Читать книгу A Stolen Name; Or, The Man Who Defied Nick Carter - Carter Nicholas - Страница 5

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Chick chuckled softly to himself as he imagined the scene in the library that Nick Carter had just described to him.

“Hold on a minute, Nick,” he said. “Let me get the chronology of those two straight in my mind. Jimmy, according to his own story, told to us four years ago, was, originally, a born aristocrat, the second or third son of somebody-or-other, wasn’t he?”

“Yes. He would never tell who he was; but it is certain that he is well born.”

“So was Nan; and both were English, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Scapegrace Jimmy went to South Africa to finish the sowing of his wild oats, and Nan went there as governess to the children of the South African consul. They met there, and were married. Jimmy was a burglar and a thief, and Nan didn’t suspect it until long after the two had come to this country. Then she found it out, and for a time he compelled her to assist him in his crooked work. Then he got caught, and was sent away, to Sing Sing, and Nan got a divorce. Later, she married Smathers, the man of many faces, and an actor. Then Jimmy got out of prison, thought Nan had peached on him, threatened vengeance, and all that, and intended to kill her, until it happened that you showed him that Nan was not the one who had betrayed him. She wanted to reform, and did so, and Jimmy agreed to let her alone. Then Jimmy got caught, was sent back to England to answer charges against him there, escaped, returned here, and supposedly died on an island in Long Island Sound. That was four years ago. Almost two years ago, Smathers died—I suppose he is really dead, isn’t he?”

“Oh, yes, there is no doubt of that, Chick.”

“And now Nan discovers her former husband, robbing a house where she is a respected guest, and——”

“And that isn’t all of it; not by a long shot.”

“Go ahead, then.”

“Well, it was a tableau for a moment, after the mutual discovery in that library. There was a half mask on the table, which Jimmy had removed while he was sorting the spoil. He always was a cool proposition, you remember.”

“Yes. That is how he got his name of Bare-Faced Jimmy.”

“He didn’t lose his presence of mind, just then, either. He stooped and picked up the gun from the floor, dropped it into one of his pockets—and sat down again upon the chair where he had been seated when she interrupted him.”

“Just like him.”

“The rest of the story I will tell just as Nan told it to me.”

“All right.”

“She said: ‘For a moment I didn’t know what to do. Until that instant it had never occurred to me that Jimmy was alive. I had not a doubt that he was dead. But there he was, as natural as ever, as handsome as ever, as cool and self-contained as ever, and just as daring as he used to be in the old days.’

“‘Sit down, Nan,’ he said to her; and she sat down.

“‘I thought you were dead,’ she told him, and he laughed in his pleasant way, and replied that he was as good as an army of dead men. Then she pointed at the jewels on the table, and at the other things that he had gotten together.

“‘At your old tricks?’ she asked him, and he nodded.

“‘Can’t keep away from it, Nan,’ he told her. ‘It is in my blood, I guess. But what are you doing here? Are you up to the old game, too?’

“Then she told him all about herself, and they talked together for quite a while. The upshot of it was that Jimmy agreed to take the risk of returning all the things to the rooms from which he had taken them, and she promised to wait where she was, until he had done so.”

“That was like Jimmy. Think of the nerve of the fellow, in going back to the rooms he had robbed, to return the jewels to the places where he had found them.”

“That is just the point, Chick; he didn’t.”

“Oh; I see.”

“He replaced a few of the things, but many of them he still kept. He told her, when he came back, that he had returned them, and it wasn’t till the following day that she discovered his deception.”

“I think it is rather remarkable that she trusted him to do it at all.”

“Jimmy could always make Nan believe that the moon was made of green cheese. Well, she promised him that she would say nothing of having found a man in the library, and much less would she mention to any living person who that man really was. So they parted. Nan returned to her room, and retired. Jimmy, presumably, left the house by the way he had entered it.”

“But he didn’t do that, either, eh?”

“No. He didn’t do that, either.”

“What did he do?”

“He sat opposite Nan, at the breakfast table, the following morning, and was introduced to her by their hostess as Mr. Ledger Dinwiddie.”

