Black Star's Subterfuge/Chapter 5

ILENCE for a moment, and then Riley spoke in a tense voice, and swiftly:

"Careful! Move hand or foot, and I'll fire! I'm not taking any chances with you, Mr. Black Star!"

A chuckle came from behind the mask, and the peculiar staccato voice of the master criminal answered him.

"Detective Riley, as I live! Very clever of you—very! And threatening, of course. Violence—always violence instead of wit and strategy!"

"Keep those hands up!" Riley commanded. "Don't move an inch! I'd as soon shoot you as not; but I guess we'll take you down to the station instead. And you'll not escape this time, either!"

"Do you really think you have me?" the Black Star asked. "You expect to take me from my own headquarters to a filthy jail?"

"Never mind the talk! Muggs, can you hobble over here beside me, so I can untie your hands and watch this chap at the same time? Then you can release Verbeck, and we'll play the rest of the evening's game in our own fashion."

The Black Star laughed aloud as Muggs stood up and started to hop like a toad to the detective's side. Riley's glance did not waver; he held the automatic steady, and his eyes never left the Black Star's mask.

Muggs stopped beside him. Riley put down his left hand and fumbled until he found Muggs' wrists, and then, still watching the master crook, he began working at the knots.

"You are a very courageous man, Mr. Riley," the Black Star said. "You cannot guess what may happen in a situation like this. Perhaps the floor will fall from under you, as it did with Mr. Verbeck once, and let you down into a pit. You may turn to find half a dozen of my good friends at your back, ready to seize you"

"Don't worry about me turning! I'm keeping my eyes on you!" Riley snarled. "Try something new."

"Something new—something clever?" the Black Star said, his tone sarcastic. "Let me think! I might extinguish the light, so we could fight it out in the dark—but still, that is not new. You'll notice the room is illuminated by only one lamp, which stands on the table beside me."

"I'm not looking at lamps—I'm watching you!" Riley replied.

The knots were proving difficult to untie with one hand, but Riley kept working at them without looking down. If he could get Muggs' hands free, Muggs could untie his feet and release Verbeck. They could bind and gag the Black Star, Verbeck could don his robe and mask, and they could capture, one by one, such of the band as came to report or receive orders.

"Those are excellent knots," the Black Star observed. "At some future time I'll be glad to teach you how to tie them. Don't you think this comedy has gone quite far enough?"

"If this is your idea of a comedy, you'll be liable to change your mind before long!" Riley said.

"I am interested to know how you got inside, and how you knew what number and countersign to write. Some of my men must have been careless."

"You'll find one of them in the hall with a broken head!" Riley exclaimed.

"Indeed? Always violent! If you would learn to use wit and strategy instead of"

The broken sentence, a quick move, a shot, darkness!

The Black Star had taken the chance. On the word, he had sprung to one side, toward the table. Riley's bullet went within six inches of his head. There was a crash as the lamp was dashed to the floor. Twice more flame streaked the darkness and bullets crashed into the wall. Verbeck, helpless, struggled to get to his feet. Muggs mouthed imprecations because his hands were still bound.

Black silence then—not even a man's breathing to be heard! Riley had retreated silently to the door, and stood there straining his ears to catch some slight sound that would tell him where the master criminal was crouching. He did not dare fire at random again; he did not know but what Muggs had moved, and might receive the bullet intended for the Black Star; he was afraid Verbeck had left the couch.

A slight hissing sound—a body crashing to the floor! Riley, holding his breath, wondered what it meant. Was it Verbeck—Muggs? Had the Black Star descended to the violence he scoffed, and used a knife in the dark?

Verbeck, on the couch, wondered, too. His nerves were on edge, waiting for the shot he expected with every heart beat: He heard the hissing again—the sound of another falling body!

Then a moment of silence again. The strain was almost unbearable. Verbeck felt like shrieking, like calling to Riley and Muggs—though he knew neither would answer and betray his position.

A chuckle—a deep, satisfied laugh! On the opposite side of the room a match flickered, and in its flame Verbeck beheld the black mask, the flaming jet star on the hood above it.

"Quite melodramatic, Mr. Verbeck, eh?" the Black Star said. "I was forced to take quite a chance that time—Detective Riley might have sent a bullet or two into my body. However, luck was with me again!"

