The double dagger or, Nat Ridley's Mexican trail
"He is too much for us! Come--pronto!" he called to the other.
By this time the man Nat had kicked down was able to rise, though he
was doubled up in pain. Thus the two fled, leaving Nat victor on the
field and with spoils in the shape of a fine rope, made of braided
horsehair, as he discovered later.
"Touch and go!" muttered the detective grimly as he straightened up.
And then the street lamps suddenly shone again, though the alley
remained shrouded in gloom. As Nat looked toward the entrance he saw,
outlined against the background of light, a figure rushing toward him.
"Stand still!" the detective ordered. "I have you covered, and if you
come a step nearer----"
"I'm a police officer!" came the sharp answer. "If you shoot----"
"Oh, all right! I beg your pardon," said Nat quickly. Though he
determined not to be taken off his guard, and held his gun in readiness.
A moment later he saw a flashlight gleaming, the beams reflecting from
the brass buttons of a member of New York's crack uniformed force. Then
Nat knew he was safe and advanced, revealing his identity.
The policeman was a stranger to Nat Ridley, though the latter was
evidently known, by reputation at least, to the patrolman, for the
latter respectfully asked:
"Are you hurt, Mr. Ridley? Can I do anything to help?"
"No, they didn't get me," was the answer, "though it was a close call.
They lassoed me as I passed the alley and dragged me in. What was the
matter with the lights?"
"A fuse blew out at the power house, I guess. It's all right now. But
who were they?"
"Oh, a couple of hold-up men," said Nat, not wanting to go into
particulars.
"Well, I'd like to pinch them," said the officer. But when he and
Nat had looked around the alley no trace of the assassins was found.
The assassins had recovered and taken away the dagger. Only the rope
remained, and Nat took charge of that. He thought he might find a use
for it if he went on to Mexico.
By this time a crowd had gathered, attracted by the shots, as the
officer had been, but it soon dispersed when Nat remarked to several
who inquired:
"Oh, it was just a couple of bootleggers."
And so common has this form of industry become that it no longer
attracts attention in the larger cities.
"Sure you aren't hurt?" asked the officer when Nat came out of the
alley into the now brilliantly lighted street.
"Not at all. I kicked one man out and I think I hit the other with one
of my shots. But evidently neither was much disabled, for they ran out
just before you came up."
"I got here as fast as I could after I heard the shooting," apologized
the patrolman. "But I was away at the other end of the block, and----"
"That's all right," Nat said. "No harm done. I was looking for another
man and they happened to spot my pin, I suppose," and he motioned to
a diamond he was wearing in his tie. "They wouldn't have made much if
they got it, though," and Nat laughed, for the "diamond" was a paste
one, a part of his disguise.
Nat went on his way, but the patrolman, jealous for the good reputation
of his post, made a further search for the mysterious men, though he
found no trace of them.
Nat Ridley did not mention his real suspicions concerning the two.
"I'll keep them guessing!" decided the sleuth. "If they look in the
morning papers to see an account of this, they won't get much from the
news."
Though he thus made light of one phase of the affair, there was another
that worried Nat Ridley, and this was the closeness with which the
Tolas were hanging on his trail.
"They have evidently sworn vengeance against all who have anything to
do with the Lembergs or the oil wells," reasoned Nat. "I've got to
watch my step. They must have shadowed me from my office. Well, I'll
just stay away from there for a time--at least, I'll fool them."
He decided not to go to his apartment or to the office, and to carry
out a plan he hastily made he went to the Herald Square Hotel, where he
engaged a room. There, after a bath, a meal, and one of his big, black
cigars, he telephoned a cipher message to Berry Todd at the latter's
home.
"Come down here, Berry," requested Nat, "and bring number fourteen with
you."
This was the number of a certain valise containing several disguises,
and a little later the assistant detective arrived at the hotel with
it. Berry himself was disguised as a country lawyer in New York for a
holiday.
"Anything up, Chief?" he whispered to Nat when in the latter's room.
"Good and plenty!" was the answer. "I think I'm up against one of the
slickest and most desperate gangs I've ever dealt with. You've got to
help me, Berry."
"Surest thing you know, Chief. How?"
"You're going to be me."
"Going to be you?"
"Yes. I want you to make up to look like Nat Ridley, and, as me, leave
the office openly to-morrow. Do it as publicly as you can--I mean
speak to the elevator boys, the paper boys, greet anyone you see whom
you know and get them to call you by name--I mean my name. In short,
you and I are going to change identities."
"Suits me, Chief!" declared Berry.
"But you've got to be careful!" warned Nat.
"Careful of what--of making a break?"
"No. Careful not to get shot or stabbed or lassoed into a dark alley!"
and Nat's voice was quietly warning. "Berry, we're up against a
desperate game. It's asking you to take your life in your hands to
impersonate me for a while. Are you game to do it?"
Without a moment's hesitation Berry answered:
"I sure am, Chief! Here's where I double for Nat Ridley!"
CHAPTER VII
LIGHTS OUT
Berry Todd and Nat made careful plans for what might happen during the
next few days. It might be necessary for the assistant to continue the
rôle of chief sleuth for some time, or until the Tolas were thrown off
their guard.
