“Where shall we hide the money?” asked Minna, nervously.
“It doesn’t matter,” and Wise’s face set sternly. “He will never get as far as the money.”
Hating his job, but fully alive to the justice and necessity of it, Wise set his trap that night.
It was a real trap, and was set up in the kitchen in such a position that it faced the cellar door. It consisted of a short-barreled shotgun which was mounted on an improvised gun carriage, made of a strong packing box.
This contrivance was fastened carefully to the kitchen wall about twelve feet in front of the cellar door, and when the door should be opened, the trap would be sprung and the shotgun discharged.
A steel spring fastened to the trigger, and a strong cord running to a pulley in the ceiling, thence to another, and finally to a pulley in the floor, and on to the door knob completed the deadly mechanism.
The tension of the spring was so carefully adjusted that an intruder might open the door a foot or more before the strain was carried to the trigger. This insured a sure aim and a clear shot.
Wise tested his trap thoroughly, and finally, with a grim nod of his head, declared it was all right.
He had sent the servants and the women-folks to bed, before beginning his work, and now he and Doctor Varian seated themselves in the library to await developments.
“As I said,” Wise remarked, “‘Stephen’ may not come at all, he may send an accomplice. Yet this I expect the most surely,—he will come himself.”