Johnston McCulley

“ Riley’s exclamation of relief showed that he had forgotten. Like madmen they worked at the covering of the manhole, smashing the ice around it, tearing at it with their hands until they were raw and bleeding. Presently they hurled it to one side.
“In we go!” Verbeck said. “And let’s try to make better time!”
“Easy there! We go—but we go prepared!” Riley said. “I’ll go first, if you don’t mind, Roger. Some of the Black Star’s gentlemen friends might be waiting in this old sewer with implements of destruction to greet us.” ”

“ Verbeck replied. “He’s liable to do almost anything that means profit. You want to remember that he had an organization that was collecting information for him, as I discovered. He knows more than we think. He has combinations of safes, knows the personal habits of people, knows—oh, everything that a crook would want to know if he pulled off a job! The information I found tabulated at his headquarters was all concerning jewels to be worn at the Charity Ball, but Heaven alone knows, besides himself, what he had gathered in the way of facts before that.” ”

“ That “poor fool” stung Roger Verbeck almost as much as the unpardonable phrase would have stung him.
He handed the Black Star’s letter to the waiting Muggs.
“We’ve fought some pretty good battles, Muggs, but nothing to what this is going to be,” he said. “On your toes, Muggs! Forget that hunch of yours! We don’t quit until I stand in court and hear a judge sentence the Black Star for his crimes, until I watch him pass in through the doors of a State prison. Think what he’s done, Muggs—of the decent persons he’s forced into his gang! This is going to be the hardest fight of our lives.” ”

“ The Black Star did not want any slip this night with a fortune at stake.
“Your attitude this evening puzzles me, Mr. Verbeck,” the master criminal whispered in a sarcastic tone. “You do not seem to be your usual self. Three or four times now I have had you as prisoner, and we have exchanged some conversation, and while I cannot say that I know you well, yet you do not seem the Verbeck of old. ”

“ He kicked the prostrate Muggs and hurried from the house. He did not know exactly in what part of the city he found himself, but he made for a crossing where he had seen a trolley car flash past, where he could make a start downtown.
And Muggs, groaning in pain, remained on the floor, but he was not fully unconscious. He had heard every word uttered by the Black Star—they seemed to ring in his brain. He kept telling himself he wanted to get up, he wanted to do something—but he could not. He struggled mentally to rise, and finally his will was communicated to his muscles. ”

“ Verbeck replied emphatically. “I’d stake my life on Muggs. He’s loyal! If the Black Star tried anything like that Muggs would tell me at once.”
“Then how did it happen? Answer me that! It stands to reason, doesn’t it, that nobody has been in this house except the three of us?”
“It looks that way, but——”
“Humph! You go right ahead thinking what you like, Roger. As for me, boy, I’m going to keep one eye on Mr. Muggs.”
“But——”
“Don’t be angry now. It’s my business to be suspicious of people. I knew you when you were a baby, and I’m right with you in this scrap with the Black Star. ”

“ And there, at the top of the marble steps, just in front of the heavy glass doors that opened into the establishment of Jones & Co., they found the watchman.
He was stretched on the floor, bound and gagged and with a black star on his forehead. Riley motioned for silence, and relieved the watchman of gag and ropes.
“He slipped up on me,” the man whispered. “He’s inside now.”
“Only one?”
“Just one man!” the watchman whispered. “He tapped me on the head and had me gagged before I knew what was happening. Then he bound me. I’m sure there was only one man. He unlocked the door with a key.” ”

“ We are honored by a visit from the Black Star, Muggs!” Verbeck said. “Think of that! The cleverest crook the town ever had to worry over—the man who got the famous Smith diamonds and cracked a safe across the street from police headquarters, who has lifted half the silver in town and stripped society women of their jewels—and he has paid us a visit. We must be getting important, Muggs—eh?”
“Yes, sir,” said Muggs.
“Well, well! The man every one is looking for and cannot find, who has been sending naughty notes to the police, telling them how dull they are. ”

“ He could not glance at his watch to get the exact time without striking a match, and he did not dare do that because some watchman might see and apprehend him. He got out of the cattle pen and started running along the street in the dark, toward the nearest car line. Slush and mud splashed over his trousers, and he realized that he would not be the usual well-groomed Roger Verbeck society knew when he invaded the big hall.
He boarded a car, drew his overcoat close around him, and crouched in a corner. It seemed that the car stopped at every street, that it made wretched time. ”

“ Never a crook lived that didn’t make a slip some time!”
“I’d like to know how those stars got on that loaf and how I got tapped on the head!” Muggs announced. “That Black Star must be able to make himself invisible!”
Riley snorted.
“He’s a human man, and that’s all there is to it—a clever, human man!” the detective declared. “And we’re clever, human men! We’ll get him! And he’ll be visible enough when we do! There never was a mystery that didn’t have a common, everyday solution, if a man’s wise enough to know how to look at things. ”

“ Verbeck could ask no more without betraying himself. He had no idea regarding the identity of the man before him. It was possible, of course, for him to call Muggs from the other room and overpower the crook, but it was doubtful if the man would talk and reveal anything after he discovered he was not dealing with the Black Star, but with an outsider. And what Verbeck wanted was accurate knowledge; he would have to be careful not to arouse the man’s suspicion. ”

