But Nick was resolved not to be shot in the back that night. Whatever the business might prove to be upon which they were engaged, he was resolved to see it through to a finish, even to the extent of helping them burglarize a bank, if that was the lay.
"To do a great right, do a little wrong," he muttered to himself. Whatever might be stolen or whatever damage might be done that night, he would charge up in his expenses, and see to it that the railroad people made it good later on, when his work should be done.
In the meantime the railroad automobile had been gathering speed, and now it seemed to Nick to be little less than wonderful that it remained on the tracks at all, for if he was any judge of speed, he knew that they must be flying along at much more than a mile a minute – and he wondered what would happen if the headlight of a locomotive should loom suddenly before them – and then, just as the thought occurred to him, they rounded a short curve, and came to a sudden stop.
CHAPTER VI.
NICK CARTER ROBS A BANK
The instant the strange machine was brought to a stop – and it was done wonderfully soon, considering the speed at which they had been traveling – the three men leaped to the ground beside the track, and Nick was ordered to follow them.
He did so, and then he was told to bear a hand; and, following directions that were given him, he seized hold of the boxlike tonneau.
Almost in a twinkling of time after that the machine was lifted from the track in sections, and finally, still in sections, was carried to a highway near at hand, where it was put together again, minus the iron wheels. But there were other wheels concealed in that commodious body, and these were quickly taken out and adjusted.
Within twenty minutes of the time when they came to a stop on the track, after rounding the curve, the machine was fitted with regular automobile wheels, and was ready to proceed along the highway.
Nick saw in this arrangement much that had puzzled other men who had been on the job. He had no doubt from what he knew of automobiles that this machine was capable of sixty miles an hour, or even more than that, on the highway; and, if that was true, it, of course, could make a half greater speed than that on rails.
But he made no comment. That was not expected of him, and would have been resented had he attempted to do so; but he climbed to his place when he was told, and again they sped away toward some destination, the nature of which he did not know.
Once he ventured to ask the man nearest him what time it was, and received a curt "Shut up!" by way of reply; so he remained silent after that.
And after a while – less than half an hour – they drove into a village, and presently ran the machine around behind a church, where it was placed in one of the stalls of a shed.
And still his three companions worked in utter silence. Beyond now and then a curt word uttered by Handsome, who seemed to be in command of the expedition, nothing at all was said.
Nevertheless, each man there seemed to know exactly what to do; as if every move they made had been nicely planned out for them – and such Nick believed to be the case.
When the machine was stored away, the men fell into line, Nick being shoved into position directly behind Handsome, and then, in Indian file, they moved silently forward toward a high fence that was near at hand.
They went over this one by one, Handsome waiting with patience until the last one was over, and then the march was taken up again.
They passed now through the rear of a large yard, and before them loomed a brick building, which Nick figured must be a courthouse; and after a moment they made a half circuit around, and came to a stop between two buildings of brick, one of them being that one already mentioned.
The night was dark now, for the moon had gone down, and there were no street lamps in that village evidently; or, if there were, they were not burned on nights when there was supposed to be a moon.
But there was light enough for Nick to discover that they were close to the main street of the village; he could see the store windows on the opposite side; and it suddenly came to him that the building that was next to them – the second one – was a bank, and that they were about to rob it.
He knew now what was expected of him; and again he determined to see the thing through to the end.
It was not to prevent one robbery that he was engaged; but to prevent many. It was not to apprehend the participants in a minor job like this one promised to be, but to capture the head that directed many such robberies, and so stop them altogether.
And still no word – not even a whisper – was spoken between the men. They worked on in utter silence, as if their plans had been thoroughly conned until they were learned absolutely by heart.
Nor did they pause in the yard next to the bank. There was scarcely a halt there; but they passed to the rear of the building, and followed one another over the high fence that was there, to the rear of the bank building.
Keeping themselves well in the shadows, they crept forward silently to a rear door of the building, and here Handsome paused for a moment, and put down a canvas bag that he had been carrying all the way; and now he whispered in Nick's ear:
"There are the tools, Dago. Let's see what kind of a cracksman you are."