"They were evidently out to do you," declared Berry, when Nat had told
of the episode in the dark alley.
"They were," agreed the chief. "Though how they made their plans so
quickly and got on my trail so easily I don't quite see."
"They're desperate!" decided Berry.
"Oh, yes. But worse, they have underground ways and means of getting
information," added Nat. "Evidently the whole band is sworn to
exterminate any who have a hand in keeping the oil wells away from
them."
"Is Mrs. Lemberg willing to let the property go back to the original
owners?" asked Berry.
"No, she isn't. She says part of it is hers by right now, since her
husband is dead, and she will need the income from it to support her,
since his business will not be carried on. She has the usual German
thoroughness and determination to hold on, and I don't know that I
blame her. But I'm working not so much to make secure the possession of
the oil wells as I am to avenge Dan Steele, and also Lemberg. Though I
was not friendly with the German detective, yet he belonged to the same
national society as I do and we are sworn to protect each other. So it
is war to the knife now between me and the Tolas."
"I'll help carry it on!" promised Berry.
A little later that night, having left certain disguises with Nat
Ridley, the helper went back home and the following morning he appeared
at the office in the semblance of Nat Ridley. So well did Berry
simulate the dress and bearing of his chief that for a moment even
Toodles was deceived, exclaiming as Berry entered:
"Good morning, Chief! You're a bit early."
"The early bird catches the worm, Toodles!" chuckled Berry. And there
was something in the laugh that made the office boy look a second time,
after which his eyes opened wide and he cried:
"Sweet daddy! If it isn't Berry!"
"Not so loud, young man!" warned the detective. "We don't want this
little masquerade known!"
Toodles subsided, but Berry was pleased that he had made such good work
of his disguise.
Nat passed a restful night in the Herald Square Hotel--that is, as
much of the night as was left after his adventures, and in the morning
went to his office, though not in his own character. He had made up to
resemble a small town business man in New York to buy goods for the
fall trade, which fact he spoke of as he ascended in the elevator.
Nat was so well made up that the elevator boys, who were well
acquainted with him in his usual manner of appearing, thought him a
stranger, and one of them directed Nat to the office of a commission
merchant in the suite adjoining the detective's offices.
To throw off any spies who might be watching, Nat entered this office,
but when the corridor was clear he came out, apologizing for having
made a mistake, and entered his own rooms, where he found Berry, as Nat
Ridley, waiting for him.
There was a hurried conference, and then the plan by which it was hoped
to trap the murderers, or at least to get on their trail, was put into
operation.
Berry, pretending to be Nat, left the office openly, and Toodles,
following instructions, asked loudly as Berry held open the door
leading into the corridor:
"What time will you be back, Mr. Ridley?"
"Can't say, Toodles!" was the equally loud answer. "If anybody asks for
Nat Ridley say he's gone fishing," and with a smile Berry, as Nat,
lighted one of the latter's black cigars, though the brand was a much
stronger one than Berry liked to indulge in. But he had to do this to
make the part perfect.
Watching his assistant from the partly opened door, Nat, who was still
attired as a business man, saw Berry enter the elevator, greeting the
boys who called him by name.
"Everything is working fine!" decided the detective.
As he watched he saw, coming from a washroom along the corridor, a
small, dark man who glided like a snake into the elevator behind
Berry. He had timed his entrance well, in order to be the last in the
descending cage.
"There goes number one!" thought Nat, as he made ready to take the next
down car. He had told Berry to wait in the corridor of the building
before going out, and when Nat reached the street floor he saw his
helper, who, of course, he pretended not to notice, start off down the
street.
Behind him went the man who had glided out of the washroom.
"The chase is on!" grimly reflected Nat Ridley.
Then began what was like a desperate game of hide and seek. All that
day Berry, as Nat Ridley, went about New York, into this office and
that, where he was known, but where his disguise was not penetrated.
And behind his assistant went Nat Ridley, now in one disguise and now
in another, for he deemed it wise to change several times.
And between Nat and Berry was the small, dark man who was a clever
shadower. That, the chief detective was forced to admit, for not once
did he betray himself, and to anyone less sharp than Nat Ridley and
Berry Todd, it would not have been known that any shadowing was going
on.
It was not until late in the evening that Number One, as Nat had called
him, was joined by another. This second man walked with a slight limp
and as if he were in pain.
"I wonder if that's the fellow I shot or the one I kicked?" mused Nat
as he noticed the halting gait. "It doesn't much matter, but it proves
that I'm on the right track. Now I hope Berry remembers what I told
him."
The assistant detective did, for he soon called a cab and, rather
ostentatiously, asked to be driven to the Club Tamalle where Nat had
seen the three men of the day before go in--the three, one of whom had
ordered Ramon to keep watch over some "pig."
Nat, meanwhile, had made some inquiries and had learned that the club
was the rendezvous of sportily inclined Mexicans, Spaniards and West
Indians.
"I wonder how Berry, as me, will fare in there?" mused Nat, as he took
another cab to follow his helper. "He'll be a bit conspicuous, I'm