[Pg 1]

Issued Weekly. Entered as Second-class Matter at the New York Post Office, by Street & Smith, 79-89 Seventh Ave., New York.

Copyright, 1915, by Street & Smith. O. G. Smith and G. C. Smith, Proprietors.

Terms to NICK CARTER STORIES Mail Subscribers.

(Postage Free.)

Single Copies or Back Numbers, 5c. Each.

How to Send Money—By post-office or express money order, registered letter, bank check or draft, at our risk. At your own risk if sent by currency, coin, or postage stamps in ordinary letter.

Receipts—Receipt of your remittance is acknowledged by proper change of number on your label. If not correct you have not been properly credited, and should let us know at once.

No. 158. NEW YORK, September 18, 1915. Price Five Cents.

THE BLUE VEIL;
Or, NICK CARTER’S TORN TRAIL.

[Pg 2]

Edited by CHICKERING CARTER.

CHAPTER I.
REMARKABLE TRICKERY.

Nick Carter listened without interrupting.

The man addressing the famous detective was not one to be wisely interrupted. His strong face, his broad, thin-lipped mouth and square jaw, the glint of his steel-blue eyes, his portly and imposing figure—all denoted that he was the type of man that insists upon having his way, his inning at the bat, as it were, but who then would graciously accord the same privilege to another.

“The danger, Mr. Carter, cannot be overestimated,” he was forcibly saying. “It really is very terrible. We are living in constant peril. That man is a perpetual menace. Unless he can be wiped out of existence, or put behind prison bars, there is no telling what he might accomplish, no possible way to anticipate it and guard against it. I cannot for the life of me understand how he got by a detective as marvelously keen and discerning as you. I cannot, Carter, on my word.”

Nick smiled and knocked the ashes from his cigar.

“It is not very difficult to understand,” he replied, with patience unruffled. “There were two reasons for it, Mr. Langham.”

“Two reasons?”

“Yes. One, because the likeness between Chester Clayton and David Margate, or Doctor David Guelpa, in which character this exceedingly clever rascal then was posing, is a most extraordinary one. I doubt that two other persons could be found, not excluding the most perfect of twins, who look so precisely alike.”

“But you already knew of that extraordinary resemblance, Mr. Carter, when Margate eluded you and made his escape.”

“Very true,” Nick admitted. “But there were other facts which I did not know, and which I had had no way of learning. That is why there was a [Pg 3]second reason for Margate’s escape. Any detective, even one as ‘keen and discerning’ as myself, if I may quote you, would be deceived by a seeming impossibility.”

“Impossibility?”

“Seeming impossibility,” corrected Nick.

“What do you mean?”

“Bear in mind, Mr. Langham, that Margate rushed from the house in which we secured his confederates and ran to his suite in the Hotel Westgate, of which Clayton still is manager.”

“I know about that.”

“I then did not know that a secret electric communication existed between the very room in which we made the arrest and the apartments to which Margate had gone, nor that a signal informing him of the arrest and warning him to flee could be communicated to him by stepping on a concealed button under the carpet. I since have learned all about that. That was done by Scoville, one of the arrested crooks, unknown to me and my assistants.”

“But, Mr. Carter——”

“One moment, please,” Nick now interrupted. “I want you to see how impossible Margate’s exploit must have appeared.”

“Go on, then.”

“Only ten minutes elapsed from the time Margate left his confederates, until I entered the Westgate in pursuit of him. The first person I saw in the hotel office was, I supposed, Manager Clayton.”

“Well?”

“How could I believe anything else?” Nick went on more earnestly. “He was in the office inclosure and wearing an entirely different suit from what Margate was wearing ten minutes before. Ten minutes is an incredibly short time in which to have covered the distance between the two houses, to have gone to his suite and changed his outside garments and got down to the hotel office.”

“I admit that, Carter, of course.[Pg 4]”

“I called to the supposed Clayton, therefore, and we went up to Margate’s suite, in company with my junior assistant, Patsy Garvan,” continued Nick. “We found the supposed Margate unconscious on his bed, clad in the same suit in which I had seen him, as I have said, only ten minutes before. Who on earth would have suspected, despite the extraordinary resemblance and all that previously had occurred, that such a lightninglike change of character could be accomplished; that the man on the bed was Clayton, and the man at my elbow was the crook himself? It would have seemed incredible, utterly impossible. That is why I did not give it a thought.”

“How was it accomplished, Mr. Carter?”

