"Sit there," she said. "I declare, we are quite domestic."

"So it would appear, madam. I am afraid that you are doing me too much honor, for one who has been so short a time among you."

"Bah! I am glad to have somebody who can talk decently near me. I tire of all these ragamuffins who are my men. Sometimes I kill one of them just for the mere fun of ridding myself of the vermin."

"Madam is incautious, perhaps."

"Why so?"

"Some day one of them might take it into his head to kill madam."

"Then somebody will have to be mighty quick about it. I'm not so easily killed as all that. Tell me—have you guessed who I am?"

"I am not a good guesser, madam."

"On the contrary, I should suppose you to be a good one—an exceptionally good one. Answer me: Have you guessed who I am?"

"I might make a guess now, madam."

"Oh, drop that madam. I don't want you to madam me all the time. Who do you suppose I am?"

"If I am to make a guess, I should suppose that you are that distinguished and elusive person whom the outside world refers to as Hobo Harry."

She laughed long and heartily, stirring her coffee vigorously the while.

"Upon my word, you are a good one," she said, still with laughter in her voice. "Yes, I am that distinguished and elusive person. There is no doubt about that. I have spent a long time in bringing this organization to perfection, Dago. What do you think of it?"

"I think it is a wonder."

"Right you are, my man! It is a wonder. For example, what did you think of the operation that was performed last night?"

"I thought it was carried out very perfectly. The men must have been a long time in laying their plans."

She laughed again.

"Not one of those men—not even Handsome—had ever seen that place before. They only obeyed my orders; nothing more. I made the plans myself. I told them exactly what to do, and when, and how to do it. It is all a question of mathematics, and of obeying orders."

"It was perfectly done, madam."

"There you go again. By the way, Handsome gives me an excellent report of you."

"I had supposed as much, else I would not be here breakfasting with you."

"That is not why I sent for you; that has nothing to do with last night."

"No?"

"I want you to tell me where I have seen you before—and where you have met me before," she said swiftly, and with a sudden and dangerous narrowing of her eyes.

If Nick had not had himself perfectly in hand he must have given a start then that would have betrayed him; as it was, he answered instantly, and as if the subject had also occurred to him:

"For the life of me, madam, I cannot remember. I have tried to recall the time and place ever since I saw you last night; but it eludes me. I cannot tell."

"It is well that you have answered as you have," she said, with a threatening cadence in her voice.

"Why so, madam?"

"Because I saw plainly in your eyes last night that you remembered to have seen me somewhere before that time. Had you denied it, you would have lied to me; and it is not healthy for people to tell me lies."

"I can imagine that, madam. But since I have no reason to do so——"

"Tell me what there is about me that is familiar to you, Dago."

"It must be your great beauty that I remem——"

"That will be about enough of that, thank you," she interrupted him coldly. "I know all about my beauty, and don't in the least need to be told about it."

"One could not very well remember you at all without remembering your beauty," insisted Nick boldly. "It is the first thing about you that strikes one; and the second is——"

"Well—what? Possibly I will be more interested in that."

"The fear you inspire, I think. You have what the French call a 'way' about you."

She started perceptibly.

"What do you know about the French?" she demanded; and Nick saw instantly that he had made a mistake in reminding her of her career in Paris. Now it was possible that she might recall where she had seen him.

But he dismissed the idea as soon as it came to him, for he remembered again how perfectly he was disguised, and how impossible it should be for her to remember him after all these years, through the disguise.

But now she was looking steadily at him, and for the moment she had forgotten to eat.

"Who are you, Dago?" she demanded suddenly. "You are not what you seem."

"Few of us are," returned the detective evasively.

"Who are you?"

"I have told you, madam, as much as it is possible to tell. You do not demand the past records of your followers. All that you insist upon is that they shall be faithful in the future."

"Who are you?" she repeated again.

"I am Dago John, madam, at your service."

"But you have another name than Dago John."

"I had another—once."

"What was it?"

"Madam does not suppose, when she asks the question, that it will be answered, does she?" Nick inquired boldly.

"By Heaven, sir, do you dare to defy me?"

"Not at all. I merely feel sure that madam asked the question as a joke, knowing that it could not be answered."

For a moment it seemed as if she did not know whether to be angry at him for his cool effrontery, or to laugh the matter off entirely, in admiration of his bravery. She decided upon the latter course evidently, for she did laugh—in a way that was not quite pleasant to hear, however; and she said:

"Try to think where you have seen me before. Help me to remember. I want to recall it."

"It is impossible, madam. I have already tried."

"Is the memory that is associated with me pleasant or otherwise?"

"It could not be but pleasant, since it was—you," he ventured; and she frowned. It was plain that she did not relish such compliments.

And now she sat with her eyes fixed upon him, idly stirring her second cup of coffee, and seeming to look him through and through, while she cast her memory back over the storms of her life, not yet more than twenty-three years, all told, and attempted with all her strength of will to call up for recognition the ghost which his appearance had conjured.

After a little she leaned forward, nearer to him, and her eyes, coal black, and blazing, fairly burned into his own; but he held his gaze steadily upon her, never once flinching from the scrutiny.

And then, so suddenly that it startled him, she leaped to her feet, knocking her coffee to the floor, and she stood over him—but whether in anger or only in astonishment that she had remembered, he could not have told.

"By all the gods!" she cried out. "I remember you now. It is your eyes that have haunted me, and now I remember where I have seen them. I remember. It was in Paris. It was at the prefecture of police. I was there. I was only a girl. I had just finished with the chief when you entered the room. I did not notice your name when it was announced, but now I remember you—at the prefecture of police in Paris! Tell me—tell me, I say, what you were doing there!"

The detective knew that it would be folly to deny the charge that she made. He knew that she remembered now, perfectly well, and that nothing could disabuse her mind of the determination it had reached.

Acting upon the impulse of the instant, therefore, and determined now to play out his role as it should appear, Nick pretended instantly to be as greatly astonished as she was at the recollection, and the strangeness of it.

He, too, leaped to his feet, imitating an astonishment as great as her own. He did not tip over his coffee, but he did manage to upset his chair, so that it fell backward on the floor; and then for the space of a moment they stood staring into each other's eyes, both—from all appearances—speechless with astonishment.

And then, very slowly, she subsided into her chair again, still keeping her eyes upon him, and still evidently taxing her memory to the utmost to recall all the incidents of that meeting at the prefecture in Paris.

"I remember now," she murmured at last, more to herself than to him. "It all comes back to me, bit by bit. Monsieur Goron was chief at the time—no? Yes. I remember. There had been a sudden death in the house where I lived—it was on the floor just beneath me—and Goron sent for me to question me about it. It was thought at first that Lucie had been murdered, and Goron thought that perhaps I would know about it. He had just finished questioning me when you entered the room—ah!"

Her eyes blazed with a sudden fire of anger, and her lips tightened over her teeth.

"When you entered the room Goron rose and shook hands with you. Why did he do that? Goron did not shake hands with criminals!"

"Nor with his police spies, did he?" asked Nick, smiling and shrugging his shoulders.

"But why did he shake hands with you?"

"Because we were old acquaintances, madam."

"And he called you by name. What was that name?"

"Madam, for some time past I have deemed it best to forget it."

"Nevertheless you shall remember it now."

Nick shrugged his shoulders, and did not reply.

"What was that name?" she demanded again.

"I have told madam that I——"

She started from her chair, and ran across the room so suddenly that Nick was interrupted in what he was about to say; and she seized a rope that hung from the ceiling and stood with her hand upon it, grasping it.

"If I pull this rope," she said coldly, "as many of my followers as hear it will rush to this place. You know what is likely to happen then if I loose them upon you. They are all like wild beasts, or like dogs, ready to tear each other at the slightest provocation. If I should point my finger at you—so—and say to them, 'Take him; he is yours,' your life would not be worth as much as the dregs in your coffee cup. Tell me, what that name was, or I will summon the men."

The detective shrugged his shoulders, and leaned back in his chair, smiling.

"It would be a foolish and a useless proceeding," he said calmly. "I should not tell them that name any more than I tell it to you. I will not tell it. It is of no moment here. It could do you no good to hear it, and to mention it might do me harm; therefore, I shall not mention it, no matter how often you order me to do so. It pains me to disobey you, madam, but you force me into the alternative, and I have no choice. Pull the rope if you will."

Instead of pulling it, she released it, still staring at him, and she returned slowly to her chair.

"You are a strange man," she murmured, "and a brave one. There is not another who would dare to defy me as you have done."

"Perhaps there is not another who has so much at stake," he replied quietly, but with perfect truth, as the reader knows.

Again she knit her brows in perplexity; again the detective knew that she was concentrating her mind upon that incident at the prefecture, trying with all her power to recall the merest detail of it.

Nick remembered that his name had been mentioned aloud at that time; he recalled the fact that Goron, in rising to shake hands with him, had called him by name plainly enough. It was evident that she also remembered that much of the facts, and was now straining every energy she possessed to recall what that name was.

