THE ACME OF KNAVERY.
Nick Carter ignored Mortimer Deland’s mocking suavity, the miscreant’s
manifest air of superiority and contempt. He sat down directly opposite
the notorious crook, replying sternly:
“That may be quickly told, Deland, and I’m right here to tell it.”
“I am listening.”
“You wish to know what I am after. I am after a rascal who has been
playing a very extraordinary game, so extraordinary that he might have
won out and accomplished his evil designs--if I had not butted into the
game to thwart it.”
“Ah!” drawled Deland. “That makes it very unfortunate for him--but
doubly unfortunate for you, perhaps.”
“That last word is well added.”
“Indeed?”
“You will agree with me later.”
“I seldom agree with men of your vocation,” said Deland, smiling
ironically. “Be good enough to explain, Mr. Carter. I do not quite get
you. For whom are you seeking?”
“For Pauline Perrot--said to have been murdered by Arthur Gordon,” Nick
replied curtly.
“Dear me, is that so?” smiled Deland, with eyes narrowing. “I remember
Gordon. It was he who started you on my track several months ago, with
very disastrous results. I would not grieve deeply, Carter, if evil did
befall Mr. Arthur Gordon.”
“I am very well aware of that, Deland,” Nick said dryly. “Your assurance
of it is entirely unnecessary.”
“Pauline Perrot, eh?” queried Deland, unruffled. “Said to have been
murdered. She is Gordon’s stenographer, I believe. I think I have seen
her coming from his business office. Murdered, eh? What are the
circumstances, Carter? Have you succeeded in finding her--or what is
left of her?”
“Yes,” Nick said shortly.
“Dear me, is that so?”
Deland did not, in fact, then suppose it was so, Henley being the only
one of the four crooks then informed of what the detective had
discovered.
“I not only have found all that is left of her, but also all that she
left behind her,” Nick pointedly added.
Deland’s eyes took on a sharper gleam and glitter, his thin lips a more
sinister and threatening curve. The tinge of color in his cheeks waned
perceptibly. His long, slender fingers closed involuntarily, until their
carefully manicured nails bit into his palms. He laughed, nevertheless,
in a cold and mirthless fashion, while he echoed inquiringly:
“All that she left behind her?”
“Exactly,” said Nick.
“You mean----”
“The garments she left in the home of Mrs. Lord, with whom she has been
boarding.”
“You have been there?”
Deland’s brows knit closer and fell to a settled frown over his steadily
dilating eyes.
“How else could I have found the garments?” Nick demanded. “Yes, I have
been there and----”
“And that’s not the only place he’s been to, nor all he----”
“One moment, Henley,” Deland coldly interrupted. “I will hear you
presently. Permit Mr. Carter to have his say. What more, Carter; what
more?”
“Oh, there is a good deal more, Deland, if I chose to tell you all of my
discoveries and deductions,” Nick now said, more sternly.
“Ah, indeed?”
“So much, Deland, that it would reveal in every detail the knavish game
you have been playing,” Nick went on forcibly. “But you have overplayed
yourself, over-estimated the value of your cards.”
“My cards?”
“Have you not learned in all the years you have lived in vice and crime
that three kings, well played, will invariably beat three knaves?”
“See here, Carter----”
“Oh, you wanted me to have my say,” Nick went on sternly, interrupting.
“The three kings you have been up against, Deland, are Patsy Garvan,
Chick Carter, and myself--three kings in the detective deck. You,
Deland, are single-handed the three knaves--yourself, the man Dayton,
and the supposed murdered girl, Pauline Perrot. Three knaves, Deland,
never beat three kings.”
“You say--you say that I am Pauline Perrot?” gasped Deland, with his
wonderful nerve shaken for the first time.
“I not only say so, but I can also prove it,” cried Nick. “I say, too,
that you now have Arthur Gordon confined in this house, and that you and
these three rascals----”
“Stop!” Deland leaped to his feet. “I have heard enough from you,
Carter. Keep an eye on him, Foster, with a weapon ready. If he utters
another word, or makes an aggressive move, shoot him instantly. This
way, Henley, into the hall. I prefer to hear your story.”
An expression of devilish ferocity now had settled upon his vicious
white face. He strode into the hall, Henley following, and for several
minutes the two remained there in a whispered discussion.
Nick Carter waited with apparent indifference.
“There soon will be something doing, I imagine,” he said to himself. “I
wonder whether Chick arrived in time to pick up his quarry. That now
appears very improbable. Fortunately, however, I have another string to
my bow, one that Henley does not even suspect. The odds are
considerable, but--ah, well, I have never known him to fail to make
good.”
There was a still more vicious look on Deland’s face when he returned
with Henley. It was like that which it had worn when, having caught
Patsy Garvan as he now had cornered Nick, he left him to die in the
Barker tomb.
He came and stood directly in front of Nick, gazing down at him and
saying, with icy severity:
“Henley has made it perfectly plain to me. There is no occasion for you
to say more.”
“Very well,” Nick returned indifferently.
“You are very clever, Carter, very clever,” Deland went on. “I have
never in Europe encountered an inspector who compared at all with you.
You are so dangerous, Carter, that the world is too small for both of
us.”
“Why don’t you move out?” Nick coolly inquired.
“You have exposed my game, indeed, and thwarted part of it,” Deland went
on, as if there had been no interruption. “But I have, at least, the
money and bonds stolen from Gordon’s vault. They are in yonder suit
case.”
“Thanks for the information,” Nick again put in. “It will save me from
searching for them.”
“I also have Gordon, here, as you have inferred,” continued Deland
icily. “And, best of all--I have you!”
“I would be foolish to deny it,” Nick dryly allowed.
“And here, Carter, before we bolt for parts unknown, is where I shall
get even with you and with him, where I will forever wipe you out of my
path. Gordon is bound hand and foot in a room on the top floor.”
“Thanks again, Deland.”
“I will send you both to the devil.”
“By what route, pray?”
“In a chariot of fire!” cried Deland, with a sudden outburst of
ferocity.
“Well, well, that will beat walking,” Nick declared, not in the least
daunted by the significance of the miscreant’s threat.
Deland swung around to Foster and Gribham, who had stood listening with
stoical indifference to the foregoing colloquy.
“Go and get him, you two,” he fiercely commanded. “Bring Gordon down
here. We will wipe them out together. We will leave no evidence here to
tell the story. We will bind both, lock them in the library closet, and
then fire the house.”
“That’s the stuff!” Henley said, with a growl. “It will burn like
tinder. That will finish them.”
“Get Gordon--get Gordon!” Deland fairly shrieked. “Bring him to the
library. We can be out of here with our plunder, with the deed done, in
less than a dozen minutes. Go and get Gordon. Bring Carter after me,
Henley. Bring him into the library. I’ll do it--I long to do it! It
shall be my hand that starts the flames!”
In another moment all of them, Nick Carter included, were striding into
the dimly lighted hall.