“My dear Mr. Bentham,” responded Nick, with a smile. “You know that I am employed to make many secret investigations. It came in my way to find out about these records, and when I heard that Mr. Anderton was dead, I looked through his study for these valuable papers. I was worried because they were not there. Now that I know you have them, I feel safer. Would you permit me to use your telephone? Then I won’t trouble you any longer.” “Trouble me?” protested Bentham. “That’s a nice thing for you to say, Carter. I haven’t ever had you in my house before, and now you are apologizing for being here. I’ll get even with you by never coming to your place,” he added, smiling. “There’s the phone. Go ahead!” Nick took up the instrument, and soon had Patsy Garvan on the wire. He had listened not more than a few seconds, when he suddenly shouted back into the transmitter, in an agitated tone: “All right, Patsy! I’ll come over there at once. Keep quiet till I come.” He put the receiver on the hook, and, with a hasty “Good-by, professor. I’ll see you later,” dashed for the door. “Wait a moment,” cried Bentham. “What’s the trouble?” “No trouble at all!” shouted back Nick. “But I believe I’m going to find out something about the Yellow Tong.” Half an hour later he was flying up the stairs to the study of Andrew Anderton. He found Patsy Garvan striding up and down the room in a state of intense excitement. “Where is he?” asked Nick, as he ran into the room. “In that tool house, or whatever the place is, in the back yard,” was Patsy Garvan’s answer, as he ran to one of the windows and flung it wide open. CHAPTER XII. AVENGED. The rope ladder that Chick had used the night before, and which was again coiled up in its place on the fire-escape balcony, was brought into use. Nick Carter did not hesitate now, nor did he care who saw his movements. He was first over the high fence into the next yard, but he had hardly alighted on the soft earth of the flower bed when Patsy Garvan was by his side. “Shoot--to kill!” was Nick Carter’s brief order, as he ran to a brick structure at the end of the yard. “We’ve got to make sure of those rascals this time.” The brick building looked like a garage, but as there was no way for a motor car to be got into this yard, Nick knew it could not be used for that purpose. One glance showed him that it was old, and that the brickwork was shaky. There was a door and one window. The window was barred. Nick decided, after a brief survey, that the bars could be torn loose with some exertion, and he seized one of them with both hands and pulled with all his might. If the detective had not been a man of extraordinary muscular power, perhaps he could not have made the bar yield. As it was, he pulled it out of one end after a few minutes’ labor. Then it was comparatively easy to get the other end out.