Transcriber’s Notes:
The original spelling, hyphenation, and punctuation have been retained,
with the exception of apparent typographical errors which have been
corrected.
Text in Italics is indicated between _underscores_.
Text in Small Capitals has been replaced by regular uppercase text.
* * * * *
NICK CARTER STORIES
New Magnet Library
Price, Fifteen Cents _Not a Dull Book in This List_
Nick Carter stands for an interesting detective story. The fact that
the books in this line are so uniformly good is entirely due to the
work of a specialist. The man who wrote these stories produced no
other type of fiction. His mind was concentrated upon the creation of
new plots and situations in which his hero emerged triumphantly from
all sorts of troubles and landed the criminal just where he should
be—behind the bars.
The author of these stories knew more about writing detective stories
than any other single person.
Following is a list of the best Nick Carter stories. They have been
selected with extreme care, and we unhesitatingly recommend each of
them as being fully as interesting as any detective story between cloth
covers which sells at ten times the price.
If you do not know Nick Carter, buy a copy of any of the New Magnet
Library books, and get acquainted. He will surprise and delight you.
_ALL TITLES ALWAYS IN PRINT_
850—Wanted: A Clew By Nicholas Carter
851—A Tangled Skein By Nicholas Carter
852—The Bullion Mystery By Nicholas Carter
853—The Man of Riddles By Nicholas Carter
854—A Miscarriage of Justice By Nicholas Carter
855—The Gloved Hand By Nicholas Carter
856—Spoilers and the Spoils By Nicholas Carter
857—The Deeper Game By Nicholas Carter
858—Bolts from Blue Skies By Nicholas Carter
859—Unseen Foes By Nicholas Carter
860—Knaves in High Places By Nicholas Carter
861—The Microbe of Crime By Nicholas Carter
862—In the Tolls of Fear By Nicholas Carter
863—A Heritage of Trouble By Nicholas Carter
864—Called to Account By Nicholas Carter
865—The Just and the Unjust By Nicholas Carter
866—Instinct at Fault By Nicholas Carter
867—A Rogue Worth Trapping By Nicholas Carter
868—A Rope of Slender Threads By Nicholas Carter
869—The Last Call By Nicholas Carter
870—The Spoils of Chance By Nicholas Carter
871—A Struggle With Destiny By Nicholas Carter
872—The Slave of Crime By Nicholas Carter
873—The Crook’s Blind By Nicholas Carter
874—A Rascal of Quality By Nicholas Carter
875—With Shackles of Fire By Nicholas Carter
876—The Man Who Changed Faces By Nicholas Carter
877—The Fixed Alibi By Nicholas Carter
878—Out With the Tide By Nicholas Carter
879—The Soul Destroyers By Nicholas Carter
880—The Wages of Rascality By Nicholas Carter
881—Birds of Prey By Nicholas Carter
882—When Destruction Threatens By Nicholas Carter
883—The Keeper of Black Hounds By Nicholas Carter
884—The Door of Doubt By Nicholas Carter
885—The Wolf Within By Nicholas Carter
886—A Perilous Parole By Nicholas Carter
887—The Trail of the Finger Prints By Nicholas Carter
888—Dodging the Law By Nicholas Carter
889—A Crime in Paradise By Nicholas Carter
890—On the Ragged Edge By Nicholas Carter
891—The Red God of Tragedy By Nicholas Carter
892—The Man Who Paid By Nicholas Carter
893—The Blind Man’s Daughter By Nicholas Carter
894—One Object in Life By Nicholas Carter
895—As a Crook Sows By Nicholas Carter
896—In Record Time By Nicholas Carter
897—Held in Suspense By Nicholas Carter
898—The $100,000 Kiss By Nicholas Carter
899—Just One Slip By Nicholas Carter
900—On a Million-dollar Trail By Nicholas Carter
901—A Weird Treasure By Nicholas Carter
902—The Middle Link By Nicholas Carter
903—To the Ends of the Earth By Nicholas Carter
904—When Honors Pall By Nicholas Carter
905—The Yellow Brand By Nicholas Carter
906—A New Serpent in Eden By Nicholas Carter
907—When Brave Men Tremble By Nicholas Carter
908—A Test of Courage By Nicholas Carter
909—Where Peril Beckons By Nicholas Carter
910—The Gargoni Girdle By Nicholas Carter
911—Rascals & Co By Nicholas Carter
912—Too Late to Talk By Nicholas Carter
913—Satan’s Apt Pupil By Nicholas Carter
914—The Girl Prisoner By Nicholas Carter
915—The Danger of Folly By Nicholas Carter
916—One Shipwreck Too Many By Nicholas Carter
917—Scourged by Fear By Nicholas Carter
918—The Red Plague By Nicholas Carter
919—Scoundrels Rampant By Nicholas Carter
920—From Clew to Clew By Nicholas Carter
921—When Rogues Conspire By Nicholas Carter
922—Twelve in a Grave By Nicholas Carter
923—The Great Opium Case By Nicholas Carter
924—A Conspiracy of Rumors By Nicholas Carter
925—A Klondike Claim By Nicholas Carter
926—The Evil Formula By Nicholas Carter
927—The Man of Many Faces By Nicholas Carter
928—The Great Enigma By Nicholas Carter
929—The Burden of Proof By Nicholas Carter
930—The Stolen Brain By Nicholas Carter
931—A Titled Counterfeiter By Nicholas Carter
932—The Magic Necklace By Nicholas Carter
933—’Round the World for a Quarter By Nicholas Carter
934—Over the Edge of the World By Nicholas Carter
935—In the Grip of Fate By Nicholas Carter
936—The Case of Many Clews By Nicholas Carter
937—The Sealed Door By Nicholas Carter
938—Nick Carter and the Green Goods Men By Nicholas Carter
939—The Man Without a Will By Nicholas Carter
940—Tracked Across the Atlantic By Nicholas Carter
941—A Clew From the Unknown By Nicholas Carter
942—The Crime of a Countess By Nicholas Carter
943—A Mixed Up Mess By Nicholas Carter
944—The Great Money Order Swindle By Nicholas Carter
945—The Adder’s Brood By Nicholas Carter
946—A Wall Street Haul By Nicholas Carter
947—For a Pawned Crown By Nicholas Carter
THE MAN WITHOUT A CONSCIENCE
OR,
FROM ROGUE TO CONVICT
BY
NICHOLAS CARTER
Author of the celebrated stories of Nick Carter’s adventures,
which are published exclusively in the NEW MAGNET LIBRARY,
conceded to be among the best detective tales ever written.
[Illustration]
STREET & SMITH CORPORATION
PUBLISHERS
79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York
Copyright, 1906
By STREET & SMITH
The Man Without a Conscience
(Printed in the United States of America)
All rights reserved, including that of translation into foreign
languages, including the Scandinavian.
THE MAN WITHOUT A CONSCIENCE.
CHAPTER I.
AN INQUISITIVE CLERK.
“Bureau of Secret Investigation.”
Nick Carter glanced at the above sign over the door, an unpretentious
and somewhat faded reminder of better days, while he descended the
flight of stone steps leading into the basement offices of the Boston
police department.
The sunlight lay warm and bright in Pemberton Square at ten o’clock
that May morning, shedding over the magnificent new court-house a
golden glory consistent, no doubt, with the wise dispensation of
justice, yet in monstrous anomaly with some of the dreadful experiences
and grim episodes sometimes enacted within those splendid sunlit walls.
Nick turned to the right in the main corridor and entered the adjoining
office, quite a commodious room, in which the general business of this
secret service branch of the local police department was conducted.
The enclosure back of the chief clerk’s high desk, which also was
topped with a brass grating, happened to be vacant when Nick entered.
In one corner of the room, however, a subordinate clerk was busily
engaged in attempting to repair a slight leak in the faucet of the
ice-water vessel, and to this young man the famous New York detective
addressed himself.
“Has the chief been in this morning?” he asked.
The clerk bobbed up from his work as if startled, drying his hands with
his handkerchief, and stared sharply at Nick for several moments. But
he saw nothing familiar in the stranger’s grave, clean-cut features.
For all that this clerk knew, or surmised, Nick might have been an
ordinary or very humble citizen, who had quietly dropped in there for
want of something better to do.
“Chief Weston?” he returned inquiringly, still sharply scrutinizing
Nick.
“There is no other chief in this department, is there?” was Nick’s
reply, with a subtle tinge of irony.
“Well—no.”
“Chief Weston, yes,” bowed Nick. “Is he in his office?”
“I believe so.”
“Busy?”
“I reckon he is, just now.”
“Reckon, eh? Don’t you know?”
“Yes, sir, he’s busy,” the clerk now said, a bit curtly, flushing
slightly under the detective’s keen eye and quietly persistent
inquiries.
“He’s not too busy to see me, I think,” replied Nick, with dry
assurance. “Go in and tell him I’m here.”
“Who are you?”
“Never mind who I am.”
“I’ll take in your card.”
“No card,” said Nick tersely.
“Your name, then?”
“Nor any name.”
“But——”
“Merely tell the chief that his friend from New York is here.”
The expression in the eyes of the irritated clerk lost none of its
searching interest, yet they now took on a rather different light, as
if he had been suddenly hit with an idea. Yet he still frowned slightly
and said:
“If you object to having your name mentioned——”
“I do object, young man,” Nick now interrupted, with ominously quiet
determination. “Your chief may possibly have persons in his office
before whom I do not care to have my name announced. Now, you go to
him and deliver my message just as I gave it to you, neither more nor
less, or you’ll very suddenly hear something drop—providing you still
retain your senses.”
Now the clerk laughed, as if amused by the cool terms of the quiet
threat, and then he turned quickly and vanished into a short passageway
between the outer room and Chief Weston’s private office.
Nick gazed after him with a rather quizzical stare—a slender chap
of about twenty-five, with reddish hair, thin features, a sallow
complexion thickly dotted with freckles, and a countenance lighted by a
pair of narrow gray eyes, that greenish-gray sometimes seen in the eyes
of a cat.
“I wonder what use they have for him around here?” Nick said to
himself, while waiting. “If I were chief in this joint, it’s long odds
that that red-headed monkey would get his walking-ticket in short
order.”
The subject of these uncomplimentary cogitations returned in less than
a minute.
“You are to walk right in, sir—this way,” he glibly announced, with
much more deference.
At the same time he opened the way for Nick to pass into the enclosure,
and through the passage mentioned.
“Thank you,” said Nick, with half a growl.
“Don’t mention it,” grinned the clerk. “Straight ahead, sir. Chief
Weston is at his desk.”
Nick heard, meantime, the tramp of men through a corridor adjoining the
opposite side of the outer office, and he knew that Chief Weston had
immediately dismissed them, to receive him in private.
“So, so; the business is important,” he rightly conjectured.
The door closed behind Nick of itself, but the snap of the catch-lock
hung fire until after the hearty voice of the Boston chief of
detectives, as he arose and gripped Nick by the hand, had sounded
through the room.
“How are you, Nick?” he cried cordially. “I’m a thousand times more
than glad to see you, Carter, on my word.”
“Same to you, Weston,” laughed Nick. “Some time has passed since we
met.”
“Too long a time, eh?”
“That’s right, too.”
“Have a chair.”
Now the catch-lock snapped lightly.
A finger between the door and the jamb had been withdrawn.
A reddish head drew away from the panel, a pair of ears ceased their
strained attention, a light step retreated through the passage, and two
narrow gray eyes like those of a cat indicated that their owner had
now satisfied his inquisitive yearning, and learned the name of the
visitor who so peremptorily had issued his commands.
As Nick accepted a chair near that taken by Weston at his desk, he
carelessly jerked his thumb toward the door by which he had entered.
“Where’d you get him, Weston?” he asked dryly.
“Get whom?” queried the chief, with inquiring eyes.
“The clerk.”
“Hyde—the one who announced you?”
“The same.”
“Oh, he’s been at work on the books out there for about a year. He’s
only an assistant clerk.”
“Ah, I see.”
“Why did you ask?”
“For no reason.”
“Nonsense! You must have had some reason, Nick.”
“None of consequence,” smiled Nick. “I asked about him, in fact, only
because I had to fairly drive him in here when I declined to send in a
card or mention my name.”
Chief Weston threw back his head and laughed.
“That’s easily explained,” said he, still chuckling. “I growl at him
roundly at regular intervals, Nick, for annoying me with visitors whom
I neither know nor wish to see. I am getting him by degrees, however,
so that he requires the whole pedigree of a caller before announcing
him, which is about as bad a fault, I imagine. Sandy is all right,
though, in his own peculiar way.”
“Sandy, eh? That’s a nickname, I take it, because of his red hair?”
“No, not exactly. His name is Sanderson Hyde.”
“Ah, just so.”
“I took him in to oblige a journalist friend,” added Weston, smiling.
“It’s always well to stand ace-high with the press, you know.”
“That’s right, too,” nodded Nick, now willing to digress. “You sent for
me to come over here from New York, Weston. What do you want of me?”
“You got my wire?”
“Certainly.”
“Did Chick come with you?”
“No,” replied Nick, at this reference to his chief assistant. “I came
over alone.”
“Are you busy in New York just now?”
“I’m always busy, Weston.”
“Too busy to undertake a little work for me?”
“Where?”
“In and about Boston.”
“What’s the nature of it?”
“There is nothing in giving you all of the details, Nick, unless you
are in a position to accept an offer and help me out,” Chief Weston
gravely rejoined. “First of all, Nick, may I count on you?”
The brows of the celebrated New York detective knit a little closer
over his keen gray eyes. He drew up a bit in his chair, remarking
gravely:
“Your business is important, Weston, or you would not have sent for me.”
“Very important.”
“A serious matter?”
“Decidedly.”
“Have your own men tackled it?”
“Yes, the very best of them.”
“With no results?”
“None but absolute failure.”
“Are they now at work on the case?”
“Some of them.”
“And you wish me to take a hand in the work?”
“I certainly do.”
“If I consent to do so, Weston, I shall impose one condition,” said
Nick decidedly.
“I expect it.”
“You do?”
“Certainly,” nodded the chief. “Am I not familiar with your methods?
You will require me to order all of my men off the case and give it
entirely to you.”
“That’s the condition,” said Nick bluntly.
“I will accept it.”
“And leave the matter to me alone?”
“Precisely. In no way whatever shall you be interfered with.”
“Very good.”
“You will undertake the work for me?”
“I will hear of what it consists,” replied Nick, with his curiosity
stirred. “If it is all that your remarks imply—well, Weston, you may
then count on me to give it an argument.”
“Capital.”
“Now, cut loose and give me the facts of the case.”
Chief Weston opened a drawer of his desk and took out a batch of papers
and documents, among which was a neatly mounted photograph about five
inches square, such as may be taken with a small portable camera, or a
kodak.
While he placed the papers on his desk, he handed the photograph to
Nick Carter, saying impressively:
“First examine this, Nick, and tell me what you make of it.”