FUN!
Helen Dilt's brain had withstood the shock of the torture to which she had been subjected by the human hyena who presided over that establishment, called a "first-class private asylum, where excellent care is guaranteed for those unfortunates who are mentally deranged."
It was Tige's business to drive her crazy or kill her, and apart from the sum to be made by boarding her after being made mad, the fiend cared very little which fate she assigned to Helen.
"I must try a few more tortures on her," muttered the tigress, "and if she don't begin to weaken soon, I'll take the bull by the horns and prepare her for transplanting."
The wretch laughed at her own facetiousness, and at once took steps to have some more "fun," as she called it.
Perhaps it was fun to her.
If everything that a person enjoys is fun, then it was fun for her to torture her patients and watch the exhibition of their anguish.
Poor Helen!
It was enough to make a heart of adamant soften to see her lying there, quivering and shivering.
It was enough to cause the stoniest eyes to shed tears of blood.
But Tige was not a human being.
It would be a libel on the whole human race to call her so.
She was rather a form of flesh and blood, without feeling, without heart, the spirit, the life, which animated her being that of Satan himself, or else one of his arch fiends.
A few words had been received from Brown.
They were to the effect that Tige was to endeavor, above all things, to actually craze Helen. It suited his ends better. But in case it was impossible to drive her mad, then to kill her.
A keeper entered Helen's room, removed the gag, and motioned her to eat.
She shook her head. She could not eat. He then offered her some liquor or wine, but this she also refused.
"You must take something to keep up your strength," the keeper said. "I've got orders to see that you take some wine, and in this establishment orders has got to be obeyed, even if I have to force the stuff down your grub-tube."
He placed a glass of wine to Helen's lips, and when she would not take it—fearing poison—he throttled her, and when she gasped let the wine run down her throat, almost strangling her.
The keeper waited.
Finding that the wine was undrugged, so far as she could tell, and feeling the generous glow it produced, she drank another glass without compelling the keeper to resort to violence.
"Will you eat now?"
"No."
"Ain't you hungry?"
"Not a bit."
"Better eat it," said the fellow. "Patients is never sure here when they'll get another meal. If you ain't hungry now, you might better eat this grub ag'in the time when you will be."
But Helen motioned the food away.
She could not eat.
Before taking his leave, the fellow replaced the gag. When Helen saw him take it up, and divined what he intended to do, she filled her lungs for screaming.
But the keeper's eyes were quick ones.
He was accustomed to similar scenes, and quick as a flash had Helen by the throat, and choked the first shriek short off.
"Now be quiet, curse you!" he hissed, as the poor girl's tongue began to protrude. "You're mighty slow in learning that it ain't best to kick against the pricks in this 'ere shebang."
Letting go of Helen's throat now, he deftly applied the gag before she could recover sufficient breath to finish the cry for help which he had choked down.
Then he left her.
An hour later she had another visitor.
It was Tige.
Helen was a brave girl. She had proved her courage when in the cellar beneath the house of McGinnis, when the cruel tide mounted higher and higher about her.
Yes, she was a brave girl.
There could be no question about that.
Yet she could not help cowering down in terror as she saw her tormentor entering the room—could not help shrinking down close to the bed, while cold chills crept up her spine, accompanied by a feeling as if she were telescoping into herself.
Tige paused.
As she stood and gloated over this unconscious action of Helen's, the fiendish woman gave utterance to a blood-chilling chuckle.
The sight of this fear that was manifested for her, was the highest compliment which Tige could be paid.
"Well, how does my deary feel after our last little picnic party?" inquired Tige, as she approached the bed, her face distorted by a horrible grimace.
Helen quivered from head to foot.
But she was silent.
The gag prevented all speech, smothered all sound, save moans and groans, and these there was no occasion for now, although there soon would be.
Helen's feet were still bare.
Toward these the hag directed her attention, and as a first move lightly ran her fingers over the soles.
The victim drew them hastily up as far as the ropes about her ankles permitted.
Tige exultantly chuckled.
Helen's feet were very sensitive.
There was a world of fun in store for the she-hyena.
From her pocket the human she-hyena now took a bunch of feathers—innocent-looking things of themselves, but capable of being made an instrument of terrible torture.
These feathers Tige commenced drawing over and brushing around on the soles of Helen's feet.
It was torture indeed!
Torture!
The word does not describe it.
Soon Helen was writhing again, and straining again, until the veins were swollen nearly to bursting.
It was agony to endure.
Don't you think so?
Well, try it.
It can be easily done; there is no costly apparatus to procure. Just two or three feathers, to be drawn over your bare feet.
Laughing, exultantly crowing, chuckling as she watched the evidences of Helen's sufferings, the she-hyena pursued her hideous work with relentless energy.
It was awful.
At last human nature could not stand it, and Helen went into convulsions.
Then Tige threw down the feathers, and sprang to get a pitcher of water.
"I must be quick," she muttered, "or she may die before I can get her out of the fit."
OUT OF JEOPARDY.
We were in a fix of the worst possible description, and I felt at that minute that no matter how important a capture I might expect to make thereby, I would never again put myself in seeming league with house-breakers.
No, sir!
Spring guns was just one too many to suit my taste.
This was my first experience in the art of "crib-cracking," and if I could only get safely out of this I felt that I should be perfectly contented to have it my last as well as my first.
If you have never been in a similar situation you can only have a faint conception of my feelings as I stood there, not daring to move lest I might set those concealed springs to going.
I do not think my bitterest enemy would accuse me of cowardice, and I don't think that my trembling just then was the result of cowardice on my part.
Such a feeling as came over me then I never had before and have never had since.
In reaching for the button of the window Woglom's hand was made a prisoner by the same means.
At once both commenced to wildly thrash about with their heels, in an attempt to get loose and make their escape.
"For Heaven's sake," I gasped, "keep your feet quiet. You may set the infernal machine at work."
But they only thrashed harder.
I momentarily expected to be blown to pieces, to be riddled by a teacupful of young bullets, a certainly not very pleasing reflection.
It occurred to me that it was a singular sort of position for a detective to be caught in, and I groaned as I thought of the laugh my brother professionals would have at my expense.
That I would eventually be able to exonerate myself, I had no doubt. But before I could do so I would of necessity be obliged to spend the remainder of the present night, and possibly several additional days and nights, in jail before being set free.
It was not a pleasant prospect.
Indeed, it was quite the contrary.
And it would, in all probability, hurt my standing in the force, and give my envious enemies a handle for sneers and innuendoes.
Some of these—and I knew I had enemies—would not hesitate to hint that there was "a nigger in the fence;" in other words, that I was not as innocent as I tried to make out.
I am afraid that I uttered an oath or two. In fact, I am quite sure I did.
But how to help myself?
Was I to stand there like a stake until I was reached and collared by the gardener and hostler, who had been hastily roused, and whom I could now hear coming with heavy tread down the stairs inside the house?
All the thrashing around of Woglom and his pal had not started the spring guns.
This thought flashed across my brain.
Ha!
Perhaps the gentleman's statement of a whole battery of these masked weapons was a fiction, designed to hold us spellbound with fear.
There was a hope in the thought.
How my heart bounded!
I had often thought I could imagine just how a cornered criminal feels, as he gathers himself, in very desperation, for a dash for liberty.
But my imagination had never drawn so vivid a picture as was painted by my situation and its natural feelings at that moment.
I glanced up.
Out of the window that head still protruded, and the eyes in it were watching me sharply.
The muzzle of the gun was directed at me point-blank.
The gentleman knew that the two others were trapped, and so paid me the compliment of keeping me under surveillance.
I heard the back door of the house opened.
In a minute the gardener and hostler would be upon me.
I had no time to lose if I meant to make my escape.
And escape I must!
Two or three bounds would certainly carry me outside the circle in which the spring-guns were concealed, if concealed they were.
I gathered my muscles.
The watcher seemed to divine my intentions, for he sternly called:
"Stand still there! If you move, or try to escape, I'll shoot you down. I am not talking idly, but am in grim earnest."
I was satisfied of that from his tone.
But I must escape.
I would risk a shot at me.
Catching my breath, I took a big leap, and——
Bang!
He had been as good as his word.
I thought a swarm of bees were flying around my head.
But I had taken a second leap just in the nick of time, and, unharmed, escaped the shower of big buckshot which would have riddled my body, had not I been so quick.
A third and fourth leap, and then I took to my heels.
The fence barred my way.
And the gardener and his companion were close behind me. I made no attempt to go out of the gate. Nor did I waste time in climbing the fence.
I ran toward it for all I was worth, and bounded over it on the fly, alighted safely on the other side, and then went down the road like a streak of greased lightning.
"After him!—after him!—I can attend to these two!" I heard an excited voice yell, and the two men obeyed the order.
As I ran, I conned the situation.
I found that I could easily outstrip the lumbering workmen. But that was not the thing. In an hour the whole country would be aroused, and it would be impossible to get a train back to the city without being collared.
A thought struck me.
Easing my pace, so as just to keep ahead of my pursuers, I took off and turned my coat inside out (it was made reversible for the purposes of disguise.)
I yanked off my false mustache, with a tiny pair of scissors hastily trimmed down my false beard, and changed its shape.
A few other changes I was able to make without pausing, and I felt sure I could then pass muster.
Suddenly halting short, I uttered a shout and then blazed away with my revolver, and was still shooting when the puffing men reached me.
"Were you after him?" I inquired.
"Yes," was the reply. "Which way did he go?"
"Straight ahead. My!—how he did run! You can never catch him."
"We can try," said they, and I joined with them in the pursuit—of a phantom, now!
Finally giving up the pursuit, we turned our steps backward over the course we had come. They told me what had happened, and I informed them that I was a detective.
We reached the house.
The constable had been summoned, and the two rascals were already in irons.
The display of my badge made me perfectly solid, and I was taken into the confidence of the authorities when I—to their surprise as well as that of Woglom and his pal—told the names of the pair and gave their pedigree.
When in the light, I saw Woglom and his pal glance at me rather hard. But the change in appearance was so great, that, while they might suspect, they could not be sure that Detective Howard was their recent companion.
Should the forgoing chapter be read by the inhabitants of that little Jersey village, they will for the first time learn who the third person of that burglarious trio really was.
I saw the rascals caged safely, and then returned to the city, as thankful a man as ever stepped in two shoes.
No more such adventures for me.
I was perfectly satisfied with one such experience.
My next move was to try and find Shadow, whom I next saw under very peculiar circumstances.
WEAVING THE NET.
Was the hour of Shadow's vengeance at hand?
It would seem so, from the expression which came into his face as he passed nearer to the man whom he believed he had at last recognized.
An intense but suppressed excitement marked his every movement.
"Thank Heaven!"
He had thus exclaimed a moment before while he was earnestly scrutinizing the face of this person.
The fact that he could be surprised into breaking his long and well-maintained silence spoke very strongly for his belief that he had at last found the man he was in search of.
And that man was McGinnis.
When he left the place Shadow followed him.
Like a sleuth-hound he kept on the track of the evil man, and so carefully did he time his movements, that the suspicions of McGinnis were not aroused.
Light-footed as a cat, noiseless as a very shadow, gliding along like a ghost, a better person than the mysterious little detective could not have been found for the purposes of dogging and pursuit.
Gradually the expression of excitement left his face, and it became very stern and set.
It pictured a grim and unalterable purpose.
And that purpose was—vengeance!
That is, if McGinnis should prove to be the right man.
Shadow had been mistaken before, and there was a possibility of his being so again.
But he was satisfied that this time he had found the right man.
Earnestly he had studied the face of Helen Dilt's abductor, and it exactly corresponded with the mental picture he had formed of the individual he was after.
Such a likeness, he told himself, could hardly be the result of accident.
A description which had been given him, every word of which he had carefully treasured up, suited McGinnis perfectly and in every particular.
And, as Shadow pursued, a grim smile began to play about his lips.
"It is the man!" he muttered, again breaking through the shield of silence with which he had so long kept himself surrounded.
"It is the man!" he muttered again. "My darling, you shall be avenged soon."
Shadow knew that he had broken the self-imposed silence.
Yet he did not appear vexed, as he had when I forced him to speak on a certain occasion.
Why was this?
It seemed to me as if he had vowed solemnly to utter no word to living being until he had found the man he was after.
Satisfied that McGinnis was the person, he considered the vow fulfilled.
This was, indeed, the true reason.
But was McGinnis the man?
As closely as "death hangs to a nigger," Shadow hung to McGinnis, nor ever let him get out of his sight.
More than once the hand of the mysterious detective sought the butt of his revolver, as it had done in the saloon, in the first fever of excitement subsequent to the recognition.
An equal number of times, however, the fingers unclasped from the weapon.
While McGinnis filled the bill as far as the description went, and while Shadow would have staked his life that he was the man, he had sense enough, and was cool enough, to be aware that after all he might be mistaken.
He did not wish to kill the wrong man.
That would be worse than no revenge at all.
No, he must be sure beyond even the smallest doubt, before he fired the fatal shot.
He must follow the same general plan he had followed for so long—keep near the suspected man, waiting until he should convict himself by his own word of mouth.
McGinnis had not the remotest idea that he was under surveillance, and certainly did not dream that he was tracked to his very door.
In the dark hours before the dawn a dark figure glided around and around the shanty, ghost-like in the perfect silence of its movements. It was Shadow surveying the lay of the land.
He was seeking a mode of access to the house of McGinnis.
None was to be found.
It was secure from any but forcible entrance, and eavesdropping from outside would be worse than useless.
Shadow saw this.
It did not stump him, however.
He knew the old saying, that there is more than one way of killing a cat, and failing in one plan, he always was able to invent another without much loss of time.
Just before daybreak Shadow withdrew from the vicinity of McGinnis' house.
While in sight of it he paused, and had any one been near, it would have been to see Shadow raise his hand and shake that slender forefinger in that peculiar way of his.
Then he was gone.
Little dreaming of the mine that was preparing beneath his feet, McGinnis, with plenty of money in his pockets, which meant unlimited rum while it lasted, considered himself in clover.
He did not issue from his house until just after sunset.
On his way up the street his attention was drawn to a rather showy-looking woman—a blonde—coming from the opposite direction.
She was young, not much over twenty, was tolerably well dressed, and wore a derby hat with a decidedly rakish air.
All told, there was a certain jauntiness about her bearing telling so plain a story that most men would have turned aside to let her pass.
Not so McGinnis.
He winked at her.
Without an instant's loss of time she winked back.
"Halloo, Bridget!" said he.
"Halloo, Pat!" was her rather free-and-easy reply, in a jocular tone.
McGinnis paused short.
"Which way?" he asked.
"Any way," was the reply.
"Walk along with me, then."
"Good enough."
McGinnis and the girl walked along side by side, the man eying her in silence for a while. Then he asked:
"Who are you?"
"Me? I'm called Daisy, mostly."
"Belong here?"
