"This, then, was a put-up job?"
"That's about the size of it."
"That runaway and injury to yourself that the papers speak about was only a blind?"
"Only a blind, my dear Keene."
The villain smiled and stroked his mustache complacently. "I don't mind telling you, seeing you're not likely to give me any further trouble, that I shall marry the heiress to the Alstine estates and quit the precarious work that I have all along been following, and hereafter live a gentleman."
"Indeed!"
The detective could not help admiring the villain's coolness, even while despising his villainy.
"You congratulate me on my plan?"
"No. You cannot carry it out."
"And why not, pray? You won't be there to interfere, Mr. Keene. I have provided against such a contingency."