Nick Carter - The Great Spy System

"I think he has suspected it already."

"Do you? Why?"

"He has posted two men in front of it. He is in doubt, however, and won't attempt any breaking in on that side until he is certain. It wouldn't do for him to disturb peaceable citizens, and you could never tell from the outside that the house is unoccupied."

"I see. Well, go over there and find out what Gordon has to say, and when you have done that, return here."

As soon as Chick departed, the senator, who was insatiable with his questions, turned to the detective again.

"I am worried about that other assistant of yours," he said.

"Who? Patsy?"

"Yes."

"What about him?"

"Well, so far as I was able to determine, the city of Washington is just about swarming with spies in the service of that scoundrel Mustushimi, and if some of them saw your man Patsy strike the spy whom you caught, isn't it just possible that they have taken after him, and captured him?"

"Patsy isn't an easy mark for people of that sort," replied the detective, smiling.

"Granted; but all the same there are so many of them that Patsy might have fallen into their hands, you know."

"I don't think so, senator."

"Where do you suppose he is now?"

"Outside there, somewhere."

"What? Among those fellows who are about to attack us?"

"No; but keeping watch over them. Don't worry about Patsy. He knows how to take care of himself as well as anybody I ever knew. He'll turn up all right, at the moment when he is least expected, and therefore probably will be the most wanted."

"Carter, do you really think that those fellows will have the nerve to attack this house while we are in it?"

"I do."

"What are you going to do to defend it?"

"Nothing at all."

"What?"

"Nothing at all. I am almost inclined to leave the door open for them to enter, only if I did that it would make them suspicious."

"Do you mean that you are going to let them get inside without offering any resistance?"

"Yes."

"Why, for goodness sake?"

"Because they will discover all the resistance they will care to meet after they have entered."

"Oh! You mean to fix yourself to fight them, then, eh?"

"I don't really think we will have to do any fighting at all, senator."

"I suppose you have prepared another puzzle for me to solve, eh?"

"Not necessarily. Do you remember that when I was telling you about these two houses, I told you that I had had the other one wired thoroughly for electricity?"

"Yes. What has that to do with it?"

"I will tell you. When I thought of using these houses, I naturally remember that fact about the wiring, for it has just been done. When I reemerge that, it reminded me of something that I did years ago, in my house in New York."

"What was that?"

"There was a band of thirteen men who had formed together and taken a some oath to do me up; to murder me, in short. well, I got onto their schemes, and I managed to find out what night had been fixed upon when they intended to visit my house in a body, storm it, and either kill me, or take me prisoner to kill me afterward. I and just had that house fitted with electricity at the time, and I went to the power-house and induced them to help me-with the result that I bagged the whole lot of them with electricity. Caught every last one of them"

"By shocking them do you mean?"

"Yes."

"And is that what you have fixed up here?"

"Something very like it-as you shall see."

"Would you mind telling me how you are going to do it?" asked the senator.

"Not at all, since there seems to be plenty of time."

"I confess that I am curious to hear."

"I thought of the plan last night before I started Chick off to come here in advance of me. I told him exactly what to do. He was to visit the electric company which supplies the light and power here, and get them to assist him, after which it was a mere question of his being able to secure help enough to do the wiring before the time set when all must be in readiness."

"Well?"

"He got the consent of the company, and he evidently found the men, for he has told me that everything is in readiness."

"So you know what has been done, the same as if you had seen to it all yourself, eh?"

"Precisely."

"What has been done?"

"Step out here a moment, and I will show you."

Nick took the senator into the hallway, and pointed toward the balustrade that ascended beside the stairs.

"Don't you notice," he said, "that there is a strip of metal, lying along the top of the rail?"

"Yes."

"Look closer, and you will see that there is also a strip of insulation beneath it, to protect the woodwork."

"I see it."

"Well, every place in the house where a stranger, upon entering, would be likely to rest his hand, is wired and insulated in just that manner-for those strips of metal are what you might call flat wires; no?"

"Yes."

"Very good. Now you must understand that the other house-the one back of this one-is protected in the same manner."

"But-"

"Wait a moment, senator."

"All right."

"There is a wire run into each of the houses, which brings in the strong current that operates the arc-lights of the street. Have you gotten onto that?"

"Yes; but won't it kill a man?"

"It might; but I haven't finished explaining yet."

"Go on, then."

"There is a switchboard arranged with resistance-coils, in the front room of the second floor of each house,and from either of those switchboards I can turn onwhatever amount of current I please. If you werestanding here, holding to this rail, and I were at theswitchboard, I could give you enough of a shock toknock you galley west, or I could give you just enoughto astonish and frighten you, as I happened to wish todo. See?"

"Jingo, but that's great!"

"I believed that I could induce these men of Mustushimi's, or, at least, enough of them to make it worth while, to attack me in this house, and to force an entrance here. I laid my plans to that effect before I left New York. I even had Chick cause a notice to appear in the Star to-night, that Nick Carter was in town on an important case, connected with a certain Japanese gentleman who had once been ordered out of the country. You may be sure that some of his associates saw that, and called his attention to it."

"You seem to have forgotten nothing, Carter."

"One must remember things when one is in my business."

"I suppose so."

"Of course, when I started out, and when I ordered all these arrangements made, there was no certainty in my mind that my expectations would be fulfilled, but I made sure to be prepared for the moment if it came,-or if I could bring it about."

"I see."

"And now you understand why I have purposely kept myself in plain sight, all along; why I chose to sit at the window over there at the hotel, and talk so that the spy across the street could read what I was saying, from the motion of my lips."

"Yes. But that spy was the one captured by Patsy. He has had no chance to report what he saw you say, at that time."

"Don't think he was the only one who was watching me. I haven't a doubt that the chief himself was watching me at the time. I figured that he was."

"You seem to have figured the thing out pretty carefully, Carter."

"I have. I had to do so, if I wished to be successful. I have promised the President that I would deliver Mustushimi to him in person, and I want to do it to-morrow morning."

"Suppose that the chief himself does not enter the house? Suppose he leaves that part of the work for his followers to do."

"In that case we will have to force those we do catch to tell us where to find their chief-and with the aid of the electricity it can be done. There is nothing in the world of which an ordinary man stands in such deadly fear as of electricity; and in the case of fellows like these, who know very little about it, they will think that they are going to be electrocuted offhand."