“ As Muggs rushed away, Verbeck bent forward and took off the Black Star’s mask. There was revealed the not unhandsome face of a man about forty-five. Verbeck contemplated this countenance as he started to remove the Black Star’s robe. It was one he never had seen before. Despite the Black Star’s words, Verbeck had been half of a mind that the master crook was some one known to the city in general as a respectable man, a sort of Jekyll and Hyde. ”

“ I’m going to see you in the prisoner’s dock, as I swore I should. And I’m going to follow you to the doors of the penitentiary, and see them close behind you. You have to pay for your career of crime. Every criminal must pay! He may succeed for a time, but in the end he pays! He can’t dodge the law of compensation. ”

“ I say no member of my band ever saw my face or heard my voice, and it is the truth. I say, moreover, that I never saw the face of one of my band or heard his voice, that I know nothing of their names or identities, and, whenever a crime is committed, I do not know which person or group does the work. Can you understand that? Turn state’s evidence, Mr. Verbeck? Not a man of them knows a thing to tell, except against himself.”
“Rot!”
“The truth,” said the Black Star. “Attend me closely. I reveal my methods to you, because you’ll never pass them on. I began my work years ago. ”

“ If you were not my prisoner now, Mr. Verbeck—but you are, and so is Muggs. I was going to bring Muggs down here and leave him with you, but he’ll have to miss this share of the fun, I think. One moment, Mr. Verbeck, until I decorate your breast with a sarcastic note.”
He reached in his pocket and brought forth the note he had prepared, and stepped toward the prisoner, reaching to his lapel for a pin.
“We’d better hurry,” one of his men suggested.
“Are you afraid, when I am here beside you?” the Black Star demanded. “Such a man has no place in an organization like mine.” ”

“ He believed sincerely that no crook could be so clever but what some honest man could match wits with him and win. He believed, too, that the Black Star did not work alone, but was the leader of a band. Not for an instant did Verbeck think the man he had taken prisoner was the notorious Black Star, but it pleased him to let the prisoner believe he did. ”

“ Apparently you have given up the fight; you are passive. Been worrying, eh? Afraid I’ll abduct your fiancée, as I almost did once, and through her force you to join my band? Stop your silly attempt to capture me, Verbeck, and your worry will end. No? Very well, then!”
Muggs gurgled behind his gag at this baiting of his comrade, and the Black Star laughed at his ineffectual attempt to speak and at the angry glint in his eyes. ”

“ After a time the traffic cop turned and raised a hand, and Muggs growled again and threw in the clutch and piloted the heavy car across the street and down the broad avenue. They were out of the congested district within a few minutes, and speeding along a boulevard that led to a section of the city where large and modern apartment houses were to be found.
Half a block behind Verbeck’s roadster a man trailed on a motor cycle, seemingly paying no attention to the car ahead, but in reality keeping close watch on it. A short distance behind the motor cycle trailed a runabout with one man in it. ”

“ The Black Star and his men staggered backward, holding the little sponges to their nostrils. The air cleared, and then the master crook opened the panel to its greatest extent, and hauled the chief of police and his two men inside the little room.
“Lively now,” the Black Star commanded. “Only four men at the bottom, remember, and there are three of us. I’ll hurl a vapor bomb as soon as we get to the bottom, and you be ready with your guns. I’ll take one of those suit cases. Number Ten, you take the other. And you, Number Six, make sure of at least two of the men at the bottom, if you can.” ”

“ The master criminal selected one man, and had him walk boldly through the brush and down to the launch. In the semidarkness the engineer of the launch would believe him to be one of the plain-clothes men returning with orders.
The Black Star’s man was within a dozen feet of the boat before the engineer was aware of his approach, for he was busy with the searchlight. He turned when he heard the man splashing through the mud at the edge of the river, and before he could ask a question he received a shot from a vapor gun and collapsed in the bottom of the boat, unconscious. ”

“ The laugh of the Black Star rang out; he continued playing the light on them. The launch was out in the stream now and turning; a moment later the engineer gave her the maximum amount of speed, and she dashed beneath the bridge and toward the city.
“Too bad our prisoners could not have been conscious and enjoyed this little battle,” he told his men. “Really, Muggs and Verbeck are not in the thick of it at all to-night. Generally they cause a part of the trouble, but to-night all our trouble has come from others.” ”

“ Muggs was small in size, but he had great strength in his arms and shoulders, and possessed knowledge of a multitude of tricks to aid him in the art of self-defense or aggression. He worshiped Roger Verbeck. He was ready at any time to fight for Verbeck, to defend his life and his happiness. The fact that the Black Star had caused his master misery was enough to make Muggs want to throttle the man. ”

“ Precisely at ten minutes of two he was standing at the corner on which he had directed the crook the night before to fumble with his hat and await orders.
It happened to be a pet day with shoppers. Traffic officers worked furiously to keep the crossings free of vehicles; uniformed footmen opened limousine doors and helped well-dressed women across the walks and into shops. Conversations seemed limited to dry goods and bargains.
Verbeck had not remembered how the corner would be thronged when he gave the Black Star’s man his orders. The corner now was a jam of human beings. ”

“ Why on earth would Howard be mixed up with a gang of crooks? Even if he wanted to be, how could he get into a first-order gang like that of the Black Star? They’d not have him! I’m crazy to think of it!”
He looked at his watch; it was a quarter of three. He decided to go to the hotel where the unknown crook was to hold conversation with Miss Freda Brakeland. Perhaps he could decide the matter there, learn the crook’s identity.
The lobby of the hotel was thronged when Verbeck entered. He met men and women he knew, but managed to keep free from lingering conversation. ”