"No; just got to New York this morning from London. I say, you old rooster, are you 'crooked?'"
"Yes," assented McGinnis.
"So am I. My pal was nabbed in London, but I managed to escape the bobbies."
"What's your lay?" inquired McGinnis.
"'Whipes' and 'tickers' and such like."
Without following their conversation further, we shall advance the time a few hours, and once again carry the reader to one of those low saloons that are patronized by the "crooked" and "flash."
At either side of a small table sat McGinnis and Daisy.
He was treating her and trying to induce her to join her fortunes with his.
Daisy hung back.
McGinnis continued to argue earnestly—and to order drinks.
A shrewd observer might have noticed that, while McGinnis swallowed all his liquor, the girl each time managed to dump hers out beneath the table.
The liquor began to mount to McGinnis' head, seasoned though it was.
He was becoming intoxicated.
He had been quite taken by the dashing manner of the girl and was now rapidly becoming maudlin and correspondingly affectionate.
He wanted to hug Daisy.
He put his arm around her, but she shook it off with a:
"Here, let's have another drink."
At last, when more than half intoxicated, he became very confidential, and to impress Daisy with the desirability of her taking him as her pal, began recounting his exploits in the past.
Her eyes began to snap and sparkle, and she listened to him with ill-concealed eagerness, while I, disguised, stood at a little distance, looking on.
My eyes had rested on Daisy's face for an instant, as they took in every inmate of the place. Back to her face my eyes had wandered, attracted by a something that was familiar.
The heavy falling of a drunken man caused her to glance around. Her eyes were directed at me for a second or two—and instantly I was staggered.
Those eyes were Shadow's!
Daisy was Shadow.
If Shadow was Mat Morris, then Mat Morris was Daisy.
But could that be?
Could Mat Morris so artfully disguise himself? Could that slender throat, and drooping shoulders, and swelling bust, belong to a man?
"HELP IS HERE!"
Not because she pitied Helen, or wished to save her life as a matter of humanity, but because she had received her orders, Tige sprang to the task of getting her victim out of the convulsions into which she had been thrown by torture.
Tige found it necessary to call for help, and did so.
For some time Helen's life hung as in a balance, and it was a matter of doubt what the result would be.
But hard work carried off the palm of victory, and at last Tige drew back with a satisfied grunt.
She next dismissed the person she had called to assist her.
Now her brow began to cloud with anger, directed at Helen, for having unconsciously caused her some anxiety.
Anxious Tige had been, for she always endeavored to do exactly as her partners wished, since by doing so she held them bound to her by closer ties of interest, and thereby was enabled to demand countenance, protection, and support from them.
It had been Brown's orders to kill Helen only as the extreme alternative, his first wish being that she should be driven mad.
Tige did not blame herself for Helen having gone into convulsions.
Not at all.
In her estimation it was the victim's own fault, and Helen must be made to suffer for having caused her so much trouble.
Wiping the perspiration from her forehead, Tige sat down to await Helen's return to consciousness.
It occurred soon after.
The poor girl opened her eyes, saw Tige beside her, shuddered, cowered down like a timid hare beset by a blood-hound, and closed her eyes, to shut out the sight of her tormentor.
"A pretty girl you are, to give me so much trouble!" growled Tige. "I'm going at you again for doing it."
On hearing these words, Helen began to shake, and a second or two later she went into a fit of hysterics.
A gloating look came into Tige's face.
It was music to her ears, these hysterical sobs and moans of her victim.
"The corner is turned," muttered Tige, as she stood beside the bed, looking down on Helen.
She referred to the corner of Helen's reason. She meant that the edge was entered.
Poor girl!
Never before in her life had she had a hysterical attack.
Her mind had been too healthy and strong for that, and it indicated, as Tige said, that the turning point was reached.
A vigorous following up of the mental impressions left on Helen's mind by the torture she had endured could not fail to result in the dethronement of her reason.
Tige was too well posted in her business, however, to attempt to torture Helen while suffering with hysterics. To have done so must inevitably have resulted in an immediate attack of convulsions again.
Instead, she took herself out of her victim's sight, and sent in one of the attendants to look after her.
When Helen had become somewhat calm, she was offered food, which, as before, she declined.
But of the really excellent wine she took three glasses.
Having sworn on a Bible, which was brought in, that she would not shriek or cry for help, the attendant removed the gag.
Sometimes gagged, sometimes not, sometimes bound to her bed, and again left unbound, but never permitted to leave her room, some days passed.
Several times each day Tige would pass suddenly into the poor girl's presence, and no matter how composed Helen might have been a minute before, the sight of her torturer at once threw her into an excited state, at the same time inducing a fear that caused her to retreat into a corner, quivering and gasping for breath, while a cold dew that sprang from every pore would bathe her entire body.
This was what Tige liked to see.
It indicated the state of Helen's mind, and kept her nerves constantly in a state of tension.
Few people have any idea of the frailty of the tenure which the human mind holds on reason, or how easily the mind can be warped or upset.
Helen's appetite was tempted with good food, daintily prepared, and rich wines were kept always at her hand. Of all these she now partook freely, wondering at the kindness manifested for her in this direction, but never once dreaming that it was done to build up her physical strength, so that she might stand a greater amount of torture without fainting, or going into hysterics or convulsions.
So the days passed for a period, the length of which Helen never knew.
She had flung herself on the bed one day, and had fallen asleep.
She was awakened by her wrists and ankles being clutched hold of. Opening her eyes, she saw Tige and two of the attendants there.
The scream that arose to her lips was cut short by the strong grip of the human she-hyena fastening on her throat.
When wrists and ankles had been secured to the four corners of the bed, they proceeded to gag Helen, who was then left alone with Tige.
This time the torture was one of burning with red-hot irons.
Tige had brought in with her a small charcoal furnace with which to heat the implements of torture.
She first touched the irons to the soles of the victim's feet.
Then Tige touched the iron to the palms of Helen's hand.
It was terrible!
Helen had lived so generously that she was stronger in body than when tortured before, and as she writhed and twisted the ropes squeaked and strained.
A throe of anguish caused her to concentrate her strength with one grand effort, and the rope that held her right hand parted.
Quick as a flash she dragged off the gag, and madly shrieked for help.
Tige sprang on her to throttle her, to choke her down; but her hands became nerveless and her face like that of a corpse, as a ringing voice exclaimed:
"Help is here!"
MAN OR WOMAN?
Man or woman?
I looked at the individual who was seated opposite to McGinnis, and asked myself this question.
The glance of those eyes had assured me that Daisy was Shadow.
But was Shadow man or woman?
Man I certainly believed him, and yet—well, I was dumfounded if ever man was.
That swelling bust might be a work of art, but it seemed to me that it arose and fell too naturally to be anything but genuine.
True, I had had ample evidence of Shadow's ability in the art of disguise, yet still I could hardly believe this to be all making up.
Shadow saw that my eyes were upon him (or her), and also that I had recognized him.
McGinnis had been so plied with drink by Shadow, that he was too drunk to notice or understand the significance of a motion of the mysterious detective's hand.
Yet it said to me as plainly as words could have done:
"Be circumspect. Be careful. Do not betray me. Go away, and leave me to alone work out the scheme I have laid."
I obeyed.
I turned on my heel and left the place. As I was about to pass through the door I glanced back.
McGinnis was becoming very affectionate, and was winding his arm about Daisy's waist.
Since Daisy was Shadow we shall not mystify the reader, but simply speak of him by the name to which we are accustomed.
"Say yes, Daisy, won't you?" said McGinnis, with a slobber which he meant for a kiss.
An expression of intense disgust on the other's face was not noticed by the drunken villain.
"I'll think over it," was the reply. "But there's one thing, McGinnis, which I want you to understand, that I won't take up with a slouch."
"I ain't no slouch," protested McGinnis. "Why, I've——" and then started again, he began recounting his exploits in a boastful tone.
Shadow listened, his ears drinking in the other's words with an avidity equal to that of the leech, as it sucks the blood of the victim to which it has fastened.
The detective heard partially what he wished to hear, and his eyes began to gleam with a red and dangerous light.
Deftly, and with a purpose, he now and then interpolated a word to direct McGinnis' mind into other channels, and at last the end toward which he had aimed was gained.
Out of his own mouth McGinnis had convicted himself.
Distinctly, unequivocally, he had fastened on himself a terrible crime—a crime which it was Shadow's sworn purpose to avenge.
"Thank Heaven!"
So earnestly did Shadow utter this exclamation that it fixed the attention of McGinnis, stupid with drink as he was.
Shadow saw it, and hastened to remove the impression made on the mind of the villain.
"Let's have another drink," said McGinnis, as soon as his mind was again at ease.
"You've had enough," said Shadow.
"I want another drink," growled McGinnis, now in his ugly state of intoxication.
"No," was the decided rejoinder.
McGinnis clenched his fist and brought it forcibly down on the table.
He swore that he was not going to be dictated to by a woman.
"Very well," said Shadow, coolly. "You were the one who was anxious for a partnership. It wasn't me. If you drink another drop I'll bust up the whole arrangement."
Muttering under his breath that he would tame her when the time came, he nevertheless did not order the drink.
For Shadow's purpose McGinnis was now drunk enough.
"Come, let's get out of this," at last remarked Shadow.
"All right, Daisy," hiccoughed McGinnis. "Goin' home with me, ain't ye?" with a leer.
"Yes."
"Bully for you. You're a gal of the right stripe. Sail ahead—give us a wing, though, for I'm kind o' unstiddy on my pins. An' I say, you must be well seasoned, 'cause you don't show the effects of this bout's much as I do."
"I've drank many a stout lad under the table," was the laughing reply, and McGinnis looked at his Daisy more admiringly than before.
Too drunk to know even where he was going, Shadow found no trouble in leading the villain whither he wished, since McGinnis now trusted him completely.
"What a mash!" McGinnis kept muttering to himself, and every time they passed under a street-lamp he insisted on having another look at his darling Daisy's face.
"What's zish?" he finally asked, reeling unsteadily and glancing around. "What's zish? Where'sh the house? Zish is a dock!"
