Toby’s face had gone as gray as ashes, and he was trembling from head to foot.
“Oh, I say!” he gasped. “I say——”
“Stop!” Chick cut in sternly. “We’ve got Devoll, Shannon, you, and the rest of your thieving gang where we want you. If you have anything to say, out with it. What you say now may determine what you’ll get for last night’s job and a hundred others, including the murder of Gaston Todd. Come on with it, if you have anything to say.”
Toby Monk, cornered and thus sternly confronted, wilted like a drenched rag. The last vestige of color had left his cowardly face. He gazed wide-eyed at Chick and asked hoarsely:
“Are you a detective—one of the Nick Carter crowd?”
“That’s just who I am.”
“I’ll squeal, then! I’ll squeal,” Toby said hurriedly, taking the last resort of a treacherous coward. “I’ll blow the whole business, if that will save my skin. On the level, God hearing me, I did not kill Todd. I knew nothing about it. I was out with my jitney when it was done. I——”
“But you know who did it, and why,” snapped Chick, striking while the iron was hot.
“Yes, yes, I know that,” gasped Toby. “Graff did it—Devoll.”
“Both——”