CHAPTER XXIII.

WHICH WAS WHICH?

At eight o’clock the next morning the chief and Chick faced each other across a well-served breakfast in a private dining room in the Old Pike Inn, while Captain Brown, the proprietor, smiled on them from a chair at the window.

“Well, of course, Carter,” went on Brown, who had been speaking, “we can’t tell much about this Howard Milmarsh. I used to see him down here at the Inn pretty often, and I thought I knew him. He has changed a little in the few years he has been away. But the features are the same, of course, and his size and shape have not much altered. In fact, I thought he would have grown heavier than he has.”

“Does he come down to the Inn now?”

“Never seen him since the night he arrived, with that man Andrew Lampton. That was before Louden Powers came. Powers stayed here one night, but the other two went straight up to the Milmarsh residence. I happened to be down at the railroad station when they arrived, or I wouldn’t have seen them at all.”

“Did you speak to them?”

“Oh, yes. Milmarsh shook hands with me, and said I had not changed since he saw me last, and I handed him back a similar line of talk. You know how men do when they haven’t seen each other for a long time.”

Carter nodded and poured out another cup of coffee for Chick.

“Ha, ha, ha!” laughed Captain Brown jovially. “What humbugs men are! I could see a lot of changes in him, but I did not think he would want me to say so, and, of course, I didn’t.”

“Well, we came up here to learn what really was going on,” observed Nick, after a pause. “What are they doing at Paradise City?”

“Nothing.”

“No building going on?”

“Why, no. They couldn’t build there. It’s that swampy place over to the northeast. Mr. Milmarsh—I mean this Howard Milmarsh’s father—never did anything with it. He talked about having it filled in some time. But he never did it. If he had, he would have made it an extension to his golf links.”

“They are selling plots, aren’t they?”

“Yes.”

“Do the people who buy the plots think the swamp won’t hurt?” threw in Chick, as he finished his breakfast.

“They don’t see the swamp,” replied Captain Brown.

“How do they buy, then?”

“From a map. Ha, ha, ha! Swamps don’t show on maps—unless you want them to. You ought to know that.”

“I do know it,” replied Chick. “But I didn’t suppose they could put over such a bluff as that. It isn’t Howard Milmarsh who does it, is it?”

Nick listened with some show of interest for Captain Brown’s reply to this.

“I don’t know who is at the back of the Paradise City project,” he answered more seriously. “I suppose Howard Milmarsh must sanction it, or it wouldn’t be going on. But the fellows engineering the game are Louden Powers and Andrew Lampton.”

It was apparent to Nick Carter that Captain Brown could have told more about the business if he had chosen to do so. But he was manager of the Old Pike Inn, and it was his policy not to say anything about anybody which might rebound and hurt his trade. He was an innkeeper first of all, and he never forgot his own interests.

“Well, captain, you will be careful not to let anybody know who we are, of course?” adjured the detective. “We shall go and see the swamp during the day, and to-night there will be something else we shall have to attend to. Secrecy is important, but I was sure we could depend on you.”

“You can bank on me to the last cent,” replied Captain Brown impressively. “You say you want to look at that swamp?”

“Yes.”

“You don’t want to walk through it, I suppose?”

“Hardly,” said Nick, with a smile. “It must be pretty wet about this time.”

“Almost a lake! What I was about to suggest is that I can take you along the east road in my car, and you can see the swamp over the fence. If that is all you want of it.”

“That will be just what we do want,” replied Nick. “I should like to assure myself that nothing has been done to alter the appearance of the place. How soon do we start?”

“In ten minutes, if you like. I’ll go down and telephone the garage at once, and have the machine at the door by the time you are ready. It will be an open car—unless you would rather ride in a limousine. You would not be so exposed to view then.”

“It’s a lonely road, and if we do see anybody staring, we can pull our hats down over our eyes, and be looking for something that we may have dropped in the car,” said the chief. “We’ll take the open car.”

Neither Carter nor Chick made any attempt to disguise themselves for this trip. They appeared merely to be two visitors to Old Pike Inn looking at the country as the guests of Captain Brown. He often took guests out in his car.

Nick knew something about the section of the Milmarsh estate generally spoken of by those who lived in the neighborhood as “the swamp.” But he wanted to look it over, to make sure that it had not been changed.

He kept in mind the instructions of the elder Howard Milmarsh, to see that his son was not deprived of any of his rights.

If this was the real Howard Milmarsh who had seated himself in the mansion, with these two shady characters, Louden Powers and Andrew Lampton, as his chief advisers, then it was the detective’s clear duty to go there and tell the new head of the Milmarsh family what his father’s wishes were.

“I shall know more about it after to-night,” was the way he finally settled it with himself.

The swamp looked about the same as he always had seen it, and he ground his teeth in indignation as he thought of the poor people who were giving up their money for worse than nothing at all.

It was just as they had passed the swamp, and were turning into another road, away from the Milmarsh estate, that Nick caught sight of a man walking in a narrow path not far from the big house, apparently in deep thought.

His head was bent and his hands were clasped behind him, as he strolled, looking neither to the right nor left.

“Who is that?” asked Nick, who had not had a look at the man’s face.

But at that instant the musing one looked up, and the morning sun fell right across his countenance, bringing up plainly every feature.

It was only a momentary glimpse that the chief and Chick had of the man’s face. But it was enough for both of them to see it so clearly that both knew it was the man who called himself Howard Milmarsh.

“Either that man is Howard Milmarsh, or I can’t tell the rightful owner of this place from a rascal who ought to be in jail. I wonder whether I shall find out which is which?”

Carter had said this loudly enough for his assistant to hear, and it was in a tone of conviction that the latter replied:

“You’ll find out, chief, and, by ginger, I believe I know already what the verdict will be.”

“You are more sure than I am, Chick. I thought I _knew_ that the man who is in the Universal Hospital is Howard Milmarsh. But that man we have just passed looks as much like the real one as the other. It’s a puzzle. But I must untangle it somehow.”

“We are going to do it to-night, aren’t we?”

“Yes. At least, we’ll try. You have the long dusters and big caps in that suit case, haven’t you, Chick?”

“All right, chief. We won’t look like ourselves when we are rigged up for our little visit to the big house on the hill. You can bet on that.”