With Links of Steel Part 3

"Where is she quartered?"

"She rents a furnished house uptown."

"Does she live alone?"

"With her servants only."

"How many?"

"She keeps a butler, a male cook, and two housemaids. Also a girl to look after her wardrobe and act as her dresser at the theater."

"Evidently Senora Cervera is wealthy," said Nick.

"Well, not exactly wealthy," rejoined Venner. "She is the popular craze just now, and from her professional work she derives a very large income which she scatters as if dollars were dead leaves. In a word, Detective Carter, Senora Cervera is an arrant spendthrift."

"So I have heard," nodded Nick.

"You have?"

"Oh, yes!" laughed the detective. "That appears to surprise you. It will not, when I tell you that there are very few public characters in New York of whose general habits I am not tolerably well informed. Of course, Mr. Venner, you have no doubt of this Spanish dancer's honesty?"

Nick added, bluntly.

Venner flushed deeply, and instantly shook his head.

"Most a.s.suredly not," he cried, with some feeling. "Senora Cervera dishonest? Impossible!"

"Improbable, Mr. Venner, no doubt; but not impossible."

"It is, sir," declared Venner, positively. "I know her well. Such an idea is absurd. Drop it at once, Detective Carter. Indeed, sir, if I thought her name was to be dragged into this affair, or her reputation to be in any way imperiled, I would quietly suffer the loss of these diamonds, and cease this investigation at once."

Nick laughed softly, and suppressed the response that, nearly rose to his lips.

"Don't do it, Mr. Venner," said he, complacently. "My observation was not intended to cast any reflection upon Senora Cervera. I have no doubt that she is perfectly honest."

"I should hope not, sir."

"By the way, have you the note she sent to you this morning?"

"Yes. Here it is."

"By mail, or a messenger?"

"A messenger brought it."

"Ah!" murmured Nick, briefly studying the written page. "Plainly a foreign hand. Very firm and forceful. It indicates a strong and determined character. I should say that Senora Cervera is a woman of rare qualities."

"That is perfectly correct, sir. She is a woman of rare qualities."

"What did she decide to do about the diamonds, Mr. Venner?"

"She gave me an order for the cross, Detective Carter, to be made and delivered as soon as possible."

"This was during your call upon her this morning?"

"Certainly."

"You had previously sent no order to Hafferman for the stones?"

"Surely not."

"Yet a written order was received by him, or he would not have delivered the goods."

"In which case, then, it was a forgery."

"No doubt of it," Nick readily admitted. "Chick."

"Yes, Nick."

"Take a carriage and go at once and interview Hafferman. See what you can learn from him. Get the written order received by him, and bring it here. Have a look at young Boyden, and see what you make of him. Also get the written signature of Mr. Hafferman, and that of each person employed in his store. Understand?"

"Sure thing!" nodded Chick, already seeing clearly the line Nick's investigation was taking, though neither Venner nor his partner yet perceived it. "I will return as quickly as possible."

"You will find me here," nodded Nick. "Wait a moment!"

"Well?"

"Also get a description of the party who delivered the written order at Hafferman's store. Inquire what he said at the time, and why he did not attempt securing the diamonds then and there."

"Probably he was not known there, and knew he could not get them,"

observed Venner, by way of explanation.

Nick made no reply to this, however, and Chick hurriedly departed.

CHAPTER III.

THE KILGORE DIAMOND GANG.

"Now, gentlemen, only a few more questions, and I then shall be ready to go at this case in a more energetic fashion," said Nick Carter, immediately after Chick's departure. "Were any of your clerks absent from the store, Mr. Venner, at the time of this robbery?"

"As I was absent myself, I cannot say," replied Venner, rather dryly.

"How about it, Garside?--you were here."

"Only one clerk, a young man named Spaulding, was out of the store."

"Was he out on business?"