As now must be inferred, of course, after his interview with Sadie Badger, in which appeared most of the conclusions at which he had arrived, Nick Carter had started out to locate the suspected gang after the discoveries made while in the Mantell residence. He also had assigned Chick and Patsy the task of hunting up Gaston Goulard, in which they were engaged while Nick was busy as described. Nick had felt reasonably sure, in fact, that these several parties, whom he knew must have been in the Manhattanville house the previous night, and presumably under the circumstances which he shrewdly suspected--he knew they would come together sooner or later. His first move was to hunt them up, therefore, before they could learn how much he had discovered and suspected, and guard themselves against the steps he naturally would take. The latter part of the afternoon found Chick and Patsy, both in a disguise of a rather sinister character, completing a round through several East Side stuss houses, known to be frequented at times by Connie Taggart, the murdered cracksman. They were not seeking him, of course, but were looking for the man now known to have been one of the confederates the previous night--Gaston Goulard. They reasoned, also, that they might discover others, or hear some remarks dropped that would supply a clew to the whereabouts of Goulard. In each of the stuss houses visited, therefore, both detectives had played briefly at one or more of the tables, while sizing up the other players and listening to what was said. They were thus engaged about half past four, in the stuss house then run by Karl Ritchie, known to be a favorite haunt of ex-convicts and denizens of the underworld. “There’s one of them, now,” Chick whispered to Patsy, when entering the place. “He has done time twice for holdup jobs.” “You mean Slugger Sloan?” questioned Patsy, glancing toward the table at which the gambler was seated. “Yes, of course,” Chick muttered. “There’s a vacant chair next to him.” “I see.” “I’ll take it, Patsy, while you play at one of the other tables. We’ll look the place over very thoroughly, and then get out.” “I’m on,” nodded Patsy, sauntering to another part of the room. Very little attention was paid to either of them by the other players, and the man mentioned by Chick hardly noticed him when he took the next chair and began his play. He was a stocky, muscular chap in the twenties, with a countenance evincing depravity and vice, also a taciturn and surly nature. The latter had plunged him into numerous fights, which had earned for him the nickname he was bearing, that of Slugger Sloan. Chick had been playing less than ten minutes, however, and was apprehending no profitable results, when something occurred that quickly reversed his opinion. He felt a hand touch the back of his chair, and then a woman who had just hurried into the place, bent between him and Sloan, to whom she whispered, yet not so low but that Chick heard her: