Verbeck arose at noon to face the day that meant the culmination of
his plans. As he bathed and shaved and dressed he kept thinking of the
prowler he had seen a few hours before. Could it be possible, he asked
himself, that some of the Black Star’s band had grown suspicious and
would take an active part against him? Had the Black Star, a prisoner
in the old Verbeck house, sent out some message from his prison
calling for rescue? Verbeck was half afraid he had made some blunder,
had overlooked something that would allow the master criminal to turn
the tables and emerge victor from the duel of wits.
He telephoned the garage for his roadster, and hurried out to the old
Verbeck place, taking with him a lineman from the telephone company’s
office. The lineman connected the telephone, which had been out of
service.
“How is the prisoner?” Verbeck asked Muggs after the lineman had
departed.
“Down in the vegetable pit, thinking of his sins.”
“Fetch him up,” Verbeck directed, and began carrying in the food he
had purchased before running out from town.
It was a surly Black Star who entered the living room, with Muggs at
his heels urging him on. He no longer was handsome because of a two
days’ growth of beard and dark circles under his eyes. He glared at
Muggs malevolently as he crossed the room and sat down stiffly on a
divan.
“How long,” he demanded of Verbeck, “are you going to keep me
prisoner, with a maniac for jailer?”
“Probably until a late hour to-night. But you need not be confined in
the pit again. I’m going to have Muggs keep you in this room, where it
is warm and comfortable. I want to give you a bit of liberty until
to-night.”
“And then?”
“Then I’ll probably hand you over to the police, and you’ll have
mighty small freedom for years to come.”
“Indeed?” the Black Star snarled. “You have arranged everything, have
you? Planned a coup of some sort?”
“Time will tell,” said Verbeck.
“And don’t you ever stop to fear for yourself?”
“I haven’t felt particularly afraid at any time.”
“I have warned you that the arm of my organization——”
“Is a long one—I remember,” said Verbeck. “The arm of the law also is
long, Mr. Black Star, and a clever, honest man can outwit a clever
crook any time, as I said once before. You called it a boast, I
believe.”
“You are not done yet.”
“Certainly not—but I’ll be done within a few hours.”
Verbeck walked to a corner and beckoned Muggs to him.
“I’ll return to-night, some time after nine o’clock,” he said. “I want
you to watch the Black Star well, Muggs. If he escapes now——”
“Why don’t you call in the police, boss?”
“And spoil everything? I’m going through with this now—I’m going to
nab the Black Star and his gang.”
“Then there’s something big coming off, and I’m not to be in on it?”
Muggs demanded.
“Neither am I, Muggs—at the moment it comes off. But we’ll both be in
at the finish—and we’ll be there strong. Just curb your curiosity,
Muggs, until this evening. I’ll explain everything then. Careful, now,
and don’t let the Black Star escape. I fancy you’ve been aggravating
him.”
“Aw, boss——”
“He looks it. Haven’t you?”
“I was just reciting a list of his sins, boss.”
“Well, Muggs, recite less and keep your eyes open more. Watch every
move he makes. Don’t you use that telephone, and don’t let the Black
Star get near it. I had it connected so we can use it to-night. Now
I’m off!”
He got in the roadster and started back downtown. He stopped before a
suburban drug store and went into a telephone booth. He had not wanted
to send this telephone message from his own apartment nor from the old
Verbeck place, for it might be traced.
He called police headquarters, and asked to be connected with the
chief. No, he said, the chief’s secretary wouldn’t do. It was
something about the Black Star.
In a moment he heard the chief’s gruff voice.
“Listen carefully,” Verbeck told him, “for I am not going to repeat
what I say or answer questions. This is very important, and if you
disregard it you’ll be sorry. Have your secretary get on the phone
extension and take down in shorthand what I am going to say.”
There was a short wait while the chief made the necessary
arrangements, then Verbeck heard himself commanded to speak.
“I have run down and caught the Black Star,” he said. “I am holding
him prisoner now. I cannot hand him over to you just yet, for, if I
did, and the least news of it leaked out, you’d never catch one of his
gang, and, without his gang, you never could convict him. Never mind
how I know it—I am not talking nonsense. You’ve got that?”
An excited voice told him that the chief understood.
