Chapter XXVI: Burglar Morgan’s Biggest Haul

“Morgan,” said Nick, “have you any information which can lead you to form an opinion or express a belief concerning the method which Paul Rogers intends to employ in removing me from the pale of existence?”

Morgan grinned.

“Would you mind saying that all over again, and saying it slow?” he asked. “But never mind. I’ll try to reply to it in my own way.

“You see, Mr. Carter, the fact is that this thing is much more serious than you imagine. If it hadn’t been, you can bet your life that I wouldn’t have spent the best part of two days, rigged out in these togs, standing out there in the street and holding out my hand for alms in order to keep up the character while I was waiting for you.”

“I believe you, Morgan.”

“I tell you, it is a serious matter; so serious that I felt it a duty which I owed to my own manhood to warn you. I’m a burglar, Mr. Carter, but I’ve kept some of my manhood tucked away in a dark corner where I can call upon it for use when it is needed. This was a case where I felt that it would come into play.”

“Just why did you feel that way?”

“Because I think they mean business. Because this gang, which has been formed at the suggestion of Rogers, under his orders and with his money, is composed of between fifty and sixty members, and--here is the point--because there is a separate and distinct method for getting rid of you, for each and every member of the gang.”

“They propose to attack me in fifty or sixty different ways, then? Is that it?”

“That’s about the size of it.”

“How do you know that?”

“Simply by the methods that were employed in my own particular case.”

“Can you tell me about that?”

“That’s what I came here to tell you.”

“Then let me hear it.”

“Remember, please, that I am relating only my own experience.”

“Sure.”

“I don’t know a thing about what was said to the others. I can only surmise, because of what was said to me.”

“Yes.”

“I was called into a room where the gun who acts as the main guy in the absence of the real chief, Rogers, received us, one by one, and each one alone. I don’t know just how far down the list my name was, but I was pretty close to the last that was called in. You see, the outfit hasn’t got on to my curves yet. They don’t know whether they can quite trust me or not.”

“I see. Go on.”

“Well, when he got me in there he looked me over with a sort of quizzical expression which I didn’t like, and presently I told him so. ‘If you’re looking for a continuous performance show,’ I said to him, ‘it wouldn’t be a bad idea for you to mosey down to Keith’s. I’m not supplying any star attractions just now.’

“I won’t try to quote him; I’ll just tell what happened. He told me that he thought I had been pretty well informed as to the purpose of the organization, but for my especial benefit he’d go over the ground a little. Then he opened with an account of the desire to liberate Rogers and expatiated on all that Rogers could and would do for the gang when once he was at liberty; and then he said this:

“‘Primarily, this is a play for a hundred million dollars’ haul--the biggest that was ever made in the open in the history of the world. There have been hauls quite as big made by a class of men who pose as philanthropists, but there was never such a one by thieves pure and simple. This is a play for a hundred millions, and it’s dead easy if we follow the lead of Paul Rogers without question. In order to make it a success, there are three men and two women to be put out of existence.’

“I stopped him right there with the remark that I would not consent to take part in one murder for a billion, to say nothing of a million. That I wouldn’t even consent to be an accessory, and that if he had anything of that kind on the paper he had better count me out of it on the start, before he told me any more about their plans.

“‘Well,’ said he, ‘we have counted you out of that. Your friends who brought you here told us that much on the start; but there is one thing which we want you to do which will make you solid with the gang, and that is to help us to get rid of the detective, Nick Carter.’

“Then he reminded me that I had been up the State doing a term of five years because you had sent me there, and he told me that every member of the gang had some complaint to make against you and some grudge to make good. He said the whole bunch had sworn away your life, one by one, each in his own particular way, and that he wanted to find out just what my method would be.

“That was when I got wise, Mr. Carter. I figured around a little so as to see his hand, if possible, only I didn’t succeed in seeing much, for all that. But I gave him the bluff that a man who handed out a proposition like he wanted me to do was a fool to start with. That if I made up my mind to put Nick Carter or anybody else to sleep, I certainly wouldn’t start in by giving my hand away before I made a play. Nit.

“‘I’ve thought a good deal about Nick Carter since I’ve been recuperating up the river,’ I said to him, ‘and I’m not going to put you wise about those thinks. Nit. I know the game,’ I said, ‘and all I want is to be left alone to play my hand in my own fashion. If I should want any help, I’ll call on you, but I don’t think I shall need any.’

“Well, he was satisfied. That ended our conversation on that topic, so you see I don’t really know so darn much after all--only by implication.”

“And by implication, will you tell me just what you make out the whole game to be?” asked Nick.

