“Sure! But I don’t quite get you? What do I care for the darned ducks?”
“Put on that leather coat you have,” directed Nick calmly. “And your high boots, as well as your big corduroy cap. Get your double-barreled gun and that string of wooden decoy ducks we used down on the Chesapeake two years ago. You have them, haven’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Very well. Don’t be more than ten minutes. Then come down to the library again. I’m going to put on my duck-hunting rig, too.”
CHAPTER IV.
THE ICE HOUSE IN THE SWAMP.
It was hardly ten minutes later when Patsy came again into the library. But, rapid as he had been in his movements, he had not been able to beat his chief.
Nick Carter was already in the room, dressed in about the same kind of clothes as he had told his assistant to put on. That is, he wore a heavy leather coat, with pockets of various sizes all over it, a cap that hid most of his face, and rubber boots which came up to his hips.
He carried a handsome repeating shotgun—light, but deadly, in the hands of a sure shot like the detective.
Glancing at himself in a mirror, Nick was satisfied that he would not be easily recognized. To make sure, he put on a heavy beard and mustache, with the result that he did not look any more like the real Nick Carter, than he did like Mrs. Pankhurst.
“Keep your cap well down, Patsy,” he directed. “Your face is not well known to these people we are going after. But some of them may have seen you.”