“I since have learned, of course,” said Nick. “Margate received the warning signal the moment he entered his suite. He instantly telephoned down to the hotel office and requested Clayton to come up there immediately on important business.”

“He did so?”

“Certainly. Clayton had no occasion to suspect Margate, whom he knew only as Doctor Guelpa. He complied, of course, and Margate invited him to his suite. Then, passing back of him, he threw one arm around his head and over his mouth, at the same time injecting into his neck a quantity of the same swiftly acting drug with which he had overcome Patsy Garvan earlier in the evening.”

“Clayton has told me about that.”

“It was done in a couple of minutes,” Nick went on. “Margate then stripped Clayton of his outside garments, exchanging them for his own, and placed his senseless form on the bed.”

“But what motive had he?” questioned Langham. “Why did he not flee at once after receiving the warning?”

Nick laughed a bit derisively.

“You don’t know this rascal, Mr. Langham,” he replied. “I now know more about him than I then did. He turned that trick only because he was short of funds. He then went down to the hotel office, a human counterfeit of Clayton, with the intention of stealing the money from the hotel vault.”

“Ah, I see,” Mr. Langham nodded. “A rascal, Carter, indeed.”

“My timely arrival with Patsy at just that moment prevented his design,” said the detective. “He had no sane alternative, when I called to him, but to accompany us to the suite. My assistant then made a hurried examination of the man on the bed, and he at once inferred that Margate had committed suicide.”

“I suppose it appeared so,” Mr. Langham allowed.

“In the meantime,” Nick added; “the supposed Clayton cried that he must telephone the good news to his mother and to Mademoiselle Falloni, whose stolen jewels we had just recovered. He hurried from the room, as if to do so. We now know that he hurried from the house, and that is the last we saw of him. But the whole business from beginning to end occurred in less than fifteen minutes, Mr. Langham, and no detective on earth, unless gifted with clairvoyance, would have suspected the trick.”

“I admit, of course, that it would have seemed impossible,” bowed Langham.

“Now, sir, let me tell you what I since have learned[Pg 5] about this crook,” said Nick. “I have looked up his record abroad. He twice had been convicted and sent to prison. He at one time was associated in Paris with the notorious Doctor Leon Deverge, who was executed two years ago for wholesale murder by means of drugs and poisons, of which he had made so profound a study that he knew much more of their subtle and deadly qualities than has been learned by any of his contemporaries.”

“I remember having read of the man.”

“This notorious physician and chemist imparted to David Margate much of his dangerous knowledge, and the career of the latter has always been one of vice and crime. It has been accomplished with such exceeding craft and cunning, moreover, that he most of the time has completely baffled the police. I admit that Margate is a terrible menace to society and to——”

“To us, Mr. Carter, in particular,” said Mr. Langham, interrupting. “For he threatened Clayton by letter many months ago that he would wreak vengeance upon him for having put you on his track, and that your life would be the price for having foiled him and imprisoned his confederates. In view of all this, Carter, and particularly his extraordinary likeness to Clayton, his very existence is a constant menace.”

“Those are the only reasons, Mr. Langham, why I consented to drive up here into the Berkshire Hills with my assistants to attend these festivities,” Nick again interposed.

“That was very good of you, Mr. Carter, to be sure,” bowed the other.

“I was pleased, of course, to be present at the marriage of Clayton and your daughter, and both assured me that they would feel easier if I was here,” Nick added. “Clayton apprehended that Margate, despite that he has not been seen or heard from save once since his jewel robbery, might attempt knavery at this time. I attribute that, however, to Clayton’s somewhat nervous temperament. I don’t take very much stock in the threats of crooks, you know, for I long have been accustomed to them. Very few of them ever make good. I doubt that David Margate ever will.”

“Well, I hope not, I’m sure.”

“It is nearly time, I think, for Clayton and his bride to depart,” Nick now said, glancing at his watch. “You will wish to see them leave, I suppose.”

It then was ten o’clock in the evening, that of a bright day in June—a fit day, indeed, for the marriage of as beautiful a girl as charming Clara Langham, the only daughter of the multimillionaire president of the Century Trust Company, with whom Nick Carter had been talking.

More than six months had passed since the extraordinary case they had been discussing, that involving the theft and recovery of the world-famous jewels of Mademoiselle Falloni, the celebrated prima donna, a case resulting also in the arrest and conviction of all of the crooks save their ringleader, whose unparalleled elusion of Nick Carter at the last moment they had been reviewing.

Nick never had confided, not even to his trusty assistants, the terrible secret intrusted to his keeping by Clayton’s cultured and attractive mother; that his extraordinary personal resemblance to the notorious crook was due to his twin relationship; that he bore his mother’s maiden[Pg 6] name, and David Margate that of the criminal father of both, who had deserted his wife in England while the children were infants, taking with him this son, who afterward fell naturally into the evil footsteps of his vicious father, who since had died under sentence in a German prison.

Nick would not have thought of betraying such a secret, of which Clayton was entirely ignorant, and the disclosure of which would serve only to mar his happiness and in a measure wreck his subsequent life.

The secret then was known, in fact, only by Nick and the sad-hearted mother, Mrs. Julia Clayton, who had confided it to him only in order that the detective might prove Clayton innocent of the great jewel robbery mentioned. It was a secret that could be safely trusted to a man of Nick Carter’s sterling integrity.

The room in which he then was seated was the private library of Mr. Gustavus Langham, in the money magnate’s great stone mansion, occupied only as a summer residence. It had been built several years before at an enormous expense, before the death of his gay and fashionable wife.

It was like an old feudal castle, with its massive walls and parapets, its broad halls and winding stairways, its stately rooms and attractive surroundings, covering a vast wooded estate in one of the most picturesque and secluded sections of the beautiful Berkshire Hills.

From the room in which Nick was seated could be heard, though the door was closed, the strains of the orchestral music, also the vivacious conversation and gay laughter of a multitude of guests, gathered at the wedding reception by a special train from New York, or with motor cars from select summer colonies from a radius of fifty miles.

The driveways and roads through the vast estate of nearly a square mile were alive with moving conveyances of one kind or another, some of the guests residing at a distance already having made their departure.

For the wedding ceremony had been performed two hours before, the reception was nearing its end, and the bride and groom were making final preparations for a precipitous departure to avoid the customary good-luck shower on such occasions.

Mr. Langham also drew out his watch and glanced at it.

“Nearly ten,” he remarked, replying to the detective. “Why, yes, I certainly wish to see them leave. I also want a last word in private with Clara. I will go and see her before she leaves her room. I told her I would do so about this time. She is expecting me, no doubt, and——”

But Mr. Langham, who had arisen while speaking, got no further with his remarks.

He was interrupted by the unceremonious opening of the door and by the hurried entrance of Clayton’s best man, George Vandyke, a New York lawyer with whom Nick Carter was very well acquainted.

One glance at the young man’s white face and dilated eyes was enough to convince the detective that something both alarming and extraordinary had occurred.

“Out with it, Vandyke,” he exclaimed, starting up and dropping his cigar into the cuspidor. “What’s the matter with you? What has happened?[Pg 7]”

CHAPTER II.
THE STOLEN BRIDE.

Nick Carter evidently was the man George Vandyke was seeking. He appeared unable to speak for a moment, nevertheless, so great was his suppressed excitement.

“I’ve been looking for you,” he finally gasped, when Nick seized him by the arm and shook him. “They told me you were here. I——”

“Out with it!” repeated Nick more sharply. “What’s the trouble?”

“Clayton has disappeared,” choked Vandyke. “He cannot be found. His bride also is missing. Neither of them are in their rooms, nor——”

“Good God! Has the blow fallen?”

Mr. Langham staggered as if he had, indeed, received a brutal blow.

Nick Carter immediately took the ribbons.

“Don’t create a stir!” he commanded quickly. “Leave me to look into the matter. Since both are missing, they may have departed together, bent upon eluding their very zealous friends and a deluge of confetti.”

“That cannot be, Nick,” Vandyke hurriedly protested. “Clayton’s suit case is still in his room. He would have taken it with him, of course, if he——”

“Leave it to me. Don’t alarm the guests needlessly.”

“But some of them already know——”

Nick did not wait for more. He brushed by the two men, and, outwardly perfectly calm, hastened through the crowded hall toward the main stairway.

Both Chick Carter and Patsy Garvan then were on the main floor of the vast house, the former near the open front door, where, both in the hall and on the granite steps and the broad veranda outside, scores of guests had gathered to speed the happy couple on their wedding journey.

Chick saw Nick approaching and caught the ominous gleam in his expressive eyes.

“What’s up?” he asked quietly, hastily meeting him.

Nick now said what he really thought.

“That devil has got in his work again.”

“Not Margate?”

“I fear so. Both bride and groom are missing.”

“The deuce you say!”

“Nothing could have been pulled off, however, under the eyes of this mob on the steps and veranda. Slip around to the side door and see what you can learn,” Nick hurriedly directed. “Keep your eyes open and nail any one acting suspiciously. Get word to Patsy and send him to the rear door. The trick may not have been turned yet. They can have been missing only a few minutes.”

“I’m wise,” Chick nodded, starting for the side hall and the broad exit under the massive porte-cochère.

Nick hastened to the second floor and toward the two rear rooms used by the bride and groom that evening, those in front having been needed to accommodate the throng of guests.

Nick discovered a solitary bridesmaid near the door of Clara’s room, and somewhat apart from the group of women then near the stairs. She happened to be one with whom he was acquainted, and he hurriedly approached her.

“What’s this I hear, Miss Arden?” he said quietly. “What do you know about it?[Pg 8]”

“Little enough, Mr. Carter,” she replied, pale and mystified. “I only know that Clara sent us all from her room after she was dressed for her journey. She explained that her father wanted to see her privately before she left, and that she was momentarily expecting him. We left her alone, therefore, and went downstairs.”

“You mean yourself and the other bridesmaids?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How long ago was that?”

“Not more than ten minutes; hardly as long, I think.”

“Who discovered her absence?”

“I did. I returned to get my handkerchief, which I had left in the room. I found the room deserted. Clara had gone, but her suit case and hand bag still are there. I came out, of course, and I at once saw Mr. Vandyke coming up the side stairs. I told him about it, Mr. Carter, and he said that Clara probably was with Mr. Clayton in his room. He knocked, but received no answer. He then went in and found that Mr. Clayton also was missing.”

“Did you make any inquiries among the guests here in the hall?”

“Yes, immediately. We could find no one who had seen either of them go out. Strange though it seems, both of them have mysteriously disappeared, leaving their luggage in their rooms.”

“You say that Miss Langham, or, rather, Mrs. Clayton, was clad in her outside garments?”

“Yes, sir. She had on her hat, veil, and jacket, and was ready to leave at any moment.”

“What is her traveling costume?”

“A navy-blue suit with hat and veil to match.”

“Who, now, is in her room?”

“No one, Mr. Carter. She——”

“Wait!” Nick interrupted. “I will look in there.”

He stepped into the room while speaking. It was in considerable disorder after the change of attire from a wedding gown to a traveling costume. There was no sign of the missing girl, no written line explaining her sudden departure, no evidence of when, why, or how she had gone. Both windows were open, but in each there was a wire screen secured on the inside. Nick saw plainly that neither of them had been tampered with.

“By Jove, this looks bad enough. It looks, indeed, as if Dave Margate has again got in his work,” he said to himself while retracing his steps. “Has the rascal designs upon this girl, disregarding the valuable gifts now in the house? Those were safely guarded from every side, but who would have thought it necessary to guard her in such a throng as this?”

“What do you think about it, Mr. Carter?” questioned Miss Arden, awed by the more serious expression on the detective’s face when he came from the room.

“I cannot say at present,” Nick replied. “Don’t be alarmed, nor spread the news too quickly. There still is a possibility that they will return.”

He did not wait for an answer, but hastened into an opposite room, that occupied by Chester Clayton.

There Nick found, at first, the same negative conditions. A single window overlooked the rear grounds. It was closed and locked. Clayton’s suit case stood near the door. His overcoat and hat were missing, however, though a pair of new kid gloves lay on the dressing stand.

Nick had only time to note these features of the scene[Pg 9] when Vandyke hurriedly entered, looking even more pale and disturbed.

“Why did you apprehend so quickly that something was wrong?” Nick asked a bit abruptly, turning to him.

“Only because Clayton appeared to fear some mishap,” Vandyke replied. “He admitted he had no definite reason for it, but he seemed very nervous.”

“Where were you when he left? You were his best man.”

“True. I came here to tell you about that.”

“About what?”

“One of the caterer’s assistants came in here a short time ago, not more than twenty minutes, and stated that Mr. Lenaire wanted to see me in the dining room.”

“Lenaire is the caterer?”

“Yes. It was upon my recommendation that he was given this job. I asked Clayton if he had any immediate use for me, and he told me to go ahead and see what Lenaire wanted. I did so and found him in the dining room.”

“What did he want?”

“He wanted to thank me again for having recommended him, and also to ask me to express his gratitude to Clayton for having seconded my suggestion, which he feared he would not have an opportunity to do personally before Clayton departed. He explained at some length, Nick, and when I returned I found that Clayton was missing. Then, when unable to find Clara, I feared something was wrong.”

“I see,” Nick nodded. “Did the waiter who came up return to the dining room with you?”

“No, not with me,” said Vandyke. “I hurried down ahead of him. I did not see him again.”

“Do you know his name?”

“I think Lenaire called him Toulon.”

“By Jove, I think I scent the rat in the meal,” Nick muttered. “Have you looked in the closet, Vandyke?”

“Not yet. Who would expect to find Clayton in the closet, or concealed in any part of the room? It would be absurd to suppose anything of the kind——”

“Not absurd to me,” Nick suddenly interrupted. “See for yourself.”

He had, while Vandyke was speaking, looked hurriedly into the wardrobe closet and under the bed. A broad, old-fashioned couch near one of the walls then claimed his attention. It was draped with a valance, which he quickly raised, and then he found what he was seeking.

Flat on his back under the couch lay the senseless form of Chester Clayton, his eyes closed and his white face upturned, as ghastly as if the hand of death had been laid upon him.

Vandyke recoiled with a shudder.

“Good heavens!” he cried. “Is he dead? Is he dead, Mr. Carter?”

“Quiet,” Nick cautioned. “No, not dead. The rascal who did this job doesn’t thrust his knavish neck into a noose. Clayton has been drugged. It’s the work of the same miscreant who downed him at the time of the jewel robbery.”

“David Margate?”

“Yes.”

“What shall we——”

“Don’t stop to question,” Nick interrupted. “Lend me a hand and we will place him on the couch. Slip out and[Pg 10] find a physician, if there is one among the guests. Don’t alarm them, however, by stating what has occurred. A physician soon can revive him. Send Mr. Langham in here, but not a word about this to Mrs. Julia Clayton. Leave me to inform her.”

“You think——”

“Never mind what I think,” Nick again cut in while they placed the senseless man on the couch. “Do what I have directed.”

“But Clara, his wife—what of her?”

“There’s nothing to it, Vandyke,” said the detective. “It’s as plain as twice two. The bride has been stolen.”

CHAPTER III.
THE ASSAULTED WAITER.

Chick Carter, hastening to follow Nick’s instructions, found nothing in the side hall nor out-of-doors that shed any light on the mystery.

Several guests were departing in a limousine from under the porte-cochère, but Chick knew two of them personally and that none was worthy of the slightest suspicion.

Returning through the hall, he found Patsy Garvan and quickly told him what had occurred, while both hastened out of the rear door of the house. As they were descending the steps, one of the kitchen servants, who was on her way in, approached them and said somewhat excitedly, addressing Chick:

“Sure, sir, there’s something wrong around here. Would you mind telling Mr. Langham, sir?”

“Something wrong?” questioned Chick, sharply regarding her. “Where? What do you mean?”

“Round here, sir,” she replied, leading the way. “I was after taking out some refuse for the barrels, sir, and I heard moaninglike, as if some one was hurted.”

“Heard it where?”

“Here, sir, under the cellar door. I was after—there ’tis again, sir!”

The corpulent Irishwoman shrank back affrighted.

A hollow, half-choked moan had issued from under a slanting bulkhead door abutting the foundation wall on that side of the house.

It was the opposite side from that on which was located the driveway making around from the front of the vast stone mansion and leading out to the stable and garage. Aside from the bulkhead door leading down to the basement there was only another door opening upon an entry and stairway for the use of the servants.

The adjoining grounds in that locality were deserted, and lighted only by the stars glittering in the purple sky. A path led across a strip of lawn to several outbuildings. Beyond this were the trees of the park and woodland covering the vast estate. Through the gloom beneath them some fifty yards away could be faintly seen a gray gravel driveway making off to the east.

Patsy caught sight of something white on the ground, just as the hollow moan interrupted the woman, and he stopped to pick it up.

It was a partly burned cigarette, yet from which only a few puffs had been taken.

Instinctively Patsy slipped it into his pocket, just as Chick exclaimed:

“By Jove, the woman is right. Lend me a hand, Patsy.[Pg 11] This door is not locked. Here’s a man on the stone steps.”

His words evoked another moan from the prostrate man.

“Wait a bit!” said Patsy. “Here is my searchlight.”

Chick had opened both sections of the slanting door, and Patsy now sent a beam of light down the several stone steps. In the area below, against an inner door of the cellar, lay a man in evening dress, bound hand and foot with stout cords and brutally gagged.

“Gee whiz!” cried Patsy. “Something wrong, Chick, is right.”

“Help me lift him out.”

“Lord save him!” said the woman, crossing herself. “Is he dead, sir?”

“Far from it,” said Chick. “Dead men don’t moan. He’ll be all right when he can breathe freely. Now, sir, speak for yourself. How came you in this mess?”

The two detectives had placed him on the greensward outside of the bulkhead door, and Chick had quickly cut his bonds and removed the gag from his mouth.

The man choked and gasped convulsively for a moment, then explained with an effort that he was Pierre Toulon, employed as a waiter by Mr. Jean Lenaire, the French caterer; that he had stolen out a short time before to smoke a cigarette, and that he had been suddenly assaulted by three masked men, who had bound and gagged him, and then confined him under the bulkhead door.

Chick did not wait to look more deeply into the man’s story, but turned to Patsy and said hurriedly:

“Go tell the chief. You’ll find him on the second floor, probably in Clayton’s room. I will help Toulon into the house. Nick will question him later.”

Patsy hurried away without replying.

He found Nick, Mr. Langham, and two physicians in Clayton’s room. The latter had begun to revive from the effects of the drug. He already could talk intelligently, and in a vague way could recall and state what had occurred.

It appeared, Nick already had learned, that the same waiter who had called Vandyke from the room, or a man so closely resembling him that Clayton detected no difference, returned almost immediately after Vandyke departed, saying that he missed his cuff link and thought it might have dropped on the floor.

Clayton naturally had bowed to look for it, whereupon the rascal instantly threw one arm around his head, covering his mouth, and at the same moment thrust the needle of a hypodermic syringe into his neck, injecting a quantity of the same potent and quick-acting drug with which, Nick immediately suspected, Clayton had been overcome by Margate at the time of his escape after the jewel robbery.

Clayton knew nothing of what had followed, having quickly lost consciousness, and Nick now left Mr. Langham and the physicians to enlighten him with the sad information. He withdrew with Patsy and hastened down to the private library in which he had been talking with Langham only a few minutes before.

Patsy already had told him about finding the waiter, Toulon, and Nick’s next move was to send for Mrs. Julia Clayton, whom he briefly informed of his suspicions, and then cautioned the dismayed woman against inadvertently betraying the secret she so long had kept from all the world.[Pg 12]

The shocking news now was generally known, and the house was in confusion. Guests were hurriedly departing, leaving sympathetic messages with the butler and other servants. All keenly felt that they could be of no assistance in the investigations then in progress, and that they were better out of the way.

“Gee whiz! there’s nothing to this, chief,” commented Patsy, turning after closing the door upon Mrs. Clayton. “This is Margate’s doings, all right.”

“Undoubtedly,” said Nick. “He served Clayton the same trick as before.”

“Surest thing you know.”

“We will try later to find out how he got away with the girl. It would be useless to undertake it at present, and immediate pursuit is out of the question. A hundred conveyances have left here during the past half hour.”

“I guess you are right, chief,” Patsy agreed.

“I know that I am,” Nick replied. “We may, however, accomplish something of importance. Margate is a past master of the art of making up and impersonating others. It seems very evident that he impersonated the waiter Toulon, but whether with Toulon’s consent and assistance, or whether he is an innocent victim of the rascal, is an open question.”

“That’s right, too,” said Patsy.

“We may find the correct answer to it,” Nick added. “Did Toulon appear to be in bad shape, as if the assault was a genuine one?”

“He did, chief, for fair, as far as that goes,” Patsy reported. “He appeared to be telling the truth. Here is the cigarette he began to smoke. I found it near the bulkhead door.”

“I will size up the fellow and judge for myself,” said Nick. “Find Chick and have him bring Toulon in here. See the caterer, also, and tell him not to leave before I have talked with him.”

Patsy hastened to obey.

Chick entered with the waiter a few moments later and closed the door.

Pierre Toulon had recovered from the assault. He was a man of medium build, with dark features and a black mustache, waxed at the ends. There was a bruise on his forehead and his lower lip was slightly scratched, also one side of his neck. His collar was wrinkled and soiled, but his garments had been brushed.

“Come nearer, Mr. Toulon, and be seated,” said Nick. “I want to question you about the assault. You are employed by Mr. Lenaire, I am told.”

There was nothing in Nick’s voice, looks, or manner denoting that he had any covert designs. He spoke very pleasantly, with a tinge of sympathy for his hearer. Toulon approached a bit gingerly, nevertheless, and seated himself on the edge of a chair, directly opposite the detective.

“Yes, sir, I work for Mr. Lenaire,” he replied. “I am a waiter.”

“How long have you been in Lenaire’s employ?”

“About two weeks, sir.”

“I understand that he sent you up to Mr. Clayton’s room, Toulon, to ask Mr. Vandyke to join him in the dining room.”

“Yes, sir, he did.”

“About what time was that, as near as you can tell?”

“I would say it was near ten o’clock, sir.[Pg 13]”

“Did you return to the dining room after taking the message to Mr. Vandyke?”

“No, sir. You see, sir, I didn’t take the message,” said Toulon, with some signs of embarrassment.

“No?” queried Nick, as if surprised. “I understood that you did. How was that?”

“Well, you see, sir, I was near dying for a smoke,” Toulon explained. “I thought it would be a good time to slip out and have one. So I went out to one side of the house, thinking I’d stay only a couple of minutes, just long enough to have a whiff or two, sir. But——”

“Ah, I see,” said Nick, interrupting. “You then were attacked by the three men.”

“Yes, sir. Hang them, that’s just what came off.”

“One of them must have impersonated you, Toulon, for the message was taken to Mr. Vandyke.”

“Taken to him?” Toulon appeared astonished. “Is that so, sir?”

“Yes, surely,” Nick nodded. “But what now puzzles me, Toulon, is how he could have known anything about the message, Lenaire having given it to you.”

“Well, sir, he might have been listening under the dining-room window when Mr. Lenaire gave me the message,” Toulon quickly suggested, with his gaze fixed on the detective’s face.

“Ah, by Jove, I hadn’t thought of that,” Nick exclaimed, with countenance lighting. “That may explain it, Chick, after all.”

“Yes, indeed,” Chick quickly agreed, now seeing precisely at what Nick was driving. “It certainly clears up that point.”

“Surely,” Nick added. “I’m glad he suggested it. So, instead of immediately taking the message, Toulon, you slipped out to have a smoke.”

“Yes, sir, a short one.”

“From your pipe, or——”

“No, sir, a cigarette,” Toulon quickly put in.

“Ah, I see,” Nick bowed, glancing at the waiter’s hands. “I don’t know that you are to be blamed. I know what it means, Toulon, to hanker for a smoke. Are you in the habit of smoking cigarettes?”

“I am, sir.”

“What kind do you use?”

Toulon hesitated for the hundredth part of a second. He then said quickly:

“Any old kind, sir. I’m not particular.”

“I prefer the Egyptian,” Nick remarked agreeably. “They have rather more flavor. I wouldn’t mind having one, too, or any old kind, as far as that goes—if you have yours in your pocket, Toulon.”

A tinge of red appeared in Toulon’s cheeks, while his brows knit perceptibly.

“I haven’t, sir,” he replied, in some confusion. “I lit the last one I had and threw away the box. Mebbe one of the other waiters has some. I’ll ask them, sir, and——”

“Oh, no, we’ll not go to that trouble,” Nick interposed, smiling. “I can get along without one. I merely thought that I’d try one of yours while we were discussing this knavish business.”

“I’m sorry, sir, that I haven’t one.”

“It don’t matter. Just where were you, Toulon, when you saw the three men?”

“I was near the bulkhead door and steps to the cellar,[Pg 14]” Toulon now replied glibly. “But I didn’t see the men, sir.”

“Why was that?”

“Because they were hidden on the steps, sir, and they jumped on me before I could get a look at them.”

“Was the bulkhead door open?”

“It must have been, or I would have heard them open it.”

“I see.”

“The first I knew, sir, was when they sprang on me from behind,” Toulon proceeded to explain. “One of them cracked me on the head with a sand bag. Another got me by the throat and jabbed something into my neck. Here’s where it scratched me. It seemed to take all the strength out of me. Then they bound and gagged me, sir, and then threw me down the steps and closed the door.”

“Possibly, Toulon, I can find the finger prints on your neck,” said Nick, rising. “They might enable us to identify your assailant, if he is a crook and——”

“I don’t think so, sir,” Toulon quickly objected. “I have been rubbing my neck, sir, and——”

“Ah, of course,” Nick cut in, resuming his seat. “That would obliterate them. Could you identify either of the men, Toulon?”

“No, sir. They wore masks.”

“All three?”

“Yes, sir.”

“H’m, that makes it bad,” Nick remarked.

“So it does, sir.”

Then, without having evinced the slightest suspicion of his hearer, but rather the contrary, in fact, Nick added pleasantly:

“That’s all, Mr. Toulon, and I’m very much obliged to you. When I find the three rascals, I will make them pay dearly for what they have done to-night.”

“I hope so, sir,” Toulon declared, rising to go. “I’d like a crack at them myself. I bear them no good will, sir, you can bet on that.”

