“Whose is it?”
“It’s owned by a man named Barker, Colonel Morgan Barker, but he’s in Europe with his family. The house hasn’t been open for a year.”
Nick remembered the man and the place, also the Barker tomb, in which Mortimer Deland had temporarily concealed the art treasures stolen from Rudolph Strickland’s flat in Fifth Avenue, and from which gruesome confinement Nick had rescued Patsy Garvan on the night of the round-up.
No additional evidence was needed to convince him that he had hit the nail on the head, that Pauline Perrot and Mortimer Deland were one and the same, and that this notorious European crook was back of the knavery then in progress.
“It’s dollars to doughnuts, now, that the rascal has taken secret possession of Barker’s unoccupied house,” Nick said to himself. “It’s the old Barker homestead, and sufficiently isolated to serve Deland admirably for such a job. He knew all about it, too, and that he would ordinarily be safe from intruders. I’ll butt in on him, now, in a way he’ll not fancy.”
The last scarce had crossed Nick’s mind when they emerged into the cleared land back of the large old country house, stable, and outbuildings.
Ginger was still tugging on the leash and leading the way between the buildings and toward the rear of the fine old dwelling.
Not a word now came from Henley.
Nick glanced sharply at the house while they approached it. Shutters protected all of the lower windows. The curtains at those on the upper floors were closely drawn. The surrounding grounds, an eighth of a mile from the nearest road, shut in by the trees of an extensive park, were entirely deserted and running to rank grass and weeds.
When within ten yards of the rear door, toward which the hound was heading, Nick said abruptly: