“Undoubtedly,” said Nick. “Deland is an expert penman. We long have known that. He is wanted in Paris for forging the signature of the prefect of police, a trick by which he escaped from brief custody.”
“Also the letter sent to Miss Strickland?”
“A forgery, Chick, surely.”
“You may be right, by Jove, though it seems almost incredible,” said Chick.
“We shall find I am right,” replied the detective confidently.[Pg 23]
“My money goes on that, chief,” declared Patsy.
“But what’s the game, aside from the robbery?” Chick questioned, pointing to the bloodstained articles. “What’s the meaning of these?”
“That’s what we must discover, as well as the present whereabouts of Deland and his confederates,” said Nick. “Arthur Gordon undoubtedly is a prisoner in their clutches. He knows nothing about the robbery, nor about the case, as we now see it.”
“You reason——”
“That he was in some way trapped by the supposed Pauline Perrot, and it’s up to us to discover how,” Nick went on. “This evidence has obviously been planted only to denote that Gordon has killed his supposed female stenographer. Deland’s deeper game is, I suspect, to subsequently bleed wealthy old Rudolph Strickland out of more money, by approaching him in some crafty way with an offer to produce Gordon and positive evidence of his innocence.”