And while she thought so deeply, her face gradually assumed an expressionless cast. She closed her lips firmly together. Her eyes became sombre. She seemed oblivious of his presence, and of her surroundings. For the moment she was back again in Paris, at the prefecture, in the presence of Goron, five years ago.

After a little, without another change of expression, she shrugged her shoulders, and rose from her chair, and then, with an assumption of carelessness, she passed from the room upon the piazza, saying as she went:

"Come. We will not bother any more about this for the present. We will take up the subject again another time, after we have both had opportunity to think it over. If you care for a cigar, Dago, there are some in that cupboard yonder. Help yourself."

Now, it happened that Nick did care for a cigar. He had not had one in many a day, but had forced himself to be content with an old pipe. The prospect of a cigar was enticing, and so he took her at her word, and helped himself—turning his back to her as he did so, and so he did not see the strange smile which crossed her face as she passed through the door upon the piazza.

He was a bit puzzled by this sudden change in her attitude and manner. He could not exactly account for it. Had she remembered? He could not tell.

He realized, however, that he was in a predicament—that his position was precarious; for if she should remember—if she should recall the name of Nick Carter as connected with that incident, he knew that his own life would not be worth the snap of a finger, no matter how bravely he might fight, or how many of the foe he should overcome in the contest that would inevitably follow.

For, scattered about in that stronghold in the swamp, there were no less than a hundred of her followers, and there was not one among them who would not kill at her bidding.

She was standing upon the piazza, looking away through the woods, when he came out, and, without turning her head, she said to him:

"Take that chair, and remain there until you have smoked your cigar. The men might take it into their heads to be jealous if you should go among them with it, and they should know that you, a new arrival, had breakfasted with me. I will return in a moment."

She left him then, entering the house; and with no thought of immediate danger in his mind, Nick followed her suggestion, and leaned back in the chair, tilting it against the house, determined to enjoy that smoke to the utmost.

After that it was difficult to tell exactly what did happen.

He remembered afterward that he smoked on in enjoyment of the cigar for some minutes, and that he thought it somewhat rank, notwithstanding the fact that it had the appearance of being of excellent quality.

And then suddenly the cigar flashed, exactly as if there had been three or four grains of gunpowder wrapped in it—and he was instantly conscious of an intensely bitter taste in his mouth.

And then it seemed to him almost as if somebody had struck him, so strange were his sensations—and from that instant memory left him entirely.

The woman had been watching him narrowly from the doorway; she was waiting for that flash from the end of his cigar, and when it came she passed out through the door swiftly, and caught him as he was about to fall from his chair to the floor of the piazza; caught him, and held him, and then deftly raised him to his feet, and half carried him inside the house before anybody—had a person been observant of the scene—could have realized that anything was wrong.

She possessed great strength, this remarkable woman; for the instant she was inside the door, heavy as he was, she raised him in her arms, and carried him into an adjoining room, where she closed the door behind her, and deposited him upon a couch.

And then, still working with great rapidity, she pulled aside a rug that was on the floor, and, having lifted a trapdoor, she again took him in her arms, and descended through the opening in the floor to the depths beneath it.

After a little she reappeared, and this time there was a grim smile upon her face, while she replaced the rug over the trapdoor, and otherwise rendered the room the same as it had been before the incident happened.

She passed coolly out upon the piazza, and for a time strode up and down it in deep thought; but at last she raised her head quickly, and called sharply to the sentinel who was pacing up and down in front of the cottage.

"Send Handsome to me!" she ordered; and then she continued her pacing until Handsome appeared.

Handsome belied his name terribly in the light of day, for an uglier-looking chap could not be imagined; and yet, withal, there was a gleam of humor in his eyes and at the corners of his mouth. She turned to him abruptly.

"Where are the others of that bunch who were found with Dago?" she asked sharply.

"Yonder," replied Handsome, jerking his thumb over his shoulder toward the glade beyond them.

"What do you think about them, Handsome?" she asked again.

"I haven't thought much about them," he replied. "They are about the usual sort, I believe; no better and perhaps no worse."

"I am not so sure of that."

"No?" he asked, vaguely surprised.

"Handsome, I want you to take them, one by one, to the pool in the woods, strip them, and scrub them with soap, and water, and sand, if necessary. I want you to make sure that there is no suggestion of disguise about any of the three. Do it at once—and when it is done, no matter whether there is a question of disguise about any of them or not, bring them to me."

Handsome departed without a word. It was plain that Black Madge was accustomed to obedience. It was plain also that her suspicions were thoroughly aroused; for now she paced up and down again restlessly, and continued so to pace until almost an hour later Handsome stood before her again.

"Well?" she demanded.

"Two of them were plainly disguised," he replied.

"And the other?" she demanded, frowning.

"The other, as plainly was not disguised."

"And the two who were disguised—what of them?"

"I cannot tell if they are known to each other. I cannot tell whether they are spies or not, only it is quite likely that they are."

"And the third one? The one who wore no disguise?"

"I think he is all right. He is the one called Pat. When he realized that the others who had been with him were in disguise, he flew at one of them, thinking that he had been followed himself, and I think would have killed the fellow if I had not been there to prevent it."

Madge listened, with a shrug of her shoulders; then she said briefly:

"Bring them here, Handsome. Bring the two who were disguised, first. Leave the other one alone until I send for him. What are the supposed names of these two?"

"One is called Tenstrike, and the other calls himself the Chicago Chicken."

"The Chicago Chicken," she said slowly. "Chick, for short, is it not? I think we are on the right track, Handsome. Bring that one here alone—first."



CHAPTER VIII.

THE DETECTIVES FACE A CRISIS.

Chick had committed the folly of not being entirely thorough in the creation of his disguise; so also had Ten-Ichi; and the soap and scrubbing brushes, as employed by Handsome, had done the work of removing it.

But Patsy? Well, it had not been necessary for Patsy to be quite so thorough, for his own particular person and features were sufficient disguise, with a few minor alterations and additions.

For instance, at the risk of not having it wear off soon enough to suit his purposes, he had gone to a professional hair dyer, and had ordered his shock of hair indelibly dyed to a dirty brick-red; and he had put spots on his face, and the back of his hands, with nitrate of silver, so that the spots burned into the skin. No soap and water could remove these. They would only disappear with time; but Patsy had never traveled on a reputation for beauty, and he did not give the matter a thought beyond the immediate necessities.

He had taken another precaution, also, just before he entered the woods to go to the place of meeting. He had stripped himself in a secluded place near the railway tracks, and he had rolled himself in the coal dust around the track, griming the dirt into his body, so that when it came to the time that Handsome stripped him—well, it can be imagined how he looked.

A little snuff rubbed thoroughly against his teeth had rendered them sufficiently discolored, and altogether he so thoroughly looked his part that Handsome, when he stripped him, had not the slightest doubt of his reality.

But the frauds connected with Chick and Ten-Ichi were easily detected.

Black Madge, while still seated at the table with the detective, had suddenly recalled the name that had long ago been mentioned in her presence by the chief of the Paris police. It had come to her in a flash that the name was Nick Carter—and that this man who was so calmly seated in her presence was Nick Carter.

Madge knew a great deal more about Nick Carter than Nick supposed she did; she knew all about his household, and about his assistants. She knew their names as well as if they were followers of her own—and when Handsome, in mentioning the names of the other men, had talked about Tenstrike and the Chicken, she had connected the names at once.

As for the other one—Pat—that had a significance also; but Pat is a very common name, and she did not do herself the honor to suppose that Nick Carter would bring all three of his assistants into the woods with him in search of her. One, she thought, would have to be left behind to look after the business, and, therefore, she was all the more ready to believe that Patsy, since he was not in disguise, was one of her own kind, who had inadvertently fallen into the company of the detectives.

Handsome and four other men accompanied Chick to the cottage, and when he stood before Madge she looked him over from head to foot with cold scorn.

"So," she said venomously, "you thought to deceive me, did you—you and your master?"

Chick made no reply, and, after a moment, she went on:

"We have a way of ridding ourselves of such men as you are, when they come among us. It is not pleasant for them, but it serves as a lesson to others. Step inside the house. Take him inside, Handsome. Let the others wait out here, and if there is the slightest sound of a row inside the house let them enter it at once."

When the three were in the room together, she said to Chick:

"You observe that I know who you are?"

Chick nodded—and he also smiled.

She stamped her foot upon the floor under her, and continued:

"Down there, beneath us, unconscious and chained to the wall, is Nick Carter. Even Handsome did not know that till now. He did not know that Dago John, who went with him last night to rob the bank, was no other than Nick Carter. But it is true, Handsome."

"Gee!" breathed Handsome, his fingers twitching.

"He is all right now, Handsome. He cannot hurt you. I have put him out of business—and I don't think we had better let the men know that Nick Carter has been among them. Let them wreak their vengeance upon this fellow, and upon the other—that little Jap. As for Nick Carter himself, I will take care of him. He will never come out of that cellar alive. And now, Chick, I want you to answer me a question."