Shadow had led him to a lonely and deserted pier on the east side of town.
Click!
Click!
It was a pair of handcuffs that produced this clicking, as they were snapped on McGinnis' wrists.
Realizing what had been done, and nearly sobered by the shock of surprise, McGinnis started back, and, raising his hands quickly, tried to bring the handcuffs down on Shadow's head.
Shadow started back in time to save himself.
Then McGinnis made an attempt to fly.
Shadow was too quick for him.
In less than a second he had drawn and cocked a revolver, and with one spring reaching McGinnis' side, he planted the muzzle against the villain's temple.
"Be quiet, unless you wish to die instantly!" Shadow sternly said, and the villain paused and stood trembling like a leaf.
McGinnis' head was more sobered than his body, and when Shadow suddenly tripped him, his feet flew out from under him, and down he heavily went.
Shadow seemed working in a systematic way, seemed to have planned everything exactly as it happened, for when he sprang on the fallen villain he held a gag in his hand.
At the revolver's muzzle McGinnis yielded, and permitted the gag to be placed in his mouth.
Shadow next fastened his feet, and when the villain was perfectly helpless the detective coolly sat down on the string-piece, to wait until the liquor's effect had passed more away.
McGinnis' fear tended to sobering him quickly, and just as a distant church-clock was striking ten, Shadow arose and then knelt beside the villain, at whom he gazed with a fixed look that indicated unalterable purpose.
"McGinnis, your time is short," the mysterious detective sternly said. "Make your peace with Heaven if you can. In three minutes you die!"
There was no mistaking the tone in which these words were said.
McGinnis was by this time sober enough to understand the full import of the words, and he began to writhe, and strain, and try to burst his bonds.
The wisdom of Shadow's gagging him was now apparent, for had he been free to do so, the villain would have bawled and shrieked like a madman.
"I abhor a murderer, and I shudder at thoughts of murder," Shadow went coldly on. "But I stifle all such feelings for the sake of avenging in a fitting manner the death of one who was more than all the world to me, whom you robbed of life. Now you know why this terrible fate has overtaken you."
It was a fearful sight, that of this man struggling with such fierce intensity to burst his bonds, to free his hands, to save his life.
Like the Nemesis he was, Shadow remained kneeling beside McGinnis, and in calm, cold voice, counted the expiring seconds.
"The three minutes are gone," he finally said, in a tone that was harsh but unwavering, and then——
"Avenged!" muttered Shadow, as he glided away from the spot a few minutes later. "Tom, I have kept my oath! Darling Tom, the same fate that was meted out to you, I have meted out to your murderer!"
Just as the clock struck eleven, and I was preparing for bed, a note was brought to me.
"Waiting for you. Important!Shadow."
"Waiting for you. Important!
Shadow."
CORNERED CRIMINALS.
"Are you ready for some sharp work?"
So I was greeted when I, as is almost needless to say, hurried down-stairs in response to Shadow's note.
"Oh, you can talk, can you?" I said. "Yes, I am ready for some sharp work. What have you on hand?" as I glanced at him from head to foot.
The skirts were gone.
He was again the slenderly-built youth that I had seen on first making his acquaintance.
"I'll tell you at the proper time," was the cool reply. "For the present do as I say. Get a dozen men as quickly as possible."
It did not take me long to do this.
Then, under Shadow's guidance, we were conducted to the vicinity of the private insane asylum in which Helen Dilt was held a prisoner.
Stationing the men so that they would not be seen, Shadow and I ascended the steps, and he rang the bell.
Soon the door opened a couple of inches, being prevented from opening further by a stout chain attached to it. But for this we should have thrown ourselves against it and forced our way in.
"Who are you? What do you want?" was asked from within.
"I came from Mr. Brown," Shadow promptly replied.
"What of him?" asked the cautious individual inside.
"He has sent me with a message to Tige concerning his patient, whom I am also commanded to see with my own eyes."
Satisfied by this display of knowledge, the fellow unfastened the chain and Shadow glided in. I sprang out from behind the pillar which had concealed me, and forced my way in just as Shadow clapped a revolver to the villain's head.
"Give an alarm at your peril!" hissed Shadow, and dragged him away from the door, which I at once swung open and admitted the men.
Handcuffs had been brought in plenty, and the keeper who had opened the door for us soon had a pair of them on his wrists.
Over the building the men scattered with as little noise as possible.
Tige was so wrapped up in her devilish work as to have heard none of the noise that could not be entirely avoided, and she knew not that her sins had found her out, until, in a ringing voice, Shadow cried out:
"Help is here!"
Helen Dilt uttered one sob, and then became very silent.
She was not dead, however.
Shadow sprang to her side even as I secured the tigerish woman, and he said that she had only fainted.
The tenderness of his manner, the way in which he commenced to bathe Helen's face, led me to inquire:
"Do you know her?"
"It is Helen Dilt!" he returned.
Helen Dilt!
I remembered the name. It was the foster-sister, the intended wife of Mat Morris.
Curiously I awaited Helen's return to consciousness, after having ironed Tige and turned her over to the custody of one of the men.
She opened her eyes at last.
She did not fling her arms about Shadow's neck, did not call him Mat, did not seem to recognize him.
Then Shadow was not Mat Morris!
This much was clear.
Who, then, was Shadow?
The mystery fretted me not a little.
"Are you ready for further work?" coolly asked Shadow, turning to me a minute later.
"Yes. Will we need as many men?"
"All but one. You can spare one to remain in charge here. Let the others march the prisoners to the station-house, and then follow me."
"Are we going to bag more game to-night?" inquired one of the men.
Shadow heard the question.
"Yes," he promptly returned. "There are plenty more to bag; but in bagging the next lot I'd advise you to keep your pops ready."
Our prisoners once safely in custody, Shadow led us by the shortest route toward the East River.
I guessed his destination this time.
"The old sugar-house?" I inquiringly said.
"Yes," was the brief reply.
"How do you expect to gain entrance?"
"Leave that to me."
I did leave it to him.
Great was my surprise when he led us by his secret entrance into the vaults beneath the old sugar-house.
I now began to understand how he had escaped—that is, if Shadow it was who had been confined in the Black Hole.
This latter I was now beginning to doubt.
Carefully we crossed the last of the series of vaults, and paused at the foot of the stairs leading up to the store-room, where I had once had a most exciting adventure.
Shadow softly mounted first.
I followed.
In the office, at the further end, Cap and some of the men were gathered, earnestly consulting about something.
The men were called up.
One was instructed to look after the door-keeper.
"Now!"
Shadow gave the word.
We rushed forward, every man with a brace of revolvers in his hands, and when I called on the rascals to throw up their hands, they cast one glance at the gleaming array of "barkers" and raised their hands.
Happily, Shadow's augury was forestalled.
We bagged as dangerous a lot of men as ever were banded together, and without firing a single shot. Unexpectedly taken as they were, they had no time to prepare for defense.
"Now for the Black Hole," said Shadow, when all the captives were in irons.
I followed him.
In the vaults he called loudly:
"What!—ho!—where are you?"
Soon came back a smothered reply, and we finally were led to a heavy wooden door secured by stout locks. As we could not open the latter, we proceeded to batter down the door, and released, in a half-starved condition—Mat Morris!
Shadow gave me no opportunity to indulge in feelings of surprise, or to obtain any information whatever concerning the mystery.
"Waste no time!" he said, coldly. "We have more work yet to-night."
Five of the men were left in the sugar-house to bag any members of the gang who might come straggling along. The others, with Shadow and myself, went to the station-house with the captives.
Between us walked poor Mat Morris, so weak that he could hardly stand.
"Take only two men this time," said Shadow, after we had reached the station; and so with two men we departed—to be surprised, I felt, as well as to surprise somebody else.
I was not wrong.
Mr. Joseph Brown was awakened by the ringing of his doorbell, and when he demanded what was the matter, was told that an intimate friend was dying and had sent for him.
When he came out we nabbed him, and within half an hour later, despite his protestations, he was behind the bars of a cell.
THE MYSTERY EXPLAINED.
During the next afternoon all of the most active parties in this written drama were congregated in the parlor belonging to a suite of rooms at one of our second-class hotels.
Here Mat Morris had been taken, as he could be more comfortable here than at any other place, not knowing where to find his mother.
Here also had Helen Dilt been conveyed in a carriage.
Shadow was there.
And lastly, I had just put in an appearance.
Both Mat and Helen understood that to Shadow they owed their deliverance, and both were deeply grateful and could not thank him enough.
After a while I said plainly that there was a mystery underlying all this which I should like to have explained.
"You shall hear the explanation," said Shadow. "I am not what I seem; I am not a man; I am Nellie Millbank, to whom you were kind enough—although a stranger—to lend the money with which to decently inter the body of her murdered lover."
"I sometimes suspected as much," I said, while Mat and Helen both opened their eyes with surprise at learning that Shadow was a woman.
"Now," said I to Shadow, "it was to you whom I paid five hundred dollars?"
"Yes."
"Then"—to Mat—"how was it possible for you to send that same five hundred dollars to your mother?"
"I found the money," said Mat.
"I lost it," said Shadow.
Here was one of those little things which had so deeply puzzled me made light as day.
By questioning, by listening when all the parties talked freely, I finally understood all the ins and outs of the thrilling drama in real life.
In his search after Helen, and in his endeavor to find her abductor, Mat had been engaged only a short while when he rendered himself suspected by the sugar-house gang, had been arrested and clapped into the Black Hole, where he had been kept a close prisoner ever since.
So it turned out that Mat Morris, whom I had believed the most active character in the drama, was for the greater part of the time kept in a condition of forced inactivity.
Nellie Millbank told me how, after having seen her lover laid away in his resting-place, she had taken an oath to avenge his death.
Knowing how slight a clew she had on which to work—the most vague description of the murderer—she had adopted a male attire, and started out with the plan of insinuating herself into the confidence of such a man as she might suspect, and lead him to convicting himself.
