[{1}]

Entered according to Act of Congress in the year 1900 by Street & Smith, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D. C.
Entered as second class Matter at the New York, N. Y., Post Office.
Issued weekly. Subscription price, $2.50 per year. July 21, 1900.

No. 186. Street & Smith, Publishers. NEW YORK. 238 William St., N. Y. 5 Cents.

Nick Carter Rescues a Daughter;

OR,

THE JUNIOR PARTNER’S STRANGE BEHAVIOR.
————
By the Author of “NICK CARTER.”
———— [{2}]

CHAPTER I.
THE DEAD GIRL.

Nick Carter glanced at his watch as he entered the street door of the Borden Building, New York City.

It was exactly half-past five o’clock in the afternoon.

“I am just on time,” mused the great detective, as he hurried toward the elevator.

Neatly folded and stowed away in one of his inside pockets was a note, which he had received by a messenger on the forenoon of that day. The note, written on a typewriter, was not signed, and ran as follows:

“Nicholas Carter, New York City. Dear Sir: Please call at room 59, Borden Building, at half-past five o’clock this afternoon on important business. Do not fail.”

There was such an air of mystery about the message that Nick concluded he would respond, and promptly to the minute he was at the place named in the note.

The Borden Building is one of those struc[{3}]tures in lower New York City which are used almost exclusively as offices.

It was Saturday afternoon, and when Nick found that the elevator was not running he was not surprised.

Evidently most of the offices in the building closed on Saturdays before this late hour.

A young man neatly, almost foppishly, dressed, had entered the building ten seconds ahead of Nick and was near the first landing on the stairs walking up when Nick placed his foot on the first step ready to follow.

Just then there came ringing through the building the sound of the footsteps of some one flying down the stairs in precipitate haste.

Nick, by looking up, saw that the person making the furious descent was a boy about fourteen years old.

The well-dressed young man stopped when he heard the boy coming, and as the latter reached him he grasped the lad by the coat, and brought him up with a jerk.[{4}]

“What in thunder ails you?” growled the young man.

For a moment the boy could not utter a word. His face was white as chalk, his teeth were chattering in his head, and he trembled so that it seemed he must fall in a heap.

The young man gave him a vigorous shake and cried:

“Can’t you speak? What have you done? Where are you going?”

Then the lad found power to chatter:

“Oh-h, Mr. Ga-a-ay, she’s de-de-dead.”

“She’s dead? Who’s dead, you fool?”

“Mi-Miss Langdon,” gasped the lad.

“Miss Langdon dead? Why, what do you mean? Speak!”

“She’s been mu-mu-mur-dered.”

“What! Where?”

“Up there in the of-of-office.”

“Are you telling me the truth?”

“Indeed I am. Somebody sh-sh-shot her.”

“Then go call the police, and be quick,” said the young man, as he let go of the boy’s collar and hastened his ascent of the stairs.

The lad continued his precipitous descent to the street, and Nick followed the young man upward. He saw the latter stop on the fifth floor, and disappear through an open door-way.

When Nick reached the same place, he noted with much interest that the No. 59 was painted on the door through which the other man had passed.

Instantly he asked himself:

“Has my mysterious note anything to do with what occurred beyond this door?”

Nick passed through the open door, and found himself inside a large general office used by a law firm.

The name of the firm was also on the door. It was:

Bridgely & Byke,
Attorneys-at-Law.

At the other end of the room a door stood ajar, giving entrance to a private office. Be[{5}]yond this door Nick heard high-pitched voices in altercation.

He rightly guessed that whatever the tragedy might be, its location was in that rear office.

Therefore, he crossed the large room, threw the communicating door open, and, standing in the doorway, took in the scene at a sweeping glance.

There were two men in the medium-sized office.

One was the man who had preceded him up the stairs.

The man whom the boy had called Mr. Gay.

The other was an older man, perhaps thirty-five years of age, tall, stockily built, with a slight stoop in the shoulder, possessing a rather cold, cynical-looking face, and a pair of gray eyes, which had a habit of trying to bore holes into everything upon which they centered.