"You will save your breath if you do not ask it," replied Chick. "I am not answering questions just at present."

"Not to save yourself, or your master?"

"I know very well that nothing that I can say will have the least effect upon my fate, or upon Nick Carter's," he replied.

"Very good," she replied slowly; and then to Handsome: "Take him away, Handsome. Take him out there to the men. Tell them who he is, and that they may do as they please with him. I think the quicksand bog would be as good a place as any for him; or the fire tree; but they may do as they please—so long as they kill him. Take him away."

Chick, realizing that it was all up with him, and that he might as well make a fight for it, leaped forward quickly, full at the woman, intending to seize upon her, and hold her as a shield; but even as he attempted to do so, the floor beneath him sank under him for the depth of two feet, and before he could recover his balance, Madge had thrown a table cover over his head, and in another moment Handsome had thrown him to the floor, and called the others to his assistance.

And so Chick was tightly bound and borne away a captive—to what fate he could only imagine.

"You need not bring the Jap here at all," Madge called after them. "Let my hoboes take him with them, along with this one; but do you bring the man Pat to me at once."

And five minutes later Handsome reappeared with Patsy in tow, only that Patsy was not a prisoner—as yet.

"Now, my man," said Madge coldly, "you will have to give a pretty straight account of yourself. You were found in bad company."

"Sure, ma'am, don't I know the same? I've been apologizing to meself ever since I discovered it, an' if Handsome here had only left me alone, faith, I'd have settled wan part of me misgivings then and there, so I would. I had me doubts about the bunch from the beginning, ma'am, when they came a-sneakin' up to me fire, and eatin' of me grub; and when that other gazabo dropped from the trees, sure, I was certain of it. I was after kapin' me eyes peeled all the time since then, your worship, but I thought it wasn't f'r the likes of me to be after makin' suggestions to y'r majesty, at all, at all."

"Who are you, and what are you, Pat?" she asked, smiling upon him.

"Sure, ma'am, it's nobody I am. I've never done anything worse than pick a pocket untel a short time ago, when I had the misfortune to get mixed up in a bit av a scrap—and the other feller didn't have the common dacency to get on his feet ag'in when it was over. He jest stayed there, so he did, and thinkin' that somebody would be axin' questions of me, I lit out. Ye wouldn't know a thing more about me if I should talk for a week—but, sure, if there's a question ye'd like to ax me, I'll be afther answerin' it to the best of me ability, so I will."

"What brought you to me?"

"Me legs—no less; begging y'r pardon for mentionin' it. They weren't purty to look at when Handsome stripped me—but we needn't mention that, aither."

"But you came here in search of Hobo Harry."

"I did. That same."

"Who sent you here to find him?"

"Nobody. I had to go somewhere. I had been readin' the papers, and I had seen a lot about Hobo Harry in 'em. All of the papers said that he was to be found around here somewhere, and that the divil himself couldn't catch him; and I says to mesilf, says I, sure that's the broth av a boy ye want to find, Pat—and here I am, ma'am."

"Did you ever hear of Nick Carter?"

"I have that."

"Ever see him?"

"I did that."

"Would you know him, do you think, if you should see him again?"

"I would that. It isn't three weeks since I saw him wid these two eyes as plain as I see y'r own beautiful face this minit. Sure, I'd know him."

"Come this way, then."

She went into the adjoining room, and they followed. There she pulled aside the rug again, and, having raised the trapdoor, descended, Patsy and Handsome following close behind her.

The narrow steps took them into a spacious cellar, and, having passed through a partition by opening a heavy oaken door, they entered what appeared to be a prison room.

Nick Carter was there. He had recovered consciousness, and was seated on a low stool against the wall. His arms were stretched wide apart, and each was held in position by an iron chain on either side of him. A ring of these chains had been passed around each wrist, and locked there, and the chains were fastened to the stone walls by staples.

Madge stopped directly in front of the detective, and glared at him, while he returned her fierce look with a half smile—for he had entirely recovered from the effects of the dose she had administered.

She raised her arm and pointed toward the detective, but before she could utter a word, Patsy cried out:

"That's him! That's him! Sure, ma'am, I'd know him among a thousand! He's got stain on his skin; I can see that; and he is disguised in other ways, ma'am, I can see that, too; but it's him. I'd take me oath to it, so I would."

Madge smiled, and softly rubbed her hands together.

"Carter," she said coldly, "do you know this man who recognizes you?"

Nick shrugged his shoulders in disdain, for he understood perfectly well that Patsy had some well-defined plan in his head for doing as he did; and he replied:

"I suppose he is somebody whom I have arrested at some time. It is only the worst criminals, like yourself, Madge, that I take the trouble to remember."

She turned away with a toss of her head.

"Come!" she ordered; and they followed her from the cellar room, and up the narrow stairs again, where she reclosed the trap.

"Go back, Pat, and take your place among the others," she ordered him then. "You will be watched for a long time, and at the first break you make you will be knifed, or shot. It is up to you whether you make good in this community or not. Go now."

When he had gone, she turned to Handsome.

"Handsome," she said slowly, "you can go now, too. Keep an eye on that Pat. At midnight to-night, come here to the cottage, for I want you to help me to carry the body into the woods to the quicksand pit. We will throw him there—Nick Carter, I mean."

"Of course. Shall you chuck him in alive?"

"No; for he would find some way to crawl out and escape. I will put him out of the way first. It will be only a dead body that we will have to carry, but I don't want the men to know that Nick Carter has been among us until after he is dead. Then it will not matter."

"Right you are," said Handsome; and he took his departure.

But down in the cellar beneath them something had happened, for as soon as the party of three left him, Nick calmly and easily pulled the iron staples from the wall and stood upon his feet. The fact was that he had already succeeded in loosening them when he heard the approach of Madge and the others, and he had been afforded barely time to resume his position of helpless captivity when the door was opened and they entered.

But now he was free, save for the short chains that were still fastened to his wrists, and the plank walls that rose between him and liberty.

But the chains on each wrist were short, and the walls were only plank; and in Madge's eagerness and haste in fastening him there she had neglected—or she had not thought it necessary—to search him for his weapons.

He knew now that there was very little time to spare, and that he and his three assistants were in a bad predicament.



CHAPTER IX.

THE ESCAPE FROM THE SWAMP.

In the meantime, Patsy had been in half a dozen different kinds of a brown study. He realized that now the entire situation depended solely upon him, and that the lives of his chief, and of Chick and Ten-Ichi, rested wholly in his hands.

He stood, be it said, all alone, in the midst of a huge swamp, from which escape could only be had by means of a boat, and into which he had been conducted blindfolded. Around him were men, all ready at any instant to take his life for the merest excuse; and already the lives of his three friends were sacrificed unless he could do something—and that very speedily—to save them.

In the cellar at the cottage he had not dared to look squarely at his chief, for fear that the inclination on his own part to make some sort of signal would be too strong for him to resist; and he had known that Madge was watching every act and motion, as a cat watches a mouse.

When he left the cottage, and had gone as far as the edge of the glade, he halted, and waited there for Handsome, for he guessed that the man would be sent away directly; and when Handsome did come, Patsy said to him:

"Sure, Handsome, will ye tell me what is to be done wid the others?"

"I haven't made up my mind about that yet," replied Handsome.

"And is it left to you that it is?"

"Certainly."

"Faith, but that's fine. I wish it was left to me, so I do."

"What would you do to them, Pat?"

"I'd skin 'em, begorra!"

Handsome laughed.

"Perhaps I will give you a chance," he said. "However, it is likely that they will go into the quicksand."

"Where is that same, then?"

"Out in the swamp a bit. There is no getting out of it, and it tells no tales. Once a man is thrown into that, he sinks out of sight in a few minutes, and that is the last of him. It is our graveyard. There are about fifty in there now. The place is bottomless."

"Cheerful, isn't it? Sure, man, it's unhealthy, it is; but I'll go and have a look at it. Where is it?"

Handsome directed him how to find it, and he hastened away; but he paused before he started long enough to select a long, strong rope that he had seen near one of the cabins. This he carried with him, and disappeared among the trees.

Patsy was gone less than half an hour, but when he returned he was whistling; and then, after a little, he found an opportunity to linger around the place where Chick and Ten-Ichi were confined in one of the cabins.

And presently he began to sing; at first in a low tone, and in unintelligible words; but his voice was good, and it attracted attention, even among that motley crew, and after a little, perceiving that they were listening, he sang the louder.

If they had but known it, he was singing in Japanese, which Ten-Ichi had taught him to speak perfectly; and the words he uttered as he sang, translated, were:

"There is a quicksand pit not far from here. They are going to throw you both into it. I have carried a rope to the quicksand pit. I have tied it to a tree near there. When you are thrown into the pit, spread out your arms. And also spread out your legs. Keep as still as possible so as not to sink too fast. I will be there as soon as I can do it. I will throw you the end of the rope. And with your own combined strength and mine, we can pull you out. I am not suspected, so I can do the act, all right. Keep up your pluck, and manage not to go into the pit head down."