“Now, listen to this,” Verbeck went on. “I have arranged for all the
Black Star’s band to be at a certain place at the same time, so you
and your men can take them all. Keep quiet, chief, and don’t ask
questions. I want you to send men enough to arrest them—eight men and
two women are in the crowd. They are to be arrested just when and
where I say. If you let as much as one of them escape all my work and
yours probably will have been for nothing. When you get them you’ll
find stolen property on every one. And as soon as I learn you have all
of them under arrest I’ll turn over the Black Star to you, I’ll tell
you where and how he met the members of his gang and gave them orders,
and I’ll let you have the inside workings of one of the smoothest
crooks’ schemes ever devised. But if you make one false move——”
A torrent of words over the wire stopped him for a moment.
“No questions, I said,” he went on. “You have understood so far? Very
well! No, I’ll not tell you who I am or where I am! Very well, if
you’ll not listen! I’ll call you up later, when you’re in a better
mood, and explain where you are to make the catch. Good-by!”
And an irate Roger Verbeck strode from the telephone booth, went out
to the street, and sprang into his car to drive furiously down the
thoroughfare. No excited chief of police could bully him with a lot of
mandatory questions, he told himself. Let them fuss and fume for a
time, then they’d listen when he telephoned.
His actions had the desired effect. At police headquarters there was a
spirited debate for five minutes between the chief and his secretary
as to whether the telephone communication had come from some practical
joker. The secretary was inclined to believe that it had. The chief
insisted that some member of the Black Star’s band had turned against
him and was engineering his downfall.
Verbeck drove on through the streets until he reached the Wendell
apartment house. Faustina was waiting for him, and again Verbeck
noticed that anxiety was stamped on her face, and now he thought there
was a look of fear also.
“Well, here we are,” he said. “And what about the ball?”
“I—I have decided to go,” she said, looking at him peculiarly.
“Brother Howard going, too?”
“Yes—he is going.”
“With any particular young lady?”
“No—alone.”
“Good! Will you be angry, Faustina, if I ask you to go to the ball
with Howard? I cannot explain just now, but—well, I’ll be there late,
in time to have a couple of dances and bring you home. I’m sorry that
I cannot explain exactly—it is something important that will keep me
away until late.”
He looked up, to find her staring at him fixedly.
“Why—what is the matter?” he stammered.
“I—oh, Roger, it is nothing!”
He sat down beside her and started to take her in his arms, but she
drew away from him.
“Why, Faustina——”
“I’m—oh, I’m just a bit nervous, Roger.”
“There seemed to be something troubling you yesterday, and there
certainly is to-day,” he said. “Can’t you confide in me, Faustina? Is
there anything wrong—anything I can do to help?”
“Nothing you can do—to help,” she said.
“Then there is something wrong?”
“Don’t ask me, please, Roger. I’m nervous, worried. Just let me rest
until to-night—I’ll try to be all right then. Certainly I’ll go to the
ball with Howard—and expect you later. And now you’ll go, won’t you,
Roger? I must lie down—and rest.”
The puzzled Verbeck walked slowly to the door, Faustina following him.
He took her in his arms and kissed her. She did not return the caress,
and she seemed on the verge of tears.
“Don’t worry,” he said softly.
“You tell me not to worry.”
“Why, yes. Perhaps whatever is troubling you will cease to trouble.
We’ll talk of it to-night? You’ll let me help you?”
“Yes,” she said, “we’ll talk of it to-night. We must talk of it
to-night.”
Verbeck hurried out, got into the car, and started for the business
district. Faustina’s actions and manner worried him, yet his mind was
busy with the Black Star and his affair. Once the Black Star and his
band of crooks were handed over to the police he’d look into
Faustina’s trouble, he told himself. Perhaps Howard was running about
too much. Perhaps there was financial trouble in the family. Whatever
it was, he’d smooth things out, he promised. He couldn’t have Faustina
worrying.
He drove carefully now through the heavy traffic, and finally stopped
before a hotel. There he entered a public telephone booth, and called
police headquarters again. Once more he got the chief on the wire.
“Will you listen now, and ask no questions?” he demanded. “This is no
hoax, so you’d better act on my tip.”
Then he told the chief where the members of the Black Star’s band
could be captured, and when and how.