Stuart Floyd had stepped to one side, then walked briskly away without a backward glance, and he was quickly lost to view in the throng of pedestrians then in the avenue.
Nick Carter walked on as if nothing had occurred. The threat did not alarm him. He gave it hardly a second thought.
It was two years since he had seen Stuart Floyd, since he arrested him for complicity in the looting of the Imperial Loan Company by Morris Garland and Moses Hart, its two treacherous managers, the case involving the felonious pawning of Lady Waldmere’s valuable jewels, held by them for collateral.
The prosecution, however, had not ended quite as Nick had expected. Both Garland and Hart were convicted and sent to the State’s prison, where they still were confined.
The two women involved in the abduction of Lady Waldmere, Vera Vantoon and her sister, Leah, were given a year for that part of the crime. It could not be proved, however, that either was involved in the looting of the loan company. They since had served their time and been liberated.
Though Nick Carter was convinced of his guilt, moreover, Stuart Floyd had, with the help of an able criminal lawyer, contrived to slip through the fingers of justice. Both Garland and Hart had sworn that Floyd knew nothing about the looting, that he had acted only as their agent in the handling of the jewels, and that he was entirely ignorant of the abduction of Lady Waldmere.
Nick felt morally sure, however, that Stuart Floyd was back of the whole business, despite the fact that it could not be proved to the satisfaction of the jury that had acquitted him.
Nick was not surprised at Floyd’s subsequent disappearance, for he had posed as a person of character and a popular man about town. The suspicion was one that would not down, however, and the stigma apparently had resulted in his disappearance, though none could say where he had gone. It was with some surprise, therefore, that the detective encountered him that morning.
Nick had not lost sight of Lord Waldmere and his wife in the meantime, and he was an occasional caller at the handsome residence bought in Riverside Drive by the Englishman, who had been cast out and disinherited because of his marriage with Mary Royal, at that time a beautiful American chorus girl.
Lord Waldmere’s investments in Colorado mines had proved very profitable, however, and he fast was becoming further estranged from his native land and more and more infatuated with American life and customs, in part due to the wishes of his charming wife. He had dropped his English title, becoming simply Mr. Archie Waldmere, though his prestige had won him a legion of friends and admission into the first circles of society.