This man at the time of Nick’s appearance stood leaning against a flat-topped table with one side of his face toward the door. He saw Nick as soon as the latter pushed the door wide open.

The other man’s back was toward the door, and Nick’s presence was not known to him immediately.

He was just saying, his remarks being addressed to the older man:

“Do you think anybody will believe your story?”

The speaker was pointing to something before him.

That something was the form of a young woman seated in a chair before an open scroll-topped desk. One arm hung helplessly at her side, and she had, apparently, partly fallen forward until her head and left arm rested upon the desk.

Nick recognized in this form the victim of a tragedy.[{6}]

Before the detective had time to move a step forward, the elder man, with those gray eyes focused upon Nick’s face, said:

“What do you want?”

“I want to know what has been going on here.”

The younger man had wheeled around facing Nick, and he, in turn, asked:

“Who are you?”

“I am Nick Carter.”

To Nick’s surprise the young man moved back several steps as if annoyed or confused, and the elder scowled without removing his gray eyes from Nick’s face.

The latter advanced to the desk where the form of the young woman reclined, and made a quick examination.

There was a bullet wound in her right temple. The ball had pierced her brain, and she was dead.

On the right hand was a glove into which the fingers had been fitted, but the thumb and upper part of the hand were still bare.

The first inference drawn from this fact was that she had been shot while engaged in putting on her gloves preparatory to leaving the office.

In the minute which followed, Nick made one of his lightning ocular inspections of the premises, in which very little was left to be discovered.

At the end of that time the sound of many rushing footsteps was heard coming up the stairs.

All this time the two men in the room with him remained silent and inactive.

Nick walked into the main office, and met the first man of the ascending throng at the door.

It was a young policeman, whom Nick happened to know quite well.

“Ah, Brown!” exclaimed Nick, confronting the officer at the threshold, “I’m glad ’tis you. You’ll understand me without a lengthy explanation.[{7}]”

“Who are you?” panted Brown, for Nick of course, was in disguise.

“I am Nick Carter. There has been a crime committed back there, and until I know more about it you must keep everybody out. Let none of these curiosity-seekers intrude.”

“I am at your service, Mr. Carter,” said Brown. “Lord, I’m glad you’re here. Seems to me you always bob up when anything happens. What is it? Murder?”

“I want to find out. Is there anybody with you?”

“Yes, McCarthy is coming, but he’s so fat it’s hard and slow work for him to get up all these stairs. Here he is now.”

Some one rapped on the door at that instant. Brown admitted a policeman, who was blowing like a porpoise.

“Bad cess to thim shtairs!” gasped McCarthy, “an’ thor had bin tin more ov ’em, sure it’s a dead mon I’d be this minute.”

“Well, McCarthy, just take charge of this door, and see that no one enters who has no right. Those who have a right, and whom I want to come in, are persons who have been in this building within the last hour, and the boy who carried you the news.”

Brown opened the door and beckoned to the boy to enter. The latter drew back as if about to fly again, but a man near by grasped him by the shoulder and pushed him toward the door.

“Who are you?” inquired Nick.

“I’m the janitor,” was the reply.

“Then come in, too.”

Still keeping hold of the terrified boy, the janitor entered the office and the door was once more closed in the face of the crowd, which by this time numbered nearly a score.

“Brown, I want you to summon the coroner, or one of his deputies just as soon as you can get him here.”

Brown asked no questions, but left on his mission instantly.[{8}]

“What’s your name?” asked Nick, turning to the janitor.

“Bush—John Bush, sir.”

“Then, Mr. Bush, I want you to look out among the people in that crowd in the hall and identify anybody who has offices in this building.”

McCarthy held the door ajar while the janitor scanned the eager faces in the crowd.

“There is Mr. Grote, Mr. Kennedy, and Miss Lucas,” was his report.

“Tell them to come in,” commanded Nick, in a low voice.

“Will Mr. Grote, Mr. Kennedy, and Miss Lucas come in?” said the janitor, addressing his words to the collection of people in the hall.

The three persons answering to these names crowded their way forward, and were admitted.