Nick did not need a second bidding. Having determined upon his course, he did not hesitate, but he seized the bag, pulled open the mouth of it, and, having selected such tools as he wanted, he applied himself to the task that had been set for him.
A professional burglar of long experience could not have gotten that huge oak door open more quickly and silently than Nick Carter did, and Handsome gave him an approving pat on the shoulder.
He was the first to enter the bank, Nick following, and the others coming behind them; and presently, after forcing another door, they stood crouching inside the bank itself.
A dim light burned in a gas jet in the centre of the large room, which was divided only by the wire screen which separated the customers' side of the rail from the clerks; and almost beneath the light, exactly where it could shine full upon the steel doors, was the huge safe of the institution.
A person might not stand in front of that safe for a moment without being in full view from the street should any one happen to pass there. Nick saw that at a glance; but nevertheless Handsome silently placed a drill and a bottle of liquid in his hand, and motioned that he was to begin the dangerous part of the work.
"Didn't you bring a screen with you, you chump?" demanded Nick, in a whisper. "If you had told me what the lay was, I'd have made one."
Handsome nodded, evidently well pleased; and at the same time he produced a roll from under his coat, and gave it to the detective. Nick unrolled it, and found that it was merely a piece of burlap, rather more than a yard long, and about two feet in width, and with a roll of cord attached to each corner of it.
He knew what that was intended for readily enough, and, taking it in his hands, he crept forward without another word, and quickly attached the four strings to objects which he selected as being situated about right for his purposes.
In two minutes the screen was in place, and it afforded a perfect shelter from view from the street, and just the sort of one that would never be noticed from the outside at all, unless a person stopped at the window and deliberately peered inside – and that nobody was likely to do, unless something else first attracted attention.
In fixing the screen in place so quickly and perfectly, Nick evidently won over not only Handsome, but the others; and now there was no more question of his doing the drilling alone. Each man took his own part of the work in silence, as if Nick had always been one of them; and, besides, now there was no time to be lost.
Drilling through the steel doors of a safe is not an easy task, and it is not done quickly, although expert burglars carry tools these days which will cut anything.
They took their turns at the drill, as they took them also with the acids and oil; and the work went on merrily until the holes were ready for the charges.
And here again it seemed that Handsome was determined to try Nick out to the last, for he bent forward and whispered in his ear:
"Prove one thing more, Dago, and you're made."
"Want me to do the blowing?" asked Nick.
Handsome nodded.
"All right," said Nick. "Light out, then."
"But – "
"Get out, I say. If I do the blowing I'm boss for the time being. Git!"
They did; and again, with the implements and the explosives at hand, Nick went to work; and, as before he worked rapidly and well – as if he were an experienced hand at that sort of employment.
And then, when the charge was ready, Nick pulled up the heavy rope matting from the floor, and after doubling it again and again until there was a huge wad of it, he braced it with desks and chairs against the front of the safe; and when all that was done to his satisfaction, he lighted the fuse, and ran back to the rear hallway, where the others were watching and waiting.
They had not long to wait after that. There was a lapse of perhaps a minute and a half, and then a dull, booming roar shook the building, and the burglars rushed forward.
Now was the time when they were compelled to work rapidly, if ever.
It was true that Nick had so muffled the sound of the explosion that it was hardly possible that the noise of it had roused anybody at all; but there was always a chance of somebody near at hand being wakeful or watchful.
At any moment they might be interrupted – and no burglar likes to be interrupted. It always means a fight, in which somebody is likely to get killed, and burglars rarely do any killing unless they have to in order to escape.
They rushed forward together; but now Nick purposely kept in the background. He had no idea of being taken himself if they should be interrupted; nor did he wish to give his companions an opportunity to kill any person who might interrupt them. It was all right from his standpoint to participate in the burglary, in order that he might ultimately catch all the thieves; but he did not wish to be a party to any fight that might come of it.
But he was made to hold one of the bags while Handsome filled it from the inside of the safe.
They pried open the inner compartments, and threw them indiscriminately upon the floor as soon as they were emptied; they jimmied open the steel boxes as readily as if they had been made of softest pine – and in twenty minutes after the explosion they were stealthily climbing the fence again, into the courthouse yard.
