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Read Ebook: Nick Carter Stories No. 137 April 24 1915: The Seal of Gijon; Or Nick Carter's Ice-House Fight by Carter Nicholas House Name Phillips Roland Ashford
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Ebook has 855 lines and 37097 words, and 18 pages
Editor: Chickering Carter
NICK CARTER STORIES
THE SEAL OF GIJON;
Or, NICK CARTER'S ICE-HOUSE FIGHT.
Edited by CHICKERING CARTER.
SLIPPED AWAY.
"Look out! You'll run us down!"
The response was a growling oath, as the heavy launch came on, full speed, straight across the river.
Nick Carter, sitting at the wheel of another craft of the same type, saw the danger, even before his assistant shouted this warning.
"Keep quiet, Chick!" he ordered, in his calm tones. "I'll make it!"
The famous detective had handled motor boats before, and he knew he could dodge the erratic craft cutting across his bows, unless the other man changed his course at the crucial moment.
They were abreast of Yonkers, and at that point the lordly Hudson is swift, as well as wide.
The launch coming across the river had suddenly appeared from the shadow of the Palisades, apparently bound straight for the busy city on the opposite shore.
In it were three men.
The one at the wheel, who appeared to be in general command, had a square, bulldog sort of face, with heavy jaw, outstanding ears, and other features that make more for physical determination than beauty.
Another man, who scowled at Nick Carter and Chick with an evil intentness that made the latter long to jump on him and have it out there and then, sat in the stern and whispered something in the ear of the engineer.
This second man was lean of face and evidently long of body. He had deep-set, unwinking eyes, and a square face at the bottom which suggested that he was at enmity with most of his kind.
With it all, there was a restless cunning in the far-buried eyes which made him even more unpleasant to contemplate than the man to whom he was whispering.
As if to counterbalance to some extent the preponderance of brutal humanity in the launch, the third passenger was a rather small, slight young man, who looked hardly old enough to vote. His face was pale and his eyes had a gentle, appealing expression, almost like that of a very innocent, unsophisticated girl.
Appearances are deceitful very often. So let it be stated at once that this gentle young fellow, barely out of his teens, and whose voice was as mild as his looks, was none other than Pet Carlin, one of the cruelest, most unscrupulous gangsters in New York City.
Carlin's name was supposed to be Peter. That had been shortened by his associates to "Pete." Afterward the final "e" had been clipped off, because of his inoffensive appearance and manner, and he was known as "Pet."
Nick Carter shut off his power, and manipulated the wheel carefully, as he saw that the man in the other boat was recklessly driving straight toward him.
There was only a narrow margin for the two launches to pass each other, but it would have been done successfully had not the stranger deliberately turned his wheel just as Nick Carter was gliding past in safety by the most skillful management of his helm.
"Larry!" exclaimed Pet, in a startled tone.
He was staring hard at the two passengers in Nick Carter's boat--two men who wore handcuffs on their wrists--and a quick look of recognition had passed back to him.
"What?" growled the man at the wheel, Larry Dugan. "What's biting yer, Pet?"
"Look!"
All three of the men in the launch gazed at the two handcuffed men, and all three expressed their astonishment in low grunts.
"Get 'em!" whispered the man behind the steersman--he of the deep-set, cunning eyes. "We've got to do it!"
It was just as this was said that the collision came.
The launch coming across the river headed straight for the middle of the other. Only because Nick Carter swung his wheel around, thus receiving a glancing blow, instead of one head-on, was his boat saved from being cut in two.
As it was, the two launches hung motionless for a moment, as two men might before they fell after receiving a mortal blow.
Then, as Nick gave another quick turn to his wheel, and at the same time opened the throttle, he slid past the other launch and was free, in the open water.
It was only for a moment, however.
The detective had seen, at the first glance, that the launch occupied by the three forbidding-looking men was superior to his own in the case with which it could be manipulated.
It was narrower in the beam, and the engine was more powerful. Besides, it answered to its helm more smoothly and promptly than his own.
Nevertheless, as Nick Carter, in that short instant, managed to get a full view of the faces of the men, he recognized them all. Also, he saw that they knew his two handcuffed passengers.
Further proof of this came at once, when, as Nick swung his launch clear, the man at the wheel of the other boat, with a snarl, twisted his wheel and again brought the two launches against each other, parallel, with a crash.
"Look out, Chick! Hold the gunwale of that other boat!" shouted Nick Carter. "Don't let them get away!"
"I should say not!" was Chick's response. "Don't you see who they are?"
"Of course I do!" shouted back Nick Carter. "That fellow at the wheel is Larry Dugan."
The detective had seen that three of the worst ruffians in New York--men who could be hired to beat, or even kill, a man, for pay--were in the launch, and he could not keep a horrible suspicion out of his mind which implicated Don Solado and Prince Miguel, his two handcuffed prisoners.
It was Nick Carter's determination now to catch the three thugs. He had little doubt that they had been hired by Solado and Miguel to make away with a man they wanted to keep out of sight, for a time at least.
The man's name was Prince Marcos.
In this supposition he was right. But he did not give the rascals credit for quite so much audacity as they possessed.
As Nick reached over the sides of the two launches which were rubbing against each other, and grabbed the man nearest to him, who happened to be Pet Carlin, there was a loud shout from Chick.
"Look out, chief! They're getting our men!"
The launches sprang violently apart, and Nick was obliged to let go of Pet to save himself from going overboard.
With his throttle wide open, sending the boat along at full speed, Nick swung around in pursuit of the other craft.
He had special reason to do this now, for, as Chick had warned him, the trio of ruffians had actually snatched away Don Solado and Prince Miguel, his handcuffed prisoners, under his very nose.
Only the fact that Nick had been hampered by his position at the wheel and the levers of the engine had enabled the rascals to be successful.
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