“I see.”
“Now, to go a step further, the man who held up McLauren was one of the gang,” Nick continued. “He was, in reality, the chief of the gang. He is the same man who followed Frank Gilbert to Boston, and who so artfully had the three cases put near the door of the freight car, and afterward succeeded in getting a forged copy of the bill of lading. He is a keen and clever rascal. He is all the mustard in the pot, that fellow.”
“You speak as if you already know him,” said Chick, gazing.
“I do know him, Chick.”
“The dickens! Whom do you suspect?”
“A man who stopped me in Madison Avenue a few days ago,” Nick declared, with more feeling. “It was the first time I have seen him for a couple of years. He cursed me for having put him to the bad, and he threatened me with something no less strange than—the melting pot.”
“The melting pot?” Chick echoed perplexedly. “What did he mean?”
“That’s right, too. What?” questioned Patsy.
Nick Carter laughed a bit grimly.
“I did not know what he meant at the time, nor seriously care,” he replied, after a moment. “I now know, however, what he meant by the melting pot. He threatened to put something over on me and send me all to the bad. It now is plain enough to me that he had this robbery in mind, and the job well in hand.”