He sang this over and over several times until he was sure that Ten-Ichi had heard and understood, and would convey the message to Chick, and then he sauntered away.

Twice after that he tried to get near to the cottage to sing to Nick Carter; but each time he was stopped and turned back again; and at last he muttered to himself:

"I'll have to wait till to-night for that part of it. After I have rescued Chick and Ten-Ichi I will have them to help me, and then it will be funny if we don't get the chief out of the pickle he is in."

It was well toward evening, almost the hour of sundown, before Chick and Ten-Ichi were carried to the quicksand pit; and then a procession followed them. The hands and feet of the prisoners were not bound, for it was desired that they should flounder in the quicksand in order to hasten its work; and without ceremony they were hurled into the midst of it, one, and then the other.

Patsy's only fear was that the horde of hoboes would throw sticks and stones at the helpless men in the sand pit; but he found that this was against orders, since the presence of such impedimenta would give the victims something to seize hold of; and the operation of sinking was so slow, and the hoboes had seen it so many times, that they had lost interest in it; so that almost at once after Chick and Ten-Ichi were thrown in they began to withdraw to their several occupations; and finally when only a group of four remained, Patsy, who was one of them, called out: "It's tired of this I am. Come on!" and, nothing loath, the others followed him away.

But he was not long gone. Almost at once he found an opportunity to leave them, and, by making a detour, to hurry back again.

Already when he had reached the pit a second time the two detectives had sunk almost to their armpits; but in an instant Patsy found the rope he had concealed, one end of which was fastened to a tree.

The task which followed can better be imagined than described, and only for the great strength of the trio it must have been unsuccessful. But with Chick and Ten-Ichi straining for their lives at one end, and Patsy pulling on the other as best he could, they came forth inch by inch, until at last they stood, covered with mud, to be sure, but on solid earth.

"Now, go around that way," said Patsy, speaking rapidly. "The cottage is over there, as you know. You'll have to cross a neck of the swamp in getting to it, but the chief is there, a prisoner. I have seen him. He is chained to the wall in the cellar. If you get a chance before I do, overcome that beast of a sentinel, who is walking up and down near the house. I'll go back through the glade, and I'll manage somehow to join you there, if I have to kill somebody in order to do it; and take these. They are extra ones. I swiped them." He handed them each a pistol as he spoke.

Chance played into Patsy's hands when he returned to the glade. Two of the men had been quarreling, and they had taken the centre of the glade to settle their differences; and there a ring had formed around them—a ring which comprised almost every man of the outfit.

The point was that the attention of everybody was diverted from Patsy, and, merely bestowing a single glance upon what was taking place, he hurried silently past them—it was almost dark now—and in a moment more had passed through the pathway to the clearing around the cottage.

As he entered the clearing silently, he came directly upon the sentinel, who, after listening to the row in the glade for a moment, had just turned to retrace his steps; this made him assume a position with his back toward Patsy, and in an instant the young athlete had leaped upon his back and shoulders, and had seized him by the throat, so that he bore him to the ground in absolute silence.

And even as he did that, Chick and Ten-Ichi dashed out of the woods and helped him; and Ten-Ichi, none too gentle, now that his anger was aroused, rapped the sentinel on the head with the butt of his pistol, so that he stiffened out and offered no more resistance.

They had been thoughtful enough to bring the rope with them, too, and it did not take long to tie the man; and then the three assistants of Nick Carter leaped forward toward the door of the cottage, realizing that at any instant they might be interrupted in their work, and knowing that the odds would be terribly against them if they were.

They leaped upon the piazza—and as they did so the door opened directly in front of them, and Nick Carter appeared before them with the senseless form of Black Madge in his arms.

For just one instant he started backward; and then he recognized his three assistants.

"Quick!" he exclaimed. "Hold her, Chick!" and he put Madge into Chick's arms. "I have drugged her with some of her own stuff. There's plenty of it in the house. Get into the woods, all of you, over there"—and he pointed to the spot he wished them to go—"and wait for me. I'll be there in a moment."

While they obeyed him, he turned back into the house; and from the edge of the clearing, where the others had concealed themselves, they presently saw a blaze flare up inside the house; then another, and then another, until there were many of them; and then Nick Carter dashed out of it again and ran toward them with all speed.

"Look, now!" he said. "Watch that upper window, in the gable!"

And looking as he commanded them to do, they presently saw, when the light had gained in brightness, the form of a woman standing there, outlined against the blazing fire; and if they had not known differently, there was not one of them who would not have sworn that it was Black Madge who stood there, surrounded by flames.

"It is a dummy that I fixed up," whispered the detective. "It was done to keep the attention of the crowd away from us. Look! The men have discovered the fire!"

The hoboes were rushing toward the scene in crowds now; and they saw the figure of the woman at the window in the gable instantly.

A cry, then a shout, then a wail went up, for they thought it was their chief—Black Madge, otherwise Hobo Harry, the Beggar King, as she preferred to be known outside her own fraternity; and in that instant the crowd went mad.

There was not a soul among them who did not rush to the rescue of their chief, believing that Nick's dummy at the window was she; and then danced and shouted, and yelled and screamed around that burning cottage, like so many madmen.

"Come, now," said the detective. "This is our opportunity!"

Like shadows they sped away through the trees. They skirted the glade, now without a sign of life within it; they hurried down the path among the alders toward the place where the boat was kept, and where there were now no less than four boats.

But they took them all in order that none might be left for the pursuers, when it should occur to them to take up the chase; and then, with the strength of desperation, and guided by Nick, who had been twice over the route without being blindfolded, they made their way silently and swiftly through the maze of the swamp, to dry land at the other side of it.

"We have not made good our escape yet," said Nick, as they climbed the grade of the railway. "If only a train would come along now, so we could flag it—hark!"

Even as he spoke, a freight came around the curve toward them, and Nick, giving the unconscious form of Madge into the care of Chick, leaped out upon the track between the rails, and, at the risk of his life, stood within the glare of the advancing headlight and waved his coat for the engineer to stop.

Fortunately it was a freight, and it was going rather slowly. The engineer saw the frantic appeal, and closed his throttle and applied the brakes.

The party was taken aboard, and Black Madge was locked up in the jail at Calamont. She jeered at her captors, assuring them that she would be free again, and that when she was they had better remember who and what she was.

Nick and his assistants then returned to New York, pretty thoroughly tired out by their experiences with Black Madge and her followers.

The following day Nick Carter called upon the president of the E. & S. W. R. R. Co., and told him the story of the capture of "Hobo Harry."

"Also, I want to tell you," said the detective, "that I was one of the burglars that robbed the bank at Calamont. I see there is quite a stir about it. But I know where the loot is concealed, and if you will raise a hundred men for me I will go back and clean out that swamp, and not only return the property to the bank, but I will find almost all that has been stolen from different places for a long time."

Arrangements were at once made to carry out Nick's plans, but the detective was not quick enough.

The news of the arrest of Black Madge had spread through the surrounding country like wildfire, and, by the time Nick and his force of railroad employees reached the place, the gang had fled, and the people of the near-by towns, having formed vigilance committees, had swooped down on the stronghold in the swamp.

Nick and his men, however, destroyed everything that remained, with axes and matches, and what they could not destroy in that way they blew up with dynamite, so that the place no longer offered a refuge for the hoboes.



CHAPTER X.

ESCAPE OF THE HOBO QUEEN.

It was about a week later that Nick Carter received a note from the president of the railroad which caused him great astonishment. It was brief and to the point. It read:

"Can you call on me at once? Black Madge has escaped."

That was all, but it was enough to stir the detective to action, and, taking Patsy, who happened to be in when the message arrived, along with him, Nick at once visited the office of the railroad.

"Well, Carter, it didn't take long for Black Madge to make good her threat, did it?" said the president as he rose and shook hands with the detectives.

"I think," replied the detective, smiling, "that, considering the trouble we were put to in capturing her, it was a very short time for us to hold her. Now, what can I do for you, Mr. Cobalt?"

"Do? Why, you can catch Black Madge again for vs."

"Oh," said the detective, smiling. "Can I? Well, possibly."

"You see," the president continued, "we have called a hasty meeting of the board since the information of the escape of Black Madge came to us, and we have decided that no effort shall be spared to get that woman into custody again. At liberty, she is a constant menace to the welfare of the road, and of every town along the line, as well as of everybody who lives in those towns."

"I'll admit that she's a bad one," said Nick.

"We don't want her at liberty. With the following she has, she is a dangerous woman—much more dangerous than a man would be in her position."

"I don't know about that. But she is dangerous enough without argument about it."

"Exactly. We want her caught. And we want you to catch her."

"I imagine that this time, Mr. Cobalt, it will be rather a harder task than it was before."

"Why so?"

"She will be very much more on her guard now than then. And, besides, she knows enough about me to know that now I will most certainly hunt her down."