“I guess, Toulon, it would be a safe bet,” laughed Nick, as the waiter withdrew from the room.

Toulon glanced back over his shoulder and grinned expressively.

CHAPTER IV.
NICK CARTER’S INSIGHT.

Langham Manor, by which name the great stone mansion and vast estate of the millionaire banker was known, presented a very different appearance in the gray light of daybreak on the following morning.

The beautiful grounds and driveways near the house were littered with bits of rubbish invariable to such an occasion. The lawns were marred with great tire tracks, where divergencies from the driveways had been unavoidable. Hundreds of paper lanterns that had lent an aspect of fairyland to the attractive park now hung limp and discolored below the drooping branches of the dew-damp trees.

Within the house was a mourning husband, robbed of his bride of two short hours, and now resting in merciful slumber under drugs administered by the physician.

Also a sad and anxious father was impatiently awaiting the work of the detectives, necessarily deferred until daylight, but who had been forbidden to accompany them[Pg 15] when they left the house at early dawn that June morning. It then was only four o’clock.

“He would be in our way and serve only to hinder us,” Nick said quietly, after he and Chick had turned a rear corner of the house.

“Sure thing,” Chick muttered. “We can do better alone.”

The detectives were not then in evening dress. They wore the business suits and woolen caps in which they had journeyed from New York the previous day in Nick’s powerful touring car. Each had in his pockets, moreover, a brace of revolvers and a disguise or two, taken from their suit cases that morning, without which frequently needed articles they never left home.

Danny Maloney, the detective’s chauffeur, then was asleep in the house, Nick having decided not to arouse him before he was definitely needed.

“I want one look at the grounds near that bulkhead door,” he observed, replying to Chick. “It will show whether Toulon put up any struggle with his three assailants, if there really were three.”

“You doubt that, also?” questioned Chick.

“I doubt most of what Toulon stated.”

“You took extraordinary care to hide your distrust,” replied Chick, smiling.

“Bet you!” said Nick tersely. “He was the best thread I could pick up, if not the only seemingly reliable one, and I made sure of keeping him in the dark.”

“But why did you suspect him so quickly?”

“Because he, or a counterpart of him, had been to Clayton’s room,” Nick explained. “I no sooner began to question him, Chick, than I felt sure I was right.”

“Why so?”

“First, because he has worked only two weeks for Lenaire. That smacks of having got the job with a view to assisting in this crime.”

“I see,” Chick nodded.

“He betrayed himself a moment later by the readiness in which he explained how the knave who had impersonated him could have learned of Lenaire’s message to Vandyke.”

“By listening under the dining-room window.”

“Exactly. His readiness showed plainly that he was prepared with that explanation.”

“True. I suspected that, also your own designs, when you agreed with him so quickly and remarked to me that he had cleared up that point for us.”

“I knew you would, of course,” said Nick. “I then questioned him about the short smoke he came out to enjoy. He said it was from a cigarette and that he is in the habit of using them. He lied. The fingers of a habitual cigarette smoker of his class are invariably discolored with nicotine. There was not the slightest sign of it on his.”

“Good work, Nick.”

“I clinched it by carelessly asking him what kind he smoked,” Nick added. “He hesitated, and then said any old kind. He could not think of the name of one. Whoever heard of a cigarette smoker who could not instantly state what kind he habitually buys?”

“Good work again, old man.”

“I then pretended I wanted one,” Nick went on, smiling. “That caught him again. He had none, but quickly claimed that he had lit his last one and threw away the box. A cigarette smoker always retains the box until he[Pg 16] lights his last one. Look around. Toulon could not have thrown a small pasteboard box so far that, if it were out here, we could not see it.”

“Surely not,” Chick agreed. “Naturally, Nick, he would merely have tossed it upon the ground.”

“Certainly. But it is not here, nor does the ground show any signs of a struggle.”

“None whatever.”

“He said he was assaulted from behind, but he displayed a bruise on his forehead, said to have been inflicted with a sand bag,” Nick added derisively. “He should have been bruised on the back of his head, if attacked from behind.”

“That’s right, too.”

“And when I suggested finding on his neck the finger prints of the crook, you saw how quickly he objected and claimed to have been rubbing his neck.”

“True again, Nick, and very significant,” Chick nodded.

“Plainly enough, Chick, all of his story and the evidence we found were cut and dried, fixed for him to cover his tracks,” said Nick. “But the rascal overleaped his mount.”

“He did, indeed, no mistake.”