“Gee!”

“That’s what I said.”

“Say, Nick, if I had heard this story without names being mentioned, I’d have said that Jimmy Duryea would have done that very thing if he were alive.”

“So would I.”

“What did Nan do, when the introduction took place?”

“What could she do? Nothing more than acknowledge the introduction. She couldn’t tell the story of what had happened during the night, with much more credit to herself, than he could have done so; and, besides, just then she supposed that all the stolen property had been returned. It wasn’t till later in the day—some time in the afternoon—that she knew the truth.”

“And then?”

“Then she laid for Jimmy. But he knew that, and avoided her, of course. Finally, she went directly to him, and asked him to walk with her to the stables, and he couldn’t very well refuse to do that. Halfway to the stables, they found a secluded spot, and there she stopped him and told him that unless he returned all the stolen property before the following morning, she would denounce him, no matter what might happen to her.”

“And he made another promise, I suppose?”

“Sure.”

“And kept it in about the same manner?”

“In precisely the same manner.”

“That brings the time to Saturday morning, doesn’t it? The thing happened Thursday night.”

“Yes.”

“What then?”

“Saturday, she went for him again. He told her that there had been no opportunity to replace the stolen jewels the preceding night, but that he would do it that night—Saturday night. Yesterday morning she did not see him at all, but she learned that the jewels had not been returned. Mrs. Remsen asked her to take a motor ride, and she had to go. They came to the city, and decided to remain till to-day—and that is how Nan happened to be at church last night, when I met her.”

“She was alone last night? Mrs. Remsen wasn’t with her?”

“No; she was alone. Nan had been chewing on the thing all day. She didn’t know what to do. She said that she had decided to telephone to me, after church, when she discovered that I was among the members of the congregation.”

“In the meantime I suppose she hasn’t said a word to anybody but you.”

“Not a word.”

“What have you advised her to do?”

“I haven’t advised her—yet. What I did do was to promise to become one of the invited guests at ‘The Birches,’ as they call the Remsen place on the Hudson.”

“I see. So you are going up there, eh?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“In a couple of hours. I’m going to take the car, and drive there—and you are going with me. Danny will do the driving.”

“Oho! I see! Do you know the Remsens?”

“No. I never met either of them; or any of the family; but Nan said she could fix that part of it all right. Nan was to tell Mrs. Remsen, this morning, that she met an old friend at church, who is to motor out their way to-day, and that she invited him to stop at The Birches. That is all there is to that.”

“You intend to get Jimmy off to one side, and—what?”

“I haven’t decided that point, as yet. You see, there is another complication in the affair. Mrs. Remsen is Theodore Remsen’s second wife. There are two stepchildren at The Birches, a son and a daughter—and Ledger Dinwiddie is supposed to be the future husband of Lenore Remsen. You see, Jimmy Duryea has an assured position at the house, and in the family. He thinks, now, that Nan dare not denounce him, because of the effect that such a denouncement would have upon herself; but with me on the ground——”

“I see. What do you propose to do?”

“I don’t know, Chick, until I get on the ground. It is a queer case all around. Nan is for compelling Jimmy to give up the plunder, and to disappear, without doing anything to him at all. She believes that I am the only person who can accomplish that with him—and, under the circumstances, she is about right, Chick.”

“Yes.”

“So I promised her that I would go there this afternoon. She and Mrs. Remsen—who is a beautiful woman of about Nan’s age—were to return this morning; they are probably halfway there by this time.”

“And you want me with you.”

“Why, yes. I thought you’d like it. Jimmy will realize what he is up against when he sees both of us there.”

“He certainly ought to.”

“I don’t know just what attitude Jimmy will take. You know as well as I do that he never plans a thing of this sort without doing it thoroughly. He is doubtless prepared at every turn, and he may have the bareface to defy me.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me if he did.”

“Nor me, either, Chick.”

“Then what?”

“Oh, we won’t cross any bridges till we get to them.”

“How soon will we start, Nick?”

“In an hour or two.”