The railway president was thoughtful a moment, and then he said:

"You see, Carter, the very manner of her escape is a menace to us."

"How is that?" asked the detective. "The first and, therefore, the only information I have had on the subject was that contained in your message, which told me merely that she had escaped. What is there that is particularly interesting about the manner of her escape?"

"Then you have not heard about it, eh?"

"I have just informed you that I have heard nothing."

"Well, to say the least, her escape was characteristic. Her hoboes did it for her."

Nick raised his brows.

"You don't say so!" he exclaimed. "Well, we might have expected something like that, I suppose. I regarded it as a little bit unfortunate that the arrest was made in the county where it was, for that compelled us to put her temporarily in the Calamont jail—and I thought at the time that the Calamont jail was a trifle close to her stamping ground. Now, suppose you tell me exactly what happened."

"You know Calamont, of course?" asked the railway president, and the detective smiled broadly.

"I know very little about it," he said, "with the exception that I assisted in the robbing of a bank that is located there."

It was the president's turn to smile.

"That was a queer experience for you, Carter, wasn't it? But the president of that bank is quite willing that you should rob it again on the same terms. You know we fixed him all up again, and my company promises to keep a large deposit there now. Altogether, they regard your descent upon the bank as a very fortunate experience for them."

"No doubt. Now about that escape."

"Calamont is a village of about three thousand inhabitants. That bank, for instance, is the only one there."

"What has that——"

"Wait a moment. Calamont has suffered a great deal from the depredations of the hoboes, and now has a force of special constables, whose duties consist in arresting and taking to jail every tramp who crosses the borders of the village. The other night, when Madge made her escape, the jail was filled with them."

"Oh," said the detective. "I begin to understand."

"Exactly."

"It was a put-up job on their part to get as many of their kind as possible in the jail for that night, and then to take their queen out of it; eh?"

"Precisely; and that is just what they did do. You see, the tramps began coming in early in the day. They made intervals between the times of their arrivals, and they appeared at different parts of the town, so that before anybody realized it, the jail was about filled with them. But they seemed not to know one another, and so the residents of the town went peacefully to sleep that night, as usual."

"Well?"

"Well, in the morning when they woke up, the jail had been gutted—literally gutted."

"In what sense do you mean?"

"In every sense."

"Tell me what you mean, please."

"I mean that all the tramps who had been locked up there overnight had disappeared; that they had managed to break into the main part of the jail, and that when they went away they took Black Madge with them; and that before they went away they passed through the jail with axes and smashed everything in sight. They tore down partitions, they smashed doors, and where the doors could not be smashed, they destroyed the locks. They tied up the jailer, and threatened to kill him—I regard it as a wonder that they did not kill him."

"So do I. Go on."

"That is all there is to it. They went there, of course, with the deliberate intention of rescuing Black Madge—and they did it."

"I suppose they must have taken to the woods north of the railway line; eh?"

"You've guessed it, Carter."

"That is a wild country up through there, Mr. Cobalt."

"You bet it is. I used to go through there every fall on a hunting expedition, when I was younger. The country hasn't changed much since that time. It is as wild as if it were in an uncivilized country, instead of being surrounded by——"

"I understand. Then you do know something about that country up through there, eh?"

"Yes; I used to boast that I knew every inch of it; but, of course, that wasn't quite so, you know."

"Yet you remember it fairly well?"

"I think so."

"Tell me something about it, for that is, I think, where I have got to search for the woman we are after."

"There isn't much to tell about it, save that it is wild and uneven; that the formation is limestone, and the timber is largely red oak. The mountains—or hills, rather—are not high, but they are precipitous, rocky, impassable, full of ravines, and gulches, and unexpected depressions, and scattered around through that region there are innumerable caves, too."

"That is bad," said the detective. "It will make it so much the harder to dislodge the hoboes."

"So you have got your work cut out for you this time, and no mistake."

"Could you suggest a competent guide for that region, Mr. Cobalt?"

"Old Bill Turner—if he would go."

"Who is he?"

"An old hunter, who used to take me out with him, and who afterward served as guide for me. But he is an old man now."

"Where does he live?"

"In Calamont. You will have no difficulty in finding him. Ask the first man you meet in the street to direct you to old Bill Turner, and he will do it."

"That part of it is all right—if he is not too old to go."

"Oh, I think he can be induced to do it. Old Bill likes the looks of a dollar as well as any man you ever knew. You have only to offer him enough, and his rheumatism will disappear like magic."

"Then that part of it is all right, too. I am to understand that I have the same free hand in the matter that I did before?"

"Of course. Your directions are: Catch Black Madge and break up her gang."

"And that, I suppose, is about all that you have to say to me at present."

"Yes; unless you have some questions to ask."

"Not one, thank you. I will ask them of Black Madge—when I catch her."

"Good! I hope it won't be long before you can ask them."

"I don't think it will be very long; only, she is a little bit the smartest woman I ever tried to handle."



CHAPTER XI.

PATSY'S DANGEROUS MISSION.

When Nick Carter and Patsy left the office of the railway president, they strolled in silence down the street until they came to a restaurant, and, entering, they found a secluded table in one corner, where they seated themselves and gave the order for luncheon.

When it was brought to them, and the waiter had departed, Nick said to his assistant:

"Well, Patsy, we start about where we began on the other case, with the single exception that we have broken up the stronghold in the swamp. It is safe to say that Madge has no less than fifty men around her, and probably as many more. I should not be surprised if there were fully one hundred in the gang, all told."

"Nor I."

"Well, I shall start for Calamont as soon as I have finished with the meal I am now eating."

"And what do you wish me to do?"

"I want you to do a serious thing, and a dangerous one, Patsy."

"Good! That is what I would like to do."

"I think that Black Madge rather liked you in your character of a young Irish crook; but I think also that she had some suspicion of you."

"There isn't any doubt of that."

"And, therefore, it will be an extremely dangerous thing to do to return there, and still represent yourself as the same character."

"Gee! Is that what you want me to do?"

"Yes. Do you suppose it can be done?"

"It can be tried."

"You must not forget that they will look upon you with suspicion."

"Oh, I don't forget that."

"They will connect you with their misfortunes at once. Handsome, particularly, after being so nicely fooled by me, will be even more suspicious of you."

"I think I can get around Handsome, all right. It is Madge I am shy of."

"There will be one thing in your favor, Patsy, if you do undertake it."

"If I do undertake it? Of course, I shall undertake it."

"Then there will be one thing in your favor."

"What is that, please?"

"The very fact that you do go back among them in the same character in which you appeared before. I am inclined to think that now they would not take in a new man, no matter how well he might be recommended; but one that they have known before will stand a lot better chance with them."

"I think so."

"The very fact of your returning will go far to allay any suspicions they might have had about you formerly. It would never occur to them that if you were really a detective that time, you would dare to return to them in the same character."

"You are right about that."

"And, consequently, if you succeed in passing the investigation of the first few hours, you will be all right."

"I am going to try it, anyhow."

"Good, Patsy! But don't for a moment forget or neglect the danger you will be in every minute you are there."

"I will not."

"You will have to cook up a good story——"

"I have that all ready now."

"Then you can start whenever you please. I shall not interfere with you in the slightest manner."

"But I want a little further instruction, chief."

"The only instruction I have to give you is this: Go there; get among them; become one of them, and one with them; pick up all the information about them that you can, with names and identifications, so that you will be a good witness against them when the time comes."

"I can do that."

"I want you to work independently of me entirely. Your only part of the game, so far as it is directly connected with my part of the work, will be to hold yourself in readiness to lend me a helping hand from the inside at any moment I may happen to want you."

"Of course. That goes without saying. Are Chick and Ten-Ichi going to be in this?"

"Yes. But I have not determined in what way as yet. You will have to be on the lookout for them. I may take one of them with me, and send the other in to follow you. Or I may send both after you, and go it alone myself. Or I may take them both with me. All that will depend upon what information I pick up when I get to Calamont."

"I see."

"Now, Patsy, it is up to you. All that red you used on your hair before has not disappeared yet; but you had better go to a hair dyer's and get it fixed up over again. Then make yourself over once more into Pat Slick. I leave the rest to you. But as a last warning, I repeat—look out for that man Handsome."

"Oh, I am not afraid of Handsome. He's a——"

"He is a much smarter man than either of us gave him credit for. He is an educated man, who can represent the hobo so perfectly that you would never suspect that he has a college education. And he is devoted to Madge. Look out for him. He is her right-hand man, and he is dangerous. If he saw through you before, or had any idea that he did see through you, your life won't be worth a snap of your finger the next time you meet—unless you can manage to shoot first."

"I know that, too. But he did not suspect."

"I am not so sure of that. Madge had a little time to think things over while she was in the jail, and as soon as she got out, she and Handsome had a chance to talk things over. With their two heads together, they make about as dangerous a pair to play against as could be imagined."

"All right. I'll stand pat—and bluff."

"Be careful that they don't call you. That's all."