And, so far as they could see, not a soul in the village had been awakened or alarmed.
They returned to the shed, where they had left the automobile, by the same route they had covered in approaching the bank; the machine was backed out; they entered it, turned on the power, and sped away through the silent streets as they had come, with nobody the wiser for what they had done, the havoc they had wrought, and the wealth they had stolen.
Down beside the road where they had made the change before, from the track of the railway to the highway, they paused long enough to secure the iron wheels, and here the change was made back to a railway machine. The car was lifted in sections to the tracks, and with everything adjusted they were soon flying down the shining rails at a frightful rate of speed, and in silence – for it seemed to be a rule among these men that there should be no talking.
Mile after mile they covered in this way, and then the machine was slowed down, and came to a stop at the point where it had picked up Handsome and Nick at first, and here they got down, and, having taken out the plunder, stood beside the track until the machine had disappeared from view.
"Now, Dago, help me with the swag," said Handsome; and together they picked it up, and once more started for the outlaws' retreat in the middle of the impassable swamp.
When they were in the boat, and almost ready to land where Nick had thrown the man into the water, Handsome turned to him, and whispered:
"You're all right, Dago. I'll tell Madge so, too!"
CHAPTER VII.
THE DETECTIVE'S PREDICAMENT
When Nick Carter was shown a place to sleep that night – or, rather, that morning, for it was well toward daylight by the time Handsome and he returned to the outlaws' camp – he tumbled upon the bunk that was shown him, and he lost no time in doing so; nor did he open his eyes again until he felt a hand shaking him lustily, and a voice crying out to him:
"Wake up, Dago! You're wanted!"
He sprang up instantly; and, because he had laid himself down with nearly all his clothing still upon his person, he was not long in making himself ready. To have insulted the profession he had adopted by washing his face was not to be thought of.
"Gee! But I'm hungry!" he said to Handsome, who was standing near, waiting for him.
"Madge will give you something to eat. She is at her breakfast now," was the whispered reply. "She wants you."
"Then," said Nick, "if I am going into the presence of a lady, and am expected to eat with her, I'll have to wash my face and hands. Show me where."
Handsome laughed.
"I do it myself once in a while," he said. "Come with me."
And he led Nick to a place along a path through the swamp where he succeeded in giving himself a good wash – for Nick had the satisfaction of knowing that the stain he had used was of such a quality that it would defy water. Alcohol alone would remove it.
They found Madge on the doorstep, awaiting them; but Handsome paused at the edge of the clearing, and muttered:
"I leave you here, Dago. I'm not in this. You're to have this interview alone."
"All right," replied the detective, and was about to move on, when Handsome detained him by a gesture.
"Put in a good word for me, Dago, if you get the chance," he whispered. "I have already said many a good one for you – and I made it as easy for you as I could all around."
"All right," said Nick again.
"And one more word, Dago. I forgot to tell you – "
"What?"
"Cremation Mike has got it in – "
"Who?"
"Cremation Mike – he worked in a crematory once – has got it in for you. He's the chap you chucked into the soup, you know. He sneaked away after you left last night, so I'm told, and he swore black and blue that he would have your life for that act. He will, too. He's sure bad medicine, that fellow. He's a bad member, too. I just thought I'd give you the pointer."
Handsome turned away then, and Nick went on alone to the piazza, where Black Madge was awaiting him.
He stopped just before he put his foot upon the veranda, and waited for her to make some sign; and she approached quite near to him, looking him straight in the eyes.
"Good morning, Dago," she said, smiling.
"Good morning, madam," he replied gravely.
"You look quite like a gentleman this morning," she continued, laughing lightly. "Or, no, rather like a mountain bandit of Italy."
"I could be either if I chose," he replied again, as gravely as he had spoken before.
"I do not doubt it. I have been giving you considerable thought since I talked with you here last night. Come inside. You haven't had your breakfast, I suppose?"
"No, madam."
"Then you shall breakfast with me. I was about to eat mine when I remembered you, and sent for you."
"Madam is most kind."
She led the way into the house, where a table was spread with good things, well cooked, too, they appeared to be; and she pointed toward a chair at the opposite side of the table.
"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 rôle 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.