The Englishman broke forth again with bitter oaths and imprecations, though his face had gone ghastly and his lips were as gray as ashes.
“Take them off! Take them off!” he repeated, striving vainly to break the steel bracelets. “You can do nothing. You cannot prove it. My word is as good as yours. There were no witnesses, no——”
“You are very much mistaken,” Nick again interrupted sternly. “I have all the corroboration the law will require. There is a dictograph behind this desk, and my chief assistant in the opposite suite has heard every word you have said. I will call him, that you may see for yourself and end your vain struggles.”
A cry failed to prove effective, however, and Nick stepped into the hall and threw open the door of the opposite suite.
It no longer was occupied.
Chick Carter had disappeared.
Nick wondered and waited—but waited vainly.
Chick did not return.
Nor did an hour bring any sign of—the genuine Mr. Pimlico.