"Is there any particular game afoot with the hoboes just now?"

"Not that I know of."

"What specific charge are we after Madge for?"

"No specific charge, save that she is accused of all the old ones. There is enough against her to send her to prison for the rest of her life, once she is caught."

"I guess that's no pipe dream."

"The railway people object to her being at liberty. That is about all."

"And it is up to us to catch her?"

"That's the idea."

"What about the rest of the gang?"

"If we can round up the entire outfit, that is what they want us to do. We are to get as many of them as we can, and make the charges after that. That is what you are going inside the ring for: to pick up all the information about the individual members of the gang that you can."

"I see."

"The battle cry is: Break up the gang! Root it out, so that it cannot grow again."

"It is a pretty big proposition, chief; don't you think so?"

"It is a big proposition, and no mistake. But I shall make my arrangements about that part of it, so that if we ever succeed in getting them rounded up, there will be no difficulty in carrying out the rest of it."

"All right. Now, I suppose I have my instructions."

"Yes."

"And that's all?"

"Yes."

"And you don't expect to see me or to communicate with me again until—when?"

"Until I see you inside the stronghold of the hobo gang."

"That is all right. We'll meet there. I'll get there, and I'll find a way to make them believe in me."

"I hesitate to send you on this business, Patsy. You have never in your life gone out to face quite as much peril as you will find in this expedition of yours now."

"Well, I'll face it; and I'll overcome it, chief."

"You're a good lad, Patsy. God bless you!"

"Don't worry about me, chief; not at all. I will be all right. The hobo hasn't been born yet who can get away with me."

"Don't forget that there are perhaps one hundred of them."

"I'm not forgetting it."

"And that the worst and most dangerous of the lot is the man called Handsome."

"I'll not forget that, either."

Nick rose from the table and stretched out his hand.

"Good-by, my lad," he said. "I don't know when we will meet again. A lot depends upon yourself. Even now I feel almost as if I ought not——"

"Don't say another word, please. I'm going to do what you have laid out for me to do. I wouldn't obey you now if you should change the order."

"Oh, yes, you would. But I won't change it."

And so they parted there in the restaurant.

And a little later Nick Carter took the train for Calamont.



CHAPTER XII.

BILL TURNER, THE WOODSMAN.

When Nick Carter arrived at Calamont, he was disguised as a lumberman. It was not exactly the season of the year for lumbermen to enter the woods, unless they were measurers, who were engaged in preparing in advance work for the winter; so that was the character which Nick Carter adopted.

Measurers go into the woods, measure trees on the stump, as it is called, blaze them with cabalistic marks, and otherwise prepare the way for the workers with the axes and saws who are to come later.

It is well known that some of the most expert lumbermen in the world are French Canadians, and so Nick adopted this character, and he knew that as such he could wander at will around the woods and mountains of that region without danger of being suspected for what he really was.

If any of the hoboes who made their headquarters in that region should see him, they would not be inclined to suspect what he really was, and the only actual danger he would stand in would be that they might be inclined to knock him on the head or shoot him from ambush in order to possess themselves of the few articles he had in his possession.

And for that very reason he adopted the disguise of a French Canadian lumberman, for it was rarely that they were supposed to have anything more than what they carried in sight on their backs.

The month was September, and therefore warm. The leaves in some places were getting yellow and red, although there had been no frost; but oak leaves turn earlier than others.

When he descended at Calamont Station, he stood there on the platform until the train had pulled out, and the other passengers who had arrived by it had departed their several ways. Then he approached the baggageman.

"Me want find ze man named Beel Turner," he said slowly.

"What's that?" asked the baggageman.

"Me want find Beel Turner."

"Oh! Bill Turner, is it? Well, go up that street there until you come to the post office. You'll like enough see an old, white-whiskered chap standing there, chewing tobacco. That'll be Bill Turner."

"Beel Turner? He ees known here? No?"

"Known here? Gee! He has lived here since the oldest inhabitant was a baby. He has always lived here. He is about a thousand years old, my man; but as strong and as lively as a kid yet. You'll find him somewhere around the post office."

Nick thanked him in his broken English and strode up the street.

Sure enough, when he arrived in the vicinity of the post office, he saw a white-whiskered man standing there, and he approached him at once.

"You ees Beel Turner?" he asked modestly, sidling up to the man.

"I be," was the response, while Bill Turner fixed his clear gray eyes upon the detective. "What might you be wantin' of me, stranger?"

"I have—hush!—I have some money for you, Beel Turner. Can you take me where we can talk so that nobody will overhear us?"

Turner eyed him suspiciously for a moment; then he turned abruptly away with the remark:

"Come along with me, stranger."

Nick walked beside him through the town to the very end of the main street. Then they turned into a roadway, which led up a steep hill for some distance, and which presently brought them to a modest cottage that was almost hidden under the brow of the hill.

"Here is where I live," said Turner. "I live here all alone, 'cept a cat and two dogs. But the dogs hev got old like me, now, and they can't go out among the hills as they used to; although, bless you, I reckon I kin walk jest as fur as ever I could, if I try. Come in."

Nick followed him inside, and Turner offered him a rocker near the open window. The whole house was as neat and clean as if it had the care of a woman.

"Now, mister," said Turner, "what hev ye got on yer mind?"

"In the first place," replied Nick, in his natural voice, "I am not what I seem to be. I am not a lumberman, or a Frenchman—or a Canadian. I am a detective."

"Sho! You don't say so. Well, that beats me. Sure, ye do it fine, mister. I would never hev suspected at all that you are not what you seem. But go on."

"I have come here after that gang of hoboes who infest the neighborhood for fifty or sixty miles around this place. I am principally after the woman who is their chief. Do you know who I mean?"

"I reckon ye must be referrin' to that there Black Madge and her gang."

"That's right."

"Well, yer up agin' a proposition. That's all I kin say about it."

"I know that; and what I want of you is to get you to help me with that proposition, Bill Turner."

"Ain't I too old?"

"Not a bit of it."

"Is there good pay in it?"

"The very best; and there is fifty dollars down for you right now—if you are inclined to do as I want you to do."

Nick took a roll of bills from his pocket as he spoke, and laid it on the table before the avaricious glances of the old man.

"Well, sir," said Turner slowly, "all I've got to say is this: If I can do what you want done, I'll do it. I want that money as bad as anybody could want it and not grab it right now where it is lying; but I have never had a penny in my life that I didn't get honestly, and I am afraid that I'm too old to do what you want done."

"I tell you that you are not."

"Then, in that case, I'll take the money and put it in my pocket—so. There! Now, go ahead. If the work is honest, and such as an honest man can do, I'll do it—if I ain't too old, and you say I ain't. But if the work ain't honest, I'll return your money. Now, what is it, mister?"

"I want you first to promise that you will not reveal my identity. I must be Jules Verbeau to you to the end, and you must forget that I am not he in fact."

"You kin consider that done, sir."

"Second, I want you to answer some questions for me."

"Fire away."

"How well do you know the hills and mountains, the ravines and gulches, the rocks and the caves around this region?"

"As well as I know that dooryard in front of you," replied the old man, pointing through the window. "I know every inch of the country—every inch of it."

"Now, another question which you will not understand at once: Do you know how to use a pencil, and is your hand steady enough to draw plans for me?"

"Yes, sir. I began life as a draughtsman; but that was when I was a boy."

"That will suffice. Now—could you draw a plan of different parts of the mountains, so it would be plain enough for me to follow without your being present with me?"

"That would depend upon you, sir. If you are a man who has some woodcraft in your make-up, I say yes. It would depend upon you."

"We will consider that question answered, then. Now, have you any idea to what part of the mountainous region around here—say, within fifty miles of where we are seated—the hobo gang would select in which to hide themselves?"

"I think I could guess it to a dot."

"Why?"

"Because there is one region up among those hills which is exactly fitted for them; and from which you couldn't drive them out with a thousand men. That's why!"

"Good. That sounds as if it might be the place they would select. How far is it from here, as you would travel afoot."

"A matter of thirty miles."

"Now, can you draw me a plan of that region?"

"I kin."

"And how to get there?"

"I kin."

"And are there caverns there? Do you suppose those people are hiding and making their headquarters in caves?"

"Yes, to both questions. The hills round that 'ere region are honeycombed with caves. Some of 'em is big, and some of 'em is little; but there's a lot of 'em there."

"Good; and you know them well enough to give me a working plan of them? What a sailor would call a chart?"

"You bet I do."

"Now, another subject: Have you ever traveled away from here? Have you ever been to New York, for instance?"

"Never in my life. I've always lived right around here. I don't suppose I have been ten miles away from here, except in the woods, in forty years. But in the woods I sometimes used to go a good ways."

"I've no doubt of that. How would you like to make a visit to New York?"

"I should like it very much—only it would cost such a lot, you know."

"Suppose your expenses were paid?"

"Well, that would be different."

"How much, in cash, will you take for your whiskers, Mr. Turner?"