Starting out on this plan, she had just caught sight of an individual whom she thought answered the description of the murderer, and was shaking her finger after him when I saw her shadow.
She heard the remark I dropped at the time, and, when she afterward wrote to me, she adopted the name my remark had suggested.
The five hundred dollars I gave to her she had lost, and Mat Morris had found, which explained the complications arising from finding bills which I recognized in the hands of Mrs. Morris.
I also then learned how it was that Shadow had come to be in the sugar-house at the time of handing me that note, although that is something concerning which the reader needs no explanation, the detective's purpose being made evident at the time.
And this is so as regards many other incidents in connection with Shadow, mysteries to me at the time of their occurrence, but made plain to the reader in various places.
And this is so also as regards Helen Dilt.
We had all her adventures and experiences to listen to, which have been recorded in their proper places.
Late in the afternoon Mrs. Morris, who had been sent for, put in an appearance, having been found and sent here.
A happier woman never drew the breath of life than she was when she was enabled to clasp both her loved ones to her heart.
Nellie Millbank and I drew a little apart, that the others might have the first few minutes of meeting to themselves.
In response to a question of mine as to how she had gathered up all the threads of the tangled skein, she replied:
"It was through McGinnis. He was the tool of Brown, the abductor of Helen, as well as the murderer of my lost one. I suspected him rightly, after many previous failures, threw myself in his way in the character of a thing which I care not to name, and when he was in liquor he told me all. He convicted himself out of his own mouth."
"Where is McGinnis?"
Shadow turned away. He pretended not to have heard my question, and I did not press it.
Together we five had supped, and a right merry party it was—although I thought that the merriment of Nellie Millbank was rather forced.
This I thought might be because of a natural embarrassment at being in men's clothing after having revealed her true sex.
Early in the afternoon I had heard of the discovery of a dead body on an East River pier. The man was handcuffed and gagged, and had been repeatedly stabbed. Already it was becoming spoken of as the most brutal murder on record.
That evening I was sent to look at the body and to give any assistance I could toward working up the case.
The moment I reached the Morgue and the sheet was drawn down, I understood the reason why Shadow had pretended not to hear my question.
The body was that of McGinnis.
On his breast had been found pinned a bit of paper, bearing these words:
"This man died a righteous death. He was a murderer, and meets the same fate he dealt to another. His victim is avenged."Search for the person who inflicted this punishment will be in vain."
"This man died a righteous death. He was a murderer, and meets the same fate he dealt to another. His victim is avenged.
"Search for the person who inflicted this punishment will be in vain."
This last sentence several shrewd detectives thought implied that the writer intended self-destruction.
This view I bolstered up to the best of my ability.
Needless to say, the murderer of McGinnis was never discovered.
In fact, none of us who knew Shadow—confound it! Nellie Millbank—ever saw her afterward, unless—— Well, one day long afterward I entered a horse-car; opposite to me sat two black-garbed sisters of mercy. For just one fleeting second the eyes of one of them encountered mine.
It may not have been Nellie Millbank, but I have always thought it was, and hope that I was right.
Dick Stanton, the false detective, was brought from the private cell in which I had placed him, and was convicted and "sent up" with the rest of the sugar-house gang.
Tige and her companion hyenas were roughly dealt with.
Murder was charged to their account, and was so well sustained that they all received life sentences.
Brown was sent to prison for twenty years, a sentence long enough to insure his never leaving the prison alive.
Helen Dilt was not long kept out of the money which her rascally uncle had so long deprived her of, and the first thing she did was to buy and present to her kind benefactress, Mrs. Morris, a completely furnished home.
Not so very long since I met a gentleman in the street, who clasped me warmly by the hand, as he said:
"Howard, it's a boy, and we think of naming it after you."
The speaker was Mat Morris.
He and Helen have been married some years now, and this boy he spoke of is not the first baby by—well, a few.
And thus we draw to a close, and with genuine regret bid adieu to the history of the strange being who was so long a mystery to me under the indefinite title ofShadow.
[THE END.]
Added table of contents.
The original contained some publisher's advertisements that are not reproduced here.
Changed "Her knowlege of herself" to "Her knowledge of herself."
Changed "name of her benefactor's" to "name of her benefactors."
Changed "speeech" to "speech."
Added missing quote after "And now, who are you?"
Changed "quick-witedness" to "quick-wittedness."
Changed "less that two hours" to "less than two hours."
Changed "capn's orders" to "cap'n's orders."
Changed "Helen'e uncle" to "Helen's uncle."
Removed unnecessary quote after "how he did eat."
Changed "ead not denied it" to "had not denied it."
Changed "credted" to "credited."
Changed "it" to "I" in "I would not put my knowledge into use."
Changed "that had not really done so" to "they had not really done so."
Changed "I was because" to "It was because."
Changed "unclapsed" to "unclasped."
Changed "prespiration" to "perspiration."
Changed ? to ! after "meted out to your murderer!"
Added missing "not" to "They were puzzled, and knew not what to do." This word was present in the originalBoys of New Yorkappearance but was missing from theNew York Detective Libraryreprint.