“Sure thing. By implication I make out this: That old Peter Danton will begin, before long, to act sort of queer. His friends and relatives won’t know what is the matter with him until it suddenly dawns upon them that he has a sort of softening of the brain. I suppose there is a drug that will produce that effect; anyhow, that is the racket. After he has had softening of the brain for a while, he’ll die--quite sudden. In the meantime, of course, the youngster will have succeeded his father. Now, the youngster has a decided weakness for good-looking women, and he is to be lured into a place where a row will be started and in the mêlée he will get a rap on the head, which will settle his hash. In the meantime the old lady is to be cared for by a trained nurse, or a maid, or somebody who is to be introduced into the house through the instrumentality of Rogers. She has got a year or two, perhaps more, to live. In short, she can live as long as she is of any use to the conspirators, for Rogers proposes to force the world to recognize the substituted heiress for the real one, through the mother. Catch on?”

“Not quite. State it.”

“Well, if the old lady is kept alive, but in the meantime her brain is sufficiently clouded so that she does not know the difference between Isabel Benton and her own daughter, and if it is Isabel Benton instead of her own daughter who lives with her the last two or three years of her life, it will be pretty hard to convince the world after that that the young woman is not the real daughter of the house; don’t you think so?”

“Yes; I do think so.”

“Well, that’s the game. By implication, remember, I’ve built all this up by the operation which you detective chaps call deduction.”

The burglar stopped abruptly and rose to his feet.

“That, Mr. Carter,” he said, “is all that I have got to say; and now, if you don’t mind, I will slip back into my own world again.”

“Morgan,” said Nick, rising also, “I wish you would make up your mind to remain on this side of the dividing line between those two worlds.”

The burglar shook his head.

“No,” he replied. “It’s no use. I can’t. I wouldn’t shine along the respectable highways of life.”

“There is a mighty good man in you, Morgan, if you would only consent to let him get on top.”

“He’s been the under dog too long a time for that, sir.”

“It is never too late.”

“Bah! Don’t preach.”

“I’m not preaching. Here!”

Nick held out his right hand, and Morgan gazed at it dumbly for a moment and then into the detective’s face again.

“Well? What about it?” he asked roughly.

“I want to shake hands with you, Morgan,” said Nick. “I want to shake hands with the man who came into my house and who is on the point of going out of it now--the real man, you know.”

“Nit!” said Morgan. “Your hand is an honest hand; mine is not. They are no more fit to mate together than a negro and a white. Nit. I’m obliged to you all the same. Good-night.”

“Wait, Morgan.”

“Well?”

“I am a fairly good reader of character.”

“I suppose you are. What of it?”

“I want you to tell me just why you have taken all this trouble to save Mercedes Danton from the conspiracy which overshadows her life--for I know that you came here for that purpose and not for the one you have given--to warn me.”

“Tell me why you think that,” said Morgan hoarsely.

“I don’t think it; I know it. I knew it by the sound of your voice and by the look in your eyes when you spoke of her.”

“All right, I’ll tell you, and that will end our conversation for the day. Once upon a time I worked six months on plans and preparations to rob Linden Fells. That was six years ago, when Mercedes Danton was only a girl of thirteen or fourteen, I think. My plans worked all right and I had the whole layout ready to my hand--I would have got away with a cool forty thousand, sure; but--well, that little girl woke up and sat up in her bed when I entered her room. It was a clear night and the moon was full. It shone straight in at the windows of her room and upon her white frightened face--no, not frightened, just startled. I stood a little back in the shadow, but she was in the full light, and there wasn’t shadow enough so but what she saw me very plainly.”

He paused, and Nick waited silently for him to continue.

“Just a year before that time, Mr. Carter, I had gone home to see my own people--my father, mother, and sister. They thought I was dead, and they think so still, for I didn’t put them wise. I sneaked into the house just the same as if I was going to rob it, knowing well that the old man would put a bullet through me if he discovered me there; but I had a good look at him and at my mother, asleep in their bed, and then I went up-stairs to see my sister in the same way. I have always been told that children sleep soundly, and I had no idea that I would disturb her, so I went into the room and stood beside the bed, looking down at her.”

Again he paused, and again Nick waited without speaking.

“It was just that same sort of a moonlight night, Mr. Carter, and while I stood there, looking down upon my sister, she opened her eyes and raised herself in the bed, just as I have said that Mercedes Danton did.

“She looked startled, too; not a whit frightened. I was the one who was frightened.

“As I took a step backward, she held out her arms toward me and spoke my name.

“‘You have come back,’ she said.

“I did not speak, Mr. Carter. I didn’t let the sound of my voice disturb the quiet and peace of that room; but I stooped down and touched my lips to her forehead, and then I turned away and fled out into the night as if I was pursued. I know that my sister has never told a soul that she saw me that night.”

“Well?” said Nick.

“Well,” repeated Morgan, “when I stood at the bedside of Mercedes Danton, who was the same age as my sister, and she rose up and faced me in just the same way, I--I----”

“You kissed her on the forehead and fled in precisely the same manner,” interrupted the detective slowly and impressively. And the burglar, in a burst of vehemence, replied:

“By Heaven, I did that very thing, and it was the biggest haul I ever made in my life.”

Without another word he wheeled on his heel and went out of the house.