Nick Carter had spent much less time at the St. Lawrence rectory than one might infer from the nature and extent of his investigations. He had covered the ground rapidly, despite the numerous deductions and explanations with which he had assisted Detective Fallon, from whom he parted shortly before ten o’clock.
Something like twenty minutes later, Nick alighted from a taxicab at a handsome stone residence in Massachusetts Avenue. It was that of Senator Ambrose Barclay, one of the leading statesmen then in the higher house, and the man directly responsible for Nick Carter’s arrival in Washington late the previous night.
A butler admitted the detective and at once ushered him into a richly furnished library, where Nick was almost immediately joined by both Senator Barclay and his daughter
