"When do you propose exposing the plot, Mr. Carter?" asked Feversham. "On the day set by the court for hearing the application which I feel assured Peter Mannion will make. Probate day is to-morrow. We must be in court when it opens, but not where Peter Mannion can see us. If I am not mistaken, he will appear to-morrow, for he is not the man to permit the grass to grow under his feet." Nick's prediction came true. The next forenoon, after court opened, Peter Mannion, accompanied by a lawyer of shady reputation, appeared. A will purporting to have been made by Arthur Mannion and witnessed by Prosper Craven and Emma Newton, a neighbor of Craven's, was presented for probate. By the terms of this will all the property possessed by the alleged decedent was bequeathed to Nellie Mannion, the wife, Peter Mannion, the uncle, being named as sole executor. As the instrument was in due form, it took the usual course, being set for hearing on the next court day. Then the matter of Playfair's will was taken up at the suggestion of Peter Mannion's attorney, and the hearing set, also, for the next court day. On reaching his room after the court-room incidents, Nick found Patsy. "And your mission. Did it succeed?" questioned the great detective. "It was too easy," replied Patsy. CHAPTER XVIII. NICK IN A TRAP. "I got in with a mob of hoboes at Patapsco," said Patsy. "I know their holes, and when I left the train at Patapsco town and went toward the river, I felt sure I'd strike 'em. And what do you think? The main hiker is Snub-nosed Johnny, who used to be train-boy on the Boston and Albany. The minute I lamped him I knew the game was mine. Inside of five minutes he handed me out a dope about Jilson and Mannion that put me on velvet. Both these guineas were with the gang, Mannion for a few days, Jilson for several weeks. "Johnny said Jilly and Mannion--the hoboes called him Serious Silas--had their blocks together about all the time. One day he saw Serious writing a letter for Jilly. The letter, he afterward discovered, was to Jilly's mother, who lives at Hagerstown. Did I go to Hagerstown? Cert. And I found the old lady. She is over seventy, sickly, and a washerwoman. Had she heard from her son lately? Her old, honest, patient face lit up with a smile that was heavenly in its sweetness. Yes, indeed, she had heard from the dear boy, who had forsaken his evil ways and was now at honest work in Baltimore. "He had not forgotten his old mother, for during the past month he had sent her one hundred dollars. And, what was better still, he was on the way to making a lot of money all in a heap, and when he had made it, he intended to send enough to keep her for the rest of her life. Then she broke down and cried, but the tears were tears of joy. My eyes were wet, too, and I could not say a word to undeceive her."