"Now what the devil do you mean by that? Are you making fun of me?"

"Not at all. I was wondering if fifty dollars more, down, would induce you to shave off your whiskers."

"Humph! Jest tell me what you are getting at and I'll answer you."

"This: I want to disguise myself so that I look like you. I want to go out in the mountains as you would go out. While I am making believe that I am Bill Turner, I want you to take a trip to New York, and to live there, at my house, and take it easy, see all the sights, go to the theatres and the museums, and all that, until I return, and I want you to shave off your whiskers, and let me blacken your brows and otherwise make some changes in your appearance, so that if any of the people from Calamont should happen to meet you in the street down there they wouldn't say, 'Why, there is Bill Turner!' Would you consent to do that?"

"For another fifty dollars down?"

"Yes."

"I would. When do you want me to shave?"

"I will tell you in good time. First, I want you to fix up those plans."

"Hadn't I better git about it right now?"

"Yes. I think you had. And I will remain here with you while you do it in order that you may explain things to me as you work upon them."

"That's a good idee, too. I can make you know them mountings as well as I do, in a short time. I knows 'em so well——"

"That reminds me. Do you happen to know by sight, or have an acquaintance with, any of the members of that gang?"

The old man shifted uneasily in his chair, and at last he replied:

"I know one of them—purty well. He calls himself Handsome."

"Good! What does Handsome know about you, Bill?"

"He don't know nothin' about me, 'cept that I'm a woodsman, and that I'm too old to do him any harm. I helped him once, and once he helped me a leetle, and we're sort of friends. But I ain't never seen him but twice in my life, and then both times I met him in the woods, so I ain't never mentioned nothin' about him to other folks."

"That's splendid! It is just what I hoped. It couldn't be better! I want you now to tell me what you talked about when you and Handsome met each other those two times in the woods."

"That's easy. The first time, I was walking through the woods, up about where you are going—that is, it was in that region—when I heard somebody hollerin' fur help. At first I couldn't tell for the life of me where the hollerin' come from; but after a leetle I located it up on the side of one of them steep hills, and so I crawled up there. Well, when I got there, I found that a man had slid into a hole in the rocks, and that he couldn't git out nohow. If I hadn't happened along the chances are that he'd starved before he'd ha' been helped out."

"And as it was—what?"

"I helped him out. I didn't have no hatchet, but I had a good huntin' knife along with me, and I managed to whittle down a good-sized spruce, which I trimmed so's to make a sort of ladder of it. When that was done I lowered the butt end of it into the hole, and Handsome—that was who it was in the bottom of the hole—he climbed up so's I could get hold of him, and then I pulled him out. There wasn't much to that, was there?"

"It saved his life."

"Probably."

"Wasn't he grateful?"

"Suttingly."

"What did you talk about after that?"

"We sot down there a spell and chinned, that's all. He axed me who I was, and I told him. He axed me if I was long in these parts, and I told him allers. He axed me where I lived, and I told him about this cottage. That's all—only he said he was a hobo, and that he was called Handsome. I allowed that the people who called him that lied mightily; but I didn't say so jest then."

"What more was talked about?"

"Nothin'."

"When was the next time you saw him?"

"That was in the middle of the summer, and it was farther south—not far from the railroad tracks."

"Well, what happened then?"

"That was the time he helped me."

"How was that?"

"I can't never tell you exactly how it was, but somehow I had got my foot wedged in the root of a tree, and I had been tryin' an hour to git it out, without success. The tree was hard, and I was just tacklin' that root with my knife—I'd have cut through it in about an hour, I reckon—when 'long comes that feller Handsome that I had saved from the hole in the rocks. He had an axe on his shoulder, and when he spied me he stopped, and laughed, and laughed until I got mad.

"'Caught in yer own trap, ain't ye?' he axed me.

"'I be,' says I. 'You've got a axe, and mebby you kin help me out o' it.'

"Well, he did. He chopped the root in a jiffy, and I was free; but, bless you, I could 'a' done it myself with my knife in a hour, anyhow. All the same, I was grateful to him, and we sot down on a log and chinned for a while."

"What about?"

"He asked me what I was doing around there, and I told him that I was thinking of looking over the swamp below the tracks a leetle, with some idea of settin' traps there late this fall and winter, and he said as how he wouldn't advise me to do it. He said as how I wouldn't be likely to ketch the sort of animals I was after, and that some of the animals might ketch me; and, as I ain't exactly a fule, I ketched onto what he meant, and I ain't been nigh that place since. And then it turned out afterward as I thought it would, them hoboes had a hidin' place in that very swamp."

"Right you are, Bill!" said Nick, laughing. "Is that all the conversation you had with Handsome?"

"Every bit of it."

"And you have never seen him since?"

"Never. Hold on; he axed me that time if I had ever mentioned the fact of our fust meetin', and I told him I had not. He seemed pleased at that, and he told me never to mention it. I allowed that I didn't see no reason why I should, and he laughed at that and seemed entirely satisfied."

"That is excellent, Bill. Now, we will get at those plans. I don't want to lose any time."

"Would you mind telling me why you axed me all about them two meetings?"

"Not at all. When I go out into the woods in the character of Bill Turner, I am likely at some time to run across Handsome himself. I want to be posted, so that he won't know but what I am you. I don't want him to catch me; see?"

"Yes. But do you suppose you kin fix yourself to look enough like me so's he won't know the difference when he sees you?"

"Certainly."

The old man shook his head.

"I don't believe it," he said, "but maybe you can. How about the voice? Your voice ain't no more like mine than a——"

"I can do that, too," replied Nick, exactly simulating the voice in which the old man was speaking; and he looked around him in wonder, and then at the detective.

"It does beat all!" he said at last. "I guess you're some too many for me, sir."

"Shall we get at those plans now?"

"Right away."

Turner brought out paper and pencil, and, having cleared the top of his table, he began to work.

First he drew a large circle on the paper, and at one edge of it he made a cross.

"That there cross is Calamont," he said. "Where we be now; and all that's inside of the ring I've made lies to the east of here, from nor'-nor'east to sou'-sou'east—and east. You understand?"

"Perfectly."

"Well, jest about in the middle o' that ring is the place where I think them fellers would hide. It's the best place for them."

"Tell me about it before you draw anything; or, rather, talk while you are drawing."

"That's jest what I'm going to do. Now, you follow my pencil and pay attention."

"Go ahead," said Nick.

"When you leave here—if you start from Calamont, which I suppose you will—you start right about here. You take a general direction nor'east from here at first. You'll find a path through the woods after you git about two miles from here, and that path will lead you several miles. But about here it'll disappear, and you won't have nothin' to guide you 'cept what I show you and tell you now."

"Exactly," replied the detective.

"Up here, at about the time you lose all trace o' the path, you'll come to a deep ravine. You want to follow up the middle of that, to the top. And when you git to the top of it you will think that you have run up ag'inst a cliff, and there ain't no gettin' out of it without goin' back.

"But that ain't so. There's a waterfall at the end of the ravine. It comes around a sort of a twist in the rocks, and if you ain't afraid of gettin' damp, you follow around there, and you will find as nice a piece of steps cut in them stones as you ever saw in your life. Indians cut 'em more'n a hundred years ago, so I'm told.

"Well, they take you to the top of that cliff. When you're up there, you find you're in another ravine, not so deep as t'other. Right here that would be," he added, making a mark with the pencil.

"All right," said Nick.

"About a mile farther up that second ravine you want to leave it. You'll find a big dead oak that hangs out over it, and beside the dead oak there is a path up the side of the ravine. It is one of my own paths. You get up it by hangin' onto two things you find there for the purpose. I put 'em there more'n twenty years ago, mister."

"Go ahead."

"When you git to the top, you want to branch off this way—so. You'll find a clearin' about there, and off to the east you'll see some high hills. You want to make for them."

"And those hills, I suppose, is my destination."

"That's where the caves are. That's where you will find the gang if they are hiding anywhere in that 'ere region."

"Now, tell me about the caverns. Tell me how to find them."

"They're easy enough to find—some of 'em is; others ain't. Wait a minute."

He pushed that paper aside, and took a fresh one.

"Now, when you come to the hills, you will approach 'em at what we call the Dog's Nose. So named because that's what it looks like. It's a rock that sticks out right about here, and you can't miss it. It looks exactly like a dog's nose, stickin' out and smelling things.

"You want to go right up under that there dog's nose; and when you git there you'll see a hole in the rock that ain't no bigger than the lower half of that window. It's a leetle bit of a hole, and it's as dark as a pocket inside it, too. Nobody, even if they found the hole, would ever think of going in there. It ain't invitin' to look at."

"How did you happen to go into it?"

"I didn't. I came out of it. I got lost in that cave for three days once, when I was a boy, and when I found my way out I came out of that hole. Nobody knows about that entrance but me, though I suppose lots of folks knows it's there."

"And it communicates with the cave?"

"It does. It'll take you to any part of the cave; and there is only one rule to follow in going through it. You'll want a light, though."

