The Pressing Peril: Nick Carter And The Star Looters

“Oh, I say, old top!”

Nick Carter stopped short and looked at the speaker.

There was no mistaking his nationality.

He was English to the bone. English in aspect, attitude, attire, and accent. English of the most pronounced and impressive type—but impressive upon as keen and thoroughbred an American observer as the famous New York detective chiefly because of the insipid and mildly obtrusive aristocracy that stuck out all over him.

He was tall and slender. He wore a suit of pronounced plaid. He was about twenty-three years old, with yellow hair and the fair skin of a straight-bred Anglo-Saxon. He wore a monocle with a cord dangling from it, and through which one watery blue eye glared larger and brighter than the other.

He had been hurrying up Fifth Avenue for about five minutes in a sort of subdued and desperate agitation, threading his way quite rudely through the stream of pedestrians always in that fashionable thoroughfare shortly before six on a pleasant October afternoon, and he incidentally had overtaken Nick Carter near the corner of Fifty-ninth Street.

He did not accost the detective because he knew him, or had the slightest idea of his vocation. It was purely by chance that he had appealed to the man he most needed. He obeyed a sudden, irrepressible impulse, that of one who scarce knew what else to do, when he grasped Nick’s arm and stopped him, exclaiming apologetically:

“Oh, I say, old top!”

Nick sized him up with a glance. He saw more than others would have seen, that this stranger not only was deeply disturbed, but also in doubt what course to pursue. Nick merely said, nevertheless, tentatively:

“Well?”

The other responded with a forward thrust of his head, a more appealing scrutiny, and with native accent and characteristics that no attempt will be made to even suggest on paper.

“You’ll pardon a chap, old top, won’t you? I’m in a bally bad mess, so I am, and jolly well upset. Would you tell me where I could find an inspector—what your blooming people call a detective? I don’t want any gumshoe bobbie, don’t you know, but a ripping roarer who knows his beastly business and can keep his mouth closed. You see, old top——”

“What’s the trouble, young man?” Nick interposed. “I may be able to aid you, or advise you. I am a detective—what your blooming English people call an inspector.”

The subtle retort in the last was wasted upon his hearer. He gazed more sharply at Nick through his monocle, nevertheless, saying quickly:

“That’s blasted lucky, then, don’t you know? I can’t account for it, ’pon my word, this running bunk against a man I wanted. What name, sir, may I ask?”

“My name is Nick Carter,” replied the detective indifferently. “But what——”

“There it is again!” exclaimed the Englishman, interrupting with countenance lighting. “This is a blooming, blasted good wheeze. I’ve heard of you, sir. You’re bally well known by name even in old Lunnon. I’m deuced well pleased, Mr. Carter, so I am.”

He seemed to have temporarily forgotten his trouble, in his surprise and pleasure upon discovering the detective’s identity. He even smiled and extended his hand, which was accepted and shaken in a perfunctory way.

Nick saw plainly, in fact, that the young man really was instinctively very frank and genuine, and that under his somewhat insipid and superficial personality he was possessed of true manly sentiments and probably some depth of character.

That he was a well-bred gentleman was equally manifest, moreover, and Nick was impelled to assist him, if possible. He brought him to the point at once, nevertheless, by replying:

“Granting all that, young man, what is your trouble? Why do you need a detective?”

“Because I’m blasted hard hit, don’t you know?” he replied, serious again. “I’ve been jolly well robbed.”