Then the door closed again.

To the five people inside, not including the policeman, Nick said:

“You will wait in this room until further orders. Meanwhile, officer,” turning and addressing McCarthy, “let no one else in until Brown returns with the coroner, and see that nobody meantime leaves by that door.”

Nick turned toward the inner room to find the young, stylishly-dressed man looking out, much interested at what had been going on in the larger office.

CHAPTER II.
THE GLOVE ON THE DEAD GIRL’S HAND.

Nick returned to the rear room. His first act was probably a surprise to both the men whom he had found there when he first entered.

In short, he requested the two men to step into the outer office.

They complied rather hesitatingly.

He followed them, and closed the communicating door.[{9}]

Then he coolly took a seat near by, and waited for the coroner.

Fifteen minutes after Brown started to bring the coroner, he returned in company with that official.

Nick met the coroner quietly, and lost no time in making himself known to him.

Then he requested Brown to send the crowd on the outside about their business, and again cautioned McCarthy to let no one of those in the large office go out.

This done, he preceded the coroner into the rear office, and closed the door behind them.

The coroner took a quick inventory of the surroundings, and then turned to Nick for information.

The detective related everything just as it occurred to him, except that he made no mention of the type-written note which had brought him to the scene at such a strange time.

“And what have you learned of the case from those two men, Mr. Carter?” inquired the coroner.

“Nothing. I have asked not a single question, preferring to wait till you got here to receive the story of the case as these people can or will give it.”

“That is quite complimentary, I am sure, Mr. Carter. Whom shall we question first?”

“Before we question anybody let me tell you about a few things I have noted in this office.”

“All right—go on.”

“The victim was shot in the right temple.”

“I see.”

“From the position of the body the shot must have been fired by some one standing in front of that window, or the shot must have come from across the street and through the open window.”

The coroner noticed that the desk on which the dead woman had fallen was almost[{10}] exactly in front of an open window and about twelve feet from it.

He glanced across the street and discovered that a window in an opposite building was directly in line with the office window and the desk.

“You think the shot was fired by some one standing in that window over there?”

“I did not say so. On the contrary, I found this pistol lying directly under the victim’s dependent hand.”

“Suicide?”

“I am expressing no opinion, just stating facts,” quietly remarked Nick, as the coroner took a pistol from him and examined it.

The weapon was of Smith & Wesson make, had six chambers, was peculiarly mounted, and on a silver plate inlaid in the handle were the initials “E. L.”

One of the chambers contained the empty shell of a cartridge. The other four were loaded.

The coroner stooped, and inspected the wound in the head of the victim.

“I see no powder marks on her face,” he said, looking up at Nick.

“There are none. Besides, I call your attention to the condition of the right hand.”

The coroner’s eyes turned quickly to the hand of the corpse, which hung at the side of the body.

“Ha! I see. She was putting on her glove, and couldn’t have handled the pistol herself.”

“Not unless she fired the shot with her left hand.”

“But the bullet entered the right temple?”

“I am not sure of it.”

“But see. Here is the wound,” cried the coroner, pointing to the little blue spot on the side of the girl’s face, which was turned up to their gaze.

“Yes, that is a wound. But the bullet might have come out at that place instead of going in.[{11}]”

“Oh! Then there is a wound on the other side of the head; the side which lies upon the desk.”

“I think there is.”

“You think. Don’t you know—have you not raised the head to see?”

“I have not raised the head to see, but I know there is.”

“Why, how do you know if you have not seen?”

“Because here is the fatal bullet, and it not only went into her head, but clean through it.”

“Where did you find it?”

“In that corner of the room back there.”

“Why, that is almost behind the body?”

“Yes. The bullet passed through her head, hit the steam coil on the other side of the desk, and carromed at an acute angle, fetching up in the corner where I found it.”

“It was surely not suicide,” mused the coroner.

“It may not have been,” responded Nick.

“She would certainly not have stopped while putting on her gloves to commit suicide?”

“You say gloves. There is but one glove,” remarked Nick, dryly.

“Only one in sight. We shall find the other, I presume, if we make search.”

“I doubt it.”

“Why?”

“Because the glove she partly put on that hand is not her own.”

“Not her own? Why, man, how do you know?”

“Because it is fully a size too small for her.”

“But——”

“You would say she has it partly on. That is true, but if you examine it carefully you will see that the fingers would not even go in as far as the ends. The glove could not have been forced on her hands.[{12}]”

“Then whose is it?”

“I don’t know,” said Nick, who meanwhile had walked across the office and was examining a woman’s light sack which hung from a hook on the wall. “It certainly didn’t belong to her, for here is the pair she used.”

He held up a pair of gloves of an entirely different color, and probably several sizes larger than that which was partially on the hand of the corpse.

“Well, by Jove!” muttered the coroner.

Nick had reached down again into the pocket in which he found the gloves. This time he fished out a lady’s pocket-book. Without opening it, he carried it across the room and gently pulled the glove from the stiffening fingers of the dead girl.

Then he rolled the three gloves and the pocket-book up together, and put them all away in an inside pocket of his coat.

“With your permission, I’ll take charge of these important articles of evidence,” he said to the coroner.

The latter nodded assent, and asked:

“What is in the pocket-book?”

“We’ll find out later when I’ve time to examine it. Now, we must get together our facts by questioning those people out there one at a time.”

“A good idea.”

“But, before we begin, I want to make a request.”

“Name it.”

“That you postpone the inquest from day to day till I have a chance to get to the very bottom of the mystery.”

“Willingly, my boy, and meantime I’ll not bother my brains about it, because I know what Nick Carter cannot fathom in a case like this will never be found out.”

“Thank you. Now, we will call in and question our first witness.”

“Who will it be? the elder of the two men—the one who must have been here first after the tragedy or when it occurred?[{13}]”

“No, I think I’ll first hear what the younger and more fashionably dressed one of the two has to tell. I’ll call him in.”

So saying, Nick went to the dividing door, opened it, and beckoned to the man who had preceded him up the stairs only a few seconds to the scene of the tragedy.

The young man entered the rear office, plainly laboring under great excitement. Nick closed and locked the door, invited his witness to take a seat, and lost no time in beginning his examination.

CHAPTER III.
WHAT THE CONFIDENTIAL CLERK KNEW.

“In order to get down to the facts in this case,” began Nick, addressing the young man, “it will be necessary to apply for information to those who are supposed to be in possession of the knowledge we seek. We have, therefore, called you in first to set us on the way in our inquiry.”

“I am ready to answer any question which it is in my power to do?” responded the young man, trying hard to repress his nervousness.

“What is your name?”

“Oscar Gay.”

“What is your business?”

“Confidential clerk.”

“For whom?”

“Bridgely & Byke.”

“Where are Messrs. Bridgely & Byke now?”

“Mr. Byke is in Europe—has been away about one month.”

“And Bridgely?”

“Bridgely has been dead more than a year.”

“Then Byke represents the firm as it existed before the death of the senior partner—he constitutes the firm?”

Gay hesitated and shuffled uneasily in his seat for a few moments before he replied:[{14}]

“The firm name remains the same, but Mr. Byke has a partner.”

“Who?”

“Victor Redway.”

“The man I found in this room with you a while ago?”

“Yes.”

“This Redway, do I understand you, took a place in the firm after Bridgely’s death?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And before that?”

“He was the confidential clerk of the firm.”

“Then you succeeded in the place made vacant by him when he was admitted to partnership by Mr. Byke?”

“I did.”

“Now, Mr. Gay, who was that dead girl—she was scarcely more than a girl.”

“Her name was Estelle Langdon. She was the office stenographer and type-writer.”

“Where did she live?”

“Somewhere up in Harlem.”

“Was she married?”

Gay’s eyes gave a quick flash toward Nick’s face at this question—a fact the detective mentally noted without pretending to notice it. The answer came almost immediately.

“Not that anybody was aware of.”

“Has she relatives?”

“None—I believe.”

“How long have you known her?”

“About six months since she came here.”

“What do you know about the way she died?”

“Nothing, except what I saw as I entered the office just before you came.”

“Tell us what that was—what you saw.”

“The body was lying there just as it is now. Mr. Redway was near by on the side next to the window. When I entered, his body was in a bent position, and one hand was extended toward the pistol on the floor.”

“About to pick it up?[{15}]”

“Either that, or had just laid it down.”

Nick came to a dead halt in his queries at this answer, and sat for thirty seconds looking Gay straight in the face. The latter became plainly uncomfortable under the detective’s glance.

“Did you ever see that pistol before?” inquired Nick, when he once more continued his examination.

“I did.”

“To whom did it belong?”

“To Victor Redway.”

“But the initials ‘E. L.,’ how do you account for them?”

“I can’t account for them. They were on the pistol as long as I knew Redway to possess it.”

“How long is that?”

“Several months.”

“Did Redway carry this pistol regularly?”

“He never carried it.”

“Then where did he keep it?”

“In the drawer of his desk over there.”

Gay nodded to the flat-topped desk setting against the wall to the right of the open window, and almost directly behind the corpse.

“You are sure of that statement?”

“Yes, I have seen it there often.”

“Didn’t he keep the desk locked?”

“No. I never knew him to carry a key to the desk.”

“Then Miss Langdon could have got the pistol herself had she chosen?”

“I suppose so.”

“What was the relationship of Redway and Miss Langdon?”

“What do you mean?”

“Were they on friendly terms?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Very confidential?”

“No, hardly that, I guess. Not in the presence of any one else, anyhow.”

“Might they have been lovers?”

“If they were, no one knew it.[{16}]”

“Did they ever quarrel?”

“Not to my knowledge.”

“They occupied this office together?”

“Yes.”

“Where is your desk?”

“In that other private office,” pointing to an adjoining room into which a door gave communication a little to the right of the desk on which the body lay, and separated from the office they were in by a heavy division wall. The door was closed, but a transom above the door stood wide open, as Nick was quick to note.

He lost no time in fixing in his mind the location of this room in its connection with the other two.

It formed the L to the suite, and had no direct communication with the large or general office. There were two doors only to this third room. One connected it with the room in which the body was found and the other opened into the hall.

Therefore, to get into that room, it was necessary to enter either directly from the hall or through both the other offices.

“This is Mr. Byke’s private office, I suppose?”

“Yes.”

“And you, as his confidential clerk, have your desk in there?”

“Only in his absence; when he is at home, I occupy a desk in the large office.”

“Were you in there at your desk to-day?”

“Not since noon.”

“You were absent since noon?”

“Yes, until I returned just in time to be ‘in at the death.’”

There was a bad attempt to smile, as this was said, but the smile was painfully forced.

“Then you know nothing about the manner of the tragedy?”

“Nothing.”

“You and Redway were exchanging hot words when I surprised you. What was it that passed between you?[{17}]”

“I accused him of having killed Miss Langdon.”

“And what reply did he make?”

“He was insolent. Asked me what I intended to do about it, and wanted to know what proofs I had to fortify my charges.”

“And then?”

“You came almost before I could reply.”

“And have you any proofs?”

“Nothing but suspicion.”

“On what is that suspicion based?”

“Well, I’ve noticed that Miss Langdon has been growing fond of him for the last few months. She showed it frequently. I imagined that he at first received her preferences with pleasure, but that of late they had become annoying to him.”

“That is the result of observation only?”

“That is all. I may be mistaken, too, you know.”

“Has Redway a family?”

“Do you mean is he married?”

“Yes. Has he a wife, children, or relatives with whom he lives?”

“I believe not—not that any one knows of.”

“Where does he live?”

“In bachelor apartments on Fifty-fifth street.”

“That will do for the present, Mr. Gay.”

The young man arose, and started to go into the other private room by way of the communicating door, but Nick stopped him.

“Not there, Mr. Gay. You will be so kind as to remain in the outer office until we have questioned the other parties.”

Gay scowled and went reluctantly back to the large office.

Nick gave the coroner a significant look, and remarked: