that
+this machine was capable of sixty miles an hour, or even more than
+that, on the highway; and, if that was true, it, of course, could make a
+half greater speed than that on rails.
+
+But he made no comment. That was not expected of him, and would have
+been resented had he attempted to do so; but he climbed to his place
+when he was told, and again they sped away toward some destination, the
+nature of which he did not know.
+
+Once he ventured to ask the man nearest him what time it was, and
+received a curt "Shut up!" by way of reply; so he remained silent after
+that.
+
+And after a while--less than half an hour--they drove into a village,
+and presently ran the machine around behind a church, where it was
+placed in one of the stalls of a shed.
+
+And still his three companions worked in utter silence. Beyond now and
+then a curt word uttered by Handsome, who seemed to be in command of the
+expedition, nothing at all was said.
+
+Nevertheless, each man there seemed to know exactly what to do; as if
+every move they made had been nicely planned out for them--and such Nick
+believed to be the case.
+
+When the machine was stored away, the men fell into line, Nick being
+shoved into position directly behind Handsome, and then, in Indian file,
+they moved silently forward toward a high fence that was near at hand.
+
+They went over this one by one, Handsome waiting with patience until the
+last one was over, and then the march was taken up again.
+
+They passed now through the rear of a large yard, and before them loomed
+a brick building, which Nick figured must be a courthouse; and after a
+moment they made a half circuit around, and came to a stop between two
+buildings of brick, one of them being that one already mentioned.
+
+The night was dark now, for the moon had gone down, and there were no
+street lamps in that village evidently; or, if there were, they were not
+burned on nights when there was supposed to be a moon.
+
+But there was light enough for Nick to discover that they were close to
+the main street of the village; he could see the store windows on the
+opposite side; and it suddenly came to him that the building that was
+next to them--the second one--was a bank, and that they were about to
+rob it.
+
+He knew now what was expected of him; and again he determined to see the
+thing through to the end.
+
+It was not to prevent one robbery that he was engaged; but to prevent
+many. It was not to apprehend the participants in a minor job like this
+one promised to be, but to capture the head that directed many such
+robberies, and so stop them altogether.
+
+And still no word--not even a whisper--was spoken between the men. They
+worked on in utter silence, as if their plans had been thoroughly
+conned until they were learned absolutely by heart.
+
+Nor did they pause in the yard next to the bank. There was scarcely a
+halt there; but they passed to the rear of the building, and followed
+one another over the high fence that was there, to the rear of the bank
+building.
+
+Keeping themselves well in the shadows, they crept forward silently to a
+rear door of the building, and here Handsome paused for a moment, and
+put down a canvas bag that he had been carrying all the way; and now he
+whispered in Nick's ear:
+
+"There are the tools, Dago. Let's see what kind of a cracksman you are."
+
+Nick did not need a second bidding. Having determined upon his course,
+he did not hesitate, but he seized the bag, pulled open the mouth of it,
+and, having selected such tools as he wanted, he applied himself to the
+task that had been set for him.
+
+A professional burglar of long experience could not have gotten that
+huge oak door open more quickly and silently than Nick Carter did, and
+Handsome gave him an approving pat on the shoulder.
+
+He was the first to enter the bank, Nick following, and the others
+coming behind them; and presently, after forcing another door, they
+stood crouching inside the bank itself.
+
+A dim light burned in a gas jet in the centre of the large room, which
+was divided only by the wire screen which separated the customers' side
+of the rail from the clerks; and almost beneath the light, exactly where
+it could shine full upon the steel doors, was the huge safe of the
+institution.
+
+A person might not stand in front of that safe for a moment without
+being in full view from the street should any one happen to pass there.
+Nick saw that at a glance; but nevertheless Handsome silently placed a
+drill and a bottle of liquid in his hand, and motioned that he was to
+begin the dangerous part of the work.
+
+"Didn't you bring a screen with you, you chump?" demanded Nick, in a
+whisper. "If you had told me what the lay was, I'd have made one."
+
+Handsome nodded, evidently well pleased; and at the same time he
+produced a roll from under his coat, and gave it to the detective. Nick
+unrolled it, and found that it was merely a piece of burlap, rather more
+than a yard long, and about two feet in width, and with a roll of cord
+attached to each corner of it.
+
+He knew what that was intended for readily enough, and, taking it in his
+hands, he crept forward without another word, and quickly attached the
+four strings to objects which he selected as being situated about right
+for his purposes.
+
+In two minutes the screen was in place, and it afforded a perfect
+shelter from view from the street, and just the sort of one that would
+never be noticed from the outside at all, unless a person stopped at
+the window and deliberately peered inside--and that nobody was likely to
+do, unless something else first attracted attention.
+
+In fixing the screen in place so quickly and perfectly, Nick evidently
+won over not only Handsome, but the others; and now there was no more
+question of his doing the drilling alone. Each man took his own part of
+the work in silence, as if Nick had always been one of them; and,
+besides, now there was no time to be lost.
+
+Drilling through the steel doors of a safe is not an easy task, and it
+is not done quickly, although expert burglars carry tools these days
+which will cut anything.
+
+They took their turns at the drill, as they took them also with the
+acids and oil; and the work went on merrily until the holes were ready
+for the charges.
+
+And here again it seemed that Handsome was determined to try Nick out to
+the last, for he bent forward and whispered in his ear:
+
+"Prove one thing more, Dago, and you're made."
+
+"Want me to do the blowing?" asked Nick.
+
+Handsome nodded.
+
+"All right," said Nick. "Light out, then."
+
+"But----"
+
+"Get out, I say. If I do the blowing I'm boss for the time being. Git!"
+
+They did; and again, with the implements and the explosives at hand,
+Nick went to work; and, as before he worked rapidly and well--as if he
+were an experienced hand at that sort of employment.
+
+And then, when the charge was ready, Nick pulled up the heavy rope
+matting from the floor, and after doubling it again and again until
+there was a huge wad of it, he braced it with desks and chairs against
+the front of the safe; and when all that was done to his satisfaction,
+he lighted the fuse, and ran back to the rear hallway, where the others
+were watching and waiting.
+
+They had not long to wait after that. There was a lapse of perhaps a
+minute and a half, and then a dull, booming roar shook the building, and
+the burglars rushed forward.
+
+Now was the time when they were compelled to work rapidly, if ever.
+
+It was true that Nick had so muffled the sound of the explosion that it
+was hardly possible that the noise of it had roused anybody at all; but
+there was always a chance of somebody near at hand being wakeful or
+watchful.
+
+At any moment they might be interrupted--and no burglar likes to be
+interrupted. It always means a fight, in which somebody is likely to get
+killed, and burglars rarely do any killing unless they have to in order
+to escape.
+
+They rushed forward together; but now Nick purposely kept in the
+background. He had no idea of being taken himself if they should be
+interrupted; nor did he wish to give his companions an opportunity to
+kill any person who might interrupt them. It was all right from his
+standpoint to participate in the burglary, in order that he might
+ultimately catch all the thieves; but he did not wish to be a party to
+any fight that might come of it.
+
+But he was made to hold one of the bags while Handsome filled it from
+the inside of the safe.
+
+They pried open the inner compartments, and threw them indiscriminately
+upon the floor as soon as they were emptied; they jimmied open the steel
+boxes as readily as if they had been made of softest pine--and in twenty
+minutes after the explosion they were stealthily climbing the fence
+again, into the courthouse yard.
+
+And, so far as they could see, not a soul in the village had been
+awakened or alarmed.
+
+They returned to the shed, where they had left the automobile, by the
+same route they had covered in approaching the bank; the machine was
+backed out; they entered it, turned on the power, and sped away through
+the silent streets as they had come, with nobody the wiser for what they
+had done, the havoc they had wrought, and the wealth they had stolen.
+
+Down beside the road where they had made the change before, from the
+track of the railway to the highway, they paused long enough to secure
+the iron wheels, and here the change was made back to a railway machine.
+The car was lifted in sections to the tracks, and with everything
+adjusted they were soon flying down the shining rails at a frightful
+rate of speed, and in silence--for it seemed to be a rule among these
+men that there should be no talking.
+
+Mile after mile they covered in this way, and then the machine was
+slowed down, and came to a stop at the point where it had picked up
+Handsome and Nick at first, and here they got down, and, having taken
+out the plunder, stood beside the track until the machine had
+disappeared from view.
+
+"Now, Dago, help me with the swag," said Handsome; and together they
+picked it up, and once more started for the outlaws' retreat in the
+middle of the impassable swamp.
+
+When they were in the boat, and almost ready to land where Nick had
+thrown the man into the water, Handsome turned to him, and whispered:
+
+"You're all right, Dago. I'll tell Madge so, too!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT.
+
+
+When Nick Carter was shown a place to sleep that night--or, rather, that
+morning, for it was well toward daylight by the time Handsome and he
+returned to the outlaws' camp--he tumbled upon the bunk that was shown
+him, and he lost no time in doing so; nor did he open his eyes again
+until he felt a hand shaking him lustily, and a voice crying out to him:
+
+"Wake up, Dago! You're wanted!"
+
+He sprang up instantly; and, because he had laid himself down with
+nearly all his clothing still upon his person, he was not long in making
+himself ready. To have insulted the profession he had adopted by washing
+his face was not to be thought of.
+
+"Gee! But I'm hungry!" he said to Handsome, who was standing near,
+waiting for him.
+
+"Madge will give you something to eat. She is at her breakfast now," was
+the whispered reply. "She wants you."
+
+"Then," said Nick, "if I am going into the presence of a lady, and am
+expected to eat with her, I'll have to wash my face and hands. Show me
+where."
+
+Handsome laughed.
+
+"I do it myself once in a while," he said. "Come with me."
+
+And he led Nick to a place along a path through the swamp where he
+succeeded in giving himself a good wash--for Nick had the satisfaction
+of knowing that the stain he had used was of such a quality that it
+would defy water. Alcohol alone would remove it.
+
+They found Madge on the doorstep, awaiting them; but Handsome paused at
+the edge of the clearing, and muttered:
+
+"I leave you here, Dago. I'm not in this. You're to have this interview
+alone."
+
+"All right," replied the detective, and was about to move on, when
+Handsome detained him by a gesture.
+
+"Put in a good word for me, Dago, if you get the chance," he whispered.
+"I have already said many a good one for you--and I made it as easy for
+you as I could all around."
+
+"All right," said Nick again.
+
+"And one more word, Dago. I forgot to tell you----"
+
+"What?"
+
+"Cremation Mike has got it in----"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Cremation Mike--he worked in a crematory once--has got it in for you.
+He's the chap you chucked into the soup, you know. He sneaked away after
+you left last night, so I'm told, and he swore black and blue that he
+would have your life for that act. He will, too. He's sure bad medicine,
+that fellow. He's a bad member, too. I just thought I'd give you the
+pointer."
+
+Handsome turned away then, and Nick went on alone to the piazza, where
+Black Madge was awaiting him.
+
+He stopped just before he put his foot upon the veranda, and waited for
+her to make some sign; and she approached quite near to him, looking him
+straight in the eyes.
+
+"Good morning, Dago," she said, smiling.
+
+"Good morning, madam," he replied gravely.
+
+"You look quite like a gentleman this morning," she continued, laughing
+lightly. "Or, no, rather like a mountain bandit of Italy."
+
+"I could be either if I chose," he replied again, as gravely as he had
+spoken before.
+
+"I do not doubt it. I have been giving you considerable thought since I
+talked with you here last night. Come inside. You haven't had your
+breakfast, I suppose?"
+
+"No, madam."
+
+"Then you shall breakfast with me. I was about to eat mine when I
+remembered you, and sent for you."
+
+"Madam is most kind."
+
+She led the way into the house, where a table was spread with good
+things, well cooked, too, they appeared to be; and she pointed toward a
+chair at the opposite side of the table.
+
+"Sit there," she said. "I declare, we are quite domestic."
+
+"So it would appear, madam. I am afraid that you are doing me too much
+honor, for one who has been so short a time among you."
+
+"Bah! I am glad to have somebody who can talk decently near me. I tire
+of all these ragamuffins who are my men. Sometimes I kill one of them
+just for the mere fun of ridding myself of the vermin."
+
+"Madam is incautious, perhaps."
+
+"Why so?"
+
+"Some day one of them might take it into his head to kill madam."
+
+"Then somebody will have to be mighty quick about it. I'm not so easily
+killed as all that. Tell me--have you guessed who I am?"
+
+"I am not a good guesser, madam."
+
+"On the contrary, I should suppose you to be a good one--an
+exceptionally good one. Answer me: Have you guessed who I am?"
+
+"I might make a guess now, madam."
+
+"Oh, drop that madam. I don't want you to madam me all the time. Who do
+you suppose I am?"
+
+"If I am to make a guess, I should suppose that you are that
+distinguished and elusive person whom the outside world refers to as
+Hobo Harry."
+
+She laughed long and heartily, stirring her coffee vigorously the while.
+
+"Upon my word, you are a good one," she said, still with laughter in her
+voice. "Yes, I am that distinguished and elusive person. There is no
+doubt about that. I have spent a long time in bringing this organization
+to perfection, Dago. What do you think of it?"
+
+"I think it is a wonder."
+
+"Right you are, my man! It is a wonder. For example, what did you think
+of the operation that was performed last night?"
+
+"I thought it was carried out very perfectly. The men must have been a
+long time in laying their plans."
+
+She laughed again.
+
+"Not one of those men--not even Handsome--had ever seen that place
+before. They only obeyed my orders; nothing more. I made the plans
+myself. I told them exactly what to do, and when, and how to do it. It
+is all a question of mathematics, and of obeying orders."
+
+"It was perfectly done, madam."
+
+"There you go again. By the way, Handsome gives me an excellent report
+of you."
+
+"I had supposed as much, else I would not be here breakfasting with
+you."
+
+"That is not why I sent for you; that has nothing to do with last
+night."
+
+"No?"
+
+"I want you to tell me where I have seen you before--and where you have
+met me before," she said swiftly, and with a sudden and dangerous
+narrowing of her eyes.
+
+If Nick had not had himself perfectly in hand he must have given a start
+then that would have betrayed him; as it was, he answered instantly, and
+as if the subject had also occurred to him:
+
+"For the life of me, madam, I cannot remember. I have tried to recall
+the time and place ever since I saw you last night; but it eludes me. I
+cannot tell."
+
+"It is well that you have answered as you have," she said, with a
+threatening cadence in her voice.
+
+"Why so, madam?"
+
+"Because I saw plainly in your eyes last night that you remembered to
+have seen me somewhere before that time. Had you denied it, you would
+have lied to me; and it is not healthy for people to tell me lies."
+
+"I can imagine that, madam. But since I have no reason to do so----"
+
+"Tell me what there is about me that is familiar to you, Dago."
+
+"It must be your great beauty that I remem----"
+
+"That will be about enough of that, thank you," she interrupted him
+coldly. "I know all about my beauty, and don't in the least need to be
+told about it."
+
+"One could not very well remember you at all without remembering your
+beauty," insisted Nick boldly. "It is the first thing about you that
+strikes one; and the second is----"
+
+"Well--what? Possibly I will be more interested in that."
+
+"The fear you inspire, I think. You have what the French call a 'way'
+about you."
+
+She started perceptibly.
+
+"What do you know about the French?" she demanded; and Nick saw
+instantly that he had made a mistake in reminding her of her career in
+Paris. Now it was possible that she might recall where she had seen him.
+
+But he dismissed the idea as soon as it came to him, for he remembered
+again how perfectly he was disguised, and how impossible it should be
+for her to remember him after all these years, through the disguise.
+
+But now she was looking steadily at him, and for the moment she had
+forgotten to eat.
+
+"Who are you, Dago?" she demanded suddenly. "You are not what you seem."
+
+"Few of us are," returned the detective evasively.
+
+"Who are you?"
+
+"I have told you, madam, as much as it is possible to tell. You do not
+demand the past records of your followers. All that you insist upon is
+that they shall be faithful in the future."
+
+"Who are you?" she repeated again.
+
+"I am Dago John, madam, at your service."
+
+"But you have another name than Dago John."
+
+"I had another--once."
+
+"What was it?"
+
+"Madam does not suppose, when she asks the question, that it will be
+answered, does she?" Nick inquired boldly.
+
+"By Heaven, sir, do you dare to defy me?"
+
+"Not at all. I merely feel sure that madam asked the question as a joke,
+knowing that it could not be answered."
+
+For a moment it seemed as if she did not know whether to be angry at him
+for his cool effrontery, or to laugh the matter off entirely, in
+admiration of his bravery. She decided upon the latter course evidently,
+for she did laugh--in a way that was not quite pleasant to hear,
+however; and she said:
+
+"Try to think where you have seen me before. Help me to remember. I want
+to recall it."
+
+"It is impossible, madam. I have already tried."
+
+"Is the memory that is associated with me pleasant or otherwise?"
+
+"It could not be but pleasant, since it was--you," he ventured; and she
+frowned. It was plain that she did not relish such compliments.
+
+And now she sat with her eyes fixed upon him, idly stirring her second
+cup of coffee, and seeming to look him through and through, while she
+cast her memory back over the storms of her life, not yet more than
+twenty-three years, all told, and attempted with all her strength of
+will to call up for recognition the ghost which his appearance had
+conjured.
+
+After a little she leaned forward, nearer to him, and her eyes, coal
+black, and blazing, fairly burned into his own; but he held his gaze
+steadily upon her, never once flinching from the scrutiny.
+
+And then, so suddenly that it startled him, she leaped to her feet,
+knocking her coffee to the floor, and she stood over him--but whether in
+anger or only in astonishment that she had remembered, he could not have
+told.
+
+"By all the gods!" she cried out. "I remember you now. It is your eyes
+that have haunted me, and now I remember where I have seen them. I
+remember. It was in Paris. It was at the prefecture of police. I was
+there. I was only a girl. I had just finished with the chief when you
+entered the room. I did not notice your name when it was announced, but
+now I remember you--at the prefecture of police in Paris! Tell me--tell
+me, I say, what you were doing there!"
+
+The detective knew that it would be folly to deny the charge that she
+made. He knew that she remembered now, perfectly well, and that nothing
+could disabuse her mind of the determination it had reached.
+
+Acting upon the impulse of the instant, therefore, and determined now to
+play out his role as it should appear, Nick pretended instantly to be as
+greatly astonished as she was at the recollection, and the strangeness
+of it.
+
+He, too, leaped to his feet, imitating an astonishment as great as her
+own. He did not tip over his coffee, but he did manage to upset his
+chair, so that it fell backward on the floor; and then for the space of
+a moment they stood staring into each other's eyes, both--from all
+appearances--speechless with astonishment.
+
+And then, very slowly, she subsided into her chair again, still keeping
+her eyes upon him, and still evidently taxing her memory to the utmost
+to recall all the incidents of that meeting at the prefecture in Paris.
+
+"I remember now," she murmured at last, more to herself than to him. "It
+all comes back to me, bit by bit. Monsieur Goron was chief at the
+time--no? Yes. I remember. There had been a sudden death in the house
+where I lived--it was on the floor just beneath me--and Goron sent for
+me to question me about it. It was thought at first that Lucie had been
+murdered, and Goron thought that perhaps I would know about it. He had
+just finished questioning me when you entered the room--ah!"
+
+Her eyes blazed with a sudden fire of anger, and her lips tightened over
+her teeth.
+
+"When you entered the room Goron rose and shook hands with you. Why did
+he do that? Goron did not shake hands with criminals!"
+
+"Nor with his police spies, did he?" asked Nick, smiling and shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+"But why did he shake hands with you?"
+
+"Because we were old acquaintances, madam."
+
+"And he called you by name. What was that name?"
+
+"Madam, for some time past I have deemed it best to forget it."
+
+"Nevertheless you shall remember it now."
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders, and did not reply.
+
+"What was that name?" she demanded again.
+
+"I have told madam that I----"
+
+She started from her chair, and ran across the room so suddenly that
+Nick was interrupted in what he was about to say; and she seized a rope
+that hung from the ceiling and stood with her hand upon it, grasping it.
+
+"If I pull this rope," she said coldly, "as many of my followers as hear
+it will rush to this place. You know what is likely to happen then if I
+loose them upon you. They are all like wild beasts, or like dogs, ready
+to tear each other at the slightest provocation. If I should point my
+finger at you--so--and say to them, 'Take him; he is yours,' your life
+would not be worth as much as the dregs in your coffee cup. Tell me,
+what that name was, or I will summon the men."
+
+The detective shrugged his shoulders, and leaned back in his chair,
+smiling.
+
+"It would be a foolish and a useless proceeding," he said calmly. "I
+should not tell them that name any more than I tell it to you. I will
+not tell it. It is of no moment here. It could do you no good to hear
+it, and to mention it might do me harm; therefore, I shall not mention
+it, no matter how often you order me to do so. It pains me to disobey
+you, madam, but you force me into the alternative, and I have no choice.
+Pull the rope if you will."
+
+Instead of pulling it, she released it, still staring at him, and she
+returned slowly to her chair.
+
+"You are a strange man," she murmured, "and a brave one. There is not
+another who would dare to defy me as you have done."
+
+"Perhaps there is not another who has so much at stake," he replied
+quietly, but with perfect truth, as the reader knows.
+
+Again she knit her brows in perplexity; again the detective knew that
+she was concentrating her mind upon that incident at the prefecture,
+trying with all her power to recall the merest detail of it.
+
+Nick remembered that his name had been mentioned aloud at that time; he
+recalled the fact that Goron, in rising to shake hands with him, had
+called him by name plainly enough. It was evident that she also
+remembered that much of the facts, and was now straining every energy
+she possessed to recall what that name was.
+
+And while she thought so deeply, her face gradually assumed an
+expressionless cast. She closed her lips firmly together. Her eyes
+became sombre. She seemed oblivious of his presence, and of her
+surroundings. For the moment she was back again in Paris, at the
+prefecture, in the presence of Goron, five years ago.
+
+After a little, without another change of expression, she shrugged her
+shoulders, and rose from her chair, and then, with an assumption of
+carelessness, she passed from the room upon the piazza, saying as she
+went:
+
+"Come. We will not bother any more about this for the present. We will
+take up the subject again another time, after we have both had
+opportunity to think it over. If you care for a cigar, Dago, there are
+some in that cupboard yonder. Help yourself."
+
+Now, it happened that Nick did care for a cigar. He had not had one in
+many a day, but had forced himself to be content with an old pipe. The
+prospect of a cigar was enticing, and so he took her at her word, and
+helped himself--turning his back to her as he did so, and so he did not
+see the strange smile which crossed her face as she passed through the
+door upon the piazza.
+
+He was a bit puzzled by this sudden change in her attitude and manner.
+He could not exactly account for it. Had she remembered? He could not
+tell.
+
+He realized, however, that he was in a predicament--that his position
+was precarious; for if she should remember--if she should recall the
+name of Nick Carter as connected with that incident, he knew that his
+own life would not be worth the snap of a finger, no matter how bravely
+he might fight, or how many of the foe he should overcome in the contest
+that would inevitably follow.
+
+For, scattered about in that stronghold in the swamp, there were no less
+than a hundred of her followers, and there was not one among them who
+would not kill at her bidding.
+
+She was standing upon the piazza, looking away through the woods, when
+he came out, and, without turning her head, she said to him:
+
+"Take that chair, and remain there until you have smoked your cigar. The
+men might take it into their heads to be jealous if you should go among
+them with it, and they should know that you, a new arrival, had
+breakfasted with me. I will return in a moment."
+
+She left him then, entering the house; and with no thought of immediate
+danger in his mind, Nick followed her suggestion, and leaned back in the
+chair, tilting it against the house, determined to enjoy that smoke to
+the utmost.
+
+After that it was difficult to tell exactly what did happen.
+
+He remembered afterward that he smoked on in enjoyment of the cigar for
+some minutes, and that he thought it somewhat rank, notwithstanding the
+fact that it had the appearance of being of excellent quality.
+
+And then suddenly the cigar flashed, exactly as if there had been three
+or four grains of gunpowder wrapped in it--and he was instantly
+conscious of an intensely bitter taste in his mouth.
+
+And then it seemed to him almost as if somebody had struck him, so
+strange were his sensations--and from that instant memory left him
+entirely.
+
+The woman had been watching him narrowly from the doorway; she was
+waiting for that flash from the end of his cigar, and when it came she
+passed out through the door swiftly, and caught him as he was about to
+fall from his chair to the floor of the piazza; caught him, and held
+him, and then deftly raised him to his feet, and half carried him inside
+the house before anybody--had a person been observant of the
+scene--could have realized that anything was wrong.
+
+She possessed great strength, this remarkable woman; for the instant she
+was inside the door, heavy as he was, she raised him in her arms, and
+carried him into an adjoining room, where she closed the door behind
+her, and deposited him upon a couch.
+
+And then, still working with great rapidity, she pulled aside a rug that
+was on the floor, and, having lifted a trapdoor, she again took him in
+her arms, and descended through the opening in the floor to the depths
+beneath it.
+
+After a little she reappeared, and this time there was a grim smile upon
+her face, while she replaced the rug over the trapdoor, and otherwise
+rendered the room the same as it had been before the incident happened.
+
+She passed coolly out upon the piazza, and for a time strode up and down
+it in deep thought; but at last she raised her head quickly, and called
+sharply to the sentinel who was pacing up and down in front of the
+cottage.
+
+"Send Handsome to me!" she ordered; and then she continued her pacing
+until Handsome appeared.
+
+Handsome belied his name terribly in the light of day, for an
+uglier-looking chap could not be imagined; and yet, withal, there was a
+gleam of humor in his eyes and at the corners of his mouth. She turned
+to him abruptly.
+
+"Where are the others of that bunch who were found with Dago?" she asked
+sharply.
+
+"Yonder," replied Handsome, jerking his thumb over his shoulder toward
+the glade beyond them.
+
+"What do you think about them, Handsome?" she asked again.
+
+"I haven't thought much about them," he replied. "They are about the
+usual sort, I believe; no better and perhaps no worse."
+
+"I am not so sure of that."
+
+"No?" he asked, vaguely surprised.
+
+"Handsome, I want you to take them, one by one, to the pool in the
+woods, strip them, and scrub them with soap, and water, and sand, if
+necessary. I want you to make sure that there is no suggestion of
+disguise about any of the three. Do it at once--and when it is done, no
+matter whether there is a question of disguise about any of them or not,
+bring them to me."
+
+Handsome departed without a word. It was plain that Black Madge was
+accustomed to obedience. It was plain also that her suspicions were
+thoroughly aroused; for now she paced up and down again restlessly, and
+continued so to pace until almost an hour later Handsome stood before
+her again.
+
+"Well?" she demanded.
+
+"Two of them were plainly disguised," he replied.
+
+"And the other?" she demanded, frowning.
+
+"The other, as plainly was not disguised."
+
+"And the two who were disguised--what of them?"
+
+"I cannot tell if they are known to each other. I cannot tell whether
+they are spies or not, only it is quite likely that they are."
+
+"And the third one? The one who wore no disguise?"
+
+"I think he is all right. He is the one called Pat. When he realized
+that the others who had been with him were in disguise, he flew at one
+of them, thinking that he had been followed himself, and I think would
+have killed the fellow if I had not been there to prevent it."
+
+Madge listened, with a shrug of her shoulders; then she said briefly:
+
+"Bring them here, Handsome. Bring the two who were disguised, first.
+Leave the other one alone until I send for him. What are the supposed
+names of these two?"
+
+"One is called Tenstrike, and the other calls himself the Chicago
+Chicken."
+
+"The Chicago Chicken," she said slowly. "Chick, for short, is it not? I
+think we are on the right track, Handsome. Bring that one here
+alone--first."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.
+
+
+Chick had committed the folly of not being entirely thorough in the
+creation of his disguise; so also had Ten-Ichi; and the soap and
+scrubbing brushes, as employed by Handsome, had done the work of
+removing it.
+
+But Patsy? Well, it had not been necessary for Patsy to be quite so
+thorough, for his own particular person and features were sufficient
+disguise, with a few minor alterations and additions.
+
+For instance, at the risk of not having it wear off soon enough to suit
+his purposes, he had gone to a professional hair dyer, and had ordered
+his shock of hair indelibly dyed to a dirty brick-red; and he had put
+spots on his face, and the back of his hands, with nitrate of silver, so
+that the spots burned into the skin. No soap and water could remove
+these. They would only disappear with time; but Patsy had never traveled
+on a reputation for beauty, and he did not give the matter a thought
+beyond the immediate necessities.
+
+He had taken another precaution, also, just before he entered the woods
+to go to the place of meeting. He had stripped himself in a secluded
+place near the railway tracks, and he had rolled himself in the coal
+dust around the track, griming the dirt into his body, so that when it
+came to the time that Handsome stripped him--well, it can be imagined
+how he looked.
+
+A little snuff rubbed thoroughly against his teeth had rendered them
+sufficiently discolored, and altogether he so thoroughly looked his part
+that Handsome, when he stripped him, had not the slightest doubt of his
+reality.
+
+But the frauds connected with Chick and Ten-Ichi were easily detected.
+
+Black Madge, while still seated at the table with the detective, had
+suddenly recalled the name that had long ago been mentioned in her
+presence by the chief of the Paris police. It had come to her in a flash
+that the name was Nick Carter--and that this man who was so calmly
+seated in her presence was Nick Carter.
+
+Madge knew a great deal more about Nick Carter than Nick supposed she
+did; she knew all about his household, and about his assistants. She
+knew their names as well as if they were followers of her own--and when
+Handsome, in mentioning the names of the other men, had talked about
+Tenstrike and the Chicken, she had connected the names at once.
+
+As for the other one--Pat--that had a significance also; but Pat is a
+very common name, and she did not do herself the honor to suppose that
+Nick Carter would bring all three of his assistants into the woods with
+him in search of her. One, she thought, would have to be left behind to
+look after the business, and, therefore, she was all the more ready to
+believe that Patsy, since he was not in disguise, was one of her own
+kind, who had inadvertently fallen into the company of the detectives.
+
+Handsome and four other men accompanied Chick to the cottage, and when
+he stood before Madge she looked him over from head to foot with cold
+scorn.
+
+"So," she said venomously, "you thought to deceive me, did you--you and
+your master?"
+
+Chick made no reply, and, after a moment, she went on:
+
+"We have a way of ridding ourselves of such men as you are, when they
+come among us. It is not pleasant for them, but it serves as a lesson to
+others. Step inside the house. Take him inside, Handsome. Let the others
+wait out here, and if there is the slightest sound of a row inside the
+house let them enter it at once."
+
+When the three were in the room together, she said to Chick:
+
+"You observe that I know who you are?"
+
+Chick nodded--and he also smiled.
+
+She stamped her foot upon the floor under her, and continued:
+
+"Down there, beneath us, unconscious and chained to the wall, is Nick
+Carter. Even Handsome did not know that till now. He did not know that
+Dago John, who went with him last night to rob the bank, was no other
+than Nick Carter. But it is true, Handsome."
+
+"Gee!" breathed Handsome, his fingers twitching.
+
+"He is all right now, Handsome. He cannot hurt you. I have put him out
+of business--and I don't think we had better let the men know that Nick
+Carter has been among them. Let them wreak their vengeance upon this
+fellow, and upon the other--that little Jap. As for Nick Carter himself,
+I will take care of him. He will never come out of that cellar alive.
+And now, Chick, I want you to answer me a question."
+
+"You will save your breath if you do not ask it," replied Chick. "I am
+not answering questions just at present."
+
+"Not to save yourself, or your master?"
+
+"I know very well that nothing that I can say will have the least effect
+upon my fate, or upon Nick Carter's," he replied.
+
+"Very good," she replied slowly; and then to Handsome: "Take him away,
+Handsome. Take him out there to the men. Tell them who he is, and that
+they may do as they please with him. I think the quicksand bog would be
+as good a place as any for him; or the fire tree; but they may do as
+they please--so long as they kill him. Take him away."
+
+Chick, realizing that it was all up with him, and that he might as well
+make a fight for it, leaped forward quickly, full at the woman,
+intending to seize upon her, and hold her as a shield; but even as he
+attempted to do so, the floor beneath him sank under him for the depth
+of two feet, and before he could recover his balance, Madge had thrown a
+table cover over his head, and in another moment Handsome had thrown him
+to the floor, and called the others to his assistance.
+
+And so Chick was tightly bound and borne away a captive--to what fate he
+could only imagine.
+
+"You need not bring the Jap here at all," Madge called after them. "Let
+my hoboes take him with them, along with this one; but do you bring the
+man Pat to me at once."
+
+And five minutes later Handsome reappeared with Patsy in tow, only that
+Patsy was not a prisoner--as yet.
+
+"Now, my man," said Madge coldly, "you will have to give a pretty
+straight account of yourself. You were found in bad company."
+
+"Sure, ma'am, don't I know the same? I've been apologizing to meself
+ever since I discovered it, an' if Handsome here had only left me alone,
+faith, I'd have settled wan part of me misgivings then and there, so I
+would. I had me doubts about the bunch from the beginning, ma'am, when
+they came a-sneakin' up to me fire, and eatin' of me grub; and when
+that other gazabo dropped from the trees, sure, I was certain of it. I
+was after kapin' me eyes peeled all the time since then, your worship,
+but I thought it wasn't f'r the likes of me to be after makin'
+suggestions to y'r majesty, at all, at all."
+
+"Who are you, and what are you, Pat?" she asked, smiling upon him.
+
+"Sure, ma'am, it's nobody I am. I've never done anything worse than pick
+a pocket untel a short time ago, when I had the misfortune to get mixed
+up in a bit av a scrap--and the other feller didn't have the common
+dacency to get on his feet ag'in when it was over. He jest stayed there,
+so he did, and thinkin' that somebody would be axin' questions of me, I
+lit out. Ye wouldn't know a thing more about me if I should talk for a
+week--but, sure, if there's a question ye'd like to ax me, I'll be
+afther answerin' it to the best of me ability, so I will."
+
+"What brought you to me?"
+
+"Me legs--no less; begging y'r pardon for mentionin' it. They weren't
+purty to look at when Handsome stripped me--but we needn't mention that,
+aither."
