The House of Fear, or Nick Carter's Counterstroke (ePub)

Excerpt: I say, shir! Can you let me have a match? I think so. The last speaker was Nick Carter, the famous detective. The first was an erect, well-built, fashionably clad man, apparently in the forties and somewhat the worse for liquor. His crush hat had a rakish cant. His Inverness hung awry over his shoulders. His cravat had a disorderly twist, and his brown, Vandyke beard had lost its carefully combed appearance. Nick Carter sized him up as a society man who had been on the bat, and who was returning home on foot to walk off the effects of it. His appearance and the hour seemed to warrant this conclusion, for it was two o'clock in the morning. Nick was rather roughly clad. His strong, clean-cut face was so artistically treated with grease paint as to effectively disguise him and give him a decidedly sinister aspect. He had spent most of the night in searching for a crook, on whom he very much wanted to lay his hands, but his efforts had been futile, and he was returning to his residence in Madison Avenue. He had turned a corner of Fifth Avenue only a few moments before, when he saw the stranger approaching, walking a bit unsteadily, and then the only person to be seen in the fashionable street. Nick saw him fishing out a cigar and vainly searching in his pockets for a match, and he was not surprised when the man stopped him with the above request, straightening up with a manifest effort and trying to speak distinctly. Much obliged, sir, said he, when Nick reached into his pocket after his match box. Will you smoke, I've got anozzer. No, none for me, thank you, said Nick. I?? Don't thank me. Do what I tell you, instead, and do it quick. Hands up!