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The Crime of the French Cafe

Nick Carter's Ghost Story

The Mystery of St. Agnes' Hospital

_THREE COMPLETE STORIES OF THE EXPLOITS OF
NICHOLAS CARTER, AMERICA'S GREATEST DETECTIVE_





THE CRIME OF THE FRENCH CAFE.




CHAPTER I.

PRIVATE DINING-ROOM "B."


There is a well-known French restaurant in the "Tenderloin" district
which provides its patrons with small but elegantly appointed private
dining-rooms.

The restaurant occupies a corner house; and, though its reputation is
not strictly first-class in some respects, its cook is an artist, and
its wine cellar as good as the best.

It has two entrances, and the one on the side street is not well lighted
at night.

At half-past seven o'clock one evening Nick Carter was standing about
fifty yards from this side door.

The detective had shadowed a man to a house on the side street, and was
waiting for him to come out.

The case was a robbery of no great importance, but Nick had taken it to
oblige a personal friend, who wished to have the business managed
quietly. This affair would not be worth mentioning, except that it led
Nick to one of the most peculiar and interesting criminal puzzles that
he had ever come across in all his varied experience.

While Nick waited for his man he saw a closed carriage stop before the
side door of the restaurant.

Almost immediately a waiter, bare-headed and wearing his white apron,
came hurriedly out of the side door and got into the carriage, which
instantly moved away at a rapid rate.

This incident struck Nick as being very peculiar. The waiter had acted
like a man who was running away.

As he crossed the sidewalk he glanced hastily from side to side, as if
afraid of being seen, and perhaps stopped.

It looked as if the waiter might have robbed one of the restaurant's
patrons, or possibly its proprietor. If Nick had had no business on his
hands he would have followed that carriage.

As it happened, however, the man for whom the detective was watching
appeared at that moment.

Nick was obliged to follow him, but he knew that he would not have to go
far, for Chick was waiting on Sixth avenue, and it was in that direction
that the thief turned.

So it happened that within ten minutes Nick was able to turn this case
over to his famous assistant, and return to clear up the mystery of the
queer incident which he had chanced to observe.

Nick would not have been surprised to find the restaurant in an uproar,
but it was as quiet as usual. He entered by the side door, ascended a
flight of stairs, and came to a sort of office with a desk and a
register.

It was the custom of the place that guests should put down their names
as in a hotel before being assigned to a private dining-room.

There was nobody in sight.

The hall led toward the front of the building, and there were three
rooms on the side of it toward the street.

All the doors were open and the rooms were empty. Nick glanced into
these rooms, and then turned toward the desk. As he did so he saw a
waiter coming down the stairs from the floor above.

This man was known by the name of Gaspard. He was the head waiter, and
was on duty in the lower hall.

"Ah, Gaspard," said Nick, "who's your waiter on this floor to-night?"

Gaspard looked at Nick anxiously. He did not, of course, know who the
detective really was, but he remembered him as one who had assisted the
police in a case in which that house had been concerned about two years
before.

"Jean Corbut," replied Gaspard. "I hope nothing is wrong."

"That remains to be seen," said Nick. "What sort of a man is this
Corbut?"

"A little man," answered Gaspard, "and very thin. He has long, black
hair, and mustaches pointed like two needles."

"Have you sent him out for anything?"

"Oh, no; he is here."

"Where?"

"In one of the rooms at the front. We have parties in A and B."

"You go and find him," said Nick. "I want to see him right away."

Gaspard went to the front of the house. A hall branched off at right
angles with that in which Nick was standing. On the second hall were
three rooms, A, B and C.

Room C was next the avenue. The other two had windows on an open space
between two wings of the building. Nick glanced at the register, and saw
that "R.M. Clark and wife" had been assigned to room A, and "John Jones
and wife" to