+
+"But you came here in search of Hobo Harry."
+
+"I did. That same."
+
+"Who sent you here to find him?"
+
+"Nobody. I had to go somewhere. I had been readin' the papers, and I
+had seen a lot about Hobo Harry in 'em. All of the papers said that he
+was to be found around here somewhere, and that the divil himself
+couldn't catch him; and I says to mesilf, says I, sure that's the broth
+av a boy ye want to find, Pat--and here I am, ma'am."
+
+"Did you ever hear of Nick Carter?"
+
+"I have that."
+
+"Ever see him?"
+
+"I did that."
+
+"Would you know him, do you think, if you should see him again?"
+
+"I would that. It isn't three weeks since I saw him wid these two eyes
+as plain as I see y'r own beautiful face this minit. Sure, I'd know
+him."
+
+"Come this way, then."
+
+She went into the adjoining room, and they followed. There she pulled
+aside the rug again, and, having raised the trapdoor, descended, Patsy
+and Handsome following close behind her.
+
+The narrow steps took them into a spacious cellar, and, having passed
+through a partition by opening a heavy oaken door, they entered what
+appeared to be a prison room.
+
+Nick Carter was there. He had recovered consciousness, and was seated on
+a low stool against the wall. His arms were stretched wide apart, and
+each was held in position by an iron chain on either side of him. A
+ring of these chains had been passed around each wrist, and locked
+there, and the chains were fastened to the stone walls by staples.
+
+Madge stopped directly in front of the detective, and glared at him,
+while he returned her fierce look with a half smile--for he had entirely
+recovered from the effects of the dose she had administered.
+
+She raised her arm and pointed toward the detective, but before she
+could utter a word, Patsy cried out:
+
+"That's him! That's him! Sure, ma'am, I'd know him among a thousand!
+He's got stain on his skin; I can see that; and he is disguised in other
+ways, ma'am, I can see that, too; but it's him. I'd take me oath to it,
+so I would."
+
+Madge smiled, and softly rubbed her hands together.
+
+"Carter," she said coldly, "do you know this man who recognizes you?"
+
+Nick shrugged his shoulders in disdain, for he understood perfectly well
+that Patsy had some well-defined plan in his head for doing as he did;
+and he replied:
+
+"I suppose he is somebody whom I have arrested at some time. It is only
+the worst criminals, like yourself, Madge, that I take the trouble to
+remember."
+
+She turned away with a toss of her head.
+
+"Come!" she ordered; and they followed her from the cellar room, and up
+the narrow stairs again, where she reclosed the trap.
+
+"Go back, Pat, and take your place among the others," she ordered him
+then. "You will be watched for a long time, and at the first break you
+make you will be knifed, or shot. It is up to you whether you make good
+in this community or not. Go now."
+
+When he had gone, she turned to Handsome.
+
+"Handsome," she said slowly, "you can go now, too. Keep an eye on that
+Pat. At midnight to-night, come here to the cottage, for I want you to
+help me to carry the body into the woods to the quicksand pit. We will
+throw him there--Nick Carter, I mean."
+
+"Of course. Shall you chuck him in alive?"
+
+"No; for he would find some way to crawl out and escape. I will put him
+out of the way first. It will be only a dead body that we will have to
+carry, but I don't want the men to know that Nick Carter has been among
+us until after he is dead. Then it will not matter."
+
+"Right you are," said Handsome; and he took his departure.
+
+But down in the cellar beneath them something had happened, for as soon
+as the party of three left him, Nick calmly and easily pulled the iron
+staples from the wall and stood upon his feet. The fact was that he had
+already succeeded in loosening them when he heard the approach of Madge
+and the others, and he had been afforded barely time to resume his
+position of helpless captivity when the door was opened and they
+entered.
+
+But now he was free, save for the short chains that were still fastened
+to his wrists, and the plank walls that rose between him and liberty.
+
+But the chains on each wrist were short, and the walls were only plank;
+and in Madge's eagerness and haste in fastening him there she had
+neglected--or she had not thought it necessary--to search him for his
+weapons.
+
+He knew now that there was very little time to spare, and that he and
+his three assistants were in a bad predicament.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.
+
+
+In the meantime, Patsy had been in half a dozen different kinds of a
+brown study. He realized that now the entire situation depended solely
+upon him, and that the lives of his chief, and of Chick and Ten-Ichi,
+rested wholly in his hands.
+
+He stood, be it said, all alone, in the midst of a huge swamp, from
+which escape could only be had by means of a boat, and into which he had
+been conducted blindfolded. Around him were men, all ready at any
+instant to take his life for the merest excuse; and already the lives of
+his three friends were sacrificed unless he could do something--and that
+very speedily--to save them.
+
+In the cellar at the cottage he had not dared to look squarely at his
+chief, for fear that the inclination on his own part to make some sort
+of signal would be too strong for him to resist; and he had known that
+Madge was watching every act and motion, as a cat watches a mouse.
+
+When he left the cottage, and had gone as far as the edge of the glade,
+he halted, and waited there for Handsome, for he guessed that the man
+would be sent away directly; and when Handsome did come, Patsy said to
+him:
+
+"Sure, Handsome, will ye tell me what is to be done wid the others?"
+
+"I haven't made up my mind about that yet," replied Handsome.
+
+"And is it left to you that it is?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Faith, but that's fine. I wish it was left to me, so I do."
+
+"What would you do to them, Pat?"
+
+"I'd skin 'em, begorra!"
+
+Handsome laughed.
+
+"Perhaps I will give you a chance," he said. "However, it is likely that
+they will go into the quicksand."
+
+"Where is that same, then?"
+
+"Out in the swamp a bit. There is no getting out of it, and it tells no
+tales. Once a man is thrown into that, he sinks out of sight in a few
+minutes, and that is the last of him. It is our graveyard. There are
+about fifty in there now. The place is bottomless."
+
+"Cheerful, isn't it? Sure, man, it's unhealthy, it is; but I'll go and
+have a look at it. Where is it?"
+
+Handsome directed him how to find it, and he hastened away; but he
+paused before he started long enough to select a long, strong rope that
+he had seen near one of the cabins. This he carried with him, and
+disappeared among the trees.
+
+Patsy was gone less than half an hour, but when he returned he was
+whistling; and then, after a little, he found an opportunity to linger
+around the place where Chick and Ten-Ichi were confined in one of the
+cabins.
+
+And presently he began to sing; at first in a low tone, and in
+unintelligible words; but his voice was good, and it attracted
+attention, even among that motley crew, and after a little, perceiving
+that they were listening, he sang the louder.
+
+If they had but known it, he was singing in Japanese, which Ten-Ichi had
+taught him to speak perfectly; and the words he uttered as he sang,
+translated, were:
+
+"There is a quicksand pit not far from here. They are going to throw you
+both into it. I have carried a rope to the quicksand pit. I have tied it
+to a tree near there. When you are thrown into the pit, spread out your
+arms. And also spread out your legs. Keep as still as possible so as not
+to sink too fast. I will be there as soon as I can do it. I will throw
+you the end of the rope. And with your own combined strength and mine,
+we can pull you out. I am not suspected, so I can do the act, all right.
+Keep up your pluck, and manage not to go into the pit head down."
+
+He sang this over and over several times until he was sure that Ten-Ichi
+had heard and understood, and would convey the message to Chick, and
+then he sauntered away.
+
+Twice after that he tried to get near to the cottage to sing to Nick
+Carter; but each time he was stopped and turned back again; and at last
+he muttered to himself:
+
+"I'll have to wait till to-night for that part of it. After I have
+rescued Chick and Ten-Ichi I will have them to help me, and then it will
+be funny if we don't get the chief out of the pickle he is in."
+
+It was well toward evening, almost the hour of sundown, before Chick and
+Ten-Ichi were carried to the quicksand pit; and then a procession
+followed them. The hands and feet of the prisoners were not bound, for
+it was desired that they should flounder in the quicksand in order to
+hasten its work; and without ceremony they were hurled into the midst of
+it, one, and then the other.
+
+Patsy's only fear was that the horde of hoboes would throw sticks and
+stones at the helpless men in the sand pit; but he found that this was
+against orders, since the presence of such impedimenta would give the
+victims something to seize hold of; and the operation of sinking was so
+slow, and the hoboes had seen it so many times, that they had lost
+interest in it; so that almost at once after Chick and Ten-Ichi were
+thrown in they began to withdraw to their several occupations; and
+finally when only a group of four remained, Patsy, who was one of them,
+called out: "It's tired of this I am. Come on!" and, nothing loath, the
+others followed him away.
+
+But he was not long gone. Almost at once he found an opportunity to
+leave them, and, by making a detour, to hurry back again.
+
+Already when he had reached the pit a second time the two detectives had
+sunk almost to their armpits; but in an instant Patsy found the rope he
+had concealed, one end of which was fastened to a tree.
+
+The task which followed can better be imagined than described, and only
+for the great strength of the trio it must have been unsuccessful. But
+with Chick and Ten-Ichi straining for their lives at one end, and Patsy
+pulling on the other as best he could, they came forth inch by inch,
+until at last they stood, covered with mud, to be sure, but on solid
+earth.
+
+"Now, go around that way," said Patsy, speaking rapidly. "The cottage is
+over there, as you know. You'll have to cross a neck of the swamp in
+getting to it, but the chief is there, a prisoner. I have seen him. He
+is chained to the wall in the cellar. If you get a chance before I do,
+overcome that beast of a sentinel, who is walking up and down near the
+house. I'll go back through the glade, and I'll manage somehow to join
+you there, if I have to kill somebody in order to do it; and take these.
+They are extra ones. I swiped them." He handed them each a pistol as he
+spoke.
+
+Chance played into Patsy's hands when he returned to the glade. Two of
+the men had been quarreling, and they had taken the centre of the glade
+to settle their differences; and there a ring had formed around them--a
+ring which comprised almost every man of the outfit.
+
+The point was that the attention of everybody was diverted from Patsy,
+and, merely bestowing a single glance upon what was taking place, he
+hurried silently past them--it was almost dark now--and in a moment more
+had passed through the pathway to the clearing around the cottage.
+
+As he entered the clearing silently, he came directly upon the sentinel,
+who, after listening to the row in the glade for a moment, had just
+turned to retrace his steps; this made him assume a position with his
+back toward Patsy, and in an instant the young athlete had leaped upon
+his back and shoulders, and had seized him by the throat, so that he
+bore him to the ground in absolute silence.
+
+And even as he did that, Chick and Ten-Ichi dashed out of the woods and
+helped him; and Ten-Ichi, none too gentle, now that his anger was
+aroused, rapped the sentinel on the head with the butt of his pistol, so
+that he stiffened out and offered no more resistance.
+
+They had been thoughtful enough to bring the rope with them, too, and
+it did not take long to tie the man; and then the three assistants of
+Nick Carter leaped forward toward the door of the cottage, realizing
+that at any instant they might be interrupted in their work, and knowing
+that the odds would be terribly against them if they were.
+
+They leaped upon the piazza--and as they did so the door opened directly
+in front of them, and Nick Carter appeared before them with the
+senseless form of Black Madge in his arms.
+
+For just one instant he started backward; and then he recognized his
+three assistants.
+
+"Quick!" he exclaimed. "Hold her, Chick!" and he put Madge into Chick's
+arms. "I have drugged her with some of her own stuff. There's plenty of
+it in the house. Get into the woods, all of you, over there"--and he
+pointed to the spot he wished them to go--"and wait for me. I'll be
+there in a moment."
+
+While they obeyed him, he turned back into the house; and from the edge
+of the clearing, where the others had concealed themselves, they
+presently saw a blaze flare up inside the house; then another, and then
+another, until there were many of them; and then Nick Carter dashed out
+of it again and ran toward them with all speed.
+
+"Look, now!" he said. "Watch that upper window, in the gable!"
+
+And looking as he commanded them to do, they presently saw, when the
+light had gained in brightness, the form of a woman standing there,
+outlined against the blazing fire; and if they had not known
+differently, there was not one of them who would not have sworn that it
+was Black Madge who stood there, surrounded by flames.
+
+"It is a dummy that I fixed up," whispered the detective. "It was done
+to keep the attention of the crowd away from us. Look! The men have
+discovered the fire!"
+
+The hoboes were rushing toward the scene in crowds now; and they saw the
+figure of the woman at the window in the gable instantly.
+
+A cry, then a shout, then a wail went up, for they thought it was their
+chief--Black Madge, otherwise Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, as she
+preferred to be known outside her own fraternity; and in that instant
+the crowd went mad.
+
+There was not a soul among them who did not rush to the rescue of their
+chief, believing that Nick's dummy at the window was she; and then
+danced and shouted, and yelled and screamed around that burning cottage,
+like so many madmen.
+
+"Come, now," said the detective. "This is our opportunity!"
+
+Like shadows they sped away through the trees. They skirted the glade,
+now without a sign of life within it; they hurried down the path among
+the alders toward the place where the boat was kept, and where there
+were now no less than four boats.
+
+But they took them all in order that none might be left for the
+pursuers, when it should occur to them to take up the chase; and then,
+with the strength of desperation, and guided by Nick, who had been twice
+over the route without being blindfolded, they made their way silently
+and swiftly through the maze of the swamp, to dry land at the other side
+of it.
+
+"We have not made good our escape yet," said Nick, as they climbed the
+grade of the railway. "If only a train would come along now, so we could
+flag it--hark!"
+
+Even as he spoke, a freight came around the curve toward them, and Nick,
+giving the unconscious form of Madge into the care of Chick, leaped out
+upon the track between the rails, and, at the risk of his life, stood
+within the glare of the advancing headlight and waved his coat for the
+engineer to stop.
+
+Fortunately it was a freight, and it was going rather slowly. The
+engineer saw the frantic appeal, and closed his throttle and applied the
+brakes.
+
+The party was taken aboard, and Black Madge was locked up in the jail at
+Calamont. She jeered at her captors, assuring them that she would be
+free again, and that when she was they had better remember who and what
+she was.
+
+Nick and his assistants then returned to New York, pretty thoroughly
+tired out by their experiences with Black Madge and her followers.
+
+The following day Nick Carter called upon the president of the E. &
+S. W. R. R. Co., and told him the story of the capture of "Hobo Harry."
+
+"Also, I want to tell you," said the detective, "that I was one of the
+burglars that robbed the bank at Calamont. I see there is quite a stir
+about it. But I know where the loot is concealed, and if you will raise
+a hundred men for me I will go back and clean out that swamp, and not
+only return the property to the bank, but I will find almost all that
+has been stolen from different places for a long time."
+
+Arrangements were at once made to carry out Nick's plans, but the
+detective was not quick enough.
+
+The news of the arrest of Black Madge had spread through the surrounding
+country like wildfire, and, by the time Nick and his force of railroad
+employees reached the place, the gang had fled, and the people of the
+near-by towns, having formed vigilance committees, had swooped down on
+the stronghold in the swamp.
+
+Nick and his men, however, destroyed everything that remained, with axes
+and matches, and what they could not destroy in that way they blew up
+with dynamite, so that the place no longer offered a refuge for the
+hoboes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.
+
+
+It was about a week later that Nick Carter received a note from the
+president of the railroad which caused him great astonishment. It was
+brief and to the point. It read:
+
+     "Can you call on me at once? Black Madge has escaped."
+
+That was all, but it was enough to stir the detective to action, and,
+taking Patsy, who happened to be in when the message arrived, along with
+him, Nick at once visited the office of the railroad.
+
+"Well, Carter, it didn't take long for Black Madge to make good her
+threat, did it?" said the president as he rose and shook hands with the
+detectives.
+
+"I think," replied the detective, smiling, "that, considering the
+trouble we were put to in capturing her, it was a very short time for us
+to hold her. Now, what can I do for you, Mr. Cobalt?"
+
+"Do? Why, you can catch Black Madge again for us."
+
+"Oh," said the detective, smiling. "Can I? Well, possibly."
+
+"You see," the president continued, "we have called a hasty meeting of
+the board since the information of the escape of Black Madge came to us,
+and we have decided that no effort shall be spared to get that woman
+into custody again. At liberty, she is a constant menace to the welfare
+of the road, and of every town along the line, as well as of everybody
+who lives in those towns."
+
+"I'll admit that she's a bad one," said Nick.
+
+"We don't want her at liberty. With the following she has, she is a
+dangerous woman--much more dangerous than a man would be in her
+position."
+
+"I don't know about that. But she is dangerous enough without argument
+about it."
+
+"Exactly. We want her caught. And we want you to catch her."
+
+"I imagine that this time, Mr. Cobalt, it will be rather a harder task
+than it was before."
+
+"Why so?"
+
+"She will be very much more on her guard now than then. And, besides,
+she knows enough about me to know that now I will most certainly hunt
+her down."
+
+The railway president was thoughtful a moment, and then he said:
+
+"You see, Carter, the very manner of her escape is a menace to us."
+
+"How is that?" asked the detective. "The first and, therefore, the only
+information I have had on the subject was that contained in your
+message, which told me merely that she had escaped. What is there that
+is particularly interesting about the manner of her escape?"
+
+"Then you have not heard about it, eh?"
+
+"I have just informed you that I have heard nothing."
+
+"Well, to say the least, her escape was characteristic. Her hoboes did
+it for her."
+
+Nick raised his brows.
+
+"You don't say so!" he exclaimed. "Well, we might have expected
+something like that, I suppose. I regarded it as a little bit
+unfortunate that the arrest was made in the county where it was, for
+that compelled us to put her temporarily in the Calamont jail--and I
+thought at the time that the Calamont jail was a trifle close to her
+stamping ground. Now, suppose you tell me exactly what happened."
+
+"You know Calamont, of course?" asked the railway president, and the
+detective smiled broadly.
+
+"I know very little about it," he said, "with the exception that I
+assisted in the robbing of a bank that is located there."
+
+It was the president's turn to smile.
+
+"That was a queer experience for you, Carter, wasn't it? But the
+president of that bank is quite willing that you should rob it again on
+the same terms. You know we fixed him all up again, and my company
+promises to keep a large deposit there now. Altogether, they regard your
+descent upon the bank as a very fortunate experience for them."
+
+"No doubt. Now about that escape."
+
+"Calamont is a village of about three thousand inhabitants. That bank,
+for instance, is the only one there."
+
+"What has that----"
+
+"Wait a moment. Calamont has suffered a great deal from the depredations
+of the hoboes, and now has a force of special constables, whose duties
+consist in arresting and taking to jail every tramp who crosses the
+borders of the village. The other night, when Madge made her escape, the
+jail was filled with them."
+
+"Oh," said the detective. "I begin to understand."
+
+"Exactly."
+
+"It was a put-up job on their part to get as many of their kind as
+possible in the jail for that night, and then to take their queen out of
+it; eh?"
+
+"Precisely; and that is just what they did do. You see, the tramps began
+coming in early in the day. They made intervals between the times of
+their arrivals, and they appeared at different parts of the town, so
+that before anybody realized it, the jail was about filled with them.
+But they seemed not to know one another, and so the residents of the
+town went peacefully to sleep that night, as usual."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Well, in the morning when they woke up, the jail had been
+gutted--literally gutted."
+
+"In what sense do you mean?"
+
+"In every sense."
+
+"Tell me what you mean, please."
+
+"I mean that all the tramps who had been locked up there overnight had
+disappeared; that they had managed to break into the main part of the
+jail, and that when they went away they took Black Madge with them; and
+that before they went away they passed through the jail with axes and
+smashed everything in sight. They tore down partitions, they smashed
+doors, and where the doors could not be smashed, they destroyed the
+locks. They tied up the jailer, and threatened to kill him--I regard it
+as a wonder that they did not kill him."
+
+"So do I. Go on."
+
+"That is all there is to it. They went there, of course, with the
+deliberate intention of rescuing Black Madge--and they did it."
+
+"I suppose they must have taken to the woods north of the railway line;
+eh?"
+
+"You've guessed it, Carter."
+
+"That is a wild country up through there, Mr. Cobalt."
+
+"You bet it is. I used to go through there every fall on a hunting
+expedition, when I was younger. The country hasn't changed much since
+that time. It is as wild as if it were in an uncivilized country,
+instead of being surrounded by----"
+
+"I understand. Then you do know something about that country up through
+there, eh?"
+
+"Yes; I used to boast that I knew every inch of it; but, of course, that
+wasn't quite so, you know."
+
+"Yet you remember it fairly well?"
+
+"I think so."
+
+"Tell me something about it, for that is, I think, where I have got to
+search for the woman we are after."
+
+"There isn't much to tell about it, save that it is wild and uneven;
+that the formation is limestone, and the timber is largely red oak. The
+mountains--or hills, rather--are not high, but they are precipitous,
+rocky, impassable, full of ravines, and gulches, and unexpected
+depressions, and scattered around through that region there are
+innumerable caves, too."
+
+"That is bad," said the detective. "It will make it so much the harder
+to dislodge the hoboes."
+
+"So you have got your work cut out for you this time, and no mistake."
+
+"Could you suggest a competent guide for that region, Mr. Cobalt?"
+
+"Old Bill Turner--if he would go."
+
+"Who is he?"
+
+"An old hunter, who used to take me out with him, and who afterward
+served as guide for me. But he is an old man now."
+
+"Where does he live?"
+
+"In Calamont. You will have no difficulty in finding him. Ask the first
+man you meet in the street to direct you to old Bill Turner, and he will
+do it."
+
+"That part of it is all right--if he is not too old to go."
+
+"Oh, I think he can be induced to do it. Old Bill likes the looks of a
+dollar as well as any man you ever knew. You have only to offer him
+enough, and his rheumatism will disappear like magic."
+
+"Then that part of it is all right, too. I am to understand that I have
+the same free hand in the matter that I did before?"
+
+"Of course. Your directions are: Catch Black Madge and break up her
+gang."
+
+"And that, I suppose, is about all that you have to say to me at
+present."
+
+"Yes; unless you have some questions to ask."
+
+"Not one, thank you. I will ask them of Black Madge--when I catch her."
+
+"Good! I hope it won't be long before you can ask them."
+
+"I don't think it will be very long; only, she is a little bit the
+smartest woman I ever tried to handle."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.
+
+
+When Nick Carter and Patsy left the office of the railway president,
+they strolled in silence down the street until they came to a
+restaurant, and, entering, they found a secluded table in one corner,
+where they seated themselves and gave the order for luncheon.
+
+When it was brought to them, and the waiter had departed, Nick said to
+his assistant:
+
+"Well, Patsy, we start about where we began on the other case, with the
+single exception that we have broken up the stronghold in the swamp. It
+is safe to say that Madge has no less than fifty men around her, and
+probably as many more. I should not be surprised if there were fully one
+hundred in the gang, all told."
+
+"Nor I."
+
+"Well, I shall start for Calamont as soon as I have finished with the
+meal I am now eating."
+
+"And what do you wish me to do?"
+
+"I want you to do a serious thing, and a dangerous one, Patsy."
+
+"Good! That is what I would like to do."
+
+"I think that Black Madge rather liked you in your character of a young
+Irish crook; but I think also that she had some suspicion of you."
+
+"There isn't any doubt of that."
+
+"And, therefore, it will be an extremely dangerous thing to do to return
+there, and still represent yourself as the same character."
+
+"Gee! Is _that_ what you want me to do?"
+
+"Yes. Do you suppose it can be done?"
+
+"It can be tried."
+
+"You must not forget that they will look upon you with suspicion."
+
+"Oh, I don't forget that."
+
+"They will connect you with their misfortunes at once. Handsome,
+particularly, after being so nicely fooled by me, will be even more
+suspicious of you."
+
+"I think I can get around Handsome, all right. It is Madge I am shy of."
+
+"There will be one thing in your favor, Patsy, if you _do_ undertake
+it."
+
+"If I _do_ undertake it? Of course, I shall undertake it."
+
+"Then there will be one thing in your favor."
+
+"What is that, please?"
+
+"The very fact that you _do_ go back among them in the same character in
+which you appeared before. I am inclined to think that now they would
+not take in a new man, no matter how well he might be recommended; but
+one that they have known before will stand a lot better chance with
+them."
+
+"I think so."
+
+"The very fact of your returning will go far to allay any suspicions
+they might have had about you formerly. It would never occur to them
+that if you were really a detective that time, you would dare to return
+to them in the same character."
+
+"You are right about that."
+
+"And, consequently, if you succeed in passing the investigation of the
+first few hours, you will be all right."
+
+"I am going to try it, anyhow."
+
+"Good, Patsy! But don't for a moment forget or neglect the danger you
+will be in every minute you are there."
+
+"I will not."
+
+"You will have to cook up a good story----"
+
+"I have that all ready now."
+
+"Then you can start whenever you please. I shall not interfere with you
+in the slightest manner."
+
+"But I want a little further instruction, chief."
+
+"The only instruction I have to give you is this: Go there; get among
+them; become one of them, and one with them; pick up all the information
+about them that you can, with names and identifications, so that you
+will be a good witness against them when the time comes."
+
+"I can do that."
+
+"I want you to work independently of me entirely. Your only part of the
+game, so far as it is directly connected with my part of the work, will
+be to hold yourself in readiness to lend me a helping hand from the
+inside at any moment I may happen to want you."
+
+"Of course. That goes without saying. Are Chick and Ten-Ichi going to be
+in this?"
+
+"Yes. But I have not determined in what way as yet. You will have to be
+on the lookout for them. I may take one of them with me, and send the
+other in to follow you. Or I may send both after you, and go it alone
+myself. Or I may take them both with me. All that will depend upon what
+information I pick up when I get to Calamont."
+
+"I see."
+
+"Now, Patsy, it is up to you. All that red you used on your hair before
+has not disappeared yet; but you had better go to a hair dyer's and get
+it fixed up over again. Then make yourself over once more into Pat
+Slick. I leave the rest to you. But as a last warning, I repeat--look
+out for that man Handsome."
+
+"Oh, I am not afraid of Handsome. He's a----"
+
+"He is a much smarter man than either of us gave him credit for. He is
+an educated man, who can represent the hobo so perfectly that you would
+never suspect that he has a college education. And he is devoted to
+Madge. Look out for him. He is her right-hand man, and he is dangerous.
+If he saw through you before, or had any idea that he did see through
+you, your life won't be worth a snap of your finger the next time you
+meet--unless you can manage to shoot first."
+
+"I know that, too. But he did not suspect."
+
+"I am not so sure of that. Madge had a little time to think things over
+while she was in the jail, and as soon as she got out, she and Handsome
+had a chance to talk things over. With their two heads together, they
+make about as dangerous a pair to play against as could be imagined."
+
+"All right. I'll stand pat--and bluff."
+
+"Be careful that they don't call you. That's all."
+
+"Is there any particular game afoot with the hoboes just now?"
+
+"Not that I know of."
+
+"What specific charge are we after Madge for?"
+
+"No specific charge, save that she is accused of all the old ones. There
+is enough against her to send her to prison for the rest of her life,
+once she is caught."
+
+"I guess that's no pipe dream."
+
+"The railway people object to her being at liberty. That is about all."
+
+"And it is up to us to catch her?"
+
+"That's the idea."
+
+"What about the rest of the gang?"
+
+"If we can round up the entire outfit, that is what they want us to do.
+We are to get as many of them as we can, and make the charges after
+that. That is what you are going inside the ring for: to pick up all
+the information about the individual members of the gang that you can."
+
+"I see."
+
+"The battle cry is: Break up the gang! Root it out, so that it cannot
+grow again."
+
+"It is a pretty big proposition, chief; don't you think so?"
+
+"It is a big proposition, and no mistake. But I shall make my
+arrangements about that part of it, so that if we ever succeed in
+getting them rounded up, there will be no difficulty in carrying out the
+rest of it."
+
+"All right. Now, I suppose I have my instructions."
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And that's all?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you don't expect to see me or to communicate with me again
+until--when?"
+
+"Until I see you inside the stronghold of the hobo gang."
+
+"That is all right. We'll meet there. I'll get there, and I'll find a
+way to make them believe in me."
+
+"I hesitate to send you on this business, Patsy. You have never in your
+life gone out to face quite as much peril as you will find in this
+expedition of yours now."
+
+"Well, I'll face it; and I'll overcome it, chief."
+
+"You're a good lad, Patsy. God bless you!"
+
+"Don't worry about me, chief; not at all. I will be all right. The hobo
+hasn't been born yet who can get away with me."
+
+"Don't forget that there are perhaps one hundred of them."
+
+"I'm not forgetting it."
+
+"And that the worst and most dangerous of the lot is the man called
+Handsome."
+
+"I'll not forget that, either."
+
+Nick rose from the table and stretched out his hand.
+
+"Good-by, my lad," he said. "I don't know when we will meet again. A lot
+depends upon yourself. Even now I feel almost as if I ought not----"
+
+"Don't say another word, please. I'm going to do what you have laid out
+for me to do. I wouldn't obey you now if you should change the order."
+
+"Oh, yes, you would. But I won't change it."
+
+And so they parted there in the restaurant.
+
+And a little later Nick Carter took the train for Calamont.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.
+
+
+When Nick Carter arrived at Calamont, he was disguised as a lumberman.
+It was not exactly the season of the year for lumbermen to enter the
+woods, unless they were measurers, who were engaged in preparing in
+advance work for the winter; so that was the character which Nick Carter
+adopted.
+
+Measurers go into the woods, measure trees on the stump, as it is
+called, blaze them with cabalistic marks, and otherwise prepare the way
+for the workers with the axes and saws who are to come later.
+
+It is well known that some of the most expert lumbermen in the world are
+French Canadians, and so Nick adopted this character, and he knew that
+as such he could wander at will around the woods and mountains of that
+region without danger of being suspected for what he really was.
+
+If any of the hoboes who made their headquarters in that region should
+see him, they would not be inclined to suspect what he really was, and
+the only actual danger he would stand in would be that they might be
+inclined to knock him on the head or shoot him from ambush in order to
+possess themselves of the few articles he had in his possession.
+
+And for that very reason he adopted the disguise of a French Canadian
+lumberman, for it was rarely that they were supposed to have anything
+more than what they carried in sight on their backs.
+
+The month was September, and therefore warm. The leaves in some places
+were getting yellow and red, although there had been no frost; but oak
+leaves turn earlier than others.
+
+When he descended at Calamont Station, he stood there on the platform
+until the train had pulled out, and the other passengers who had arrived
+by it had departed their several ways. Then he approached the
+baggageman.
+
+"Me want find ze man named Beel Turner," he said slowly.
+
+"What's that?" asked the baggageman.
+
+"Me want find Beel Turner."
+
+"Oh! Bill Turner, is it? Well, go up that street there until you come to
+the post office. You'll like enough see an old, white-whiskered chap
+standing there, chewing tobacco. That'll be Bill Turner."
+
+"Beel Turner? He ees known here? No?"
+
+"Known here? Gee! He has lived here since the oldest inhabitant was a
+baby. He has always lived here. He is about a thousand years old, my
+man; but as strong and as lively as a kid yet. You'll find him somewhere
+around the post office."
+
+Nick thanked him in his broken English and strode up the street.
+
+Sure enough, when he arrived in the vicinity of the post office, he saw
+a white-whiskered man standing there, and he approached him at once.
+
+"You ees Beel Turner?" he asked modestly, sidling up to the man.
+
+"I be," was the response, while Bill Turner fixed his clear gray eyes
+upon the detective. "What might you be wantin' of me, stranger?"
+
+"I have--hush!--I have some money for you, Beel Turner. Can you take me
+where we can talk so that nobody will overhear us?"
+
+Turner eyed him suspiciously for a moment; then he turned abruptly away
+with the remark:
+
+"Come along with me, stranger."
+
+Nick walked beside him through the town to the very end of the main
+street. Then they turned into a roadway, which led up a steep hill for
+some distance, and which presently brought them to a modest cottage that
+was almost hidden under the brow of the hill.
+
+"Here is where I live," said Turner. "I live here all alone, 'cept a cat
+and two dogs. But the dogs hev got old like me, now, and they can't go
+out among the hills as they used to; although, bless you, I reckon I kin
+walk jest as fur as ever I could, if I try. Come in."
+
+Nick followed him inside, and Turner offered him a rocker near the open
+window. The whole house was as neat and clean as if it had the care of a
+woman.
+
+"Now, mister," said Turner, "what hev ye got on yer mind?"
+
+"In the first place," replied Nick, in his natural voice, "I am not what
+I seem to be. I am not a lumberman, or a Frenchman--or a Canadian. I am
+a detective."
+
+"Sho! You don't say so. Well, that beats me. Sure, ye do it fine,
+mister. I would never hev suspected at all that you are not what you
+seem. But go on."
+
+"I have come here after that gang of hoboes who infest the neighborhood
+for fifty or sixty miles around this place. I am principally after the
+woman who is their chief. Do you know who I mean?"
+
+"I reckon ye must be referrin' to that there Black Madge and her gang."
+
+"That's right."
+
+"Well, yer up agin' a proposition. That's all I kin say about it."
+
+"I know that; and what I want of you is to get you to help me with that
+proposition, Bill Turner."
+
+"Ain't I too old?"
+
+"Not a bit of it."
+
+"Is there good pay in it?"
+
+"The very best; and there is fifty dollars down for you right now--if
+you are inclined to do as I want you to do."
+
+Nick took a roll of bills from his pocket as he spoke, and laid it on
+the table before the avaricious glances of the old man.
+
+"Well, sir," said Turner slowly, "all I've got to say is this: If I can
+do what you want done, I'll do it. I want that money as bad as anybody
+could want it and not grab it right now where it is lying; but I have
+never had a penny in my life that I didn't get honestly, and I am afraid
+that I'm too old to do what you want done."
+
+"I tell you that you are not."
+
+"Then, in that case, I'll take the money and put it in my pocket--so.
+There! Now, go ahead. If the work is honest, and such as an honest man
+can do, I'll do it--if I ain't too old, and you say I ain't. But if the
+work ain't honest, I'll return your money. Now, what is it, mister?"
+
+"I want you first to promise that you will not reveal my identity. I
+must be Jules Verbeau to you to the end, and you must forget that I am
+not he in fact."
+
+"You kin consider that done, sir."
+
+"Second, I want you to answer some questions for me."
+
+"Fire away."
+
+"How well do you know the hills and mountains, the ravines and gulches,
+the rocks and the caves around this region?"
+
+"As well as I know that dooryard in front of you," replied the old man,
+pointing through the window. "I know every inch of the country--every
+inch of it."
+
+"Now, another question which you will not understand at once: Do you
+know how to use a pencil, and is your hand steady enough to draw plans
+for me?"
+
+"Yes, sir. I began life as a draughtsman; but that was when I was a
+boy."
+
+"That will suffice. Now--could you draw a plan of different parts of the
+mountains, so it would be plain enough for me to follow without your
+being present with me?"
+
+"That would depend upon you, sir. If you are a man who has some
+woodcraft in your make-up, I say yes. It would depend upon you."
+
+"We will consider that question answered, then. Now, have you any idea
+to what part of the mountainous region around here--say, within fifty
+miles of where we are seated--the hobo gang would select in which to
+hide themselves?"
+
+"I think I could guess it to a dot."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"Because there is one region up among those hills which is exactly
+fitted for them; and from which you couldn't drive them out with a
+thousand men. That's why!"
+
+"Good. That sounds as if it might be the place they would select. How
+far is it from here, as you would travel afoot."
+
+"A matter of thirty miles."
+
+"Now, can you draw me a plan of that region?"
+
+"I kin."
+
+"And how to get there?"
+
+"I kin."
+
+"And are there caverns there? Do you suppose those people are hiding and
+making their headquarters in caves?"
+
+"Yes, to both questions. The hills round that 'ere region are
+honeycombed with caves. Some of 'em is big, and some of 'em is little;
+but there's a lot of 'em there."
+
+"Good; and you know them well enough to give me a working plan of them?
+What a sailor would call a chart?"
+
+"You bet I do."
+
+"Now, another subject: Have you ever traveled away from here? Have you
+ever been to New York, for instance?"
+
+"Never in my life. I've always lived right around here. I don't suppose
+I have been ten miles away from here, except in the woods, in forty
+years. But in the woods I sometimes used to go a good ways."
+
+"I've no doubt of that. How would you like to make a visit to New
+York?"
+
+"I should like it very much--only it would cost such a lot, you know."
+
+"Suppose your expenses were paid?"
+
+"Well, that would be different."
+
+"How much, in cash, will you take for your whiskers, Mr. Turner?"
+
+"Now what the devil do you mean by that? Are you making fun of me?"
+
+"Not at all. I was wondering if fifty dollars more, down, would induce
+you to shave off your whiskers."
+
+"Humph! Jest tell me what you are getting at and I'll answer you."
+
+"This: I want to disguise myself so that I look like you. I want to go
+out in the mountains as you would go out. While I am making believe that
+I am Bill Turner, I want you to take a trip to New York, and to live
+there, at my house, and take it easy, see all the sights, go to the
+theatres and the museums, and all that, until I return, and I want you
+to shave off your whiskers, and let me blacken your brows and otherwise
+make some changes in your appearance, so that if any of the people from
+Calamont should happen to meet you in the street down there they
+wouldn't say, 'Why, there is Bill Turner!' Would you consent to do
+that?"
+
+"For another fifty dollars down?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I would. When do you want me to shave?"
+
+"I will tell you in good time. First, I want you to fix up those plans."
+
+"Hadn't I better git about it right now?"
+
+"Yes. I think you had. And I will remain here with you while you do it
+in order that you may explain things to me as you work upon them."
+
+"That's a good idee, too. I can make you know them mountings as well as
+I do, in a short time. I knows 'em so well----"
+
+"That reminds me. Do you happen to know by sight, or have an
+acquaintance with, any of the members of that gang?"
+
+The old man shifted uneasily in his chair, and at last he replied:
+
+"I know one of them--purty well. He calls himself Handsome."
+
+"Good! What does Handsome know about you, Bill?"
+
+"He don't know nothin' about me, 'cept that I'm a woodsman, and that I'm
+too old to do him any harm. I helped him once, and once he helped me a
+leetle, and we're sort of friends. But I ain't never seen him but twice
+in my life, and then both times I met him in the woods, so I ain't never
+mentioned nothin' about him to other folks."
+
+"That's splendid! It is just what I hoped. It couldn't be better! I want
+you now to tell me what you talked about when you and Handsome met each
+other those two times in the woods."
+
+"That's easy. The first time, I was walking through the woods, up about
+where you are going--that is, it was in that region--when I heard
+somebody hollerin' fur help. At first I couldn't tell for the life of me
+where the hollerin' come from; but after a leetle I located it up on the
+side of one of them steep hills, and so I crawled up there. Well, when I
+got there, I found that a man had slid into a hole in the rocks, and
+that he couldn't git out nohow. If I hadn't happened along the chances
+are that he'd starved before he'd ha' been helped out."
+
+"And as it was--what?"
+
+"I helped him out. I didn't have no hatchet, but I had a good huntin'
+knife along with me, and I managed to whittle down a good-sized spruce,
+which I trimmed so's to make a sort of ladder of it. When that was done
+I lowered the butt end of it into the hole, and Handsome--that was who
+it was in the bottom of the hole--he climbed up so's I could get hold of
+him, and then I pulled him out. There wasn't much to that, was there?"
+
+"It saved his life."
+
+"Probably."
+
+"Wasn't he grateful?"
+
+"Suttingly."
+
+"What did you talk about after that?"
+
+"We sot down there a spell and chinned, that's all. He axed me who I
+was, and I told him. He axed me if I was long in these parts, and I told
+him allers. He axed me where I lived, and I told him about this cottage.
+That's all--only he said he was a hobo, and that he was called Handsome.
+I allowed that the people who called him that lied mightily; but I
+didn't say so jest then."
+
+"What more was talked about?"
+
+"Nothin'."
+
+"When was the next time you saw him?"
+
+"That was in the middle of the summer, and it was farther south--not far
+from the railroad tracks."
+
+"Well, what happened then?"
+
+"That was the time he helped me."
+
+"How was that?"
+
+"I can't never tell you exactly how it was, but somehow I had got my
+foot wedged in the root of a tree, and I had been tryin' an hour to git
+it out, without success. The tree was hard, and I was just tacklin' that
+root with my knife--I'd have cut through it in about an hour, I
+reckon--when 'long comes that feller Handsome that I had saved from the
+hole in the rocks. He had an axe on his shoulder, and when he spied me
+he stopped, and laughed, and laughed until I got mad.
+
+"'Caught in yer own trap, ain't ye?' he axed me.
+
+"'I be,' says I. 'You've got a axe, and mebby you kin help me out o'
+it.'
+
+"Well, he did. He chopped the root in a jiffy, and I was free; but,
+bless you, I could 'a' done it myself with my knife in a hour, anyhow.
+All the same, I was grateful to him, and we sot down on a log and
+chinned for a while."
+
+"What about?"
+
+"He asked me what I was doing around there, and I told him that I was
+thinking of looking over the swamp below the tracks a leetle, with some
+idea of settin' traps there late this fall and winter, and he said as
+how he wouldn't advise me to do it. He said as how I wouldn't be likely
+to ketch the sort of animals I was after, and that some of the animals
+might ketch me; and, as I ain't exactly a fule, I ketched onto what he
+meant, and I ain't been nigh that place since. And then it turned out
+afterward as I thought it would, them hoboes had a hidin' place in that
+very swamp."
+
+"Right you are, Bill!" said Nick, laughing. "Is that all the
+conversation you had with Handsome?"
+
+"Every bit of it."
+
+"And you have never seen him since?"
+
+"Never. Hold on; he axed me that time if I had ever mentioned the fact
+of our fust meetin', and I told him I had not. He seemed pleased at
+that, and he told me never to mention it. I allowed that I didn't see no
+reason why I should, and he laughed at that and seemed entirely
+satisfied."
+
+"That is excellent, Bill. Now, we will get at those plans. I don't want
+to lose any time."
+
+"Would you mind telling me why you axed me all about them two meetings?"
+
+"Not at all. When I go out into the woods in the character of Bill
+Turner, I am likely at some time to run across Handsome himself. I want
+to be posted, so that he won't know but what I am you. I don't want him
+to catch me; see?"
+
+"Yes. But do you suppose you kin fix yourself to look enough like me
+so's he won't know the difference when he sees you?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+The old man shook his head.
+
+"I don't believe it," he said, "but maybe you can. How about the voice?
+Your voice ain't no more like mine than a----"
+
+"I can do that, too," replied Nick, exactly simulating the voice in
+which the old man was speaking; and he looked around him in wonder, and
+then at the detective.
+
+"It does beat all!" he said at last. "I guess you're some too many for
+me, sir."
+
+"Shall we get at those plans now?"
+
+"Right away."
+
+Turner brought out paper and pencil, and, having cleared the top of his
+table, he began to work.
+
+First he drew a large circle on the paper, and at one edge of it he made
+a cross.
+
+"That there cross is Calamont," he said. "Where we be now; and all
+that's inside of the ring I've made lies to the east of here, from
+nor'-nor'east to sou'-sou'east--and east. You understand?"
+
+"Perfectly."
+
+"Well, jest about in the middle o' that ring is the place where I think
+them fellers would hide. It's the best place for them."
+
+"Tell me about it before you draw anything; or, rather, talk while you
+are drawing."
+
+"That's jest what I'm going to do. Now, you follow my pencil and pay
+attention."
+
+"Go ahead," said Nick.
+
+"When you leave here--if you start from Calamont, which I suppose you
+will--you start right about here. You take a general direction nor'east
+from here at first. You'll find a path through the woods after you git
+about two miles from here, and that path will lead you several miles.
+But about here it'll disappear, and you won't have nothin' to guide you
+'cept what I show you and tell you now."
+
+"Exactly," replied the detective.
+
+"Up here, at about the time you lose all trace o' the path, you'll come
+to a deep ravine. You want to follow up the middle of that, to the top.
+And when you git to the top of it you will think that you have run up
+ag'inst a cliff, and there ain't no gettin' out of it without goin'
+back.
+
+"But that ain't so. There's a waterfall at the end of the ravine. It
+comes around a sort of a twist in the rocks, and if you ain't afraid of
+gettin' damp, you follow around there, and you will find as nice a piece
+of steps cut in them stones as you ever saw in your life. Indians cut
+'em more'n a hundred years ago, so I'm told.
+
+"Well, they take you to the top of that cliff. When you're up there, you
+find you're in another ravine, not so deep as t'other. Right here that
+would be," he added, making a mark with the pencil.
+
+"All right," said Nick.
+
+"About a mile farther up that second ravine you want to leave it. You'll
+find a big dead oak that hangs out over it, and beside the dead oak
+there is a path up the side of the ravine. It is one of my own paths.
+You get up it by hangin' onto two things you find there for the purpose.
+I put 'em there more'n twenty years ago, mister."
+
+"Go ahead."
+
+"When you git to the top, you want to branch off this way--so. You'll
+find a clearin' about there, and off to the east you'll see some high
+hills. You want to make for them."
+
+"And those hills, I suppose, is my destination."
+
+"That's where the caves are. That's where you will find the gang if
+they are hiding anywhere in that 'ere region."
+
+"Now, tell me about the caverns. Tell me how to find them."
+
+"They're easy enough to find--some of 'em is; others ain't. Wait a
+minute."
+
+He pushed that paper aside, and took a fresh one.
+
+"Now, when you come to the hills, you will approach 'em at what we call
+the Dog's Nose. So named because that's what it looks like. It's a rock
+that sticks out right about here, and you can't miss it. It looks
+exactly like a dog's nose, stickin' out and smelling things.
+
+"You want to go right up under that there dog's nose; and when you git
+there you'll see a hole in the rock that ain't no bigger than the lower
+half of that window. It's a leetle bit of a hole, and it's as dark as a
+pocket inside it, too. Nobody, even if they found the hole, would ever
+think of going in there. It ain't invitin' to look at."
+
+"How did you happen to go into it?"
+
+"I didn't. I came out of it. I got lost in that cave for three days
+once, when I was a boy, and when I found my way out I came out of that
+hole. Nobody knows about that entrance but me, though I suppose lots of
+folks knows it's there."
+
+"And it communicates with the cave?"
+
+"It does. It'll take you to any part of the cave; and there is only one
+rule to follow in going through it. You'll want a light, though."
+
+"I've got the light. What is the rule?"
+
+"Always--no matter where you are in any of them caves, take the way to
+the right. Never take a gallery to the left, goin' in either or any
+direction. It's a rule that holds good in them caves. It's a sort of way
+that nature provided so's you could find your way through there; and I
+happened to discover what it was."
+
+"It all sounds very simple and easy."
+
+"And it is, if you've got the pluck and the sand. But it's a ticklish
+place. There is a good many places in there that I ain't never explored,
+and don't want to; and it's safe to bet that the hoboes ain't done it,
+neither. I reckon, mister, that that's about all I kin show you--hold
+on, though!"
+
+"What now?"
+
+"Well, there's one place up there which it might be handy for you to
+know about, and I don't think anybody but me knows about it, either."
+
+"What is that?"
+
+"Well, you might find occasion to want to hide yourself away while you
+are in there."
+
+"That is more than likely, Bill."
+
+"Well, just arter you pass through the hole that is under the Dog's
+Nose, and about twenty rods from there, you'll find a place where there
+is a bowlder sort of set into the rocks. You won't notice it unless you
+look for it, but it is there. Under it you'll find a small stone wedged
+fast. If you pull out that small stone, and then push on the big rock,
+it'll swing around like it was on a pivot, and you kin step inside the
+hole it leaves, and close up the door after you. You'll find an
+interestin' place in there, too, if you ever have occasion to use it,
+mister; and nobody will find you there, either."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.
+
+
+The detective passed the remainder of that day, and much of the night,
+in old Bill Turner's company, and during that time they talked
+incessantly about the mountains to which Nick was going, about the
+caverns in those mountains, and the trails through them; and when the
+conversation was finished Nick felt that he could find his way without
+difficulty wherever he cared to go among them.
+
+When he saw that the old man was tired out, he sent him to bed, and
+himself dropped upon a couch in Turner's living room, where he slept
+like a top till morning.
+
+Soon after dawn they were both astir; and after they had eaten some
+breakfast, and Turner had made his usual pilgrimage to the post office,
+they began again upon the plans and went over them for the last time.
+
+And then came the task of making the changes in their personal
+appearance. This, to the layman, sounds like no easy task; but to Nick
+Carter it was merely the practicing of an art of which he was thoroughly
+a master.
+
+He had brought with him the things necessary to accomplish the changes;
+and when the old man returned from the village he set to work--first
+upon himself--for he knew that he must make his own disguise letter
+perfect if he hoped to deceive such a man as Handsome.
+
+He first made up his face, not with paints, but with stains that would
+not wash off, to represent the leathery, weather-beaten countenance of
+the old man; and here he was, perhaps, fortunate in the fact that the
+profusion of white whiskers worn by the old man rendered his face the
+easier to copy, and in reality concealed much of it from view.
+
+Then he adjusted the beard.
+
+But not as false beards are supposed to be adjusted. This was done
+almost hair by hair. That is, the beard was divided into tufts of hair,
+and each tuft was stuck on with a glue of Nick's own creation, so that
+there was no danger that it would drop off under any circumstances--and
+so that it could not be pulled off without drawing patches of skin with
+it.
+
+And this was as it should be, since if any one should suppose that the
+whiskers might be false, and should seize them and pull sharply upon
+them, they would resist the effort exactly as if the beard was natural.
+
+In height the two men were about the same. In figure, the old man was
+possibly somewhat stouter than Nick; but there was not enough
+difference to be noticeable.
+
+The detective occupied about three hours in making up that disguise, so
+particular was he about it; but when it was finished at last it was
+perfect. So perfect, indeed, that Turner regarded him in amazement; then
+came closer to look into his eyes, and at last he said:
+
+"I'm glad, Mr. Carter, that I didn't meet you on the street in that rig.
+It would have frightened me to death. I'd have been sure that I was dead
+and had met my own ghost, out for a walk."
+
+That night, when the train bound for the city passed through Calamont at
+half-past eleven, a man climbed aboard of it who--if anybody had noticed
+him particularly--it would have been supposed was the same French
+Canadian lumberman who had appeared there the day before.
+
+But there was no one there save the ticket agent, and he did not notice
+particularly. It is certain that he had no idea that in the black-haired
+man who went away was old Bill Turner.
+
+But so it was. Nick had made the old man up in a representation of the
+Frenchman; or at least near enough to it so that in the darkness the
+difference would not be noticed; and the old man, being made to appear
+young, really felt young, and he went away joyously.
+
+In his pockets he carried letters; one was to Chick, and the other was
+to Joseph, his confidential servant, in case Chick should happen not to
+be at home when Turner arrived there.
+
+And those letters gave instructions that Turner was to be treated to
+everything he wanted, and that Chick and Ten-Ichi should take turns in
+showing him about the city. Nick assured them that they could help him
+quite as much in that way as if they were among the mountains with him,
+assisting him in the actual work.
+
+And the next morning--the morning after the departure of Turner--Nick
+took the old man's place in the customary stroll, or hobble would be a
+better word, to the post office.
+
+He stopped and talked with people as he met them, having posted himself,
+with the old man's aid, in what he was to say. And he stood around the
+post office steps for two hours, as Turner was in the habit of doing.
+
+He was trying out the part; trying it on the dog, so to speak. And he
+was thoroughly satisfied with the result.
+
+In his talks there in front of the post office he gave it out that he
+was going to take another trip into the woods; and as it was the season
+of the year when Turner had been in the habit of being absent, no
+surprise was felt. And that afternoon he literally pulled up stakes and
+started.
+
+Once he was in the woods, Nick quickened his pace. He realized now that,
+figuratively, he had burned his bridges behind him, and that he must see
+the thing through to the end.
+
+He did not fear the consequences at all; he felt that there was only one
+chance of his failure, and that was in the shrewd eyes and keen
+intelligence of Handsome.
+
+Handsome had met Turner twice and talked with him each time. Nick knew
+Handsome well enough to know that the outlaw would have studied Turner
+very closely at those interviews; the question now was, would Handsome
+detect the fraud?
+
+Nick did not think it likely; and, anyhow, the risk had to be taken.
+
+That night the detective made himself a fire and camped in the woods; in
+the early morning he started on again.
+
+In due course of time he came to the ravine, and went up it to the top
+as the old man had directed him to do. And he went around the "rocks
+with a sort of a twist in them" until he found the steps that were cut
+in the stones, and so mounted to the top.
+
+Far up the second ravine he found the dead tree that hung over it, and
+the pathway up the side of the hill beside it; and that night he camped
+again in the woods.
+
+He had not far to go that second morning, after he had eaten some
+breakfast, before he arrived at the Dog's Nose. It was ten o'clock in
+the morning when he got there.
+
+All that morning Nick had noticed signs that he was approaching the
+region where he would find the hobo gang. He had seen where trees had
+been chopped down and corded up for firewood; and there were many other
+signs that many men were in the vicinity.
+
+When he came to the shelter of the Dog's Nose, he stopped there, and,
+having fixed himself a temporary camp, resolved that he would remain
+there until night, for he had some hope that some of the hoboes would
+happen along, and that he could talk with them.
+
+That was his game; not to sneak upon them unawares, but to let it be
+known that he was in the neighborhood, so that Handsome would come to
+him. He wanted that ordeal over with Handsome as soon as possible.
+
+He was destined not to be disappointed. The afternoon was well advanced
+when Handsome suddenly stepped out of a cluster of balsams, and stood
+before him.
+
+He had approached as silently as an Indian; as if he had passed his life
+in woodcraft, and, indeed, Nick had no doubt that he had.
+
+For a moment he stood there near the balsams, silently regarding the
+detective; and Nick, perfectly acting the part of Turner, looked up and
+nodded, but said nothing.
+
+After a little Handsome strode forward, no longer taking care to remain
+quiet; and he seated himself on a log near Nick, and facing him, while
+at the same time he toyed with apparent carelessness with a revolver he
+held in his hand.
+
+"What brings you here, Turner?" he asked at last.
+
+"The season of the year brings me," was the reply. "I have come here
+every autumn at this time for more'n fifty years."
+
+"Indeed!" Handsome looked at him with new interest. "Is that true?" he
+asked.
+
+"I wouldn't have any reason to lie to ye, would I?" asked Nick. "Old
+Bill Turner hasn't missed a year in fifty years in coming here, Mr.
+Handsome."
+
+"Then you must know these hills mighty well, eh?"
+
+"I know every inch of 'em; every leaf that falls on 'em, almost. That's
+the way I know 'em."
+
+"And do you know about the places under the hills as well?"
+
+"Do you mean the caves?"
+
+"I do."
+
+"I know 'em purty well--yes. There is some parts of 'em that nobody
+knows, I reckon; and while I--well, maybe I don't know all about 'em,
+and maybe I'd get lost in 'em now; only I don't think so."
+
+"What do you know about that hole up there, under that rock that is
+shaped like the nose of a dog?"
+
+"I know it's a hole. I reckon that's about all that anybody knows about
+it. It's a dark sort of a place. I ain't got no fancy for goin' into
+it."
+
+"Does it connect with the main part of the cavern?"
+
+"Maybe it does, and maybe it doesn't; but most likely it does; only I
+don't think that anybody would be after trying to find out."
+
+"You have never been through that hole, then?"
+
+"I ain't never been inside of it," replied Nick, with perfect truth.
+
+Handsome thought a moment, and then he asked suddenly:
+
+"Turner, who sent you up here?"
+
+"Nobody sent me; why?"
+
+"Didn't the people of Calamont send you to find me and my followers?"
+
+"Nary a bit of it."
+
+"Well, now that you have seen me, and know that I am here, and therefore
+guess that others are here with me, what would you do about it if you
+should go back to Calamont now, and somebody there should ask you if you
+had seen me?"
+
+"Look here, Handsome, I don't meddle with other people's affairs. I want
+'em to leave mine alone, and consequently I leave theirn alone. You hear
+me speak!"
+
+"But what answer would you make if that question was asked of you?"
+
+"I probably shouldn't answer at all."
+
+"Suppose an answer was insisted upon?"
+
+"I ain't never found nobody yet who could make old Bill Turner answer a
+question if he didn't want to."
+
+"Do you mean that you would not wish to answer that question?"
+
+"Look here, Handsome, if you want me to promise that I won't tell on ye,
+why don't you say so? What you and your fellers do ain't none of my
+funeral, so long as you leave me alone. Do you think I came up here to
+spy on you?"
+
+"That is what I thought when I first discovered you."
+
+"Well, forget it. I ain't carryin' no tales. I'd 'a' been dead long ago
+if I had done that. Life's too short. I ain't never mentioned to nobody
+about the two times I have met you, and I ain't likely to, either. I
+ain't got time. You ain't robbed my house, and I don't care what you do
+as long as you leave me alone."
+
+Again Handsome was silent a while, and then he said suddenly:
+
+"Turner, would you like to go to our camp?"
+
+"No; that is, I ain't particular about it. You might think I was trying
+to spy on ye--or some of the men might, and that would make me mad."
+
+"They won't think anything of the kind if I take you there."
+
+"All right. If you want me to go--I'll go."
+
+"Come along, then. You have got this far, and we've either got to trust
+you, or kill you. It will depend upon you which that will be."
+
+Keeping in his mind's eye the plans that Turner had made for him, Nick
+knew perfectly the route over which Handsome led him on the way to the
+camp, to which he had referred.
+
+It was a picturesque place. Turner had described it in detail to the
+detective, and had mentioned it as the most likely place for the outlaws
+to make their headquarters. He had said:
+
+"Ye see, mister, it's a sort of sasser in the mountings. There ain't
+only one way to git to it from the outside, and that is a purty hard
+one; so hard that half a dozen men could hold it agin' a thousand; and
+the other way to git to it is through the caves; and ye've got to know
+them galleries mighty well in order to find yer way through. I think
+you'll do it, because you act as if you had been in caves afore."
+
+The place was a "sasser" in the mountains, sure enough. On every side of
+it there were frowning cliffs, which rose hundreds of feet in the air;
+and these cliffs were as inaccessible from the outside as they were from
+the saucer itself. There was only one pathway, and that was through a
+narrow fissure, barely wide enough for one big man to walk through it.
+
+And this latter could have been stopped up with rocks in half an hour,
+so that nobody could get through it.
+
+Handsome made the supposed Turner walk in front of him when they entered
+the fissure; and thus it was that they appeared on the opposite side of
+it; then Handsome took the lead.
+
+Already the hoboes had erected cabins of slabs and of logs; and many of
+them were still at work building others; but as with one accord they
+ceased to work when they saw Handsome approaching with the old man; and
+they stared at him.
+
+"Have you got another one, Handsome?" somebody called out to him; but
+Handsome deigned no reply, passing on in silence, and leading the way to
+a cabin that was larger and better than the others, and which stood
+exactly in the centre of the miniature valley.
+
+Nick guessed that this was the temporary home of Black Madge, and he
+was, therefore, not at all surprised when she stepped out upon the porch
+in front of it.
+
+She showed her white and even teeth, and smiled, in her own bold way, as
+Handsome approached her, with Nick in tow; and she asked, as soon as
+they were near enough:
+
+"Whom have we here?"
+
+"It is the old chap I have told you about, Madge," replied Handsome.
+
+"Sent here to spy upon us, I suppose," she smiled scornfully. "Why
+didn't you shoot him at once instead of bringing him here?"
+
+Before Handsome could reply, Nick wheeled upon him.
+
+"Didn't I tell ye so?" he demanded, with a show of anger. "Didn't I tell
+ye so? Didn't I say that they be thinking that I was a spy; but you
+wouldn't have it so? Tell me that."
+
+"I don't think he is a spy, Madge," said Handsome. "Remember that I have
+known him for a considerable time. And I have found him on the level."
+
+Madge shrugged her shoulders.
+
+"All right," she said. "That is, all right this time. Only now that he
+is here, he stays. Don't forget that."
+
+"Oh, I haven't forgotten that."
+
+"Nobody leaves this valley without my permission; not a single one."
+
+"They are all pretty well satisfied that you mean that, Madge."
+
+"Now, tell me what you brought the old man here for."
+
+"Because he knows every inch of the galleries inside those caves. I want
+to know about them myself, and I want the old man to teach me about
+them. The time will come, Madge, when we will be mighty glad to know
+about those galleries."
+
+"Possibly so," she replied. "Do as you like with him; only
+remember--nobody leaves this valley without my permission. When I get
+the men thoroughly organized and so they will do what I want them to do,
+then I will turn loose upon the world one of the best--and the
+worst--criminal organizations that has ever been heard of. Do what you
+please with the old man. He looks old enough to have been dead long
+ago."
+
+"And as old as I am, madam, I've never before heard a woman speak so to
+me," said Nick, as if he were hurt by it.
+
+Madge turned to him quickly.
+
+"You mustn't mind what I say--always Turner," she said. "I have a habit
+of speaking harshly at times; but I am not unkind to those who are true
+to me. Do you happen to know a man who is named Nick Carter?"
+
+She asked the question suddenly, as if she expected the utterance of the
+name would make the supposed Turner start with surprise; but Nick looked
+at her quite calmly, and replied:
+
+"I know the name. He's a detective chap, ain't he? I heerd about him;
+something about that bank robbery."
+
+"Is he in Calamont now, Turner?"
+
+"No, ma'am; he ain't."
+
+"You speak positively."
+
+"Well, I know he wasn't there when I came out of town; and I didn't hear
+that he was expected there, nuther. And if he had been expected there
+I'd 'a' heerd it. There ain't nothin' goin' on in that town that I don't
+hear about."
+
+"Do you know if he has been sent for?"
+
+"I ain't heerd nothin' about his bein' sent for, ma'am."
+
+"If, some day, I should decide to send you into the village to do some
+errands for me, do you suppose you could make some inquiries about Nick
+Carter for me, and at the same time forget all that you know about us,
+who are here?"
+
+"I reckon I could, ma'am."
+
+"I'll think about it. I may want to use you," she said; and turned away.
+But she stopped and turned toward them again, calling to Handsome, who
+went to her side; but Nick could hear the conversation that passed
+between them.
+
+"What about that fellow Pat?" she heard Madge inquire; and he could
+barely refrain from giving a start that might have betrayed him, for
+that question told him plainly that Patsy had already managed to arrive
+among the hoboes, and--that his fate still hung in the balance. He
+listened eagerly for Handsome's reply.
+
+"I haven't had a chance to examine him yet," he said. "You wished me to
+talk with him before I brought him to you."
+
+"Go and bring him here now. Leave Turner here with me until you return."
+
+"Get up there on the porch and sit down, Turner," he said. "Smoke your
+pipe if you wish to. The queen won't object. I'll be back in a moment."
+
+But when Handsome had hurried away to bring Patsy, and Nick had seated
+himself upon a rustic chair, Madge came and stood in front of him.
+
+"Turner," she said severely. "Tell me the truth now. What brought you
+into this neighborhood?"
+
+"The season of the year brought me," Nick replied to her as he had done
+to Handsome.
+
+"Who sent you?"
+
+"Nobody sent me, ma'am."
+
+"Swear to that."
+
+"'Tain't necessary. I have said it."
+
+"Do you know what would happen to you if I should find that you were
+acting as a spy?"
+
+"I suppose I could guess."
+
+"I'd have you burned at the stake, just as Indians used to burn their
+captives."
+
+"Well, ma'am, I reckon I've lived too long a time now to be much afraid
+of death. When a man has passed eighty, he ain't much afraid of things."
+
+"Are you as old as that?"
+
+"Old Bill Turner is eighty-four, ma'am; but he don't look it, does he?"
+
+"No. I wish I could feel sure of you. I wish I could feel sure that you
+are not a spy."
+
+"Well, ma'am, it's my experience that we can't somehow help our feelings
+much. If you are in doubt about it, treat it as you would an
+earache--with silent contempt. Doubts, ma'am, are suthin' like boils;
+they're the devil and all while you've got 'em; but they do get well
+arter a while. You ain't got no call to doubt old Bill Turner, as I
+knows on."
+
+"I'll talk with you again, Turner. In the meantime, see that you walk in
+a straight line."
+
+"I can't do that no more. My old feet ain't so steady as they used to
+be. But I'll do the best I can."
+
+"We can't ask anybody to do more than that. Now keep silent. Here comes
+Handsome with another man who I fear may be a spy."
+
+Patsy, with his hair a brick-red, and with spots and freckles on his
+face that were a sight to see, came forward at that moment, led by
+Handsome.
+
+His hands were tied together behind his back, and he looked as if he had
+been treated rather badly. However, there was a grin upon his face as he
+approached, and ducked his head in what was intended to be a polite bow
+to the queen of the outlaws.
+
+"So you have come back again?" she demanded of him abruptly.
+
+"Yes, I'm back, your honor--I mean, ma'am," he replied, grinning the
+more.
+
+"Where have you been while you were away, then? Tell me that?"
+
+"Well, sure, your majesty, I was a-runnin' most of the time. When the
+fire broke out down there, and the divil to pay generally, they all
+thinkin' as how it was y'rsilf that was bein' burrnt to death inside the
+cottage, I helped all I could until it was found out that it wasn't you,
+at all, at all, but a dummy that had been fixed up to look like you. And
+then when the hull bunch of the spalpeens went crazy and tried to find
+out what had become of you, it wasn't long until I found out that I was
+all alone in that place, the rest having gone in search of you. And
+after that I thought it wasn't healthy for me around there."
+
+"I think you're a spy, Pat," she said coldly.
+
+"Divil a bit of it. Who says so? Don't you belave it!"
+
+"Why did you not stay with the rest of the men, then?"
+
+"Divil a wan of me can tell that same, now. I clean forget. I think I
+was scared out of me two wits. If I had been a long time wid yez, instid
+of bein' there only wan day, sure I'd have remained, so I would. But I'd
+been there so little that I thought it wasn't healthy for me. That's
+all."
+
+"What made you come back now?"
+
+"Sure I heard that ye'd escaped from your jailers, and I knowed that
+you'd be after protecting me. Didn't you tell me that I was all right?
+And, thinks I, if I can find 'em now, sure the quane will be after
+takin' care of me; and here I am."
+
+"When I heard that you had returned, I made up my mind to have you
+shot!"
+
+"Oh, glory be to gracious! Don't be after doin' that same, your honor!
+Faith, why should ye be after shootin' the likes of me? I ain't done
+nothin' at all."
+
+Patsy, with a perfect assumption of fright, fell upon his knees before
+the woman and raised his hands beseechingly to her.
+
+And for a moment she looked down upon him with cold contempt in her
+eyes. It was evident to Nick, who was watching the scene narrowly, that
+she was coldly calculating the chances of letting him live, and that a
+breath upon the scales either way would decide her.
+
+For a long time she remained in the same attitude, and then she raised
+her head and spoke to Handsome.
+
+"When one in my position is in any doubt," she said coldly, "there is
+only one thing to do, and that is to give myself, not the other person,
+the benefit of the doubt. That is what I have decided to do, Handsome.
+Take him away."
+
+"What shall I do with him?"
+
+"Take him back to the cabin where he was tied up, and tie him up again.
+To-night, when the fires are lit, we will convene a court and try him. I
+will be the judge at that trial, and after it is over we will probably
+hang him. I see no other way. Take him away. Go."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+BLACK MADGE GIVES JUDGMENT.
+
+
+It was a strange scene upon which the light of a huge camp fire shone
+that night, in the mountain retreat of the outlaws.
+
+A stake had been set in the ground, and to this Patsy was tied, so that
+all could see him plainly. Somewhat to one side, on a huge rustic chair,
+made by one of the men, the queen was seated in state, ready to act as
+judge at the trial that was to begin, and Cremation Mike was selected as
+prosecuting attorney.
+
+A jury of twelve of the men had been drawn, only it was a foregone
+conclusion that they would bring in their verdict according as the queen
+should direct.
+
+Handsome acted as master of ceremonies, and around them was gathered the
+entire membership of Black Madge's hobo gang--as villainous a looking
+crew as might be imagined.
+
+As yet, no one had been appointed to defend Pat, and now Madge raised
+one hand, when she was ready to begin the trial, and she announced:
+
+"There is no one who has offered to act as attorney for the prisoner.
+This trial will afford you some amusement, my men. We will have a good
+time out of it, anyhow, before we hang him. I will appoint counsel for
+him."
+
+They were all silent, waiting, and presently she spoke again.
+
+"I will name the old man there, Bill Turner, as counsel for the defense.
+Will you defend the man, Turner?"
+
+"I'll try to, madam, though I don't know anything about the case. He may
+be guilty for all I know. What is he charged with?"
+
+"With being a spy."
+
+"If you want me to defend him, I'll do my best."
+
+"Go ahead, then. Let the trial begin," she ordered.
+
+The prosecution took up the case; that is, Cremation Mike got upon his
+feet and began to make a speech to the jury. He said:
+
+"We've got proof enough that the man is a spy, ain't we, mates? We all
+know what happened down there in the swamp, the time that Nick Carter
+got among us, and carried away Black Madge almost before our eyes, and
+we none the wiser for it. We know how Nick Carter set the cottage afire
+after drugging Madge, and how then he fixed up a dummy in one of the
+windows, so that we would think that she was burning up. We know that,
+don't we, mates?
+
+"And don't we know that there were four men who came to our camp in the
+swamp at the same time, and who came together? Wasn't one of that four
+Nick Carter himself? And were not two others of that same four Nick
+Carter's assistants? And who was the fourth one of that four? Why, it
+was that cove there, tied to the stake, and waiting for you to hang him.
+
+"Would he have been in that sort of company if he hadn't been made out
+of the same kind of cloth? Didn't he come there with that other outfit?
+Didn't we prove--that is, didn't Madge prove that one of the four was
+Nick Carter; that another of the four was his assistant, who is called
+Chick? And that still another of the four was another assistant, who is
+called Ten-Ichi?
+
+"And don't you know that Nick Carter has got still another assistant,
+and that his other assistant is named Patsy? Haven't you heard of that?
+It is true. And so is this fellow's name Pat--or Patsy. It is all the
+same.
+
+"Now, again, didn't they come here together? Didn't Handsome find them
+camping in the woods, waiting for a chance to get to our camp, and
+didn't this fellow tell him the first one of the bunch that he was
+looking for Hobo Harry, the Beggar King--and ain't Hobo Harry and Black
+Madge one and the same? I tell you, there ain't any doubt that the man
+is a spy, and that he ought to be hanged.
+
+"Now, do you guns remember what happened the night of the fire, the time
+when Nick Carter got away with Madge, and took her to jail? I'll remind
+you of it. Don't you remember that when we found the other two out, they
+were sent to the quicksand pit? I was one of those who helped to throw
+them into the quicksand pit. Did you ever hear of anybody's getting out
+of that pit alive? I never did until that incident; but I have found out
+since that both those assistants, Chick and Ten-Ichi, are alive and
+kicking, down in New York, this very day.
+
+"Well, who got 'em out of that quicksand pit, then? Why, this fellow!
+That is where he was, and what he was doing while we were fighting the
+fire, and don't you forget it! We was all too busy to remember about the
+men we had chucked into the sand; but he didn't forget. For why? Because
+he was one of them himself, and because he had determined all along to
+go to that pit as soon as ever he could, and get them out of it.
+
+"How'd he get 'em out, you ask? I don't know. I only know that he did
+get 'em out somehow, for they are out. I know that for certain."
+
+Nick, in the character of Turner, leaped to his feet.
+
+"I object!" he cried out. "This man ain't tryin' this case fair. I don't
+know who he is, and I don't keer a cuss; I only know that you app'inted
+me to defend him, and I'm a-goin' to do it till you tell me to stop. I
+object, ma'am, to the course he is adoptin'. It ain't fair. He's making
+a lot of statements the which he ain't got a shadow of proof about. I
+don't know anything about that air fire he speaks about, 'ceptin' what
+I've heerd down at Calamont. But we ain't got the fire here as a
+witness; and we ain't got the quicksand here as a witness; and we ain't
+got the two men as he says was saved from it here as witnesses. And
+unless he can produce witnesses to testify to what he says about them
+air escapes, I move that the hull speech he made be strucken out, your
+honor. Let him call his witnesses to the stand, and swear 'em, or swear
+at 'em. Let him do suthin, 'cept standing up there and shootin' off his
+mouth."
+
+Madge smiled grimly. She was getting more enjoyment out of this affair
+than she had anticipated.
+
+"Call your witnesses, Mike," she said.
+
+"I ain't got none, Madge, to swear to what I have said, but every one
+here knows it is the solemn truth. I don't need no witnesses. However,
+I'll put Handsome on the stand fur a minute, about the way the bunch
+arrived at our camp, if you say so."
+
+"I think it would be a good idea. It would be more regular."
+
+"All right, Madge. Handsome, take the stand. Hold up your right hand,
+and swear that you'll tell the truth. That's all right. Now, did you
+hear what I said about your findin' that outfit in the woods north of
+the track?"
+
+"I did."
+
+"Wasn't it the dead-level truth?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"The hull four was there, warn't they?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"And they was all strangers?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"You never seen any one of them afore that time, had you?"
+
+"Never."
+
+"And, later, wasn't it found out that three of 'em were spies?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"And wasn't one of the spies Nick Carter himself?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And weren't the other two his assistants?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"Didn't they confess it?"
+
+"They did."
+
+"And weren't they afterward thrown into the quicksand pit to die?"
+
+"They were."
+
+"Did they die there?"
+
+"I don't think they did."
+
+"Don't you know that they escaped?"
+
+"I'm reasonably certain of it."
+
+"How did they escape?"
+
+"I don't know that."
+
+"Isn't it your opinion that this galoot here----"
+
+"I object!" shouted Nick.
+
+"Oh, well," exclaimed Mike, in disgust, "ask him some questions
+yourself, then."
+
+"I will. Handsome, when did you first see them four in the woods north
+o' the track?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know. Before dark that night."
+
+"Was they together?"
+
+"Part of the time."
+
+"Only part o' the time? What do you mean by that?"
+
+"They didn't come there together."
+
+"Oh, didn't they? Where was you?"
+
+"I was hiding, and watching them."
+
+"So you saw 'em all when they arrived there, did you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Who got there first?"
+
+"This man--Pat."
+
+"Did the others appear to know him?"
+
+"No; but they didn't appear to know each other, either."
+
+"But if they were spies, and you afterward proved that they were, and if
+they got there, and found Pat already there, it would be natural that
+they should act as if they didn't know each other, wouldn't it, in order
+to deceive him?"
+
+"I suppose so."
+
+"Have you ever seen anything suspicious about the prisoner?"
+
+"No; only his disappearance after the fire and the arrest of Madge."
+
+"P'r'aps he kin explain that."
+
+"He can't. He has tried already. You heard him. I don't call that an
+explanation, but it is probably the best he can give."
+
+"Would you be afraid to trust him now?"
+
+"Personally? I don't think I would."
+
+"Then, personally, you don't think that he is a spy?"
+
+"No; but I don't _know_ that he isn't."
+
+"That'll do. I don't want to ask you any more questions." He turned to
+Cremation Mike. "Have you got any more witnesses?" he asked.
+
+"No," with a grin. "I don't need no more."
+
+"Maybe not. But I've got one witness."
+
+"Oh! Have you. Who is it?"
+
+"I'm going to put the prisoner on the stand."
+
+But Madge was plainly tired of the amusement already. She rose in her
+place, and her eyes were flashing darkly.
+
+"We will stop this farce here and now," she said. "It won't do any good,
+anyhow. I can see plainly enough that there are some here who believe he
+is a spy. I am a good deal of that opinion myself; and as there is a
+doubt in my mind, I'll just settle the thing right now. Jury, you can
+find the man guilty. That's what he is, probably."
+
+"Guilty," said the jury, with one voice, and grinning.
+
+"Prisoner," continued Madge, "you have got until to-morrow morning, at
+nine o'clock, to live. At that time the boys will take you to some
+convenient tree, and hang you by the neck until you're dead--and that
+settles it."
+
+Things looked dark for Patsy. It was quite evident that Black Madge was
+in deadly earnest in what she had said. One life more or less was
+absolutely nothing to her, and if there was the breath of a suspicion
+against one, it was, from her standpoint, better to put that one out of
+the way at once than to run any sort of risk by permitting him to live.
+
+Nor did the hoboes who had gathered there to hear and to witness the
+trial hesitate to voice their sentiments about it by loud cheering when
+Madge uttered the sentence of death. It would be a hanging, indeed, and
+it did not make much difference to them who was hung. It has been said
+before that they were much like wild beasts, or dogs, who are without
+any quality of compassion.
+
+When Nick walked away from the scene of the trial near the fire, he
+found that Handsome was beside him, and then, before either uttered a
+word, Madge joined them.
+
+She was smiling as if she were well pleased with her evening's work, and
+she said to the detective:
+
+"You did well, Turner. One would suppose that you had at some time been
+a lawyer."
+
+"I'd 'a' got the man free if I'd had a fair judge and jury," replied
+Nick boldly, stroking the white whiskers he wore.
+
+Madge frowned. Then she laughed aloud.
+
+"I like you for your boldness," she said. "But have a care that you do
+not find yourself suddenly in the same predicament, Turner."
+
+"I'd be inclined to shoot myself afore I came to trial, if I should,"
+Nick retorted.
+
+They had reached Madge's cabin by this time, and now they mounted to the
+porch, and Nick pulled out an old pipe that Turner had given him, filled
+it, and lighted it.
+
+The detective was determined in his own mind that before the dawn of
+another day he would find some way to save Patsy; but how it was to be
+done he had no idea.
+
+He did not know yet what disposition they intended to make of him. For
+all he knew they might send him into one of the cabins and lock him up
+for the night. But he did know that unless he acted, Patsy would be
+murdered at sunrise the following morning, and he did not intend to
+permit that to happen.
+
+"Miss Madge," he said, after a pause, during which he had smoked in
+silence, "if it is all the same to you, I'd like to know what you intend
+to do with me to-night. I'm an old man, and I'm sorter 'customed to
+going to bed rayther early, so, if you don't mind, and you'll tell me
+where I'm to sleep, I think I'll turn in."
+
+Instead of replying directly to him, Madge turned to Handsome.
+
+"What shall we do with him?" she asked. "You are responsible for his
+being here. I think I will turn him over to you."
+
+"All right," said Handsome, rising. "I'll take him to my own cabin.
+He'll be safe enough there. I'll be back in a minute, Madge."
+
+Nick followed him across the floor of the little valley to a hut that
+was at the opposite side of it, and close to the cliff--and Nick knew at
+once, from his recollection of the plan he had studied, that he was
+quite near to the entrance to the cavern.
+
+The cabin consisted of only one room, in which two bunks had been
+roughly built, and, after lighting a candle, Handsome indicated one of
+these, and said:
+
+"You can sleep there, Turner. Turn in when you like. To-morrow we will
+explore the caves together."
+
+"Right you are," said Nick, yawning widely. "I shan't need any rocking
+this night. My old legs are tired out for sure."
+
+Two minutes after the departure of Handsome, Nick blew out the candle,
+and for a time he stretched himself in the bunk, lest Handsome should
+return to see that all was right. But it was speedily evident to the
+detective that Handsome had no suspicion whatever of him, and had,
+therefore, left him to his own devices.
+
+But Nick knew that it could not be very long before the outlaw would
+return to seek his own rest and repose, and that he must, therefore,
+determine upon what he was to do before he should return.
+
+Ten minutes he lay there, and then he rose slowly and cautiously from
+the bunk and crept to the door which had been left open, and peered out.
+
+The fires were still blazing merrily, and many of the men were gathered
+around them. Some of the men were playing cards, and the others were
+engaged in various ways. At all events, they one and all seemed to have
+forgotten his existence, and that was what he chiefly desired.
+
+Nick knew in which cabin Patsy was a prisoner. He could see it from the
+doorway where he was standing, almost opposite him at the other side of
+the valley. The distance in feet from his own position was about the
+distance of a city block--two hundred feet.
+
+The old silver watch, the size of a turnip, which Turner had carried
+forty years or more, was in his pocket, and by the light of the stars
+Nick managed to see the time--ten o'clock.
+
+"There is no time like the present," he mused to himself, while he
+hesitated in the doorway. "If I wait until all is quiet, I will stand
+all the more chance of being discovered; and, besides, it won't be long
+until Handsome returns here, and after he has come and crawled into his
+bunk it will be next to impossible for me to get out of here without
+rousing him--unless I should drug him, and that will not do at all.
+Handsome is altogether too fly for that. He would know that he had been
+drugged.
+
+"Now, if it wasn't for these white whiskers, I could creep around the
+edge of the bottom of the cliff to the cabin where Patsy is, without
+being noticed; and I dare not take them off----"
+
+He stopped there. There was absolutely no use in conjecturing upon the
+"ifs" of the question, and so, after another moment, during which he
+studied the lay of the land intently, he slipped noiselessly out at the
+door and around behind the cabin, and from there crept on his hands and
+knees to the bottom of the cliffs. And there he discovered what he had
+been unable to see in the imperfect light. The grass there was quite
+tall, where it had not been trampled by the feet of the motley crew that
+infested the place, and he found that by lying at full length and
+pulling himself slowly along on his stomach he would be able to conceal
+himself almost entirely from view.
+
+Nick made that half circle of the small valley, crawling in that way,
+and entirely without being discovered; and in that manner he arrived
+directly in the rear of the cabin where Patsy was a prisoner.
+
+But here a new difficulty confronted him. There was a guard in front of
+the door, and that guard, strangely enough, was Cremation Mike.
+
+The cabin in which Patsy was a prisoner was built of roughly hewn logs,
+the crevices and chinks being stopped with mud and clay. The ground
+beneath it was hard--rocky, in fact; so there was no possibility of
+digging under the logs without tools to do it, and even then it would
+have taken too much time to accomplish it.
+
+Nick turned his attention to Cremation Mike. He was seated upon a
+convenient stump, smoking a short pipe. His back was toward the door of
+the cabin, and he was about ten feet from it. The door itself had been
+fastened by passing a freshly cut sapling across its front, and slipping
+either end of it into rustic slots that had been hastily fashioned for
+the purpose.
+
+It was plain that there was only one way to get Patsy outside of that
+cabin, and that was to overcome Cremation Mike; and, having determined
+upon this, Nick crept forward as silently as a shadow, and so rounded
+the corner of the cabin, and presently came up half standing, directly
+behind the unsuspecting outlaw.
+
+Nick did not wish to kill the man, but he did want to knock him out so
+effectually that he could not interfere in what was to follow, and
+therefore he had picked up a piece of round, smooth stone, which he had
+wrapped in his handkerchief.
+
+And now, with this improvised weapon, he struck Cremation Mike sharply
+on the back of his head, with the result that Mike pitched forward, and
+would have fallen to the ground had not Nick managed to catch him. Then
+he laid him down gently upon the ground, and turning swiftly, opened the
+door of the cabin.
+
+"Quick, Patsy!" he called in a sharp whisper. "It is I. Nick. Come."
+
+Patsy, who had not been bound, it seemed, leaped to the door with a low
+exclamation of surprise and pleasure.
+
+"Bully, Nick," he whispered. "I thought it was all up with me that time.
+And do you know, it never once occurred to me that the old man might be
+you. The disguise is perfect."
+
+"Come," said Nick. "There is no time for words now. Follow me, and do
+exactly as I do. I want to get back to my own sleeping place before my
+absence is discovered, if it is possible to do so. But, first, is there
+any sort of a chair or stool inside that cabin?"
+
+"Yes. A stool."
+
+"Bring it out, if you know where to put your hand upon it."
+
+Patsy brought it in a twinkling, and, placing it against the stump, Nick
+propped the senseless form of Mike upon it, so that from the front it
+appeared as if he were seated there quite naturally.
+
+"He will come around presently," said Patsy, "and miss me."
+
+"Let him. That is what I want him to do," replied Nick. "Come on, now."
+
+He dropped upon his knees again, and, with Patsy following, they crept
+around through the grass again along the edge of the cliff, and at last
+reached the cabin from which the detective had started.
+
+But he did not stop here. He made at once for the entrance to the
+cavern, which was near at hand, and passed inside, with Patsy following
+closely behind him; and then with his electric flash light, he led the
+way along the corridor of the cave--for it was his object to find that
+hiding place to which Turner had directed him in case he found it
+necessary to hide.
+
+"Keep to the right always in that cave, no matter which way you are
+going," Turner had told him with emphasis, and remembering that now,
+while he wondered if, after all, there were two corridors to the cavern,
+he followed the rule, and almost on a run--for the passage was quite
+smooth before them--he led the way through.
+
+They came at last to the bowlder to which Turner had referred, and Nick
+removed the small stone from beneath it. And then he pushed upon it as
+Turner had directed, with the result that the rock swung open before
+them, leaving an aperture through which they could easily pass.
+
+But Nick did not enter. Instead he thrust a candle and a box of matches
+into Patsy's grasp, and said to him:
+
+"Remain here until I come for you, even if you get hungry. I don't know
+any more about what is ahead of you than you do. I only know that you
+will be safe there. We have no time to talk now. I will shut this rock
+behind you."
+
+Then he turned and sped away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+NICK'S CLEVEREST CAPTURE.
+
+
+Nick Carter made his way as rapidly back through the cavern as he had
+gone through it with Patsy; but when he arrived at the entrance he came
+to a stop, and then went ahead again very slowly.
+
+He had no idea how long a time he had been gone, nor what might have
+happened during his absence. But when he peered out upon the valley,
+everything was apparently in the condition in which he had left it. If
+there had been any change at all, it was only that fewer of the men were
+gathered around the fires. Otherwise everything was the same.
+
+And so, with all the swiftness he could muster, he crawled to the cabin
+which Handsome had given him to occupy, entered it cautiously, and,
+finding it empty, crawled into the bunk that had been allotted to
+him--tired, but rejoiced to think that he had succeeded so well where
+there had been such small chance of success.
+
+And it so happened that he had barely laid himself down and composed
+himself to wait for developments, when a great cry went up, which was
+immediately followed by other shouts and loud curses--and Nick knew that
+the escape of Patsy had been discovered, and that he had returned just
+in time to avoid the consequences.
+
+Almost immediately following upon the utterance of the shouts, the door
+of the cabin flew open, and Handsome leaped inside, his eyes ablaze, and
+his whole form quivering with rage--and he carried a flash light, which
+he threw at once into the detective's face; into the face of the man he
+supposed to be Bill Turner.
+
+Nick could see that the instant the light fell upon him Handsome seemed
+greatly relieved; and then, before the outlaw could utter a word, Nick
+cried out in the voice of old Turner:
+
+"What--what's all that row about, Handsome?" and he blinked his eyes as
+if he had just been awakened.
+
+"It's lucky for you that you don't know what it's about!" was Handsome's
+rejoinder. "Get out of that, Turner, and come along with me."
+
+"But, what's the matter?" demanded Nick, sliding out of the bunk. "What
+has happened?"
+
+"That fellow Pat has escaped--that's what!" was the reply.
+
+"Sho! You don't say so! Well, well, well! When did he do it?"
+
+"I haven't found out yet. Come along. I thought at first that maybe you
+had had a hand in it--but I see you did not."
+
+"What! Me?"
+
+Every hobo that belonged to the gang had gathered in the centre of the
+place near where the mock trial had been held, and they were talking
+earnestly together. Cremation Mike, with one hand held at the back of
+his head, was the centre of the group--or rather of the throng.
+
+But Handsome burst unceremoniously through the crowd and confronted
+Mike, Nick following at his heels.
+
+Black Madge forced her way through it at the same time from the opposite
+side.
+
+"Now, Mike," said Handsome savagely. "Tell me how this happened."
+
+"I don't know. All that I know is, I got a crack on the head from
+behind. When I woke up, the bar had been ripped off the door and the
+bird had flown. That's all I know."
+
+"How long ago did it happen?"
+
+"How do I know that? Unless some one can tell how long I've been
+unconscious. But I'll bet my hat that it ain't ten minutes. I don't
+think it's three minutes. He can't be far away, and"--grinning--"he
+can't get away. He can't go through the pass, because the guards are
+there; I posted them myself; and the only way in which he could hope to
+get out is through the cave, and I don't believe he could find his way
+through there. I know that I wouldn't try it myself. I'd rather stay
+here and be hung."
+
+Madge interrupted the conversation here.
+
+"Do you think that he got out of the cabin without aid?" she asked of
+Mike. "Do you believe that it was he who struck you, Mike?"
+
+"I do, Madge. I'm sure of it."
+
+"Then, you weren't keeping good guard, that's all."
+
+"Well, I never thought it was possible for him to get out of that cabin.
+It may be that I dozed. I didn't suppose I did, but----"
+
+"But," said Madge icily, "the point is this: The boys shall not be
+disappointed in the hanging bee they were to hold in the morning. It is
+up to you, Mike, to find the prisoner. If you don't find him in time,
+you shall hang in his place--that's all. I mean it."
+
+Cremation Mike's face turned to the color of chalk, for he realized that
+she did, indeed, mean what she said. For a moment he stood there
+trembling, and then he seized a lantern which one of the men was
+holding, and cried out:
+
+"Come along, whoever will help me. I know that he can't have gone far.
+He ain't had time. I know it. Come along."
+
+"Wait," said Handsome coolly; and he turned to Nick.
+
+"Turner," he said, "I begin to think that it is fortunate that you came
+here when you did."
+
+"I am sure of it," said Nick in reply.
+
+"You know that cave from end to end, don't you?"
+
+"I think I do."
+
+"Then, you shall act as guide."
+
+"All right. I'm ready."
+
+But this short conversation had called the attention of Madge to the
+supposed old man, whom she had for the moment forgotten, and now she
+turned savagely upon him.
+
+"I believe that you are at the bottom of this," she said, her eyes
+blazing.
+
+Before Nick could make any reply, Handsome broke in.
+
+"That is nonsense, Madge," he said. "I know it. As soon as there was an
+alarm--as soon as Mike yelled out that the prisoner had escaped, I
+legged it for the cabin, and I found Turner just waking up from his
+sleep. He had no hand in it. He couldn't."
+
+"It's lucky for you," said Madge, still eying Nick sharply.
+
+"Will you guide us through the cave, Turner?" demanded Handsome.
+
+"Sure."
+
+"Then, come on."
+
+"Hold on a minute," said Nick. "Don't you think it would be a good idea
+to send some of the men to guard the other entrances? If the prisoner
+hasn't had time to get through the cave yet, and if he should happen to
+find one of the ways out on the other side, he'd run right into the
+arms of whoever was on the watch."
+
+"Good!" said Handsome. "We know of two outside entrances. How many do
+you know about?"
+
+"Four," replied Nick. "Four, not counting the hole under the Dog's Nose.
+That may be an entrance; but one man can guard that."
+
+"Where are those entrances?"
+
+Glibly Nick described how they might be found, using the exact language
+that had been used by the old man in his description of them; and after
+a short delay four men were sent away to each of the entrances, on a
+run, with instructions to remain on guard before them until they should
+be relieved.
+
+"Now," said Nick, when they had gone, "we know that the prisoner can't
+escape. We know it's only a matter of time when he'll be
+caught--therefore, we needn't hurry. Don't you agree with me, Handsome?
+He can't get out of the cave at any of the entrances, without being
+captured or shot down, an', o' course, he can't come back this way
+without meetin' with the same fate. Ain't that right?"
+
+"I guess it is," agreed Handsome.
+
+"Ain't that right, Miss Madge?" asked Nick again, turning to her.
+
+"It sounds entirely reasonable," she replied. "There has been only one
+mistake made from the start of this affair, and that is that Pat was not
+shot down when he first showed himself here. As it stands now, he has
+temporarily made his escape. I am satisfied, now, that he is a spy, and
+I commission each one of you to shoot him down without mercy, on sight.
+I shall go with you into the cave to search."
+
+"Do you wish me to direct the search?" asked Nick, still standing
+quietly before her.
+
+"Yes. What have you to suggest?"
+
+"This: There be four entrances outside o' the one here in this little
+valley. I should divide the men into four parts. I kin direct each party
+so that it won't have no difficulty in followin' the cavern and
+searching it thoroughly to the entrance. I'll take one o' the parties.
+How many men are there here now?"
+
+"Let me see," replied Madge. "Sixteen have gone away to guard the
+entrances, and four will have to remain here on guard. That takes away
+twenty. We still have eighty left."
+
+"Good. That'll give us twenty in each party. Now, madam, it's for you to
+say who'll lead them. Tell me who the leaders will be, and I'll instruct
+'em at once."
+
+She picked out four of the men, and ordered them to step forward; and,
+one by one, Nick directed each of them how to proceed after he had
+passed the entrance of the cavern with the men who were to follow him;
+and he made the directions so explicit that there was not one who had
+any doubt about being able to follow them.
+
+It was as Nick had suspected it would be; that Madge did not yet trust
+him far enough to give him the sole leadership of one of the parties,
+but she directed that Handsome should go with him--and at the last
+moment, when they were ready to start, and after the other three parties
+had entered the cavern, she decided to accompany Nick's party herself.
+
+"I may as well go along," she said. "I would like to learn something
+about the interior of that cavern myself, and I don't know a better way
+to learn it than to go with you."
+
+And so it was that presently the detective found himself in the cavern,
+leading twenty-two persons, for the extra two were Madge and Handsome.
+
+And the course that Nick had selected for himself was the one that would
+take him past the hiding place where he had left Patsy; for it was no
+part of his plan that he should give the others even a chance of an
+accident of finding that hiding place.
+
+It had been shortly after eleven o'clock when Nick returned to the cabin
+after assisting Patsy in his escape; it was now after midnight.
+
+There were torches and lanterns in abundance scattered among the four
+parties that were searching; and, in the directions that Nick had given
+each party, he had taken good care that they should become thoroughly
+lost if possible. He had an object in this, as will be seen.
+
+The way through the cave along the route which the detective had
+selected to follow was smooth and even, as we already know; but Nick
+made it as long and as rough as possible by taking the party off into
+some of the side galleries as they proceeded.
+
+He was looking for a place where he might lose some of them, and at
+least where he might, before the expedition was finished, succeed in
+separating them.
+
+What he chiefly desired was to finally get either Madge or Handsome
+alone with him.
+
+It was two hours later before they finally passed the bowlder behind
+which was the entrance to the hiding place where Patsy was concealed;
+but not one of the party so much as glanced toward it; and Nick led the
+way on past it to the exit--and that exit was not the hole under the
+Dog's Nose, but a larger one at some distance from it.
+
+There they found the four men who had been sent hither, and they
+reported that they had seen nothing; and cautioning them to remain on
+guard, Nick led his party back into the cave again.
+
+And then, after a few moments, he pretended suddenly to find that fifth
+entrance--the hole under the Dog's Nose--and there four other men were
+waiting--and they had seen not a thing to suggest the proximity of the
+prisoner who had escaped.
+
+"Now," said Nick, "I think we'd better s'arch them side galleries more
+thoroughly. If you'll return with me to the entrance from the valley,
+we'll start over again, and go into and through every one o' 'em. We'll
+divide our party into smaller groups o' three and four, and in that way
+we kin cover all of them at the same time. What do you say?"
+
+"All right," said Madge, still looking upon him with suspicion. "But
+Handsome and I will remain with you, Turner."
+
+"That is what I hoped you'd do," replied Nick; but he spoke with a
+meaning which she did not understand.
+
+They followed the plan suggested by the detective. That is, they
+returned to the entrance from the valley, and there Nick divided his
+followers into six parties, thus arranging that four of the parties
+should contain four searchers each, one of them should contain three,
+and his own immediate party should consist of himself, with Handsome and
+Madge.
+
+To the leaders of each of these subparties he gave the necessary
+directions, with the result that he sent them off as they arrived at
+their respective galleries, and after a little he found himself alone
+with the two chiefs of the outlaws.
+
+"There ain't much for us to do now," he said. "There ain't much more
+searching as we kin do. There's only two galleries left for us to
+explore 'less we find some hiding place that's remained unknown until
+now."
+
+"And that isn't likely, is it?" asked Madge. Her voice was still filled
+with suspicion against him.
+
+"You know as much about that ere as I do," he replied.
+
+But they searched each of the galleries without any result, and Nick
+finally directed the route so that at last they paused to rest directly
+in front of the movable rock behind which was the entrance to the place
+where Patsy was concealed.
+
+And Nick seated himself so that his own back was against that rock, for
+he did not care to run the chance that Handsome might lean against it
+hard enough to move it--at least, not until he was in every way prepared
+for that part of the drama.
+
+Madge was tired by this time, and she showed it. She leaned against the
+rocky wall and sighed deeply; and Handsome furnished the cue for the
+next scene--so perfectly that Nick could not have ordered it otherwise
+if he had tried.
+
+"I'm dry," said Handsome, yawning. "This is dry work, Madge. Don't you
+think we had better give the thing up for a time and wait. Pat will be
+starved out after a little. He'll have to come out and get caught."
+
+"If he ain't lost in the galleries," suggested Nick; and Madge replied:
+
+"No; we won't give it up. If you are dry, Handsome, suppose you go to
+the camp and get something for us all. I wouldn't mind having something
+myself."
+
+"I'll do it," said Handsome, rising. "Wait here."
+
+He was off like a shot, for now he felt that he knew the route
+sufficiently well through the caverns to find his way without
+difficulty; as, indeed, he did. And he had a lantern to light his path.
+
+Nick sat quietly until Handsome was well out of hearing, and then,
+purposely, he leaned very hard against the rock behind him--so hard that
+it moved, and he nearly fell upon his back inside the opening.
+
+With a well-simulated cry of surprise, he leaped to his feet, and stood
+staring, and Madge did the same.
+
+"A secret hidin' place!" cried out the supposed old man--and he pushed
+the rock farther in, thus making the opening even larger.
+
+Then he stooped forward toward it.
+
+"Hello in there!" he called lustily, for he wished to warn Patsy of what
+was taking place, and at the same time to instruct him what to do. "Come
+out of that, you--Pat! There are two of us here, and one is Madge
+herself. Come out of that!"
+
+"You fool!" exclaimed Madge.
+
+"Come out of that!" repeated the detective, pretending not to hear her.
+"Come out of that, or we'll come in after you!"
+
+There was no reply, and Nick turned to her.
+
+"Come along," he said. "We'll go inside and find him."
+
+She had a revolver in her hand, and now she stepped quickly forward, for
+there was nothing of the coward about Black Madge. There was not a thing
+on earth that she feared.
+
+She stepped forward so quickly that she had passed inside the barrier of
+rock before Nick--as he intended she should--and then, as he stepped
+after her, he seized her quickly from behind--seized both her arms, and
+pulled them behind her with a suddenness that made her drop her weapon
+to the rocky floor.
+
+As he pulled her backward, she tried to cry out, but he had anticipated
+that, and already he had grasped her so that he could press one of his
+hands for an instant over her mouth, and at the same moment he called
+out:
+
+"Quick, Patsy! On your life! There isn't an instant to spare!"
+
+And Patsy was ready and fully prepared.
+
+He had approached them through the darkness at the first note of warning
+from Nick, and was in reality only a few feet distant when they entered
+the rocky passage; so that when the detective seized upon Madge and
+pulled her backward, Patsy was ready to leap forward and to give his
+aid.
+
+When Nick's hand was pressed over her mouth to stop the cry that rose to
+her lips, Patsy was there to seize her, also; and he did it; and,
+although she struggled fiercely, she was quickly overpowered, and a gag
+was thrust into her mouth.
+
+Then they tied her, hand and foot, with cords with which Nick had
+provided himself, and together they carried her far back into the recess
+behind the rock.
+
+"There is a big room here," said Patsy. "And it is stocked with
+provisions, and a stream of pure water trickles through it. One could
+live here a month without going out."
+
+"Good!" said the detective. "Carry her in there. Then when we have made
+her safe, we will wait for Handsome, and serve him in the same manner.
+And after that, I have got a plan which will work the whole thing out to
+a finish."
+
+Madge was glaring at him venomously all this time, for she could not
+speak. But her eyes were terrible to see in their utter ferocity.
+
+She knew now what the game was that had been played against her. She
+knew now that the man she had supposed to be old Bill Turner was all the
+time no other than Nick Carter himself.
+
+She could have bitten her tongue out with rage and chagrin. She fairly
+writhed in the ecstasy of her impotent anger.
+
+But they laid her gently upon the rocky floor, where there were some
+blankets over leaves--it was evident that Bill Turner had used this
+place as a retreat of his own, and had provided it for that purpose,
+like a schoolboy who finds a cave and makes a cache--and then Nick spoke
+to her.
+
+"You see, Madge," he said, "it is all up with you and your gang; or very
+nearly so. We are going out now to capture Handsome, and bring him here
+to keep you company. After that I will show you a trick that will make
+you green with envy, and that will finish up this hobo business of yours
+once and forever. Come on, Patsy."
+
+They left her there and returned to the entrance.
+
+"Now," said the detective, "there is only one way to make Handsome fall
+into the trap. We must leave this entrance open for him to discover when
+he returns. He will first miss us. Then he will see the hole behind the
+rock. Then he will step forward to look inside. Then no doubt he will
+call out. I will stand here and remain silent; and then Handsome will do
+one of two things--he will either come inside to search for Madge and
+me, or he will set up a yell for the others to come to him."
+
+"Suppose he brings some of the men back with him?" asked Patsy.
+
+"We have got to chance that."
+
+"Well, what are we to do when he steps inside this hole--for he will do
+that?"
+
+"You stand over there in that niche," replied Nick. "When he steps
+inside the very nature of the place will bring his back toward me. I
+will tap him on the back of the head with my fist and knock him into
+your arms. You are to grab him with your arms around him, and hold him
+so that he cannot get at a weapon, and until I can get my fingers on
+him. That is all. Now, ready and wait."
