“That’s the ‘Patrol,’” said Deever.  “Give her a wide berth.”

Instead of complying, the boatman put his helm over, and stood straight toward the tug.

“Here!” cried Deever; “what does this mean?”

“It means,” said the boatman, “that you’re my prisoner, Patrick Deever.  I am Nick Carter.”

Ten minutes later they were both aboard the police-boat, and in another hour Nick had redeemed his pledge to produce Patrick Deever alive before the superintendent.

“I’d have had him, anyway,” said Patsy, afterward.  “He turned on me in the woods up there in Nyack and knocked me down, and tied me.

“He thought I was done, but I wasn’t.  I was just going for a tug when you ran him aboard the police-boat.

“At any rate,” he said in conclusion, “it’s some satisfaction to know that it was you, and not he, that outsailed me.”

The two Deevers were punished in due course for conspiracy, and Flint for perjury.

“On the whole,” said Superintendent Byrnes to Nick, “I think that was about the prettiest work I ever saw.  The most puzzling thing in the world, I’ve noticed, is apt to be a perfectly plain case.”

The end.