"I've got the light. What is the rule?"

"Always—no matter where you are in any of them caves, take the way to the right. Never take a gallery to the left, goin' in either or any direction. It's a rule that holds good in them caves. It's a sort of way that nature provided so's you could find your way through there; and I happened to discover what it was."

"It all sounds very simple and easy."

"And it is, if you've got the pluck and the sand. But it's a ticklish place. There is a good many places in there that I ain't never explored, and don't want to; and it's safe to bet that the hoboes ain't done it, neither. I reckon, mister, that that's about all I kin show you—hold on, though!"

"What now?"

"Well, there's one place up there which it might be handy for you to know about, and I don't think anybody but me knows about it, either."

"What is that?"

"Well, you might find occasion to want to hide yourself away while you are in there."

"That is more than likely, Bill."

"Well, just arter you pass through the hole that is under the Dog's Nose, and about twenty rods from there, you'll find a place where there is a bowlder sort of set into the rocks. You won't notice it unless you look for it, but it is there. Under it you'll find a small stone wedged fast. If you pull out that small stone, and then push on the big rock, it'll swing around like it was on a pivot, and you kin step inside the hole it leaves, and close up the door after you. You'll find an interestin' place in there, too, if you ever have occasion to use it, mister; and nobody will find you there, either."



CHAPTER XIII.

BLACK MADGE'S LIEUTENANT.

The detective passed the remainder of that day, and much of the night, in old Bill Turner's company, and during that time they talked incessantly about the mountains to which Nick was going, about the caverns in those mountains, and the trails through them; and when the conversation was finished Nick felt that he could find his way without difficulty wherever he cared to go among them.

When he saw that the old man was tired out, he sent him to bed, and himself dropped upon a couch in Turner's living room, where he slept like a top till morning.

Soon after dawn they were both astir; and after they had eaten some breakfast, and Turner had made his usual pilgrimage to the post office, they began again upon the plans and went over them for the last time.

And then came the task of making the changes in their personal appearance. This, to the layman, sounds like no easy task; but to Nick Carter it was merely the practicing of an art of which he was thoroughly a master.

He had brought with him the things necessary to accomplish the changes; and when the old man returned from the village he set to work—first upon himself—for he knew that he must make his own disguise letter perfect if he hoped to deceive such a man as Handsome.

He first made up his face, not with paints, but with stains that would not wash off, to represent the leathery, weather-beaten countenance of the old man; and here he was, perhaps, fortunate in the fact that the profusion of white whiskers worn by the old man rendered his face the easier to copy, and in reality concealed much of it from view.

Then he adjusted the beard.

But not as false beards are supposed to be adjusted. This was done almost hair by hair. That is, the beard was divided into tufts of hair, and each tuft was stuck on with a glue of Nick's own creation, so that there was no danger that it would drop off under any circumstances—and so that it could not be pulled off without drawing patches of skin with it.

And this was as it should be, since if any one should suppose that the whiskers might be false, and should seize them and pull sharply upon them, they would resist the effort exactly as if the beard was natural.

In height the two men were about the same. In figure, the old man was possibly somewhat stouter than Nick; but there was not enough difference to be noticeable.

The detective occupied about three hours in making up that disguise, so particular was he about it; but when it was finished at last it was perfect. So perfect, indeed, that Turner regarded him in amazement; then came closer to look into his eyes, and at last he said:

"I'm glad, Mr. Carter, that I didn't meet you on the street in that rig. It would have frightened me to death. I'd have been sure that I was dead and had met my own ghost, out for a walk."

That night, when the train bound for the city passed through Calamont at half-past eleven, a man climbed aboard of it who—if anybody had noticed him particularly—it would have been supposed was the same French Canadian lumberman who had appeared there the day before.

But there was no one there save the ticket agent, and he did not notice particularly. It is certain that he had no idea that in the black-haired man who went away was old Bill Turner.

But so it was. Nick had made the old man up in a representation of the Frenchman; or at least near enough to it so that in the darkness the difference would not be noticed; and the old man, being made to appear young, really felt young, and he went away joyously.

In his pockets he carried letters; one was to Chick, and the other was to Joseph, his confidential servant, in case Chick should happen not to be at home when Turner arrived there.

And those letters gave instructions that Turner was to be treated to everything he wanted, and that Chick and Ten-Ichi should take turns in showing him about the city. Nick assured them that they could help him quite as much in that way as if they were among the mountains with him, assisting him in the actual work.

And the next morning—the morning after the departure of Turner—Nick took the old man's place in the customary stroll, or hobble would be a better word, to the post office.

He stopped and talked with people as he met them, having posted himself, with the old man's aid, in what he was to say. And he stood around the post office steps for two hours, as Turner was in the habit of doing.

He was trying out the part; trying it on the dog, so to speak. And he was thoroughly satisfied with the result.

In his talks there in front of the post office he gave it out that he was going to take another trip into the woods; and as it was the season of the year when Turner had been in the habit of being absent, no surprise was felt. And that afternoon he literally pulled up stakes and started.

Once he was in the woods, Nick quickened his pace. He realized now that, figuratively, he had burned his bridges behind him, and that he must see the thing through to the end.

He did not fear the consequences at all; he felt that there was only one chance of his failure, and that was in the shrewd eyes and keen intelligence of Handsome.

Handsome had met Turner twice and talked with him each time. Nick knew Handsome well enough to know that the outlaw would have studied Turner very closely at those interviews; the question now was, would Handsome detect the fraud?

Nick did not think it likely; and, anyhow, the risk had to be taken.

That night the detective made himself a fire and camped in the woods; in the early morning he started on again.

In due course of time he came to the ravine, and went up it to the top as the old man had directed him to do. And he went around the "rocks with a sort of a twist in them" until he found the steps that were cut in the stones, and so mounted to the top.

Far up the second ravine he found the dead tree that hung over it, and the pathway up the side of the hill beside it; and that night he camped again in the woods.

He had not far to go that second morning, after he had eaten some breakfast, before he arrived at the Dog's Nose. It was ten o'clock in the morning when he got there.

All that morning Nick had noticed signs that he was approaching the region where he would find the hobo gang. He had seen where trees had been chopped down and corded up for firewood; and there were many other signs that many men were in the vicinity.

When he came to the shelter of the Dog's Nose, he stopped there, and, having fixed himself a temporary camp, resolved that he would remain there until night, for he had some hope that some of the hoboes would happen along, and that he could talk with them.

That was his game; not to sneak upon them unawares, but to let it be known that he was in the neighborhood, so that Handsome would come to him. He wanted that ordeal over with Handsome as soon as possible.

He was destined not to be disappointed. The afternoon was well advanced when Handsome suddenly stepped out of a cluster of balsams, and stood before him.

He had approached as silently as an Indian; as if he had passed his life in woodcraft, and, indeed, Nick had no doubt that he had.

For a moment he stood there near the balsams, silently regarding the detective; and Nick, perfectly acting the part of Turner, looked up and nodded, but said nothing.

After a little Handsome strode forward, no longer taking care to remain quiet; and he seated himself on a log near Nick, and facing him, while at the same time he toyed with apparent carelessness with a revolver he held in his hand.

"What brings you here, Turner?" he asked at last.

"The season of the year brings me," was the reply. "I have come here every autumn at this time for more'n fifty years."

"Indeed!" Handsome looked at him with new interest. "Is that true?" he asked.

"I wouldn't have any reason to lie to ye, would I?" asked Nick. "Old Bill Turner hasn't missed a year in fifty years in coming here, Mr. Handsome."

"Then you must know these hills mighty well, eh?"

"I know every inch of 'em; every leaf that falls on 'em, almost. That's the way I know 'em."

"And do you know about the places under the hills as well?"

"Do you mean the caves?"

"I do."

"I know 'em purty well—yes. There is some parts of 'em that nobody knows, I reckon; and while I—well, maybe I don't know all about 'em, and maybe I'd get lost in 'em now; only I don't think so."

"What do you know about that hole up there, under that rock that is shaped like the nose of a dog?"

"I know it's a hole. I reckon that's about all that anybody knows about it. It's a dark sort of a place. I ain't got no fancy for goin' into it."

"Does it connect with the main part of the cavern?"

"Maybe it does, and maybe it doesn't; but most likely it does; only I don't think that anybody would be after trying to find out."

"You have never been through that hole, then?"

"I ain't never been inside of it," replied Nick, with perfect truth.

Handsome thought a moment, and then he asked suddenly:

"Turner, who sent you up here?"

"Nobody sent me; why?"

"Didn't the people of Calamont send you to find me and my followers?"

"Nary a bit of it."

"Well, now that you have seen me, and know that I am here, and therefore guess that others are here with me, what would you do about it if you should go back to Calamont now, and somebody there should ask you if you had seen me?"

"Look here, Handsome, I don't meddle with other people's affairs. I want 'em to leave mine alone, and consequently I leave theirn alone. You hear me speak!"