+
+They had some time to wait; longer than Nick expected, and he began to
+fear that Handsome would bring some of the men back with him; but at
+last they saw the glimmer of his light as he approached, and Nick knew
+by the sounds he heard that Handsome was returning alone.
+
+Presently he appeared. He was calling out softly, for he could not
+understand why he had not been answered--and the light he carried
+prevented him from seeing the hole behind the rock until it was directly
+in front of him.
+
+And then he came to a sudden stop, and gazed at it in astonishment.
+
+"Gee!" Nick heard him exclaim. "Dogged if they haven't found a hole
+here. And they have gone into it, too. I wonder if that old cuss knew
+about it all the time?"
+
+He remained in doubt for a moment what to do; and then, as Nick had
+predicted, he stepped softly forward, and, holding his light aloft,
+peered through the opening.
+
+But Nick had chosen his place of concealment well, and Handsome could
+not see him.
+
+Then Handsome called out:
+
+"Madge! Bill! Where the devil are you?"
+
+There was no reply, and he waited a moment before he called again. Then
+he repeated:
+
+"Madge! Madge!"
+
+When no reply came to this second call, he stood for some time in doubt,
+as if he thought of calling assistance to him before he entered that
+dark and unknown place; and once Nick thought he half turned, as if he
+had decided to summon some of the others.
+
+But he evidently thought better of this, for he turned about resolutely
+again, and boldly stepped into the opening. Two such steps brought him
+exactly into the position where the detective wanted him, and as soon as
+he had achieved it, Nick struck him with his fist.
+
+With a half-articulated cry, Handsome pitched forward and fell into the
+grasp of Patsy, who was ready for him; and then, when he would have
+struggled, other arms--Nick's--seized him from behind, and another blow
+fell upon him, striking him behind the ear, and rendering him half dazed
+for the moment.
+
+And then Nick, knowing that Patsy could hold him, turned about and
+closed the rock door of the retreat; and before Handsome had recovered
+his senses sufficiently to offer any resistance, the two detectives had
+bound him so securely that he could not move.
+
+"Take his feet," ordered Nick, then. "We will carry him back into that
+chamber, to keep Madge company."
+
+While they were doing that, Handsome managed to recover his powers of
+speech--for, now that the rock door was closed, Nick did not think it
+necessary to gag the man--and his powers of speech in this particular
+instance were something frightful to listen to.
+
+He was still swearing when they dropped him, none too gently, upon the
+floor of the cavern not far from Madge; and then Patsy lighted two
+bracket lamps with which the place was provided, while Nick smilingly
+removed the gag from Madge's mouth.
+
+And where Handsome had worn out his vocabulary of curses, Madge took it
+up, and completed it in masterly style, and there was really nothing for
+either of the detectives to say for a long time. But her breath was gone
+after a while, and she lapsed into sullen silence, closing her remarks
+with the request:
+
+"At least give me something to drink out of that bottle that Handsome
+went after."
+
+Nick could really do nothing less, and he complied; and the liquor
+seemed to restore some of her accustomed coolness, for she looked at
+Nick with an ugly gleam in her black eyes, and said:
+
+"You are Nick Carter again, aren't you?"
+
+"Again?" replied Nick, laughing. "I was always Nick Carter. I was so
+interested in that last interview I had with you, Madge, that I couldn't
+stay away; and now, when you condemned my assistant to death, you
+hastened the reckoning. That is all."
+
+"I'll condemn you to death yet--and watch you die, too!" was her
+retort.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+NICK MAKES BAD MEDICINE.
+
+
+Handsome had also recovered from his paroxysm of rage by this time, for
+he was one who had the gift of knowing when he was beaten, and the logic
+to accept a situation when he knew that it could not be avoided.
+
+"I reckon you've got the drop on us, Carter," he said. "You've played
+the game mighty well, too. There is one thing about it that I would like
+to know, though, if you will tell me. Will you?"
+
+"What is it?" asked the detective.
+
+"I want to know if you have been old Bill Turner from the beginning. I
+want to know if it was you whose acquaintance I made in the first place,
+the time I was pulled out of the hole in the rocks, or if it was old
+Bill himself."
+
+"That was the old man himself," replied Nick, smiling.
+
+"And the second time I met him; was that him--or you?"
+
+"That was the old man, also."
+
+"Well, all that I can say is that you have played the part so devilish
+well that I find it hard to believe even now that you are not what you
+appear to be."
+
+"You're a fool!" said Madge spitefully.
+
+"Oh, I admit the impeachment, Madge. There isn't any doubt of it. I'm a
+fool, all right."
+
+"And you are up against it rather hard just now, Handsome; you and
+Madge," said Nick.
+
+"I know that, too. I'm no fool as far as that is concerned. What are you
+going to do about the rest of the gang?"
+
+"I'm going to capture the whole bunch," was Nick's rather astonishing
+reply.
+
+"I don't see how you are going to do it," retorted Handsome. "There is a
+cold hundred of them, all told--and every entrance to the cave is
+guarded. You attended to that yourself."
+
+"Certainly, I did; because I foresaw this very moment."
+
+"Well, all that I can say is that you can see a cussed sight farther
+into a stone fence than I can."
+
+"I'll show you how it is done, if you are interested," replied the
+detective. "But, first, I am afraid that I will have to ask you to step
+out here a moment, into the other part of the cave, always remembering
+that if you make any kind of a break, down you go with a cracked skull;"
+and Nick leaned forward and loosened the cords around his ankles.
+
+"Oh, I know when my hands are in the air, Carter. If I make any breaks
+it will be because I think I see a chance of winning. What do you
+want?"
+
+He rose stiffly to his feet as he asked the question; and Nick looked
+him in the eye as he replied:
+
+"I want you to remember, in the first place, that I am more than twice
+or three times as strong as you are, and that if you offer to give me
+any trouble I shall hurt you; and hurt you so badly, too, that you won't
+get over it right away. I am going to take you into the other part of
+this cavern, toward the door where we entered. I am going to free your
+hands, and then I shall ask you to put on these old togs that Turner has
+left here for a change of clothing in case he got wet--for I want these
+that I am wearing for Patsy. After you have made the change I shall tie
+you up again, and then you will see--what you will see. But, remember,
+if you refuse to obey me on the instant that I give an order, down you
+go, and I will take the clothing off your senseless body, instead of
+letting you do it, and keep well. Now, are you ready?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+Nick took him into the adjoining part of the cave, and held the light on
+him while he made the necessary change; for Nick had found some extra
+clothing of Turner's in the cave; and when that was done he tied
+Handsome up again, more securely than ever, and placed him on the floor
+again.
+
+"Now, Patsy," he said, "you and I will make a change. You will play the
+part of old Turner, and I will play the part of Handsome. It is
+necessary for what we have to do."
+
+Nick first dressed himself in the outer clothes that Handsome had
+removed; and then he sent Patsy into the other part of the cave to put
+on the clothing he had taken off--the suit that he had worn as old
+Turner; and, while Patsy was making the change, he was himself busily
+engaged in removing the white beard and hair that he had been wearing.
+
+It will not be necessary to describe in detail this operation; it is
+sufficient to say that the two detectives worked steadily for a long
+time; and that when at last they were through with what they were doing,
+Nick had assumed the personality of Handsome, and Patsy was transformed
+into what Nick had been--old Bill Turner.
+
+When everything was in readiness, he saw to it once more that the bonds
+which held his two prisoners were sufficiently secure, and that there
+was no possibility of their escaping; and he went so far as to fasten
+them to the opposite walls, so that they could not crawl within reach of
+each other, and make use of their teeth; and then he turned to Patsy,
+who was now, to all outward appearance, old Bill Turner.
+
+"Come along, Bill," he said, exactly imitating the voice of Handsome--so
+that Handsome grinned in spite of himself. "We have got a lot to do yet,
+and it will be daylight before we know it."
+
+They passed outside then, into the corridor of the cavern, and when Nick
+had shut the big rock in place over the entrance, he wedged the small
+stone under it, so that it could not be moved from the inside.
+
+"There," he said. "Even if they should get loose, which is not at all
+likely, they could not get out. And if they yell themselves hoarse,
+nobody could hear them. Come on. We've got a lot of work cut out for
+us."
+
+"What is there to do first?" asked Patsy.
+
+"The first thing is to return to the cabins in the valley, and find out
+what time it is. Oh, there is a watch in those clothes. Look at it. What
+time is it?"
+
+"Half-past two," replied Patsy, imitating the broken voice of the old
+man to perfection.
+
+"That's good, Patsy. I refer to your imitation. You will not have to use
+it much--possibly not at all; but it is as well to be perfect in your
+part all the same. I think we will have time enough for what we have to
+do if we hurry."
+
+He led the way rapidly then, back to the valley, where some of the
+searchers had already returned, and he found them grouped around the
+exit, when they issued from the cave.
+
+But when they attempted to address him, believing him to be Handsome, he
+returned no reply, for he had seen Handsome ignore them utterly many
+times; but it was Cremation Mike who stepped forward in front of them
+as they approached the cabin in which Madge was supposed to live.
+
+"Any luck?" he demanded surlily.
+
+"No," replied Nick, stopping for a moment.
+
+"Look here, Handsome, if that fellow is gone for good, do you suppose
+that Madge will do what she said she would?"
+
+"What was that, Mike?"
+
+"Hang me in his place?"
+
+"I shouldn't wonder if she did."
+
+"Say, Handsome, can't you say a word for me with her? Where is she? Can
+I see her?"
+
+"You had better keep away from her," suggested Nick.
+
+"No; I want to see her. Take me to her, will you?"
+
+"All right. Come along," replied the detective, and so Cremation Mike
+fell in behind them, and followed them into the cabin where Madge was
+supposed to be.
+
+But they were no sooner inside the house with the door closed than Nick
+wheeled in his tracks, and grasped Mike by the throat, and then struck
+him with his fist over the temple. The result was that Cremation Mike
+sank to the floor without a sound, and was speedily bound and gagged.
+
+"That's one," said the detective grimly. "There are a good many more,
+Patsy."
+
+"Do you expect to get them all, one by one, in that way?" asked Patsy.
+"It will take a week to do that."
+
+"No; I have a better plan than that. Wait."
+
+Nick knew of Madge's fondness for trapdoors, and also that she always
+kept a large supply of liquors on hand with which sometimes she treated
+her men, or some of them. He had no doubt that somewhere in that cabin
+he would not only find the liquors he wanted, but also drugs.
+
+There was a trapdoor in the floor of the largest room in the cabin, and
+under it was a shallow cellar wherein were several cases of liquors. The
+robbery of freight cars had always kept the hoboes well supplied with
+such articles.
+
+"Now, I'm going to make the hoboes a punch," he said to Patsy. He was
+searching through a cupboard while he spoke, and from there he produced
+a large bottle of laudanum. "I will have to use this," he continued. "It
+is the only thing here which will do at all, and as it has an
+excessively bitter taste, I will have to make a punch in order to
+conceal it. But it will do the work I want done better and more safely
+than anything else."
+
+"You'll have to use a washtub for the punch, to make enough for all of
+them," said Patsy. "And is there enough laudanum?"
+
+"Plenty; and there is a couple of pails. They will do as well as a tub.
+Now help me. We have lemons, and sugar, and everything that we require,
+here in this cupboard. But first, let's drop Cremation Mike into the
+cellar with the cases."
+
+They did that, and replaced the trapdoor; then they sliced lemons--all
+that they could find; they found a pot of cold tea, and this they dumped
+into the mess with the laudanum; and upon all this, bottle after bottle
+of the whisky was poured into the pails until they were filled to the
+brim.
+
+"Now, Patsy," said the detective, "remember that you are old Bill
+Turner. I want you to go out among the men right now, and tell them that
+Madge and Handsome have fixed them all up a punch, and if they will form
+in line and pass in front of the door of this cabin, each one of them
+can have two drinks of it. And it would be a good idea if you should act
+as if you had already taken your own two--or several. It will give them
+confidence."
+
+"I can do it," replied Patsy, and he went out.
+
+After a little Nick heard the murmur of voices before the cabin, and he
+stepped to the door and opened it; and then he found that the men,
+without an exception, save those who were on guard at different
+places--he found that eighty men had formed in line, and were ready for
+the treat that had been promised them.
+
+He carried out the two pails and stood them on the porch; and then with
+a dipper in one hand and a goblet in the other, he called out:
+
+"Come up slow, now; one by one. Don't be in haste. Remember there are
+two drinks each, for you, and no more. These two pails will just about
+do it. I'm doing the trick for Black Madge, who happens to be busy just
+now."
+
+And so they began the procession past him; and so he doled out the
+concoction he had arranged for them, and watched them gulp it down with
+evident relish; and he called out when he served the first drink:
+
+"The orders are that each one of you, as soon as you have had your two
+drinks, shall go to your quarters and turn in. You are wanted to rest
+up, so that we can begin this search again, and find that fellow we are
+after. Come on, now. When you have taken your medicine, go to your bunks
+and turn in--all of you!"
+
+And they came. Then they took their medicine, and so nicely had Nick
+calculated the quantity that would be required that there was scarcely a
+pint of the concoction left when they were through.
+
+Many of them stopped long enough to beg for a third drink of it, and
+only once did Nick grant that request--to a big fellow for whom two
+might not be sufficient.
+
+And within thirty minutes after that last one had passed the porch, that
+camp was as quiet as a church.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+
+A WHOLESALE ROUND-UP.
+
+
+"Patsy," said the detective, when they reentered the cabin, after
+watching their punch consumed almost to the dregs, "this is about the
+biggest capture I was ever in."
+
+"But we are not through yet, chief," replied the assistant, stroking the
+white beard he wore so naturally that Nick laughed aloud. "There are
+sixteen more men at liberty yet, and we have got the whole bunch to tie
+up. Don't forget that there are four men stationed at each of the
+outside entrances to----"
+
+"Oh, I haven't forgotten it. We will serve them in the same way. All we
+have to do is to manufacture one more pail of punch. So here goes. And
+as for tying them up, that will hardly be necessary."
+
+"Why?"
+
+"They are good for twelve hours of solid sleep at the very least. Many
+of them will not waken in twenty-four hours."
+
+"And maybe some of them will never wake up. How is that?"
+
+"It is a chance that we had to take; but by restricting them to two
+drinks each, I figured that there would be no danger. No; I think we are
+all right. Now, help me make this extra pail of punch. After that we
+will carry it through the cavern to the different parties of four each."
+
+"Suppose they get suspicious, and won't drink it?"
+
+"No danger of that, my lad."
+
+When the punch was made, they divided it into two lots, each carrying
+half, and, thus equipped, they again entered the cavern, this time just
+as daylight was beginning to appear.
+
+The first party they selected to serve was the one farthest away, and
+the detective discovered that they were grumbling because they had not
+been relieved.
+
+But when he appeared with the pail of punch, and told them what had
+happened--that every one had been served with the same thing--they
+forgot their sorrows and had their share as the others had taken theirs.
+
+And here, in order to make doubly sure, Nick had given each of the
+drinks a larger dose of the sleeping draught than he had served in the
+valley. As soon as the men had drunk what was given them, and had been
+refused more, he left them, followed by Patsy, and returned through the
+cave to another entrance.
+
+And here again the operation was repeated in the same manner, an idea of
+suspicion never once entering the head of any of the men; they were far
+too eager for the drink which the thoughtfulness of their mistress had
+provided for them.
+
+"They'll be suspicious when they begin to feel drowsy all at once,"
+suggested Patsy, as they moved away.
+
+"Let them," replied Nick. "We won't be there, and not one of them will
+be able to go very far before he drops in a stupor. I have fixed it, all
+right."
+
+They found the second party as eager as the first, and one of them
+already the worse for too many drinks from a bottle he had had in his
+pocket; but they took the medicine that Nick portioned out to them as
+the others had done, and they in turn were left alone to drop off to
+sleep as they would; for they had been awake all night, and now it was
+broad daylight. They figured that they deserved some sleep.
+
+At the third entrance the four men were already asleep--all but one of
+them, and he was drowsing; and Nick, in his character of Handsome,
+pretended to be angry at first. He pretended to refuse to give them the
+punch that had been sent to them until they begged so hard that he
+finally relented.
+
+"Why," said Patsy, when they left them, and took their way toward the
+fourth, and last, place--the hole under the Dog's Nose, near the place
+where Handsome and Madge were prisoners, "it's all as easy as living on
+a farm."
+
+"And not half so interesting," laughed the detective.
+
+They walked past the movable rock behind which the two prisoners were
+confined without so much as devoting a glance to it, for they were both
+intent upon accomplishing this last installment of capture through the
+medium of the laudanum; and here they found the four men who were on
+duty, just about ready to mutiny because they had not been relieved.
+
+But the presence of Handsome--or the man they believed to be
+Handsome--quieted them at once, for they stood in wholesome dread of him
+and his anger; and when they understood what had been brought to them,
+they were ready for anything.
+
+And so it was that in their turns they took their medicine as the others
+had done. When they had swallowed it, Nick said to them:
+
+"Stretch out, now, you fellows, where you are. I'll let you sleep for a
+while, at least. I'm going to sit here and smoke. I am tired myself.
+Turner, sit down. We'll keep watch here for a spell."
+
+The men did not require a second invitation, but speedily took advantage
+of the permission--and it was surprising how soon the laudanum took
+effect upon them.
+
+Ten minutes had not elapsed before the four were sleeping soundly, and
+snoring as if they never expected to awake again.
+
+"I think we can go now," said Nick, at last, rising.
+
+"What is the next trick to be done?" asked Patsy.
+
+"Let me see," replied Nick. "It's thirty miles from here to Calamont.
+How far is it to the railway track in a direct line? That is the way you
+came, isn't it?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"How far is it?"
+
+"About four miles, possibly. I can make it in an hour."
+
+"Then skip. This is the nearest point to start from. Get to the track as
+soon as you can. Flag the first train that comes along, no matter what
+it is. Get aboard it, and go to the first station. Get off there, and
+use the telegraph operator. Have him wire to Mr. Cobalt, the president
+of the road, exactly what has happened. Ask Cobalt to send a special
+train to us from the nearest point. We will want about twenty officers
+to take charge of all these prisoners, and he had better send along some
+chains with padlocks on them. You can figure that out yourself. We will
+want to make chain gangs of these men, so that they can walk to the
+railway, but so that they are chained together and cannot escape. You've
+got the idea?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Go, then, and see how quickly you can get the officers here, and we can
+get this crew away from here."
+
+"And you?"
+
+"I'll stay here. Skip, now. Don't talk any more."
+
+"Have I got to carry these whiskers with me?" grinned Patsy.
+
+"You'd better not stop to remove them now. I put them on to stay. Go!"
+
+And Patsy went.
+
+Nick remained where he was for a while, thinking deeply, and altogether
+satisfied with what he had accomplished; but after a little he rose, and
+took his way back into the cave, intending to see what Handsome and
+Madge were doing, and if they were making any effort to free themselves.
+
+But after he had reentered the cave, and had covered the twenty rods
+that intervened between it and the movable rock, he stopped in
+astonishment and stared.
+
+The rock was pushed wide open.
+
+With a bound he darted forward and entered the place, but only to find
+that Madge and Handsome had both disappeared. Their bonds were lying
+upon the floor of the cavern, but they were no longer there themselves.
+
+Nick did not wait to see more than that then.
+
+He turned away on a run, and darted through the galleries with all the
+speed he could summon under the circumstances--and he came out into the
+valley, where the sun was shining, directly behind his two escaped
+prisoners, for they had not preceded him by more than a minute,
+evidently.
+
+With one wild spring he was upon them, and as Handsome turned to defend
+himself, Nick hit him with his fist, so that he sent him reeling across
+the grass, where he fell senseless to the earth.
+
+But in the meantime Madge had turned with a scream of rage, and when she
+saw the real Handsome fall helpless, she broke into a run toward her own
+cottage, for she had no weapon to use now, Nick having deprived them
+both of their guns.
+
+But the detective ran after her, and, just as she was about to leap upon
+the porch, he succeeded in seizing her, and in pulling her back again
+toward him.
+
+She turned upon him then like a fury; but with a laugh he sprang under
+her extended arms, and seized her around the waist; and then he lifted
+her from her feet, and, still laughing, he ran across the grass to the
+cabin in which Patsy had once been a prisoner, and in another moment he
+had tossed her inside, closed the door and fastened it.
+
+For a long time he could hear her storming in there, but he had to hurry
+back to Handsome, who was still down and out when he got to him, but who
+presently revived.
+
+But he had all the fight taken out of him, and he allowed himself to be
+bound again securely, after which Nick led him to Madge's cabin, and
+tied him to one of the rustic chairs on the porch.
+
+Including Black Madge and her first lieutenant, Handsome, there were one
+hundred and two prisoners turned over to be dealt with by the law when
+Patsy returned to the place in the hills, having piloted the officers
+who were sent by special train to complete the capture.
+
+Black Madge did not see the detective again to speak to him; but she
+sent him a note, in which she said:
+
+"I haven't done with you yet, Nick Carter. I will
+never forgive you for fooling me as you did. I shall
+manage to get my liberty again, somehow, some time,
+and when I do, it will be for the purpose of
+wreaking vengeance on you. And I will get even some
+day, never fear."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE'S THREAT.
+
+
+Nick Carter had entirely forgotten Black Madge's threat when he was
+forcibly reminded of it one morning by the following letter which he
+found on his breakfast table:
+
+"NICK CARTER: One month ago--how time flies--I wrote
+to you that I hadn't done with you yet; that I would
+never forgive you, and that I would get even some
+day.
+
+"That was a month ago. I thought when I wrote that
+it might take a year--but they are easy marks in
+this State.
+
+"It was my hope after you captured me and all my
+followers, that I would have a chance to see you
+again, and to talk to you before I was taken away to
+prison. You would say probably that I wanted to
+boast; for a threat, after all, is only another kind
+of boasting. But it wasn't so, Nick Carter; I wanted
+to tell you what you had succeeded in doing; and
+this is it:
+
+"You have succeeded in creating in me a passion
+which supersedes all others in my nature--the
+passion of hatred. Twice now you have foiled me;
+twice you have been successful in arresting me, and
+the latter of these two times you not only destroyed
+the organization which I had created, and rendered
+it utterly impotent for my future uses, but you
+destroyed almost at one blow every ambition that I
+had through that organization and by reason of it.
+
+"You didn't know that, and you couldn't appreciate
+it; and it wouldn't matter at all to you if you had;
+neither has it anything to do with the purport of
+this letter.
+
+"I know you will say that I am a fool to take the
+trouble to warn you, but I would be less than a
+woman, and much less than the bad woman I am, if I
+did not take this opportunity of exulting over the
+chance that is now promised to me to get square with
+you.
+
+"Heretofore my every effort has been centred upon
+playing on my fellow men; heretofore I have had only
+two thoughts in pursuing my career; one was to
+create an organization of which I was the supreme
+head, and the other was to secure by the operation
+of that organization all the money that it was
+possible to obtain.
+
+"I have always been a thief with a system. My
+robberies have all been committed after careful
+planning; you know that because of the one you
+helped to commit yourself. But now I have only one
+ambition left--to get square with you. I haven't
+decided yet how I shall do it, or when, or where it
+shall be done. If I had so decided I would not tell
+you, so it makes no difference.
+
+"But I have been a hard student, Nick Carter, of
+many things. I have had good instructors in the
+science of mixing and using poisons; there is no
+person living to-day, man or woman--yourself
+included--who is a better marksman than I am with
+firearms; there is no person, man or woman, who is
+more adept to-day in the use of all weapons than I
+am. This is not boasting; it is fact.
+
+"Moreover, I have the power to appear in many
+guises--disguises you might call them. In one or
+more of them--perhaps in many of them--I shall
+appear to you, and when you are least expecting it I
+shall strike.
+
+"Don't think by that that I mean to strike you dead.
+That would not be making you suffer enough; but I
+shall find other and better ways in which to
+strike--ways that will make you suffer and realize
+what you did when you made me your enemy, and made
+me hate you as I do.
+
+"And another thing; I have already set to work to
+bring together, as rapidly as I can find them,
+people who have criminal records and who have reason
+to hate you as I do; people whom you have pursued as
+you have pursued me; those whom you have sent to
+prison; those whose careers you have interrupted;
+those you have threatened; and those who have cause
+for holding a grudge against you.
+
+"I have sought many of those, and I have found many.
+I am still seeking others, and I shall find more;
+and when I have got together enough of them, and
+have selected from that number those whom I deem
+most available for my purpose and competent to carry
+out my directions as I shall give them, I shall
+organize them into a Band of Hatred, the sole object
+of which shall be your undoing and, ultimately, your
+death.
+
+"You have preyed too long already upon that class
+of humanity to which I belong, and from our
+standpoint your position is much the same as is our
+position from yours.
+
+"You know me well enough, Nick Carter, to know that
+from this moment forward you will never be safe from
+danger for one moment of your life; whether you are
+sleeping or waking; whether you are afloat or
+ashore; whether you are quartered in the seclusion
+of your own study at home, or are abroad upon the
+streets of the city.
+
+"You know that I do not threaten idly. You know that
+I am a woman with a purpose. You know that I am
+intelligent, educated, and determined. You know that
+I am a woman to be feared.
+
+"I have thought this matter all over, and decided
+upon it during those hours when I was locked in the
+cabin up there in the hills, after you had drugged
+the men of my company, and succeeded in capturing us
+all.
+
+"When I was taken to prison I knew that it would be
+only a short time before I would be able to make
+good my escape. How I have succeeded in
+accomplishing it does not matter. I have found one
+key in my experience that never fails to open prison
+locks, if it is properly applied; the fact that it
+is made of gold is sufficient explanation, and gold
+I had in plenty, for I have always been successful,
+and even now I have hoards concealed in different
+places which will supply me with funds more than
+sufficient to carry out to the bitter end this
+campaign of vengeance upon which I have determined.
+
+"I think that is all.
+
+"I shall leave here for New York City an hour after
+this letter is put in the mail. When you will see me
+first I do not know.                   BLACK MADGE."
+
+The detective read this remarkable letter twice from beginning to end,
+and then he passed it in silence across the table to Chick, who was
+seated opposite to him.
+
+And Chick also read it twice in silence, and as silently returned it.
+Nick, realizing that Ten-Ichi and Patsy would also fall under the
+sweeping hatred of Black Madge, tossed it over to them with the
+direction that they read it also.
+
+There was not one among them who felt like making any comment upon the
+letter, or its contents, at least until their chief had spoken; but
+presently, with a gesture to Chick, which meant that he was to follow
+him as soon as he had finished his breakfast, the detective left the
+table and went to his study.
+
+It was only a few moments after that when Chick entered the room,
+smiling.
+
+"I hope, Nick," he said, dropping into a chair near the window and
+lighting a cigar, "that you enjoyed the reading of that letter from
+Madge?"
+
+The detective was silent a moment before he replied, and then quite
+slowly he said:
+
+"So far as I am personally concerned, Chick, the letter or its contents
+has no more effect upon me than the snapping of your fingers, but I will
+confess that I am in some dread concerning what she might do to you,
+and to Ten-Ichi and Patsy."
+
+Chick leaned back in his chair and laughed aloud.
+
+"If you will excuse me for saying so," he remarked, "that is utter
+nonsense. Of course, the boys downstairs and I are quite capable of
+taking care of ourselves."
+
+"I don't doubt that," said Nick, "but that is not exactly the point."
+
+"What is, then?"
+
+"You have forgotten one part of her letter," said Nick.
+
+"What part?"
+
+"That part wherein she speaks about making me suffer, rather than
+attempting to do me physical harm."
+
+"Oh! I haven't forgotten it."
+
+"Do you understand what she means by that, Chick?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Let me hear if you do."
+
+"Well, she probably means that it would be her first effort to make you
+suffer by injuring those whom you love--in other words, by doing
+something or other to one of us. But forewarned is forearmed, and,
+anyhow, I don't think it behooves any of us to be afraid of a woman."
+
+"This is a case," said Nick, "where a woman is much more dangerous than
+a man. A man would fight out in the open; a woman will fight in the
+shadow; or, at least, such a woman as that will. She is a pretty bad
+one, Chick, and a grave foe."
+
+Chick nodded.
+
+"It is always best," continued the detective, "to give your enemy or
+your adversaries credit for every advantage they possess. Black Madge is
+a wonderfully smart woman, and is unprincipled and implacable as she is
+smart. She will halt at nothing to carry out her design of vengeance,
+and just as sure as you are sitting there, Chick, we will presently feel
+the surety of that threat."
+
+Chick flicked the ashes from his cigar, and then strode across the room
+to the window, where he stood for a moment looking out.
+
+"I don't see exactly what we are going to do to head her off before she
+begins," he said presently.
+
+"There is nothing to do," replied Nick gloomily.
+
+"Upon my word," said Chick, laughing, "one would think that you were
+more than usually affected by that letter from Madge. Do you really take
+it so seriously as all that?"
+
+"I take it seriously," replied the detective, "because I so well
+understand what the woman means, and she means just what she says.
+Instead of going on evenly and living the life we have been living, we
+must not be for an instant off our guard from this day on, until she is
+again behind the bars, and I hope the next time I arrest her it will be
+within the limits of the State of New York, where I can place a watch
+over her so that she will not escape."
+
+"And I hope so, too," said Chick.
+
+"And now, in the meantime," continued Nick, smiling, "since we have this
+letter and know what she is about to do, I think we will meet her
+halfway, and not wait for her to open the ball. Since she is at liberty,
+we will set about capturing her at once."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+
+THE BAND OF HATRED.
+
+
+Down on the East Side of New York, in Rivington Street, and some
+distance east of the Bowery, on the second floor of one of the oldest
+buildings in the city, a remarkable meeting was being held during the
+night that followed the receipt of Madge's letter by Nick Carter.
+
+In a room on this floor, which was brilliantly lighted by four gas jets
+blazing from the chandelier, nine people were seated. They were gathered
+along two sides of the room, in which was a centre table, and behind
+this table was Black Madge.
+
+Before her on the table were various sheets of letter paper, which she
+had turned from a pad one after another as she made notes upon them, and
+in her hand she held a pencil which ever and anon flew rapidly over the
+paper while she recorded such information concerning those who were
+present with her as she cared to remember.
+
+They had been present in that room for upward of an hour, and during
+that time Madge had questioned each one of the eight who faced her
+concerning the statements they had made, and which she had noted.
+
+Now she leaned back in her chair, and, holding one of the sheets of
+paper in her hand, she said:
+
+"Stand up, Scar-faced Johnny, and answer the questions I shall ask you."
+
+One of them, a short, stocky, red-headed, brutalized being, who was
+almost as broad as he was long, leaped to his feet, thrust his hands
+deeply into his pockets, and with his chin stuck forward aggressively,
+waited.
+
+"You hate Nick Carter, do you, Johnny?" Madge asked.
+
+"I hate him like poison."
+
+"And you would kill him if you could?"
+
+"I'd cut his throat in half a minute if I was sure of not being caught."
+
+"Tell me again why you hate him so."
+
+"Ain't he sent me twice to prison? Once for four years and once for
+three. And the last time he done it didn't he hand me a welt alongside
+of the jaw that I'll never forget? A man can't hit me like that and have
+me love him afterward. You just show me the way to do it, Black Madge,
+and I'll lay him out cold--so cold that he'll never get over it again.
+All I want is a chance."
+
+"All right," said Madge, "take your seat.
+
+"Now, Slippery Al, you stand up. What's your line of graft, Slippery?"
+
+Slippery, who was tall, and sallow, and lean, and unkempt, and who
+looked consumptive and otherwise unwholesome, grinned sheepishly, as he
+replied:
+
+"I reckon my name ought to answer that question. I slips in and I slips
+out where I can and when I can, and picks up anything that's lying
+around."
+
+Madge laughed scornfully.
+
+"You don't look as if you had sense enough to hate anybody or anything,"
+she said.
+
+"Oh, I hate Nick Carter, right enough," was the unhesitating reply.
+
+"Why do you hate him?"
+
+"Because he sent my father and my mother and my two brothers to prison,
+and they're all there now, and they weren't doing a thing that
+interfered with him in any way."
+
+"What were they doing?" asked Madge.
+
+"Well, if you want to know it straight, Black Madge, they was running a
+little counterfeit plant of their own--making dimes and quarters and a
+few half dollars for some of us to blow in when we couldn't find the
+real rhino."
+
+"Running a counterfeit plant, eh?"
+
+"That's it, marm."
+
+"And Nick Carter sent them all to prison, did he?"
+
+"He did that."
+
+"How does it happen that he didn't send you along with them?"
+
+"Well, I managed to slip out just in time," said Slippery, with one of
+his sheepish grins; "but he sent a bullet after me when I was running
+away that singed the hair over my right ear, and taking it all in all I
+hate him about as much as anybody."
+
+"Not enough to kill him if I should ask you to do it, do you?"
+
+"Well, Madge, when it comes to killing, that ain't in my line; but if
+you want me to lead him on somehow where somebody else could do the job,
+I think I'd be about the covey that could do it."
+
+"That'll do for you. Sit down, Slippery."
+
+"What's your name?" she added to the man who was next him.
+
+A dark, beetle-browed, heavy-jawed, coarse-featured man, who looked as
+if he was as powerful as a giant, rose slowly to his feet, and replied
+in a surly tone, and with an ugly glitter in his eyes:
+
+"I have got about forty names; leastwise, the police say I have; but
+they as knows me best calls me Bob for short; sometimes they fixes it up
+a little by calling it Surly Bob. But I think that Bob will do for you."
+
+"What have you got against Nick Carter, Surly Bob?" asked Madge,
+smiling. She liked the looks of this hard-featured individual. He was
+just brutal enough in his appearance to satisfy her ideas of what a man
+should be.
+
+Bob deliberately took a huge chew of tobacco into his mouth before he
+replied, and then, with a slow and almost bovine indifference, he
+responded:
+
+"I don't know as it makes much difference to you, Black Madge, what I
+hate him for as long as I do hate him, and I'm bound to get square with
+him some day, whether I do it in connection with this organization that
+you're getting together or on my own hook without the help of any of
+you," and he glanced defiantly around. "It's enough that I do hate him.
+He's done enough to me to make me hate him. It's enough that if I had
+him alone in this room to-night one of us would never leave it alive
+unless he got the best of me without killing me, for I would certainly
+do him if I got half a chance.
+
+"But I'll tell you one thing about him that maybe it will do some of you
+good to hear, for I give you fair warning that you want to give Nick
+Carter a wide berth unless you can manage somehow to catch him foul.
+He's about as strong as three horses, and if he ever succeeds in getting
+his grip on you you're gone. I'm about as tough as they make them, but
+I'm a wee baby in Nick Carter's hands, and don't any of you forget it."
+
+"Tell us the story," said Madge.
+
+"Oh, it ain't no story; it's just a short account. We ran into each
+other once near the front door of a bank I had gone into after hours and
+without the permission of the president and board of directors. When I
+picked myself up from the middle of the street after he grabbed me there
+was a crack in the top of my skull which didn't get well for three
+months. That's all I've got to say about it, but I want to add this: If
+that fellow Slippery Al, who says killing ain't in his line, but leading
+astray is, wants to bring Nick Carter my way, and will fetch him along
+so as I can get him foul, I'll fix him for keeps, and no questions
+asked."
+
+And Surly Bob sat down.
+
+He had no sooner taken his seat than the individual next to him sprang
+up without waiting to be asked to do so. If you had encountered this
+individual along Broadway or on Fifth Avenue in New York City, you might
+not have devoted a second glance to him; but if you had, and still had
+not studied him closely, you would not have thought him other than a
+gentleman.
+
+His features were handsome or would have been handsome were it not for
+the crafty and shifty expression of his eyes and the otherwise
+insincerity that was manifest in his face. Among his companions of the
+underworld he was known far and near as Gentleman Jim.
+
+By profession he was what is known as a confidence man, although it was
+said of him that he had the courage to take any part that might be
+required of him in preying upon the world at large.
+
+He had been known to assist, and to do it well, at a bank robbery. He
+had once lived for some time in Chicago as a highwayman. It was said of
+him that in his youth he had begun his career of crime by rustling
+cattle in the far West, and that he was as quick and as sure with a gun
+as any "bad man" of that region.
+
+His attire was immaculate and in the height of fashion. He was clean
+shaven, and he wore eyeglasses which gave to him somewhat of a
+professional look, and which he had been heard to say were excellent
+things to hide the expression in a man's eyes.
+
+In stature he was tall, rather broad, and extremely well built. In
+short, Madge looked upon him when he rose with undoubted admiration in
+her eyes, as if she believed that here was a man who could be anything
+he chose to be in the criminal world.
+
+When he spoke it was in an evenly modulated tone of voice which might
+have done excellent service in a drawing-room; and, moreover, his voice
+was pleasant to listen to.
+
+"I suppose you would like to hear from me, as well as from the others,
+Madge," he said slowly. "I haven't got very much to say, except that I
+don't take much stock in boasted hatreds. Where I was raised, and where
+I began my career--and I am not particularly proud of that career--when
+we hated anybody we rarely said much about it, but I will say this to
+you, and to the others who are here: I am very glad that this
+organization is being perfected. I am very glad that some concerted
+action is to be taken against this man, Nick Carter, who has come pretty
+near putting us all out of business. You all know who I am, and some of
+you have got a pretty good idea what I am. Nick Carter knows about as
+much about me as any of you, which, after all is said, is next to
+nothing at all. But I have been on a still hunt for Mr. Nick Carter for
+some time, and when I get him in a position which Surly Bob calls foul,
+I shan't wait to send to any of you for assistance. I'll do the rest
+myself."
+
+"And now you," said Madge, fixing her eyes upon the individual who was
+seated next to Gentleman Jim "Rise in your place and tell us your name,
+and make us a little speech, as the others have done."
+
+"My name is Cummings--Fly Cummings, I'm called. Some of the bunch here
+knows me and some don't. Those that do know me don't need to be told
+anything about me, and those that don't know me are just as well off.
+I'm in business for myself, and always have been. The world owes me a
+living, and it's been paying it pretty regular ever since I was sixteen
+years old, and I'm now coming sixty-two. I'm like the others here in one
+respect: I've got a grudge against the man we've been talking about.
+I've never been able to make him feel it, because I've always fought
+mighty shy of him rather than get within his reach; but when I heard
+that this here movement had been started going by you, Madge, and the
+word was passed around among the guns downtown that you wanted a few of
+us that hated Nick Carter to come to the captain's office and form a
+little organization, it struck me that it was just about the right thing
+to do. I've heard what Surly Bob had to say, and I know that Surly isn't
+the sort of chap that's in the habit of talking through his hat. If
+Surly Bob had it in for me I'd patronize the New York Central Railroad,
+and take a train out of town right away.
+
+"I've heard what Gentleman Jim had to say, and if Jim was looking for my
+gore to-night, I'd take a steamer across the ocean or commit suicide,
+because I'd know I couldn't get away from him in any other way.
+
+"I've heard what Slippery Al had to say, and while Slippery ain't of
+much account, he's about the nastiest toad that ever picked a pocket,
+and I wouldn't care to have him down on me.
+
+"And as for Scar-faced Johnny, well, Johnny is a bad one, too. I ain't
+making any threats particularly, Madge, but I'm willing to join this
+organization, or I wouldn't be here, and I want to say now that when
+you're fixing up the business, and arrange for the signals so that we
+can summons each other when we want them, I'll do my part to the tune of
+compound interest; and I guess that'll be about all from me."
+
+The sixth man of the party, who was the next to get upon his feet, had
+the stamp of prison life all over him. His face bespoke the pallor which
+is acquired in no other place in the world, and the vicious, shifty,
+sneaking gleam in his eyes spoke well of the craftiness which is the
+result of long confinement under the domination of brutal guards and
+turnkeys.
+
+So recently had he escaped from prison, apparently, that his hair was
+still cropped short to his skull, and one almost expected when looking
+at him to see the stripes of prison garb upon him.
+
+"I am Joe Cuthbert," he said slowly, in a tone so low that it could
+scarcely be heard. "I wouldn't have come here to-night at all if I
+hadn't been assured on the level that it would be perfectly safe to do
+so. I don't think there is any one of you in this room except Madge
+herself who knows me, but you will all hear from me later on as sure as
+I'm alive and can escape arrest.
+
+"You may have been told since you came here that I have just escaped
+from prison, or if you haven't been told it, and know how to read, you
+have probably seen the rewards for my recapture. You will know, too,
+that I was sent up for croaking another chap, or, as they call it in the
+courts, for murder. I want you all to know that I served eight years.
+Eight years of hell, and that I've come out of there with the
+determination of getting square with the man that sent me up. That man
+was Nick Carter; and that's all I've got to say."
+
+There was a moment of utter silence after this announcement, which had
+in it many of the elements of the dramatic.
+
+There was not a person in that room who had not seen the inside of a
+prison, and many of them had served as many as four years, while others
+had been in prison many times for short terms.
+
+But to have just escaped from prison after having been confined for
+eight long years seemed to them the climax of the possibilities of
+hatred.
+
+But the moment passed, and Madge fixed her eyes upon the seventh of the
+group, who slowly rose to his feet and said:
+
+"After what we've just heard, Madge, it doesn't seem that anything that
+I can say can add to the intensity of feeling that pervades this
+distinguished assembly. I regard it as quite an honor to be among those
+who know so well how to hate. As for me, I have also been inside a
+prison, to which this man Nick Carter sent me. I had been mixed up in a
+little diamond robbery from one of the big firms in this town. I don't
+know but maybe some of you heard about it; it was called the taking of
+the pear-shaped diamonds, and at the time that happened I was in love
+with a very beautiful girl, and was outwardly leading a very respectable
+life. It's enough for me to say now that when the exposure that
+followed Nick Carter's investigation of that case, and through it the
+exposure of all my previous criminal record, which before that time I
+had been able to conceal, the girl went back on me, and would have
+nothing more to do with me. Now she is married to another man, and while
+I don't blame her any, I do blame the man that exposed me, and if any of
+you people that are gathered here can help me in getting square with him
+I'll be eternally grateful. My name is Eugene Maxwell."
+
+There was only one other individual left in this collection who had not
+as yet spoken, and now, although Madge fixed her eyes instantly upon
+him, he remained in his chair as he was, with immovable, sphinxlike
+countenance and gloomy eyes. He was a tall, spare, rather well-dressed
+figure, when he rose at last in reply to her spoken request, and he
+stood, half leaning upon a cane which he held in his two hands, and bent
+a little toward her as he spoke.
+
+"I haven't any name, so far as anybody knows," he said slowly, and with
+distinct and deliberate enunciation. "It has pleased my friends always
+to bestow a title upon me. Until to-night I have always worked alone,
+and have rarely made myself known to any of the inhabitants of the
+underworld, and if any of you here have ever happened to be told about
+The Parson, you will know who I am."
+
+There was a distinct stir in the room when he uttered this name or
+title, for The Parson had always been more or less a mystery, and one
+that was much envied by thieves generally. He was a confidence man of
+the higher type; the sort of man who would go into strange cities or
+villages or communities, and represent himself to be a professional man;
+sometimes a minister; sometimes a priest; again a rabbi; and it was his
+graft to solicit and collect contributions for charitable purposes upon
+forged recommendations and letters which he had prepared in advance.
+
+His success in this line had been enormous, and his work had always been
+done in the dark and alone, until six years before this particular
+occasion, having done it once too often, Nick Carter had trailed him
+down and captured him.
+
+He continued:
+
+"I was always very successful in my line of graft until Nick Carter got
+after me, and while I didn't get quite so long a term as our friend
+Cuthbert, I was sent up for five years, and served four years and three
+months of it. I want to say to you now that every night and every
+morning of my life during those four years and three months I cursed
+Nick Carter and everybody and everything that belonged to him. That's
+why I'm here. I take part in this little scheme that Madge has concocted
+to down that fellow with the greatest pleasure I have ever known. If you
+should happen to be in want of funds any time----"
+
+"I'll supply the funds," interrupted Madge.
+
+"All the same, if you should happen to be in want of funds at any time,
+all you've got to do is to whisper it to The Parson and I'll put my hand
+down in my pocket and supply the dollars, for I've got a few left, and I
+know where there are a lot more to be obtained."
+
+He resumed his seat slowly, rested his chin upon the head of his cane
+between his hands, and the gloomy look came over his face again like a
+mask.
+
+And now Madge stood up behind the table, resting her hands upon it, and
+leaning a little bit forward as she spoke.
+
+"I'm a proud woman, my friends," she said. "I'm a young woman, too,
+being not yet twenty-four, and a good hater. I am part Spanish and part
+French. I was raised in Paris, and learned all that I know about my
+business over there. The first time that I ever saw Nick Carter in my
+life was in the office of the Prefecture of Police in the room of the
+Chief of the Secret Service. I was seventeen years old at the time when
+the chief had sent for me to question me about the death of a woman
+which had occurred in the house where I lived on the floor above me, and
+about which, fortunately, I knew absolutely nothing.
+
+"But Nick Carter came into the chief's office while I was there. I had
+only a fleeting glance of him at the time. I left the room almost as
+soon as he entered it. I did not see him again for five years, at which
+time he came in disguise to the thieves' headquarters where I was
+staying. I recognized him that time by his eyes, but nevertheless he
+captured me and sent me to jail.
+
+"I escaped from that jail before I came to trial, and did it through the
+help of my friends. Somewhat later than that he hunted me down a second
+time, but I escaped, and I have sworn now to be even with him, and that
+is why I have brought you here together. You will please to stand up
+now, raise your right hands, and repeat after me in taking the oath of
+The Band of Hatred."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+
+A CHAPTER OF ACCIDENTS.
+
+
+A strange series of accidents began the night of the day following the
+receipt of the letter, and Nick Carter had no doubt whatever that it was
+the first act to be played in the drama of vengeance which Black Madge
+had inaugurated against them.
+
+It was rather a simple thing of itself, and did no damage to amount to
+anything. The fact was that during the night some malicious person had
+placed under the front steps in the areaway of his house a barrel that
+had been filled with cotton waste saturated with oil. It was only
+necessary after that to apply a match to the inflammable material to
+start an incipient conflagration. Had the house itself not been built of
+granite, and--save the doors and windows and other trimmings--been
+practically fireproof, the result would have been disastrous; as it was,
+however, beyond badly scorching the door, and cracking a few of the
+stones by reason of the intense heat that was generating, no damage was
+done.
+
+But the fact had been sufficient to remind Nick Carter and his three
+assistants that Madge had not threatened idly, and that already she had
+undertaken to carry out the substance of some of her warning.
+
+At midnight the day following the fire in the areaway a blazing bomb was
+hurled through the window of the second story of Nick Carter's house,
+and rolled to the middle of the floor, where it blazed furiously, and
+would undoubtedly have done a great deal of damage had it not so
+happened that the housekeeper was present at the time, for Nick had a
+guest that night, and she had been called late to prepare the room for
+him.
+
+The day following this one, about four o'clock in the afternoon, Joseph
+discovered a dynamite cartridge containing a pound and a half of the
+explosive in the vestibule at the front door. The fuse of this cartridge
+was already alight and would have reached and exploded the percussion,
+or detonating cap, if Joseph, for some reason unknown, had not gone to
+the front door at that moment. He was not called there, and had not
+heard anybody in the vestibule, or on the steps, and Joseph forever
+insisted after this incident that it was an intervention of Providence.
+
+This last incident was extremely serious, for had the cartridge been
+exploded it must have torn away the entire front of the house, and have
+done enormous damage, even if it had taken no lives.
+
+Friday night of that week at about half-past eight o'clock in the
+evening Chick and Patsy were walking up Madison Avenue together, and
+when they arrived at the corner of Thirtieth Street, and were about to
+turn toward Fifth Avenue, a shot was fired at them from across the
+street.
+
+Fortunately the bullet did not strike either of them; and, although they
+both immediately pursued the would-be assassin, he was evidently
+prepared to avoid them, for he leaped upon a bicycle and sped away so
+swiftly that there was no hope of overtaking him. They only saw that he
+was tall and slender, and that was all.
+
+The Saturday morning following an express wagon stopped at Nick Carter's
+house and delivered a package addressed to the detective, which was
+marked: "Fragile. This side up, with care."
+
+Joseph carried it to the detective's study, placed it upon the table,
+and was about to leave the room when Nick stopped him.
+
+"What is that, Joseph?" he asked.
+
+"An express package, sir, which just came for you."
+
+"Who brought it, Joseph?"
+
+"The express wagon, sir."
+
+"Bring it over here. Let me see it."
+
+Joseph took the package in his hand, carried it over to place it on the
+desk in front of the detective, who regarded it with a smile, while
+strangely enough his mind went back to the number of attempts to injure
+him that had been made during the week that was now nearly past.
+
+"Did you sign for it, Joseph?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, sir."
+
+"I am expecting no package." said the detective.
+
+"No, sir," said Joseph, not knowing what else to reply.
+
+"I think, Joseph," said the detective, "that if you will take it to the
+basement, or, rather, to the laundry, and draw one of the tubs there
+full of water, it would be a good idea to put the package to soak for
+five or six hours before we open it."
+
+"Really, sir," said Joseph. "Why?"
+
+"Joseph, if that package had come here as it has a week or ten days ago,
+I should have opened it without a second thought, but, under the
+circumstances and considering all that has happened of late, I deem it
+wise to use every precaution. Take the package down and soak it as I
+have directed."
+
+Some hours later, when the detective recalled the incident to mind, he
+and Chick went to the basement together, found the package, and with a
+great deal of care opened it--from the bottom.
+
+It was found to contain an infernal machine of the most approved
+pattern, loaded with broken glass, slugs of lead and old iron, and an
+assortment of nails, old keys, and bullets.
+
+"A very pretty little present to send a fellow," said Nick, smiling
+grimly. "I rather think it is a lucky thing, Chick, that it occurred to
+me to give it a good soaking. I wonder what the woman will do next?"
+
+Sunday evening when the detective entered his room he found Joseph
+writhing on the floor in evident agony, brought about by the contents of
+what had been a box of candy, and Nick instantly guessed that another
+attempt had been made upon his life, this time to poison him.
+
+But Joseph fortunately had only nibbled at one of the pieces, and,
+beyond an hour's suffering for his foolishness, was not injured.
+
+It appeared, when Nick questioned him, that a boy had handed the box of
+candy in at the door, saying, when Joseph appeared to receive it, that
+it had been ordered by the detective himself, and was to be placed in
+his study for him; and the boy had had the temerity to raise the lid of
+the box when he delivered it, wink slyly at Joseph, and exclaim:
+
+"See! aren't they dandy? I tasted one; they're fine."
+
+And then he had run away, laughing.
+
+Joseph had seen the candy, and, being fond of it, could not resist the
+temptation also to take a taste of it when he placed the box upon his
+master's table.
+
+That same night, at half-past eleven o'clock, Nick was seated at the
+desk in his study, which is located on the third floor in the rear of
+his house. He was engaged in looking over some notes relative to an old
+case which he wished to recall to mind.
+
+The shade at the window was lowered, but the light was in such a
+position that it threw his shadow against the curtain and outlined his
+head upon it almost perfectly.
+
+Suddenly he was startled by the report of a gun, and the next instant a
+bullet crashed through the glass of his window and buried itself in the
+opposite wall of the room.
+
+Later on, when he investigated the incident, he found that the bullet
+had passed directly through the shadow of his head as it was cast upon
+the window shade, the person who fired it evidently supposing that his
+head was directly behind that shadow; but the fact that the light was at
+one side of the room, and had therefore thrown the shadow somewhat back
+of where he was actually seated, saved his life.
+
+Further investigation disclosed the fact that the bullet had been fired
+from the rear of one of the houses in the block directly behind where
+the detective lived. It was not discovered how the would-be assassin had
+secured his position on the roof.
+
+But this accumulation of accidents--so called for want of a better
+term--was altogether too much for the serenity and the composure of the
+detective and his assistants.
+
+It was evident that Madge had determined to make his life miserable if
+it could be done, and when Nick recalled the substance of the letter she
+had sent him he decided in his own mind that the bullet had not really
+been intended to take his life, but only to warn him of the dangers that
+were hovering over him every minute that he lived.
+
+In the meantime--or, rather, during the time that has already been
+mentioned--the detective and his assistants had not been idle. There had
+not been a day or a night when he and Chick and Patsy and Ten-Ichi had
+not been engaged in searching some part of the city for Black Madge, or
+for some trace of her.
+
+They had visited the dens in the lower part of the city; they had
+questioned the policemen and the stool pigeons of the detective bureau,
+and they had even gone so far as to communicate directly with crooks who
+were known to them for information concerning the woman.
+
+But none had been forthcoming. Black Madge was keeping herself as
+thoroughly under cover as if she were still in the prison in that other
+State from which she had escaped.
+
+But after this occurrence of Sunday night, when the bullet was shot
+through the window at the detective, he determined to make no more
+half-hearted efforts to find Madge, but to set out at once that very
+night in search of her; and accordingly he put away his papers and
+called Chick into the room with him.
+
+"Chick," he said, "do you happen to know anything about Mike Grinnel's
+place?"
+
+"I only know," said Chick, "that he is said to keep one of the worst
+dives in the city, and that it is located somewhere in Rivington Street.
+I am not sure about it, because I have never had occasion to go there.
+The only thing I do know about it is that it is said to be a great
+Sunday night resort for thieves and crooks of all classes."
+
+"Right," said Nick. "That coincides with what I have heard. I have never
+been there, either, Chick but I am going there to-night--now. The
+question is, do you want to go with me?"
+
+"I sure do," replied Chick.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+
+CURLY JOHN, THE BANK THIEF.
+
+
+Mike Grinnel's place in Rivington Street was at that time one of those
+monstrosities which were permitted to exist within the limits of New
+York City nobody knows how. During the day and the early part of the
+evening it was to all appearances merely an ordinary saloon, and if a
+stranger were passing it he would regard it as a likely place to enter
+if he required refreshment.
+
+But when the hours deepened into the night, the place gradually assumed
+more and more the aspect which might be labeled dangerous. Men and women
+drifted in together and talked in low tones at tables arranged along the
+side of the room, and as the time continued toward midnight, and passed
+it, the air of respectability gradually disappeared until it was
+entirely gone.
+
+By eleven o'clock the place was usually thronged by people who seemed to
+know each other in a furtive sort of way, and who sometimes would call
+others by name across the room.
+
+At one o'clock the front doors were closed and locked; the curtains were
+tightly drawn so that not a ray of light was permitted to escape into
+the street, blinds were pulled up to make this fact doubly secure, and
+this was when the place really began to live and thrive in its true
+character. Then also was when Mike Grinnel himself came out of his
+shell, and assumed personal charge of the affairs of the place; for Mike
+Grinnel had a reputation among the crooks and thieves who were his
+customers, and if an incipient row started at any time among his guests
+he had only to look with his frowning brow in their direction to quell
+it.
+
+The way into this dive of Grinnel's after the legal hours, and when it
+was supposed to be closed, was, strangely enough, through a house from
+the other side, and of course it followed that only the initiated--those
+who were known to the man at the door--could pass.
+
+When Nick Carter and his first assistant left the house that particular
+Sunday night to go to Mike Grinnel's, the principal question was how
+they were to get inside the place at all.
+
+Nick had no doubt in his mind whatever that if Black Madge were in town
+that she would be one who would most certainly visit Mike Grinnel's dive
+Sunday night, for that was the red-letter night of the week at that
+place among the inhabitants of the underworld.
+
+He knew that she would feel perfectly secure against intervention there.
+He knew that she would have perfect confidence in the espionage which
+Mike Grinnel exercised in his place for the safety of his customers,
+for it was his boast that no thief or criminal of any sort had ever been
+arrested in his place and taken from it by the officers.
+
+And, therefore, Nick felt sure that if he could but gain admission and
+Black Madge were in the city, which he did not doubt, he would find her
+there.
+
+To enter a place of this kind one must be actually introduced; that is,
+vouched for by some frequenter of it. It will not suffice for one to
+apply at such a place, and state merely that he knows so-and-so and is
+all right; he will be turned down hard. But Nick Carter was never
+without resource in a matter of this kind, and, therefore, when he left
+the house with Chick, instead of going directly to Mike Grinnel's they
+took their way to police headquarters, where, as he knew would be the
+case, he found the inspector.
+
+"Inspector," he said, "I noticed in the paper yesterday morning that
+Curly John had been arrested by one of your men and brought to
+headquarters on suspicion of being connected with that Liverpool bank
+robbery three months ago."
+
+"That's correct," said the inspector. "Do you know anything about the
+case?"
+
+"Not a thing in the world," said Nick, laughing; "but I want to use
+Curly John. I want to use him very badly. I want you to lend him to me
+for to-night, if you will."
+
+The inspector could only stare his amazement. He had known Nick Carter a
+good many years, but never before had he received a request of this kind
+from him.
+
+"I guess you will have to say that again, and say it slow, Nick; I don't
+think I understand you."
+
+The detective laughed heartily. Then he began at the beginning and told
+first about the letter he had received from Black Madge containing the
+threats, and then one by one related the incidents that had happened to
+him and to his household during the week that was past. In conclusion,
+he said:
+
+"Now, inspector, I am convinced that if Black Madge is in the city of
+New York, she is now at this very moment seated at one of the tables at
+Mike Grinnel's place. I want to go there to find out. If she is there I
+want to know it. If she is there and I can manage to find out where she
+goes when she leaves there, that is all I care to know to-night."
+
+"But how can Curly help you?" asked the inspector.
+
+"Curly can help me in this way: I know something about his reputation
+and his career. I came across him once several years ago in reference to
+an old case of mine with which he had nothing to do, but concerning
+which he gave me some valuable information. I found that Curly John was
+all right at that time, and, as people of his profession regard it,
+pretty much on the square. I want you, if you will, to ring the bell
+and order him brought up here and let me talk to him."
+
+"That's easy," said the inspector, and he did as requested.
+
+Five minutes later when Curly John entered the room he paused when he
+was just inside of the door, and fixed his eyes intently upon Nick
+Carter, and then, with scarcely a glance at the inspector, who had
+summoned him, he addressed himself directly to the detective.
+
+"I know you," he said. "I remember you perfectly well, Mr. Carter, and I
+wouldn't be afraid to bet that it was you that sent for me right now. I
+hope you've come to get me out, for I give you my word that I know no
+more about that Liverpool crib-cracking business than you do, and that's
+what they're holding me for just now."
+
+"Curly," said Nick, "you gave me some assistance once in a case I had
+after I assured you that you would not betray a pal in doing it, and
+that I would do a certain favor for you afterward. Did I keep my word
+with you?"
+
+"You kept it for fair, Mr. Carter. I ain't forgot it, neither."
+
+"Well, Curly, I have come here to-night to get you to do another favor
+for me, but first answer me one question."
+
+"All right, sir. What's that?"
+
+"Do they let you in at Mike Grinnel's Sunday night prayer meetings?"
+
+"They sure do, Mr. Carter."
+
+"If you were at liberty at this minute, isn't that the first place you
+would point for?"
+
+"That's about the size of it."
+
+"And you would have no trouble in getting inside?"
+
+"Not the least in the world."
+
+"If the inspector will consent to let you go will you take me there--me
+and this young man beside me, who is my assistant--on condition that I
+make you a solemn promise that I will make no arrest while there; that I
+will in no way interfere with Grinnel's business, or with any of his
+customers who are there, and that unless you reveal the fact yourself it
+will never be known that I was inside the place?"
+
+Curly John scratched his head in perplexity.
+
+"That's a pretty big contract you ask of me, Mr. Carter," he said.
+"What's the game?"
+
+"The game is, Curly, that I am very anxious to find out if a certain
+person is in the city. If that person is in the city that person will be
+at Grinnel's to-night, I know."
+
+Curly scratched his head some more.
+
+"And suppose, Mr. Carter, that person is at Grinnel's to-night, what do
+you expect to do to that person?"
+
+"To use your own words," replied Nick, "not the least thing in the
+world."
+
+"Then what do you want to go there for?"
+
+"I have already told you that. I want to find out if that person is in
+the city."
+
+"Are you giving me this on the square?" asked Curly John.
+
+"Absolutely on the square."
+
+"And you won't make any trouble?"
+
+"Not a particle of trouble of any kind."
+
+"You nor that chap over there who is with you?"
+
+"Neither of us. You have my word for that."
+
+"Well, what about what's to come after it? Do you intend to follow that
+person down and do the arresting afterward?"
+
+"I will promise you, Curly, that there shall be no arrest of any kind or
+of any person arising out of the visit to Grinnel's place to-night
+within twenty-four hours from this moment."
+
+Curly scratched his head a third time very intently and seriously, and
+at last asked:
+
+"Don't any of them coves over there know you, Mr. Carter?"
+
+"I suppose," said Nick, smiling, "that every one of them knows me, and
+that many of them know Chick as well."
+
+"And so that's Chick, is it? I have heard about him. Well, now, Mr.
+Carter, let me ask you this: You just now said that unless I told it,
+not a soul would know that you were there at that place to-night if I
+took you there. Now, how do you reconcile that with the fact that they
+all know you?"
+
+"In this way, Curly: That I shall ask you to wait here a few moments
+after you give your consent, while Chick and I step into the next room
+and make some alteration in our appearances with things that the
+inspector will loan me from his cabinet."
+
+Curly sneered.
+
+"Oh! this is a disguise business, is it? Well, Mr. Carter, do you think
+that the guns down there at Grinnel's are such blamed fools as not to
+see through a racket of that kind?"
+
+"Oh! I can fool them, all right," said Nick, "if you consent. Now,
+Curly, I have given you a promise once before in my life, and lived up
+to it literally. I have made you one now, and I will live up to it
+literally. The inspector will let you go and will send for you in case
+he should want you again. You get your liberty, and I get what I want.
+And now, Curly, it's up to you. Will you do it?"
+
+"Yes, by thunder, I'll do it! Go into the next room and get ready. When
+you're ready, I am. And I will introduce you and Chick there as a pair
+of old pals of mine from the other side of the water."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+
+AT MIKE GRINNEL'S DIVE.
+
+
+When Curly John knocked at the door of the Sunday-night entrance to Mike
+Grinnel's dive in a peculiar manner, that was evidently full of
+significance to the one behind it, it opened instantly, and the burly
+form of the bouncer of the establishment was discovered.
+
+His face, which might have been a stone mask for all the expression it
+manifested when he first appeared, beamed with joy, however, when he
+discovered Curly John, and thrust out his big hamlike fist with
+undoubted enthusiasm.
+
+"Hello, Curly," he said. "I thought you were in limbo."
+
+"And so I was," replied Curly, "until they discovered that they didn't
+want me."
+
+"Make up their minds that you wasn't in that little affair, eh?"
+
+"That's the size of it, Red. Here's my two friends that I brought with
+me. Some one you don't know, and they ain't either of them known inside,
+either. Do you let them pass?"
+
+"Sure, Curly. I lets them pass, if you say so."
+
+"Come, lads," said Curly, without vouchsafing any further statement to
+the guard at the door; and so it was that the way was open for the two
+detectives to enter upon the mysteries of that infamous retreat where it
+was the proprietor's boast that no police officer had ever appeared
+without his own expressed permission.
+
+The big room where the patrons congregated on Sunday night was
+comfortably filled when Nick Carter entered it with his two companions.
+
+In all that place there were only two tables unoccupied, and one of
+those was almost directly in the centre of the room. Curly led the way
+to it at once, and the three seated themselves around it while the bank
+burglar sent out his order for the refreshments that were required.
+
+Nick and Chick had made the necessary changes in their appearance; and
+each assumed the outward character and general aspect of a person who
+would be likely to frequent such a place as Grinnel's.
+
+Nick Carter was always a thorough believer in the maxim that too much
+disguise was worse than none at all, and therefore, when the occasion
+required that he should assume one, it was his habit to do as little
+real disguising as possible, and therefore, with the exception of giving
+himself a black eye, and blocking out a couple of his teeth, fixing his
+face so that it appeared as though there was a couple days' growth of
+beard upon it, and donning a rough-looking costume, he was unchanged.
+
+In a place like Mike Grinnel's no man thought of taking off his hat
+unless his head was too warm, and therefore Nick kept his on with the
+brim pulled down well over his eyes.
+
+The mere fact that the two detectives were in the company of Curly John
+was sufficient voucher for their personalities, and it did not occur to
+anybody, not even to Mike Grinnel himself, to question them.
+
+They were there; they were with Curly John; he had brought them, and
+that was enough. And, although there were many expressions of welcome
+spoken and called out to Curly John when he passed into the room and
+took his seat at the table, nobody in all that throng offered to
+approach him, for it was an unwritten law of the underworld that a man
+who reappears for the first time among his associates after imprisonment
+is left alone to make his own advances when he is pleased to do so.
+
+As for the two strangers who accompanied him, their presence did not
+concern the others, so long as Curly John vouched for them.
+
+If they thought anything about it at all, they assumed that the burglar
+was preparing for another professional trip, and that the two strangers
+were interested in his plans. They all regarded it as none of their
+affair, and in the underworld it is the rule of life to mind your own
+business, and let other people do the same.
+
+As soon as the detective had taken his seat--which he was careful to do
+in such a position that he could command a view of the greater part of
+the room without perceptibly turning his head--he began, little by
+little, and one by one, to study the people who were there.
+
+At first he paid no attention whatever to the men; but, since it was a
+fact that more than half of the guests, or patrons, or whatever you
+please to call them, were women, and as there were at least sixty
+persons present, it was some time before his eyes rested upon the face
+that he sought.
+
+But Madge was there without question. She had not thought it necessary
+to attempt any disguise of any sort, and her bold, black eyes were
+roving restlessly about the room when Nick Carter encountered them.
+
+But his own were so thoroughly shaded by the wide brim of the slouch hat
+he wore that he did not believe that she knew he was looking at her.
+
+In this manner he studied her for some time, and discovered that she was
+furtively watching Curly John and the two who had come there with him.
+
+It was apparent to the detective that Black Madge had not overcome her
+old habit of suspecting everybody; and the mere fact that there were two
+strangers present in the room, even though they were accompanied by one
+of the old habitues of the place, was to her a warning that they might
+not be all right.
+
+It had been Nick's intention to make no demonstration of any kind while
+he was inside Grinnel's dive; it was his purpose to go there and observe
+all that he could, and then to go away again without having exchanged a
+word with any one except Curly, unless it should become absolutely
+necessary.
+
+He intended--if he should succeed in finding Madge there--to trust to
+luck and his own ingenuity to follow her when she would leave the place,
+and so discover where she was living, and by that means he could keep
+his eye upon her for several days thereafter, and ultimately could round
+up the gang of crooks which he had no doubt she had organized.
+
+But Madge, although she had no idea that either of the strangers might
+be Nick Carter, did not intend that these two men should leave that room
+without passing through some sort of inspection which would serve to
+identify them for what they might be.
+
+While every one else in that place was thoroughly satisfied about them,
+because of their presence with Curly, this fact cut no ice with Black
+Madge, and always suspicious, she was instantly suspicious of them when
+they entered.
+
+Therefore, a very short time had elapsed after the detectives took their
+seats at the table, before she left her own place, and crossed the
+sawdust-covered floor swiftly to Curly's table.
+
+There she slapped him on the shoulder, as a man might have done, and
+with a laugh, which called the attention of every other person in the
+room to what she was doing, as she intended it to do, she exclaimed:
+
+"Hello, Curly. It does me good to see you back among us again. How did
+you put out the lamps of those chaps up in Mulberry Street, so that they
+let you out?"
+
+Curly, who was wise in his day and generation, jumped to his feet and
+shook hands heartily with Black Madge; for he guessed instantly that it
+was not to greet him that she had crossed the floor, but rather to gain
+a closer view of his companions, and by standing erect he could keep her
+a little distance without appearing to do so.
+
+"Oh! they just found out they didn't want me," he replied. And then,
+realizing that something was expected of him by the others in the room,
+at least, if not Madge herself, he jerked a chair around toward her, and
+added: "Sit down, Madge, won't you, and have something?"
+
+"Sure," she replied, laughing again, and dropping negligently into the
+chair.
+
+"What kind of a game are you playing now, Madge?" asked Curly, after he
+had motioned to the waiter to approach; and then, pausing long enough
+to give the order, he added: "Last I heard of you you were behind the
+mosquito bars resting up a bit."
+
+Madge laughed again. She seemed to be full of laughter to-night, but it
+was an uneasy, imperfect, and significant sort of laughter that Nick
+Carter had heard from her lips before, and which he, therefore,
+understood. He realized, now, that it was important that he should
+proceed with great caution.
+
+"Oh, yes," she said. "Nick Carter did that for me. But I'm out again,
+just the same, and now my lay is to get square with Nick Carter."
+
+"You don't say so," said Curly, shifting uneasily in his chair, and
+forgetting himself so far as to cast one furtive glance in the direction
+of the detective. "What are you going to do to him?"
+
+"Ask me that after I've got him where I want him," replied Madge, fixing
+her bold eyes full upon Nick Carter's face; and then, slowly removing
+them, and swinging her body half around until she again faced Curly, she
+added insinuatingly:
+
+"Aren't you going to introduce me to your friends, Curly?"
+
+Curly shook his shoulders. He was on safe ground, now, ground where he
+felt perfectly at home; for it was never necessary to indulge in
+introductions in that walk of life, not even when they were asked for,
+but he replied:
+
+"Sure, Madge. These are my two friends, and I guess that'll be about
+enough. You can call them by any name you want to, and they'll both
+answer you."
+
+"Under cover?" she asked.
+
+"A little," admitted Curly.
+
+"Are they dumb, or tongue-tied, or have they temporarily lost their
+voices; or, are they only bashful? I should think that two full-grown
+men such as they are might be able to speak for themselves."
+
+"It ain't always good taste to speak for yourself," said Curly, with an
+uneasy laugh. "They might do it once too often."
+
+Madge's suspicions were plainly aroused. She remained silent for a
+moment after that, and then, leaning forward, she rested her arms upon
+the table, and with her face thrust well forward over them, again stared
+into the detective's face.
+
+"Do you know who you are like?" she asked coolly.
+
+"Yes," replied Nick, just as coolly as she had spoken, "I have heard it
+said often, but if you will take my advice you won't mention the name
+aloud. It might excite some of the people here."
+
+She laughed.
+
+"That's just what I mean to do," she said, with a tightening of her
+lips. "They need excitement; that's what they live on. It's what we all
+live on. It's what we come here to get. Excitement is the backbone and
+muscle and sinew of our beings. And do you know that I think I could
+startle them all mightily right now if I should call something out to
+them which is on my mind to say?"
+
+She reached out her left hand, and seized Curly by the shoulder, pulling
+him over to her, and then, in a tone which only the three who were
+present with her could hear, she went on, her voice deadly calm:
+
+"Did you think, Nick Carter, that you could fool Black Madge? Did you
+think that you could come here into this same room where I am without my
+knowing instantly who you were? Don't you know that your very presence
+in the same room with me would make itself known to my sensibilities by
+reason of the very hate I bear you?"
+
+She paused a moment and laughed uneasily. And then she continued:
+
+"Don't you know, Nick Carter, that you have walked directly into a trap,
+from which you cannot escape? And were you not aware before you came
+here that if your identity became known your life wouldn't be worth a
+moment's purchase? If you so much as quiver an eyelid, Nick Carter, I
+will call out your name, and point you out as a spy, and you know what
+that will mean in Mike Grinnel's dive."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE'S DEFIANCE.
+
+
+It was a crucial moment for each of the three men who were seated at
+that table, and it affected each of the three quite differently.
+
+Chick was concerned only for the safety of his chief, for even then it
+did not occur to him that Black Madge had taken sufficient interest in
+himself to identify him, and that doubtless she still regarded him as
+really a friend of Curly's.
+
+Curly was plainly frightened, as well as utterly astounded. It had never
+occurred to him that the disguise of Nick Carter, which had seemed to
+him to be perfect, would be, or could be, so readily penetrated; and he
+realized, for the moment, at least, that he was in as much danger as
+Nick Carter himself, for if it should be known to the others--or should
+suddenly be made known to them--that Nick Carter was in that room, they
+would not only kill the detective, but they would also murder the man
+who had dared to bring him there.
+
+Black Madge was as thoroughly aware of this fact as was Curly himself,
+and she did the latter justice to believe that somehow he had been
+imposed upon by the detective, just as Nick had sought to impose upon
+all of them; in a word, she did not blame Curly for the existing
+situation.
+
+As for the situation itself, she was delighted with it, for it had
+thrust Nick Carter into her power much more quickly and certainly than
+she had ever supposed it could be done.
+
+She had not been seated at the table with them a full minute before she
+was perfectly assured in her own mind that the man opposite her was Nick
+Carter, and it did not occur to her to doubt that the other man was one
+of his assistants--it made no difference to her which one.
+
+And now, while she threatened the detective with death if he should make
+any overt omission, she was eagerly casting about in her mind how to get
+him entirely into her power to do with as she would without alarming the
+others that were present there.
+
+She knew that Nick Carter understood and realized the danger as
+thoroughly as she did; but she also knew that he was extremely
+resourceful whenever danger threatened, and that she might only count
+upon him as captured and overcome entirely when he was bound and gagged,
+or dead, before her.
+
+As for Nick, when Madge uttered the threat to him, he returned her gaze
+steadfastly, at the same time reaching out a little farther with the
+hand that was resting upon the table, and then he replied, quietly and
+in the same low tone that she had employed:
+
+"I took every one of those things into consideration, Madge, when I came
+here. Now, I want to know if you intend to shout out that name, and give
+the alarm, as you have threatened to do, or if you will sit there
+quietly where you are, pretending to be interested in the drink in front
+of you, and talk it over calmly."
+
+She shrugged her shoulders, and again leaned back in her chair, but at
+the same time drawing it a little nearer to the table.
+
+"As you please," she said. "I don't care to precipitate matters and
+break up the party here unless you force me to do so--at least, not just
+yet."
+
+"Madge," said Nick, "you think that you have me in your power. You
+believe that by shouting out my name I would be killed. That is
+doubtless quite true, but before that killing was accomplished I should
+have done a little execution on my own account, and Chick, who is here
+beside me, is quite ready to do his part. As for Curly, he is an
+innocent party in this affair, so we won't consider him at all, although
+you must admit that he would have to take the consequences of bringing
+me here, which would be far from pleasant."
+
+She nodded, and smiled at him fiercely, and then she replied:
+
+"Go on. You were about to tell me that in the sleeve of that arm, which
+is extended toward me over the table, you hold a weapon with which you
+could kill me before I could give the alarm a second time. Very well I
+know it, but all the same I am not afraid of it, Nick Carter, any more
+than I am afraid of you, and you know that I have never been that."
+
+"I know," said Nick.
+
+"Go on, then," she repeated. "What do you want to talk about? Since you
+wish to talk things over calmly, what did, you come here for, anyhow?"
+
+"I came," said Nick, "believing that you were in the city, and knowing
+that I would find you here if you were, I came because I was determined
+to find out where you were, and to put a stop to your career."
+
+She started savagely, but Nick held up his hand and hushed her.
+
+"I am not going to make any arrests in this place, Madge. I am not going
+to interfere with Mike Grinnel's business, or with his reputation for
+affording security to his patrons. If every person in this room was my
+friend instead of my enemy, you, Madge, would be as free to depart in
+peace when you get ready to do so as you would have been had I not come
+here."
+
+"That all sounds very fine," she said, "if only I cared to believe it."
+
+"Believe it or not, as you please, it is the truth."
+
+"And what did you come here for?"
+
+"I have told you that already. I came to find you."
+
+"And, having found me, to let me go away in peace?"
+
+"I have said that also, I believe."
+
+"Nick Carter," she exclaimed, laughing scornfully, "you are not a good
+liar."
+
+"I never lie," replied Nick.
+
+"Well," she said, "I will speak my little piece, now that you are
+through. You are here, and there are two locked doors between you and
+the street, and there are between twenty and thirty men in this room now
+who would rather be killed than let you escape if they knew you were
+here. I might as well confess to you that eight of those men belong to
+me. That is, they obey my orders. Now, what are you going to do about
+it?"
+
+"I think," replied Nick quietly, and smiling back at her, "that, with
+your permission, I will order another round of drinks."
+
+She pushed back her chair petulantly from the table, and half started to
+rise from it, but Nick Carter's voice, low, but sharp, halted her.
+
+"Stop, Madge," he said; "keep your seat. This thing has gone too far for
+either of us to attempt to fool the other. You might as well understand
+that if there is to be any row precipitated, I will do the
+precipitating."
+
+She blazed her eyes at him for an instant, and then parted her lips with
+the evident intention of shouting out his identity. And, while he did
+not move to prevent her from doing so, the steady gaze of his eyes
+somehow overcame her, and she closed them again without making a sound.
+
+"That is better, Madge," he said. "This is a case of diamond cut
+diamond, only for the moment my diamond is a little harder and sharper
+than your own. Take my advice, and sit where you are."
+
+Curly and Chick had both been absorbed spectators and listeners to this
+little scene between the detective and Black Madge.
+
+Chick had, of course, made himself ready at any instant to act, no
+matter what sort of action might be required.
+
+But Curly was distinctly in a quandary. He knew that it was no fault of
+Nick's that the discovery had been made, and he also knew that if she
+was forced to keep silent the identity of Nick Carter would not be
+discovered by the others present.
+
+If the thing should come to a row, every instinct of Curly's life and
+profession would force him to take the side of the underworld as against
+Nick Carter, and his impulse would be that way, too. But his strongest
+desire at that moment was to prevent an exposure at any cost. It was for
+this reason that he now intervened.
+
+"Madge," he said, "listen to me for a minute."
+
+"Hello, Curly," she said, turning her head lazily toward him, "it isn't
+necessary for you to butt in on this affair."
+
+"I am going to butt in, Madge, just the same. Now, listen to me."
+
+"Go on, then."
+
+"You know where I stand, Madge, and there ain't no reason why I should
+explain how all this came about; or, if you think there is, there ain't
+going to be any explanation offered anyhow, but the point about it is
+this: It wouldn't be healthy for you, nor for any of us, if you should
+yell out a certain name in this present community, and I want to tell
+you right now that I won't stand for your doing it. It's up to you to
+keep still, Madge, and mind your own business, for while I should be
+with the boys as against Nick Carter to the bitter end, if it actually
+came to a fight, at the same time I'd blame you for the fight, and
+although you're a woman you would be the first one I'd look for out of
+this bunch. Now, I've spoken my piece, and you can go on with yours."
+
+This was a development which Madge had not anticipated, but Curly had
+spoken so plainly to the point, and his premises were so well taken and
+so logical from his standpoint, that she could offer no objection.
+
+If she could have left the table for a moment; if she could have had
+time to think, or if she could have secured an opportunity to exchange
+half a dozen sentences with any one of the members of her Band of
+Hatred, it would have been different, and she might have planned for the
+overthrow of the detective.
+
+As it was, the circumstances had arrived at such a condition that
+leaving her chair would be equivalent--so far as her companions were
+concerned--to the calling out of Nick Carter's name.
+
+Madge knew Curly John, and she knew him for a man who never made idle
+threats. His reputation among his fellows was that he spoke very rarely,
+and said very little when he did speak, but that what he said was always
+to the point, and that he always meant what he uttered.
+
+And so she saw the tables rather turned upon herself. Instead of Nick
+Carter being in her power, she was temporarily in his.
+
+The situation had its ludicrous side. Each was in a sense the prisoner
+of the other, for, while Nick Carter could not hope to escape from that
+room unless she gave him permission to leave it, she could not rise from
+the chair upon which she was seated without risking death unless he
+permitted it.
+
+If only she could have conveyed the shortest kind of a message to Mike
+Grinnel, or have signaled some word to Slippery, or to Surly Bob, or
+Gentleman Jim, or Fly Cummings, or Cuthbert, or Maxwell, or The Parson,
+all of whom were in that room at the time, everything would have been so
+easy for her.
+
+But she could not leave her chair; neither could she signal to any of
+these.
+
+Nick Carter's eye was upon her; his arm was extended across the table,
+and she knew the potency of that arm, as well as something about the
+strength and fund of resource of the detective.
+
+But the situation was unbearable. She felt that she could not endure it,
+and that in some manner it would have to be brought to a close, and at
+once.
+
+And so she leaned still further back in her chair, gradually tilting it
+until it rested poised upon the two rear legs.
+
+And then, with a sudden motion, and at the same instant uttering a
+scream, which rang shrilly through the room, she threw herself directly
+backward, at the same time kicking up her feet and so striking them
+fiercely against the under side of the table.
+
+The weight of her body and the force with which she struck the table
+instantly overturned it, bottles, glasses, and all, so that it crashed
+to the floor in utter confusion.
+
+And at the same instant every one in that room leaped to their feet and
+reached for their weapons.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+
+THE FLIGHT THROUGH THE CELLAR.
+
+
+The action of Black Madge was so sudden and so unlooked for that it came
+as an entire surprise, even to Nick Carter, and the act which overturned
+the table, coming as it did from a position directly opposite his own,
+sent the table full upon him, and spilled the contents that had rested
+upon it into his lap.
+
+More than that, in spite of his effort to resist the force of the
+attack, his chair was overturned backward, and he found himself the next
+instant sprawling upon the floor.
+
+But even if he was for an instant put out of business by the incident,
+there were other things connected with it which worked to his
+assistance.
+
+Always in a resort of this kind, where there is ever the least
+likelihood of police interference, there are many arrangements prepared
+for instantly turning off the lights, and it is the first impulse of
+every person who finds himself in such a place to "dowse the glim"
+instantly upon the raising of a disturbance, if it is possible to do so.
+
+Again, when there is the sudden noise of crashing glass and the
+appearance of confusion in such a place at such a time, it never can be
+determined at once what the cause of it is, and, as discretion is
+always the better part of valor, and certainly is counted so among the
+denizens of the underworld, there were at least a dozen men in that room
+at the time who leaped for the switch to turn off the lights the instant
+that Madge upset the table.
+
+Mike Grinnel himself happened to be standing where one of the switches
+was within reach of his hand, and so it happened that before Nick
+Carter's chair could reach the floor the place was in total darkness.
+
+Nick was not unaccustomed to experiences of this kind. It was by no
+means the first time that he had been present in a resort like this one
+when the lights had been turned off, and it is safe to say that he never
+in his life entered a room where such a thing was likely to occur
+without studying his surroundings carefully the moment he was inside,
+and determining then and there what course he would pursue if such an
+event should occur.
+
+Consequently, although Madge's action came as an utter surprise to him,
+he was nevertheless prepared for it. And so was Chick.
+
+When the detective found himself falling, and knew that his chair must
+topple over, the thought instantly came to him that Chick would escape
+the greater part of the confusion resulting from it--and he knew that
+he could rely upon Chick's activity and resource as thoroughly as upon
+his own.
+
+Nick managed to seize the edge of the table with his hands while
+falling, and exerting the great strength of his arms to the utmost, he
+literally picked it from the floor and hurled it over his head, while he
+was practically lying on his back.
+
+Then, kicking the chair from under him, and half rolling over--realizing
+in that instant that Madge could not possibly get upon her own feet as
+quickly as he could on his--he leaped to his knees, and threw himself
+forward across the now empty space which the table had occupied, and so
+managed to seize the skirt of Black Madge's dress.
+
+One jerk of his strong arms pulled her toward him, and the next instant
+he had seized her, and by passing one arm around her neck clapped his
+hand over her mouth, thus preventing her from calling out.
+
+Although she struggled fiercely, clawing with her hands, and kicking
+with her heels, and attempting vainly to scream, the confusion in the
+room was so great that no one was conscious of what she was doing, save
+Nick Carter himself, who held her.
+
+And Nick knew that behind the bar, almost midway in its length, there
+was a small door, which connected with some sort of an apartment back of
+it. What that apartment was, he did not know, other than that he had
+seen Grinnel pass out and return through that small door twice since he
+entered the place; and he concluded that it must be sort of a retiring
+room, possibly a private office of the proprietor.
+
+The door was not tall enough for a man to pass through standing in an
+upright position, and it was considerably narrower than an ordinary
+door; but all the same, to Nick's idea, it offered a safe and secure
+retreat for the moment, if he could but succeed in reaching it.
+
+What was beyond it, he did not know. But it was enough for him, that, if
+he could get past it before the lights were turned on again, he at least
+would be out of that crowded room, and have time to catch his breath,
+and determine what it was best to do.
+
+He regarded Chick as entirely competent to take care of himself.
+
+Therefore, the instant that he seized upon Madge, and stopped her
+screaming by clapping his hand over her mouth, he pulled himself to his
+feet, and, holding her struggling form firmly, he carried her safely
+across the space which intervened between him and the end of the bar--a
+space which he knew would be practically clear of impedimenta at the
+moment.
+
+Nick figured that Grinnel, having turned off the lights, would stand
+silently with his hand upon the switch ready to turn them on again in an
+instant.
+
+If he could only succeed in carrying Madge behind that bar and through
+the door already described before the lights were turned on, much would
+be accomplished.
+
+The detective reached the end of the bar in safety, and, feeling the
+back of it with his body, glided around behind it to the spot where he
+knew the small door to be located, and then, releasing his left hand
+from the woman he carried long enough to reach for the latch of the
+door, he pulled it open, passed through, and closed it behind him.
+
+With the hand that was still free he pulled a pair of handcuffs from his
+pocket, and, before Madge could escape him, he snapped them upon her
+wrists behind her back and dropped her to the floor, at the same time
+pulling a handkerchief from his pocket and tying it firmly--much too
+firmly for her comfort--around her jaws.
+
+His next act was to produce his flash light and turn it upon the door,
+where, to his delight, he discovered that it was only necessary to drop
+a heavy iron bar into place to secure it; and this bar passed entirely
+across the door, and rested in iron slots at either side of it.
+
+He also noticed in that instant that the door was an extremely heavy
+one, and that the partition through which it opened was a substantial
+one. Without doubt, the room had been prepared by Mike Grinnel himself
+with great care as the means of a safe and sure retreat for him in the
+event of a raid upon his place.
+
+The detective discovered, also, that there was a gas jet in the room,
+and he turned this on, and lit the gas at once.
+
+Madge was in the meantime using every effort in her power to pull the
+handkerchief from her face, so that she could cry for help, but now with
+light sufficient to see what he was about, the detective lost no time in
+securing her so firmly that she was entirely helpless.
+
+To her baleful glances of utter hatred, he paid not the slightest
+attention, but he began at once to examine the room with great care,
+knowing well that there should be another means of entrance to and
+egress from it than the one he made use of. For Mike Grinnel, skilled as
+he was in the habits of the people he dealt with, would never have built
+for himself a den from which there was no escape after once he had
+entered it. Although there was no sign of a second door to be seen
+anywhere, Nick did not despair of finding one, and he began his search
+by first pulling out a sideboard which stood against the wall, and
+looking behind it.
+
+He next had recourse to a couch, under which he searched for a trapdoor,
+but found none; and then his attention was attracted to an iron safe,
+not quite so high as his head, which stood in one corner of the room.
+
+An iron safe is not a thing which is easily moved from its position, but
+Nick seized upon it, nevertheless; nor was he surprised when he found
+that it was so perfectly balanced on the wheels that supported it that
+it moved readily enough in response to his efforts.
+
+And behind it was the door he sought. It was not over three feet high,
+and thirty inches in width, but there was a latch upon it, mortised into
+the wood, and there was a hole in the door, through which was passed a
+small steel chain that was attached to a rung fastened to the iron safe.
+This, of course, was intended to use for pulling the safe back into
+position after the door had been made use of, and the fugitive, whoever
+he might be, had made his escape.
+
+Nick pulled open the door, thus making it ready for his use, and then
+quickly returned to Black Madge's side. He raised her in his arms,
+carried her to the little door, and, having unceremoniously thrust her
+headfirst through it, crawled after her, closed the door, and pulled the
+safe into place again with the aid of the chain.
+
+He found himself now in a narrow corridor, faced by rough bricks on
+either side of him, evidently constructed between the party walls of the
+two buildings, and ten feet in front of him he perceived a flight of
+steps leading downward.
+
+Again picking Madge up in his arms, he hurried down the narrow stairs to
+the bottom, and there came upon an iron door, fastened with a spring
+lock on the inside, which he therefore easily opened.
+
+Passing through this, and closing it behind him, so that the lock
+snapped again, he found himself in the cellar beneath the building that
+adjoined the one in which Mike Grinnel's dive was located. Across the
+cellar, and at the far end of it, was a flight of wooden stairs.
+
+Nick regretted at that moment that he did not remember what sort of a
+place was located next to Grinnel's, but he realized the imperative
+necessity of getting out of the building into the street as quickly as
+possible, no matter how he accomplished it, and therefore, when he
+carried his captive up those stairs to the top of them, and found there
+only an ordinary wooden door locked against him, he lost no time in
+kicking it open, and passing through.
+
+When he did so, and when he came out in the room above, it happened that
+the battery of his own light gave out, and before he could determine his
+surroundings he was in utter darkness.
+
+This lasted, however, only a moment, and he was in the act of hastening
+forward toward the front of the house, when, with startling suddenness,
+the whole place flashed into brilliant illumination, and he found
+himself standing at one end of what looked like a Chinese laundry, while
+directly in front of him, and not many feet distant, was Mike Grinnel
+and three of the men from his place, confronting him, with drawn
+revolvers in their hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+
+THE MAN IN THE BED.
+
+
+The detective knew in that instant that he could no longer hope to save
+his prisoner; that is, to escape with her, and that the chances were
+about a thousand to one against his own escape.
+
+That Mike Grinnel was thoroughly incensed, and that he was determined
+that the detective should never get out of that place alive, was
+apparent in the cold glitter of his eyes, as he looked at Nick across
+the barrel of his revolver.
+
+And Nick knew how Grinnel had succeeded in heading him off. He could see
+in his mind just what the surprise was in the saloon when the lights
+were again turned on and it was discovered that one of the strangers who
+had come there with Curly had disappeared, and had taken Black Madge
+with him.
+
+Grinnel, knew, of course, that there was only one way out of that place,
+which was through the private door back of the bar into the little room
+which he used as an office, and thence through that other door behind
+the safe, through the narrow corridor, down the stairs into the cellar,
+and then up again into the back end of the Chinese laundry.
+
+And Grinnel had lost no time in summoning to his aid three of his most
+trusted adherents, and hastening with them to the laundry, where he was
+ready to head off the detective's retreat.
+
+It had not been difficult for them to get there and be ready for him
+before he could reach the place with his burden; for he had used up a
+great deal of time in searching out the secret door behind the safe, and
+in finding his way through the cellar.
+
+And, moreover, Mike Grinnel was a man of expedient. Having arranged this
+method of escape for himself, if the necessity of it should arise, he
+had also prepared the laundry with lights to turn on or to extinguish as
+he might desire; and, therefore, having reached the laundry and prepared
+himself and his followers for the coming of the detective, they had only
+to wait silently in the darkness until they heard him approaching, when
+Mike switched on the lights.
+
+It was a moment fraught with peril, and with unnumbered possibilities.
+At such times there is always an instant of inaction; an instant when
+neither party concerned knows quite what to do.
+
+But the detective, as it happened--with the possible exception of Mike
+Grinnel himself--was the first to recover.
+
+The detective was carrying Madge in his arms; and now, at the risk of
+injuring her, realizing that it was the only way by which any
+possibility of escape could be offered to himself, he raised her over
+his head at the very instant that the turning on of the lights revealed
+his enemies, and threw her with all his strength at Mike Grinnel's burly
+figure.
+
+Of course, not one of the crooks dared to use his weapon, lest Black
+Madge herself be shot, and it was upon this idea that the detective
+acted as much as any other.
+
+Nor did it occur to Mike Grinnel that this other, whom he had seemed to
+have now guessed must be Nick Carter, would resort to any such measure
+as he had, and, therefore, he was not prepared.
+
+The body of Madge, flying the short distance across the room, struck
+Grinnel squarely on the chest, and thus forced him backward against two
+of the men who were with him; and so in that instant four people all
+together were huddled in a heap upon the floor, and only one of Nick's
+visible enemies remained standing.
+
+And the instant that Nick threw Madge at them, he leaped forward and
+seized the switch, which was almost at Grinnel's shoulder, where he had
+been standing; and, with a twist of his wrist, he turned off the lights
+as suddenly as they had been turned on.
+
+At the same instant he had taken into consideration the position of the
+one man of the enemy who was left erect, and no sooner had he turned the
+switch than he leaped forward toward the spot where he knew that man to
+be standing.
+
+Nicely calculating the distance, he struck out a savage blow with his
+right hand, and he heard this last one of his enemies go down in a heap
+upon the floor.
+
+And then the detective leaped over him toward the door which he had seen
+during that brief interval of illumination, passed through it, and
+pushed it shut behind him.
+
+He knew now that he was in the front room of the laundry. He knew that
+there should be tables and benches there, and it was only the work of an
+instant for him to reach out and feel around until he seized upon one,
+and then, exerting his great strength, he pulled it over in front of and
+against the door he had closed.
+
+A faint light shone into that room from the street, and Nick instantly
+leaped for the front door of the shop, reaching it only to find that it
+had been locked when the others entered.
+
+But the door was of glass, and, hesitating not an instant, he seized a
+chair and hurled it into the street, thus making a hole through which he
+had no difficulty in passing.
+
+The next instant he was outside, and for the moment, at least, safe. But
+the detective knew that he was by no means free from pursuit as yet,
+although he had no intention of fleeing very far; and, as he was about
+to turn away, he remembered that he had left Chick inside the saloon
+surrounded by rascals of every kind.
+
+It was not in the nature of Nick Carter to desert any one under such
+circumstances, much less his favorite, Chick.
+
+While he hesitated, he heard a noise behind him in the laundry that was
+made by Grinnel and his three followers, attempting to escape from the
+predicament into which he had thrown them.
+
+He remembered then that Grinnel and his men must have come out of the
+dive by the front door or by the hall-door entrance, in order to have
+reached the laundry when they did, and he figured in that instant that
+it was more than likely that in doing so they had not thought to fasten
+the door behind them, or had purposely, perhaps, left it unlocked in
+order that they might be able to return with all the more speed to the
+safety and seclusion of the dive.
+
+He heard them pounding against the door against which he had pulled the
+heavy bench, and he knew that at least three or four minutes must elapse
+before they could make their escape; and in that moment he decided to
+return to the saloon at whatever cost, if it were possible for him to
+get there.
+
+A few quick bounds brought him to the front door of the dive--that door
+which swung so ceaselessly to and fro during the legal hours of its
+business. He knew, although he tried it softly, that it was securely
+locked against him, and he passed on to the hall door of the house,
+which was just beyond it. This, as he had guessed might be the case, was
+not fastened, and he pushed it open and passed beyond it.
+
+He found himself in a hallway in black darkness, and while he paused for
+a moment to listen, not a sound of any kind came to his ears, a fact
+which led him to determine that either Chick had already been done for
+by the frequenters of the dive, or else that he had been made a
+prisoner, and was lying somewhere, bound and gagged, awaiting the return
+of Grinnel.
+
+Nick now crept along the hall until his hand came in contact with a
+balustrade; and here he paused, uncertain whether to proceed through the
+hall to the rear of the building, which he knew should give an entrance
+to the saloon, or to ascend the stairs and temporarily hide himself in
+the neighborhood of the house. Everything considered, this latter course
+was distinctly the best one, since, doubtless, it would never occur to
+Mike Grinnel or to any of those who were concerned with him in this
+incident, that Nick Carter would have the temerity to return to the same
+house from which he had just escaped.
+
+Therefore, if safety were the only incentive for Nick Carter, to act
+upon this was the very best course he could have adopted. But Nick was
+ever one who considered his own safety last. His whole impulse now was
+to do the best that could be done to get Chick out of the predicament
+into which he had been thrust; and he considered that to be the very
+method he had adopted.
+
+Nick knew the characteristics of the people against whom he was pitted
+well enough to understand that the moment they realized that he had
+escaped them they would simply return to the saloon of the dive to
+discuss it--and doubtless, also, to call to severe account those who
+were responsible for the affair.
+
+Such a discussion would not take place until two things had
+happened--until they were satisfied utterly that Nick Carter had escaped
+them, and also that they had Chick so thoroughly in their power that he
+could not hope to escape.
+
+And so the detective ascended the stairs softly, and as silently as a
+shadow. He had no means of knowing, of course, the character of the
+rooms on those floors, or their location; but, nevertheless, the
+circumstances were such that he had to take desperate chances, and
+therefore when he reached the landing he felt with his hands silently
+along the wall until he came to a door, which he felt slowly down until
+he touched the knob. This he turned, trying to open the door which
+resisted him, showing that it was locked.
+
+There is a way to force a door--that is, an ordinary door--and at the
+same time make very little noise. It is done--if the door opens
+inward--by seizing the knob firmly with both hands, having turned it,
+and then by bracing the body with one knee pressed firmly against the
+door directly under the knob. In this position, if it is assumed by a
+strong man, every effort may be centred upon one sudden impulse forward,
+which, while there is no visible or perceptible impact, will place all
+of the muscular force and weight of the man directly upon the point
+where the latch or lock of the door is located; and it is a very
+substantial lock which will not give way under this sort of pressure
+when it is correctly applied. Nor is there any perceptible noise, more
+than that of the tearing out of the slot which holds the bolt of the
+lock.
+
+When this door gave way before the detective it admitted him to a square
+room at the rear of the house--a room in which a lamp, turned low, was
+burning; and as he closed the door behind him and pulled a chair in
+front of it to hold it shut, he saw a figure of a man, who had been
+sleeping fully clothed on a bed in one corner of the room, start to an
+upright posture, staring and apparently alarmed.
+
+"Who----" the man started to exclaim, but the detective interrupted him
+with a sharp command.
+
+"Shut up," he ordered, "if you let out a peep you will be the worse for
+it."
+
+Without a word, the man sank back upon the pillow, apparently not in the
+least alarmed now, and evidently believing that the person who had
+entered his room was only another like himself, who, having gotten into
+some sort of trouble, was fleeing from his pursuers; and by all
+precedents, if the man was pursued to that room, it would be infinitely
+better for its permanent occupant to appear to be still sleeping
+soundly, than to have any of the aspect of a confederate, and so he
+closed his eyes again as if he were still alone.
+
+Nick waited a moment at the door, listening for sounds outside, and
+while he stood there he heard the hall door from the street open, and
+presently close again, and he could distinguish the tramping of feet
+along the hall as several persons passed to the rear of the house,
+evidently on their way to the saloon again.
+
+As soon as these noises had ceased, he knew that he was for the moment
+at least safe from pursuit. He piled other things against the door, and
+then deliberately crossed the room to the lamp and turned it up, after
+which he strode over to the bedside.
+
+"Now, my friend," he said to its occupant, "I'll have to ask you to wake
+up for about three minutes."
+
+"All right," was the simple response. "What do you want? Who are you,
+anyway? And what in blazes do you mean by bursting into my room in this
+way?"
+
+"First," said Nick, "I want to know who you are, and whether you belong
+here or not?"
+
+"Oh, you make me tired," grunted the man on the bed. "I'm Phil, the head
+day bartender downstairs."
+
+"All right, Phil," said Nick, smiling. "Get up on your feet, where I can
+look at you, and where you can answer a few questions for me."
+
+"Oh, what's eating you?" growled the bartender. "I ain't been to bed
+more than an hour. Let me sleep."
+
+Instead of replying, the detective reached out his hand, and, seizing
+Phil by the shoulder, jerked him from the bed to the floor, stood him on
+his feet, and then seated him forcibly upon one of the wooden chairs
+near at hand--so forcibly that his jaws snapped together like the
+cracking of a nut.
+
+"Now, will you be good?" asked Nick, smiling grimly.
+
+"Yes, curse you," was the surly reply. "What do you want?"
+
+"I want to talk to you."
+
+"Well, talk on, can't you? I'm listening. Who are you, anyhow?"
+
+"I'll tell you who I am," answered the detective, "and after I have done
+so, perhaps you will consent to listen to me. I am Nick Carter, the
+detective, and I want to make a little bit of use of you right now,
+Philip."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+
+THE CRIMINAL'S COMPACT.
+
+
+"How long have you been here in this room?" asked the detective sharply.
+
+"I told you about a minute ago," was the surly reply. "About an hour."
+
+"Where were you before you came here?"
+
+"That's none of your infernal business."
+
+"I want to know if you were downstairs in the saloon?"
+
+"No, I wasn't, if that will satisfy you."
+
+"Have you been there at all to-night?"
+
+"Yes, I was there about three hours ago."
+
+"Was Black Madge there when you were there?"
+
+A cunning leer came into the fellow's face before he answered, and then
+he replied by asking another question.
+
+"Who's Black Madge?" he demanded.
+
+"You know well enough who Black Madge is," insisted the detective; "and,
+Phil, if you keep a civil tongue in your head and answer my questions as
+I ask them, it will be all the better for you. If you do not----"
+
+"Well, what then?"
+
+"If you do not, there are several little things connected with your
+career which will make it unpleasant to have the inspector up at
+headquarters question you about."
+
+"Well, I ain't a-goin' to give away anybody downstairs, no matter what
+happens," said the bartender.
+
+"I'm not asking you to give anybody away. I merely asked you to answer
+my questions."
+
+"Well, go ahead and ask them. I will answer them if I can."
+
+"Was Black Madge in the saloon downstairs when you were there?"
+
+"Yes. She was."
+
+"Has she been in the habit of coming here frequently of late?"
+
+"I can't tell you for certain about that. You know, I'm on duty in the
+daytime, and people of her kind come only at night."
+
+"Answer my question," said the detective sternly. "You know the answer
+to it, and you understand that I know you do."
+
+"Well, I guess she's been in most every night for the last week."
+
+"Do you know where she lives?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Do you know any of the gang that is traveling with her?"
+
+"Yes; I guess I know most of that bunch."
+
+"Well, Phil, I want you to tell me their names; every one of them. That
+is, every one that you are certain forms one of her gang."
+
+"There ain't anything certain about it, Carter. I'll tell you that on
+the level. All I know about her and her gang is guesswork. But if I was
+asked to mention them I should say that, judging from appearance, there
+is about eight of them. Besides, Madge has got something up her sleeve,
+but what it is I haven't an idea. It looks to me, though, as if they
+were getting ready to crack some pretty big crib, and make the haul of
+their lives. Now, if you're on to that lay, and your only purpose is to
+prevent them doing it, so that I ain't telling you anything that will go
+for putting them behind the bars, I will be on the level and tell you
+all I know."
+
+"You will have to tell me, anyhow, Phil," returned Nick quietly. "If you
+don't do it willingly, I know of more than one way to compel you to do
+it. However, you may rest easy upon the point you have made. I am not at
+the present moment seeking to put any of them behind the bars; only
+Black Madge herself. She has got to go there, whether you talk to me or
+not."
+
+"Well," said the bartender, "she don't cut any ice with me, anyhow.
+She's too stuck up for my kind."
+
+"All right," said Nick; "tell me the names of those eight men."
+
+"There's Slippery Al, Surly Bob, Gentleman Jim, Fly Cummings, Joe
+Cuthbert, Eugene Maxwell, and The Parson. Oh, and there's Scar-faced
+Johnny; I forgot him. Now, I'll leave it to you, Carter, if that ain't a
+likely bunch."
+
+"And they were all in the room downstairs to-night," murmured the
+detective meditatively.
+
+"What!" exclaimed the bartender in astonishment, "do you mean to say
+that you have been inside that saloon to-night?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+"Would you mind telling me how you got there?"
+
+"Never mind all that, Phil. That is not what I am here for--to explain
+things to you. Do you know where Black Madge lives, or where she can be
+found besides in this saloon?"
+
+"I don't know anything about her more than I've told you."
+
+The detective looked around the room for a moment, and discovered that
+one of its articles of furniture was a tall, old-fashioned pier glass,
+which reflected the full length of a person who stood before it. Then he
+turned around and commanded the bartender to stand on his feet, studied
+his appearance carefully, and then he shook his head.
+
+"It won't do," he muttered.
+
+"What won't do?" asked Phil.
+
+"I was considering the possibility of making myself up in your likeness,
+and of venturing in that disguise to go to the saloon," replied the
+detective.
+
+"What! right now?" asked Phil.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you don't think you could do it, eh?"
+
+"No, Phil. You're too tall and too big. I never could make myself up to
+look like you in the world. I will have to think of some other way."
+
+Phil was thoughtful for a moment, while the detective was absorbed in
+his own study of the situation, and then he looked up suddenly and
+exclaimed:
+
+"Why don't you send me downstairs for you?"
+
+"Because," replied Nick, "the moment you got there you would call up the
+whole gang, and have them up here after me inside of a minute."
+
+"I wouldn't, either, Carter. Not if I agreed not to."
+
+"I can't trust you, Phil."
+
+Again that cunning leer came into the dissipated face of the bartender,
+and he said quickly:
+
+"You can trust me, if you pay me enough for it."
+
+"A bribed man is usually the first to betray," said Nick.
+
+"Not if the bribe is big enough, Carter."
+
+"Do you mean to say that I can trust you to go down into the saloon and
+to come back here presently and tell me exactly what the situation is?"
+
+"You can, if you pay me enough. I told you that before."
+
+"It isn't the question of pay, Phil; that is, the amount of pay. I would
+be willing to give you almost anything if I thought you would perform
+exactly what I want done, and return to me with the information I
+desire, without saying or doing anything to betray my presence here."
+
+"Well, I'm your huckleberry, if you want me to do it. All you've got to
+do on your part is to cough up the dough."
+
+The detective, who always went well supplied with funds, took a roll of
+bills from his pocket, and slowly counted out one hundred dollars,
+which, without a word, he handed to the bartender.
+
+"I am going to take you at your word, Phil," he said slowly, "and that
+is the first installment only of what I shall give you if you perform
+the service well and thoroughly, and do exactly as I instruct you to do,
+no more, and no less."
+
+"And if I do it all as you tell me to do, how much more do I get?"
+
+"Listen, and I will tell you."
+
+"I'm listening, you bet your life."
+
+"I came here to-night, Phil, with my first assistant, Chick; he is
+downstairs somewhere now, probably bound and gagged and thrown under a
+table, or behind the bar, or locked up in a closet. I want you to go
+down there, and find out exactly what has become of Chick, and what has
+happened to him. I want you to pick up all the information you can about
+what has happened there to-night--that is, what they are saying about
+it. You will have to remain there perhaps half an hour to accomplish
+this, and all of that time you must be extremely careful not to let it
+appear that you know anything about me at all."
+
+"Well, and after that, what am I to do?"
+
+"When you know what has become of Chick, and where he is now, figure out
+the best way in which we can set him at liberty at once, or, if you can
+manage to do it before you return to me, do it. If you succeed in
+setting him at liberty yourself within the next half hour, I will,
+before the sun goes down to-morrow, give you nine hundred dollars more,
+and that will be a pretty good nest egg for you, Phil."
+
+"I'll do the job, you needn't fret."
+
+"Wait, there is another thing."
+
+"Well, sir?"
+
+"If you find that you cannot liberate him yourself without assistance,
+you are to return to me at once, and we will plan together how it can
+best be accomplished. When we have done that, if through your aid I
+succeed in getting Chick safely away from here, you shall have the nine
+hundred plunks extra just the same."
+
+"On the level, Carter?"
+
+"Yes, on the level, Phil. I mean every word I say."
+
+"Well, I'm the huckleberry that can do it."
+
+"Wait, Phil, before you start, there is one more thing still."
+
+"What! another?"
+
+"Yes. This. After we have gotten safely out of this pickle, and the
+place has quieted down, it will be up to you to find out for me where
+Black Madge hangs up her clothes. It is important, Phil, that I should
+get that woman back into the prison where she belongs."
+
+"I ain't no stool pigeon," grumbled the bartender.
+
+"Neither am I asking you to be a stool pigeon," said the detective.
+"What I want you to do is simple enough. I am not laying any plans
+against any of the regular frequenters of this place. It's only Black
+Madge I want, and you have confessed already that you don't like her.
+Now, it's up to you if you want to go through this whole job, and do it
+right. And, Phil, if you will stick to me and see the whole game through
+the way I have outlined it to you, another thousand goes with the first
+one."
+
+"Geewhiz! do you mean that?"
+
+"I certainly do."
+
+"Well, then, I'm game for the whole layout, and I will see it through to
+the end, but I don't want you to forget, Carter, that, if anything ever
+comes of it so that my part in this business is found out by any one of
+that crowd down there now, male or female, I wouldn't give a snap for
+my chances of being alive twenty-four hours afterward."
+
+"They won't find it out through me," said the detective. "If they find
+it out at all it will be through you. And there's one thing more you
+must remember, Phil, and that is if you betray me you will be in a whole
+lot worse fix than you would be if your friends downstairs discover your
+treachery. For if you do betray me, I will never let up on you, Phil,
+until I see you behind the bars for a term of years that will make you
+an old man before you come out again."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+
+THE GLARE OF A MATCH.
+
+
+When the bartender had taken his departure, Nick found a cigar in one of
+his pockets, and seated himself to smoke quietly until Phil should
+return. But when more than half an hour later the cigar was consumed,
+and he had thrown it aside, he began to feel a sense of uneasiness that
+the man should be gone so long a time.
+
+However, he realized that it was no easy task that Phil had undertaken,
+and that he might well occupy an hour or more in accomplishing it.
+
+He had no more cigars to smoke, but he seated himself resolutely in a
+chair, determined to wait with patience until his messenger should
+return.
+
+There was a small clock, ticking away merrily on the mantel, at the far
+end of the room, and the detective watched it while the minute hand
+worked its way slowly around the dial, until an hour, then an hour and a
+quarter, and, finally, an hour and twenty minutes had elapsed since the
+departure of the bartender.
+
+His impatience was now so great, and his natural distrust of the
+confederate he had employed was so prominent in his mind that he left
+his chair, having first extinguished the light, and, going to the door,
+opened it softly and peered outside.
+
+The hallway was in utter darkness, the same as when he was there last,
+and, although he listened intently, he could not hear the suggestion of
+a sound from the lower regions of the house. After waiting a few moments
+longer, he tiptoed forward cautiously to the stairs, and descended them,
+being careful to step as closely as possible to the spindles of the
+balustrade, in order that they might not creak beneath his weight, and
+thus alarm others in the house. In this way he gained the lower floor.
+
+Nick was somewhat handicapped without his flash light, but he remembered
+quite distinctly the location of the sound he had heard two hours
+earlier, when the party from the laundry had followed him in, and passed
+through the hallway to a rear door. Now he sought that door by following
+carefully along the wall until he came to it.
+
+But, although he searched diligently for many minutes, he could not find
+so much as a suggestion of a door anywhere.
+
+He remembered then that in all probability there was no perceptible door
+at all; that the door which was there somewhere was concealed in the
+wainscoting in some way, or otherwise hidden from casual observation. To
+have maintained a door of entrance to the saloon from that hallway would
+have rendered it entirely unnecessary for Grinnel to keep up his
+private entrance to the saloon from the other street. Nick's only method
+of finding it now was to light a match, and this he hesitated to do, not
+knowing what warning its glare might convey to others.
+
+But there was no alternative, and presently he began his search by
+lighting matches one after another, permitting them to flare up
+sufficiently for a moment's vision, and then throwing them quickly to
+the floor, after the manner adopted by burglars when they were engaged
+in robbing a house before the pocket flash light was invented.
+
+He was not long in discovering the entrance he sought. The walls along
+the hallway were not plastered; they were merely built up with matched
+boards, which had stood there unpainted for so long a time that they had
+achieved a veneer of filth and dirt which made them look, in the flare
+of the match, like mahogany.
+
+But he could easily see where there was a keyhole cut into one of these
+boards, and, although around it there was no other evidence of a door,
+he knew that if he could turn the tumblers in that lock it would be
+revealed to him.
+
+He went to work with his picklock, and, as he supposed, the instant the
+bolt of the lock was shot back the door opened easily and noiselessly in
+his grasp, and from beyond it he could at once hear the murmur of
+distant voices; also very far ahead of him, and beneath what was
+evidently another door, he could perceive a gleam of light.
+
+He stepped through, and closed it after him, but, realizing that it was
+more than likely that he might wish to leave in a hurry, he left it
+unlocked.
+
+And now he tiptoed forward to the door beneath which the light shone,
+and, getting upon his hands and knees, held his ear down where he could
+hear with more distinctness.
+
+The effect was almost the same as if he were inside the saloon.
+Strangely enough, also, it was Madge's voice that came to him first, for
+it appeared that she was seated near that very door, and by the answers
+that were returned to her, Nick knew that no less a person than Mike
+Grinnel himself was her companion. And they were speaking in low tones,
+but, nevertheless, every word they uttered could be heard distinctly by
+the detective.
+
+It was in the midst of their conversation, evidently, that Nick began to
+listen, and Madge was saying:
+
+"I swore then, Mike, that I would be even with him, and that if I ever
+succeeded in getting out of that prison where he put me I would never
+rest another minute until Nick Carter was placed beyond the power of
+injuring anybody."
+
+"You bit off a little more than you could chew, didn't you, Madge?"
+asked Mike Grinnel, in his slow, even voice, in which he never permitted
+a sign of emotion.
+
+"No, I didn't," she retorted. "I made some mistakes, maybe. I shouldn't,
+for instance, have written him the letter I did."
+
+"What was the letter, Madge?"
+
+"Like a fool I wrote him a threatening letter, in which I told him to
+look out for me. That was my vanity, I suppose. I wanted him to know
+that I was on his track. I wanted to worry him; to give him something to
+think of, and a lot of things to look out for."
+
+"Well, what then, Madge?"
+
+"It was then, Mike, that I began to get the guns together, Slippery Al,
+and Gentleman Jim, and the others, and, of course, I made this place our
+headquarters."
+
+"That, Madge, is just what you shouldn't have done. That's what I'm
+finding fault with you about now.
+
+"Well," she said, "it's done, and it can't be helped; and Nick Carter
+has been here, and he's gotten away again; but, all the same, we've got
+Chick in our power, and if I do to him as I feel like doing now, he will
+regret the day that he ever took my trail."
+
+"If you leave him where he is now, Madge, he'll do that," said Grinnel,
+laughing softly.
+
+"Why, what would happen to him there?" she demanded quickly.
+
+"For one thing the rats would probably eat him up before very long, and
+it wouldn't be the first meal of that kind they've had down there,
+either."
+
+"You didn't tell me where you put him," said Madge.
+
+"I don't tell anybody exactly where that place is, Madge. It's a little
+hole that I've dug out underneath the cellar of this house; if it was
+anywhere in the old country it would be called a dungeon; as it is, I
+call it the grave--people who go there have a habit of never coming out
+again."
+
+The detective was anxious to know what had become of Phil, the
+bartender. It was evident that the man had done nothing to betray the
+detective, since these two were talking so quietly just inside the door
+where Nick was listening.
+
+The next words, while they did not exactly reassure him, made him think
+that, after all, the bartender might be carrying out his contract by
+attempting to set Chick at liberty himself.
+
+"Is that where you sent Phil a few moments ago?" she asked. "Down there
+to the dungeon where you put Chick?"
+
+The detective could hear Grinnel chuckle and then reply:
+
+"Yes, Madge, I sent him down there to fasten the young fellow up, so
+that there would be no chance of his getting loose. You see, he was
+senseless when we chucked him in there, and I forgot to make him fast,
+as a sailor would say, but there are staples in the wall down there, and
+there are chains fastened to those staples, and there are nice little
+steel bracelets at the end of those chains, that fit beautifully around
+a man's ankles. I sent Phil down to lock them fast."
+
+"I thought nobody knew where that place was except yourself," said Madge
+quickly.
+
+"Oh, Phil's all right. I have to have some confidence in my men here, or
+I couldn't run the place."
+
+"All the same," the detective heard her murmur, "I'd rather you had left
+Chick to me. They're a slippery lot, those detectives, and I shall be
+uneasy----"
+
+The detective heard no more of what was said, for at that instant he was
+greatly startled by hearing a sound behind him, and evidently beneath
+him, the consequence being that he paid no further attention to the
+conversation beyond the door.
+
+Indeed, he drew back away from it, and softly rose to his feet, in order
+that he might be thoroughly prepared for anything that should happen;
+and while he stood there he was conscious of a cold, damp draught of air
+blown into his face--air that smelled as if it might come from the
+cellar--and he was somehow conscious that a trapdoor had been lifted,
+while the next moment he was aware that somebody was climbing through
+it into that narrow hallway--somebody who was not more than ten or
+twelve feet away from him. How he had wished for his little flash light
+then.
+
+Once he imagined that he could hear a faint whisper, and a sharp,
+warning hiss for silence immediately following it.
+
+Then it came back to him suddenly, all that he had heard Mike Grinnel
+say to Madge about the dungeon in the house, and the bartender's errand
+to it.
+
+He thought then that the people who had raised themselves through the
+trap--and he was sure that there were two of them--must be Phil and
+Chick, the latter having been liberated by the former; and, acting upon
+the impulse of the moment, he struck a match and held it into the faces
+of the two men. The glare of the match shone directly into the face of
+Chick.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII.
+
+BLACK MADGE CAUGHT IN A TRAP.
+
+
+But the flaring up of the match also developed another rather startling
+fact, and that was the presence of Curly, who, with the bartender, Phil,
+was standing directly behind Chick.
+
+The light also discovered Nick Carter to the others, as it discovered
+them to him, and, although it burned but a moment, it was a revelation
+to all the parties concerned. It was Phil, the bartender, who acted more
+quickly than the others in this somewhat confusing moment of the
+encounter, for, with admirable presence of mind, he stepped quickly
+forward, and, reaching out his hands, managed to pull the others toward
+him until their heads were so close together that the faintest whisper
+could be heard, and then he said:
+
+"Follow me along the corridor into the front hall. We can talk there."
+
+They did so, and presently they stood together in the front hallway
+beside the stairs beyond the hidden doorway which Nick had discovered.
+And, during the time they occupied in getting to this point, Nick, who
+realized that the disguise he wore was no longer of any importance,
+busily engaged himself in removing it, or, at least, the facial part of
+it, so that, although in the dark they could not see him, he had
+restored himself, nevertheless, to his proper person.
+
+"Now, Curly," said the detective, "tell me what this all means. I don't
+understand it at all."
+
+"Let me talk," interrupted Phil. "It's this way, Carter: When you
+escaped from the barroom through the little door into the boss' sanctum,
+you had no sooner gone than Grinnel switched on the lights again, and
+your absence was discovered. Then it was that the whole bunch lit on to
+Curly and Chick here, with both feet, downed them, trussed them up, and
+when Chick was taken to the cellar below, to feed the rats, if he had
+been left there long enough, Curly was fired along with him. I tell you,
+right now, Carter, it's all up with Curly in this place. He never can
+make himself good with this bunch again as long as he lives, and it's up
+to him to light out now, for good and all, unless he wants to turn up
+his toes and go to the morgue."
+
+The detective turned to Curly again, and once more struck a match so
+that they could all see the faces of one another.
+
+"Is that straight, Curly?" he asked.
+
+"That's about the size of it, Mr. Carter."
+
+"Then," said Nick, "am I to understand that the occurrences of this
+evening have released me from my promise to you to make no arrests in
+this place, or any arrest of any one who is now in this place within
+twenty-four hours?"
+
+"Yes, sir, the promise is all off. You can do as you've a mind to. It
+would suit me to a T if you would gather in the whole push."
+
+"Thank you, Curly," said Nick. "That statement of yours lets me out of a
+peck of trouble, for having given the promise, of course I would not
+break it, and I could not quite see how we could carry this thing
+through to a finish without."
+
+He was silent for a moment after that, and then he asked:
+
+"Can I rely upon you, Curly, to stand by me through what is to come?"
+
+"To the last ditch, Mr. Carter," was the emphatic response.
+
+"And you, Phil--what about you?"
+
+"Well," was the slow reply, for the man was evidently considering his
+words with very great care, "I guess my usefulness in this place is just
+about over. When the boss finds out that Curly and Chick have both
+gotten out of the dungeon below, he will know mighty well who it was
+that let them out, and that will mean yours truly for the dead wagon in
+about fifteen minutes; so I think, Carter, that I'd better tie up to you
+while I've got the chance. I am not a crook myself, and never have been
+one, although I have consorted with them, and been companions with them
+for a good many years."
+
+"And will you see the thing through to the finish, Phil?" asked Nick
+again.
+
+"I will do just as Curly said he would do. I'll stand by you to the last
+ditch."
+
+"Are you all ready to obey my orders, exactly as I shall give them?"
+asked Nick again, slowly.
+
+"We are," came the unanimous response.
+
+"In this case," said the detective, "I am going to make a desperate
+effort to find out what a bold stroke will do, and here is my plan: We
+will go back together to that door before which I was standing a moment
+ago, which, I conclude, from its character, is rather a flimsy----"
+
+"It is that," said Phil.
+
+"And after we get there we will stand silently for a moment, each one of
+you preparing for the signal which I shall give. When I say, 'Now,' I
+will throw myself against the door, and burst it open, and as I do so,
+and leap into the room, you three are to follow me, one after the other,
+as quickly as possible.
+
+"You, Phil, will make directly for the electric switch, and you will see
+to it, no matter what happens, that the room is not plunged in darkness.
+
+"You, Curly--by the way, have you any weapons about you?"
+
+"I have got two guns in my pocket, all right."
+
+"Very well; you, Curly, the moment you get into the room, will draw your
+two guns, and level them at the crowd.
+
+"After that all you have to do is to follow the lead of Chick and
+myself, and protect yourselves until the fight is over--if there is a
+fight."
+
+"I reckon I can do that, too, Mr. Carter," said Curly.
+
+"I haven't a doubt of it, Curly. I want you to remember not to shoot too
+quick, and under no circumstances to shoot to kill, unless it is
+absolutely necessary; as a matter of fact, I don't expect that we will
+have much trouble, for when they see us in the room, fully armed, and
+hear the first words that I shall utter, I think we will have no
+difficulty in carrying our point."
+
+There was nothing more said then, and Nick turned away, and led them
+quickly back again to the door, near which he had heard the conversation
+between Black Madge and Mike Grinnel.
+
+For a moment they stood there, waiting to get their breath, and to
+prepare their muscles and sinews and nerves for the ordeal to which they
+were about to be put; and then from the detective came a low and
+emphatic--"Now!"
+
+The instant that the detective shouted out this word, he plunged
+forward, throwing his shoulder heavily against the flimsy door, already
+mentioned, so that it was burst from its lock and from its hinges at
+the same time, and was sent flying halfway across the room.
+
+But even before the clatter which followed the crash had subsided, Nick
+Carter, with a pistol in either hand, had leaped across the threshold,
+and with one more bound arrived at the spot directly beside Mike
+Grinnel.
+
+Turning the weapon about while he approached, he brought the butt of it
+down, with a resounding whack, upon Grinnel's skull, sending him
+tumbling to the floor, and then he straightened up, with both arms
+extended, and the muzzles of his pistols wavering from form to form of
+the astonished throng in the room, and he cried out:
+
+"Hands up, every one of you. I am here after just one person. The rest
+of you I don't want, unless somebody interferes with me, and if you do
+interfere there are enough outside of this house, without doubt, to take
+you all in."
+
+When he leaped across the threshold, the others followed him, as he had
+directed, and, having already cautioned Chick in a whisper to look out
+for Madge, and feeling sure that the others would do their respective
+duties, as he had directed, Nick had no fear whatever of the result.
+
+A collection of criminals assembled as these were are always glad to
+hear that there is only one among them who is "wanted," for each one
+seems instinctively to know that he is not "it." And Nick Carter knew
+the criminal class so well that he was certain that this announcement
+would prevent any immediate attack upon him by the twenty or thirty men
+who were gathered there.
+
+Having heard this statement, and having, also, taken due notice of his
+suggestion that there were plenty of reenforcements outside the
+building, although it will be remembered that the detective had not
+explained how far outside they were, and remembering that a considerable
+time had elapsed since Nick Carter left that room before, they were one
+and all willing to wait a moment before beginning what might be an
+unnecessary attack, which would be sure to send many of them to prison
+before it was over. And so they waited, casting furtive glances at one
+another, many of them with their hands upon their weapons, and all of
+them ready to fight, if need be, but quite as ready to avoid a fight, if
+it were policy to do so.
+
+"Now, listen to me," said Nick Carter. "I came here to-night to get
+Black Madge, and I know by the sounds I have heard behind me since I
+entered the room just now that she has got a pair of bracelets on her
+that she doesn't like to wear. I am going to take her away with me, and
+she is going to be sent back to the prison from which she escaped, and
+if there is anybody in this crowd that interferes with me, or offers to
+do so, it will be very much the worse for that person.
+
+"On the other hand, if I am not interfered with, we shall go away
+quietly with Madge, and what the rest of you may do after that does not
+concern me. You have my word for it, and you all know that when Nick
+Carter gives his word, he keeps it. Now, answer me, somebody, and let
+him speak for all. Does what I say go?"
+
+A voice from the far end of the room replied instantly:
+
+"I say it goes, for one."
+
+"Then answer, all of you," said the detective.
+
+"It goes. You bet it goes."
+
+In their eagerness to answer his request, they came near to all shouting
+at once.
+
+"Thank you," said Nick, smiling. "Now, I have one more word to say, and
+then we will take our departure. There are eight men here whose names I
+will call, and I want them each to take this as a warning from me. They
+are Scar-faced Johnny; a man called Slippery Al; Surly Bob, whose career
+I know; Gentleman Jim, who, for the good of his health, ought to take a
+vacation on the other side of the ocean; Joe Cuthbert; Eugene Maxwell;
+Fly Cummings; and, last, but not least, is the man who is known as The
+Parson, and that same Parson had better get himself out of New York as
+quickly as possible.
+
+"I am speaking now to those eight whose names I have mentioned. I know
+that you have all joined in with an organization created by Black Madge.
+I know, or think I know, the purpose of that organization. I will give
+all of you twenty-four hours to get out of the city of New York, and if
+any one of you is found inside of the limits of the city after that
+time, look out for squalls."
+
+There was a low murmur around the room following upon this speech by the
+detective, but whether in protest or approbation, the detective did not
+concern himself to discover.
+
+With calm deliberation, he turned his back upon them all, and motioned
+to Chick, who had Madge securely handcuffed to his own wrist, to precede
+him through the door.
+
+Then he motioned to Curly and to Phil to pass through it also.
+
+And, then, stepping himself to the door, he turned about upon the
+threshold, and faced the crowd once more.
+
+"One last word to you all," he said. "He among you who hurts Curly John,
+or Phil, the bartender, for this night's work, or attempts to do so,
+hurts me. I bid you good night."
+
+It is only necessary to add that, within forty-eight hours of that time,
+Black Madge found herself again in the prison of that State for which
+she had expressed such abounding contempt, and that, at her trial, which
+followed soon after, she was sentenced to serve ten years in the State
+prison, where she is at this day.
+
+
+THE END
+
+
+"The Temple of Vice" is the title of New Magnet
+Series No. 1223, by Nicholas Carter. It is a story
+that will thrill you throughout its reading.
+
+
+
+
+NICK CARTER STORIES
+
+New Magnet Library
+
+Not a Dull Book in This List
+
+ALL BY NICHOLAS CARTER
+
+
+Nick Carter stands for an interesting detective story. The fact that the
+books in this line are so uniformly good is entirely due to the work of
+a specialist. The man who wrote these stories produced no other type of
+fiction. His mind was concentrated upon the creation of new plots and
+situations in which his hero emerged triumphantly from all sorts of
+troubles and landed the criminal just where he should be--behind the
+bars.
+
+The author of these stories knew more about writing detective stories
+than any other single person.
+
+Following is a list of the best Nick Carter stories. They have been
+selected with extreme care, and we unhesitatingly recommend each of them
+as being fully as interesting as any detective story between cloth
+covers which sells at ten times the price.
+
+If you do not know Nick Carter, buy a copy of any of the New Magnet
+Library books, and get acquainted. He will surprise and delight you.
+
+_ALL TITLES ALWAYS IN PRINT_
+
+901--A Weird Treasure
+902--The Middle Link
+903--To the Ends of the Earth
+904--When Honors Pall
+905--The Yellow Brand
+906--A New Serpent in Eden
+907--When Brave Men Tremble
+908--A Test of Courage
+909--Where Peril Beckons
+910--The Gargoni Girdle
+911--Rascals & Co.
+912--Too Late to Talk
+913--Satan's Apt Pupil
+914--The Girl Prisoner
+915--The Danger of Folly
+916--One Shipwreck Too Many
+917--Scourged by Fear
+918--The Red Plague
+919--Scoundrels Rampant
+920--From Clew to Clew
+921--When Rogues Conspire
+922--Twelve in a Grave
+923--The Great Opium Case
+924--A Conspiracy of Rumors
+925--A Klondike Claim
+926--The Evil Formula
+927--The Man of Many Faces
+928--The Great Enigma
+929--The Burden of Proof
+930--The Stolen Brain
+931--A Titled Counterfeiter
+932--The Magic Necklace
+933--'Round the World for a Quarter
+934--Over the Edge of the World
+935--In the Grip of Fate
+936--The Case of Many Clews
+937--The Sealed Door
+938--Nick Carter and the Green Goods Men
+939--The Man Without a Will
+940--Tracked Across the Atlantic
+941--A Clew from the Unknown
+942--The Crime of a Countess
+943--A Mixed-up Mess
+944--The Great Money-order Swindle
+945--The Adder's Brood
+946--A Wall Street Haul
+947--For a Pawned Crown
+948--Sealed Orders
+949--The Hate that Kills
+950--The American Marquis
+951--The Needy Nine
+952--Fighting Against Millions
+953--Outlaws of the Blue
+954--The Old Detective's Pupil
+955--Found in the Jungle
+956--The Mysterious Mail Robbery
+957--Broken Bars
+958--A Fair Criminal
+959--Won by Magic
+960--The Piano Box Mystery
+961--The Man They Held Back
+962--A Millionaire Partner
+963--A Pressing Peril
+964--An Australian Klondike
+965--The Sultan's Pearls
+966--The Double Shuffle Club
+967--Paying the Price
+968--A Woman's Hand
+969--A Network of Crime
+970--At Thompson's Ranch
+971--The Crossed Needles
+972--The Diamond Mine Case
+973--Blood Will Tell
+974--An Accidental Password
+975--The Crook's Double
+976--Two Plus Two
+977--The Yellow Label
+978--The Clever Celestial
+979--The Amphitheater Plot
+980--Gideon Drexel's Millions
+981--Death in Life
+982--A Stolen Identity
+983--Evidence by Telephone
+984--The Twelve Tin Boxes
+985--Clew Against Clew
+986--Lady Velvet
+987--Playing a Bold Game
+988--A Dead Man's Grip
+989--Snarled Identities
+990--A Deposit Vault Puzzle
+991--The Crescent Brotherhood
+992--The Stolen Pay Train
+993--The Sea Fox
+994--Wanted by Two Clients
+995--The Van Alstine Case
+996--Check No. 777
+997--Partners in Peril
+998--Nick Carter's Clever Protege
+999--The Sign of the Crossed Knives
+1000--The Man Who Vanished
+1001--A Battle for the Right
+1002--A Game of Craft
+1003--Nick Carter's Retainer
+1004--Caught in the Toils
+1005--A Broken Bond
+1006--The Crime of the French Cafe
+1007--The Man Who Stole Millions
+1008--The Twelve Wise Men
+1009--Hidden Foes
+1010--A Gamblers' Syndicate
+1011--A Chance Discovery
+1012--Among the Counterfeiters
+1013--A Threefold Disappearance
+1014--At Odds with Scotland Yard
+1015--A Princess of Crime
+1016--Found on the Beach
+1017--A Spinner of Death
+1018--The Detective's Pretty Neighbor
+1019--A Bogus Clew
+1020--The Puzzle of Five Pistols
+1021--The Secret of the Marble Mantel
+1022--A Bite of an Apple
+1023--A Triple Crime
+1024--The Stolen Race Horse
+1025--Wildfire
+1026--A Herald Personal
+1027--The Finger of Suspicion
+1028--The Crimson Clew
+1029--Nick Carter Down East
+1030--The Chain of Clews
+1031--A Victim of Circumstances
+1032--Brought to Bay
+1033--The Dynamite Trap
+1034--A Scrap of Black Lace
+1035--The Woman of Evil
+1036--A Legacy of Hate
+1037--A Trusted Rogue
+1038--Man Against Man
+1039--The Demons of the Night
+1040--The Brotherhood of Death
+1041--At the Knife's Point
+1042--A Cry for Help
+1043--A Stroke of Policy
+1044--Hounded to Death
+1045--A Bargain in Crime
+1046--The Fatal Prescription
+1047--The Man of Iron
+1048--An Amazing Scoundrel
+1049--The Chain of Evidence
+1050--Paid with Death
+1051--A Fight for a Throne
+1052--The Woman of Steel
+1053--The Seal of Death
+1054--The Human Fiend
+1055--A Desperate Chance
+1056--A Chase in the Dark
+1057--The Snare and the Game
+1058--The Murray Hill Mystery
+1059--Nick Carter's Close Call
+1060--The Missing Cotton King
+1061--A Game of Plots
+1062--The Prince of Liars
+1063--The Man at the Window
+1064--The Red League
+1065--The Price of a Secret
+1066--The Worst Case on Record
+1067--From Peril to Peril
+1068--The Seal of Silence
+1069--Nick Carter's Chinese Puzzle
+1070--A Blackmailer's Bluff
+1071--Heard in the Dark
+1072--A Checkmated Scoundrel
+1073--The Cashier's Secret
+1074--Behind a Mask
+
+
+
+
+READ
+
+When you want real recreation in your leisure hours, read! Read the
+STREET & SMITH NOVELS!
+
+They are the cheapest and most interesting reading matter published in
+America to-day. No jazz--no sex--just big, clean, interesting books.
+There are hundreds of different titles, among which you will find a lot
+of exactly the sort of reading you want.
+
+So, when you get tired of rolling around in your Lady Lizzie or
+listening to the blah-blah of your radio, hie yourself to the nearest
+news dealer, grab off a copy of a good detective, adventure or love
+story, and then READ!
+
+Read the STREET & SMITH NOVELS. Catalogue sent upon request.
+
+Street & Smith Corporation
+79 Seventh Avenue   New York City
+
+Printed in the U. S. A.
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber's Note: The original edition of this work did not contain a
+table of contents. A table of contents has been created for this
+electronic edition.
+
+The advertisement containing a list of other Nick Carter stories has
+been moved from the front of the book to the back.
+
+The following typographical errors present in the original edition have
+been corrected.
+
+In Chapter II, a period was changed to a comma after "who he was".
+
+In Chapter V, a missing period was added after "take me into the fold"
+and after "near the tracks".
+
+In Chapter VII, "dregs in you coffee cup" was changed to "dregs in your
+coffee cup".
+
+In Chapter XIII, "she heard Madge inquire" was changed to "he heard
+Madge inquire".
+
+In Chapter XIV, "lying at full lngth" was changed to "lying at full
+length".
+
+In Chapter XVI, "He rose stifly" was changed to "He rose stiffly".
+
+In Chapter XIX, a missing quotation mark was added before "but he sent a
+bullet after me".
+
+In Chapter XXII, "that wake of life" was changed to "that walk of life".
+
+In Chapter XXVI, a missing period was added after "too stuck up for my
+kind".
+
+No other changes have been made to the original text.]
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman at Bay, by Nicholas Carter
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN AT BAY ***
+
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+
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+will be renamed.
+
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+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
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