“The first one is this: Will you return those jewels you stole last Thursday night?”
“I have not stolen any jewels, and therefore I cannot return any. Next?”
“Will you, after the jewels are returned to the proper owners, leave this place, and the United States as well, never to return, on condition that I let you go away unmolested?”
“Since I cannot—or will not, if you prefer it so—return the jewels, that last question requires no answer; but I will answer it by saying that I shall remain a guest at this place just so long as it pleases me to do so.”
“The third and last question, is this: Will you promise me never to communicate with Lenore Remsen again, after to-day?”
One quick flash of keen resentment crossed the face of Duryea, when that question was asked; but it was gone as quickly as it appeared. He laughed outright, flicking away the stub of a cigarette as he did so, and producing another one.
“Don’t be an ass, Carter,” he said, rising and turning to cross the summerhouse toward the door through which they could see the people on the veranda of the mansion.
Instantly Nick Carter leaped from the seat he had been occupying, and sprang upon him. He seized him by the arms, pulled his hands behind him, and snapped the handcuffs upon his wrists in that position; and then Nick pulled him away from the door so that there was no chance of being seen from the house.
Beyond the first impulse of resistance, Jimmy made none at all; and when the detective thrust him back again upon the chair where he had been seated before, he looked up with a quiet smile, as if he rather enjoyed the proceeding.
“Jimmy,” said Nick, “I’m not going to monkey with you. You are past all that. You have laid your plans, and you think they will work out to the end. But they won’t. They might do so with some people, but they won’t with me. Now, I offer you your liberty upon those three conditions, and I do it for Nan’s sake, not for yours.”