The match flame died out. The Black Star struck another and carried it across the room. He picked up the lamp, put it back on the table.

"Only the chimney broken," he said. "We'll have poor light, but it will serve."

He chuckled again as he touched the flaming match to the wick. The fitful, uncertain light filled the room. Verbeck gave a cry of horror. Muggs was stretched on the floor near the table; Riley lay on his face near the door.

"Do not be alarmed for your friends," the master criminal said. "They have not been assassinated, Mr. Verbeck, but merely put to sleep for a short time. Unless you desire to share their condition, remain where you are, on the couch, until I give you permission to leave."

He hurried across to Riley and took off the robe; he picked up the mask from the floor where Riley had tossed it; he hurried out through the door. Verbeck started to get up, but fell back on the couch again. He did not know of the vapor gun, and it was a mystery to him what had happened to Muggs and Riley. He didn't want to be rendered unconscious himself, for there was work to be done if he was allowed to go, or could escape.

He wondered how Riley had trailed them and entered the room. And what would happen, now that the detective knew the location of the Black Star's headquarters? Would the master criminal change his mind and hold all three of them prisoners? Would it be impossible to prevent the theft of gold planned for two o'clock in the morning?

The door opened, and the Black Star came into the room again.

"Detective Riley strikes hard," he observed. "However, my man is conscious again now, and will be with us in a few minutes. The pity of it is that he'll be useless after this, as I have seen his face. I must provide for him and send him away, for I cannot break one of our rules. Ah, well—it is all in the game!"

"And the game isn't ended yet!" Verbeck said.

"Angry because I was forced to put your friends asleep, eh?" the Black Star chuckled. "That puzzles you, perhaps. Merely a vapor gun, Mr. Verbeck—though the vapor itself is somewhat of a secret. See?"

He took the vapor gun from beneath his robe, waved it at Verbeck, then returned it. The door opened—there entered a robed and masked man, who staggered as he walked.

"You brought the straps? Good!" the Black Star said. "We'll just make Detective Riley secure first. Easy, now! Don't be rough, simply because he knocked you on the head—it's all in the game."

In a moment Riley was bound and rolled to a corner of the room. Then the Black Star held a handkerchief beneath Muggs' nostrils, and almost immediately Muggs sighed and opened his eyes.

"That's better. Help me get him to the couch," the master criminal ordered his man.

They carried Muggs across the room and put him down beside Verbeck. The Black Star took out his watch and glanced at it.

"Um! Nine-thirty," he said. "But for the sudden and unexpected appearance of Riley, you'd be home by this time, Mr. Verbeck, with this man of yours. You must blame Detective Riley for the delay Ah, Mr. Muggs! Feeling better now?"

"You—you" Muggs stammered.

"No violent language, I pray! Attend me closely now, gentlemen. I promised to send you home, and I'll keep my promise. You must go as you came, of course—unconscious. You then will be unable to say where this room is located. With Detective Riley it is different. He evidently trailed somebody to this place—he knows its exact location. I cannot allow him to go free, naturally, after that. I must keep him prisoner for a time. It may be necessary for me to change my headquarters again. Quite a nuisance!"

"If Riley is harmed" Verbeck began.

"Tut, tut! I repeat, I abhor violence. But let us not waste more time." He turned to the man beside him. "You understand?" he asked. "The cab is waiting, I believe. Take these two men to within a block or so of Mr. Verbeck's residence, and drop them there. You must use the vapor gun, of course."

Without replying, the man Riley had struck stepped forward, drawing the weapon from beneath his robe. Muggs shrank from him. A touch of the trigger, and Roger Verbeck beheld the cloud of vapor, heard Muggs' futile cry of protest, and saw his comrade in arms topple over on the couch as if shot through the heart.

"Very neat," the Black Star said. "Carry him out, and then return for the other."

Muggs was lifted and carried to the door. The Black Star helped take him into the hallway. Verbeck heard a third man called in low tones, and the master criminal returned.

"You see, Mr. Verbeck, it is useless to match wits with me," he said. "A short time ago you thought you had me, eh? And now"

"The game isn't ended yet!" Verbeck interrupted.

"I believe you said that once before. I care not how long the game endures, if I take all the tricks. Ah, here is our friend again! It is your turn now, Mr. Verbeck."

The man with the vapor gun stepped swiftly across the room.