“What trick is that?” she demanded. “Come across plainly. I don’t get you.” “You don’t, eh?” Moll frowned. “Tell that to the marines.” “Tell it to whom you like,” Sadie retorted. “It’s all one to me.” “Well, whether you get me, Sadie, or not, the gent wants to meet you,” Moll insisted. “What do you say?” Sadie Badger gazed at the curbing for several seconds, evidently sizing up the significance of what she had heard, and the consequences involved in whatever course she might shape. “Who is the gent, Moll?” she then asked abruptly. “You don’t know him.” “What’s his name?” “Goulard.” “I never heard of him.” “That cuts no ice,” Moll declared. “He’s all right. You’d better see him. If you’ll go with me----” “I guess not! Not if the court knows itself,” Sadie Badger interrupted, with scornful significance. “Safety first, Moll. When I meet strange gents, I meet them where I’m dead sure of having the best of it.” “I’ll send him to you, then,” Moll Damon quickly suggested. Sadie hesitated again for a moment, then said curtly: “You may do that, Moll, if you like.” “Where to?” “I’m heading for home. You know where I hang out. Send him there and I’ll see him.” “I’ll do it,” Moll quickly nodded. “He’ll show up within an hour.” “All right! I’ll be there.” The women parted with as little ceremony as they had met. “Goulard, eh?” thought Nick, having heard every word that passed between the couple. “Goulard, eh? If he shows up before I do, Miss Sadie Badger, he’ll go some. This is too good an opportunity to lose.” The conversation between the two women had transpired in a very few minutes. The significance of it, in view of what Nick had learned and suspected, convinced him not only that he was on the right track, but also that the work he had laid out for himself and his two assistants before leaving the Mantell residence, the nature of which will appear, was likely to prove successful. No one had noticed him in the barroom doorway, and Nick presently slipped out and started in pursuit of Sadie Badger. “She is not acquainted with Goulard, and probably does not know him by sight,” he rightly reasoned from what he had overheard. “If I have sized up the evidence correctly, then, I probably can worm out of her precisely what took place in the Manhattanville house, and possibly learn what became of Padillo and his war prize. I’ll wager I have it near enough to pull wool over the woman’s eyes and loosen her tongue. I’ll take the chance, at all events, regardless of the consequences.” Nick had no difficulty in overtaking Sadie Badger nor in trailing her to her destination.