Two women, frightened for their miserable lives, turned and ran toward the open door—only to rush into the ready arms of Chick Carter.
Chick had arrived at the edge of the woods only a short time before, and had seen Patsy brought out of the house and into the basement of the garage. Hastening to cross the lawn and lend a hand, as he had promised, Chick had encountered the bloodhound, killing him with a single well-directed shot, and then had rushed on and into the garage, just in time to head off Vic Clayton and Claudia Badger when they turned to flee.
The rest may be briefly told, for a more complete and successful round-up could hardly be imagined. In less than ten minutes the entire gang were in irons, and thirty minutes later they were taking a ride in the local patrol-wagon, instead of a Packard car.
The exposure of their rascally scheme also was complete when the case came to trial, a little later, for Nick Carter found in and about the house and stable ample evidence to prove that his deductions had from the very first been entirely correct.
Fortunately, too, he found letters and clues enabling him to trace much of the stolen property upon which Badger had realized thousands of dollars, and which ultimately was restored to its rightful owners.
In Badger’s safe Nick found his own watch and chain, but the money of which he had been robbed was missing. He had in his success with the case, however, a reward that far more than offset his trivial loss.
Dumfounded when informed by what means the Boston detectives had been baffled in their efforts to discover these road robbers, Chief Weston’s gratitude to Nick was equaled only by his bitterness for Sandy Hyde, and he made sure that the treacherous scamp should receive a sentence as long as the others of the Badger gang—and that was one of years.
Long before the release of any of them, the Badger place near Brookline had passed into other hands, sold under a heavy mortgage, and from that time Tremont Street knew the notorious Madame Victoria no more.