The last was said pleasantly enough, yet very emphatically, as Nick bowed and withdrew from the room, with the smiling eyes of the woman steadily meeting his till the door closed between the two. Then there came over her one of those swift changes seen only when suppressed passions, intensified by restraint, are abruptly given free rein. Her smile vanished like a flash, displaced by a frown that transfigured her every feature and lent to her usually attractive face the threatening and vengeful visage of a fury. With eyes gleaming, with lips drawn, with breast heaving under the sudden swell of her pent feelings, she shook both clenched hands after the departing detective, while muttering fiercely through her white teeth: “Yon will solve the problem, will you? You will tear away the veil of mystery, will you? Not if I know it—not if I can prevent it, Mr. Nick Carter! “Beware what you do—what you attempt! Let the cost be what it may, my prediction shall be fulfilled, and only failure shall be yours! Beware lest you fail, for the inevitable price of failure will be—death!” Then she turned and hurried across the room, with every movement of her lithe and supple figure as quick and graceful as those of a leopard. With a quick sweep of her arm, she threw aside the curtain of a door of a small closet, into which she entered, to seize the receiver from a telephone attached to the wall. “Give me 22 ring 2, Brookline!” she commanded. It was the number of the telephone in the house of Mr. Amos Badger. CHAPTER VIII. UNDER THE SURFACE. As Nick Carter had rightly conjectured, when weighing the mystifying knowledge displayed by Madame Victoria, there was something under the surface. What the something was, moreover, plainly appeared in what followed the visit of Nick to the suburban house of Mr. Amos Badger. The moment the detective departed, in company with Grady, there came over both Badger and his wife a very decided change. With an ugly gleam in his dark eyes, which were still following the runabout as it sped down the long driveway, Badger ripped off the red flannel bandages from around his neck, exclaiming vehemently: “Whew! these infernal things have set me reeking at every pore! Thank Heaven he remained no longer, or I should have run down into my boots. There’s not a dry rag on me.” His wife indulged in a laugh, a vicious little laugh, most unpleasant to honest ears. “Yet the ruse worked well, Amos,” she cried exultantly. “Yes, apparently.” “Apparently?” “That’s what I said,” growled Badger, as the runabout passed out of view. “What do you mean?” demanded Claudia, with quickened apprehension.