"I am delegated to be your escort," replied Sloan.
"What is your hour of meeting?"
"Twelve o'clock."
"Ah, a midnight affair. All right, Sam; you'll find me waiting for you at the hotel."
Here they separated. Webster realized that quite an important period in his Baltimore experience was opening up before him, and that all his detective skill would probably be called into play to foil a band of conspirators. How to thwart the schemes of these Knights of Liberty, whose purpose, as he understood, was to assist in the overthrow of the Government of the United States, was now the question to be solved.
He did not, however, attempt to form any plans at this time, but waited for such developments as he had no doubt would be made that night. He resolved to learn the nature of the plots that were in existence, before he commenced counterplotting.
Promptly at eleven o'clock Sam Sloan put in an appearance at the hotel, and he and Webster proceeded toward the place of meeting. The night was dark and stormy, just the right sort of night, Webster thought, for the concocting of hellish plots and the performance of evil deeds.
"That night, a chiel might understand,
The Deil had business on his hand."
The stars were hidden from view by masses of flying clouds; the wind whistled shrilly through the trees and spires; while the deep, threatening murmurs of distant thunder were accompanied by fitful flashes of lightning, which illumined the scene with a weird, quivering light. Few shops were open in the localities through which they passed. Occasionally a light was seen struggling through the screened window of a saloon, and the sound of midnight orgies within indicated that business had not been suspended there; but elsewhere all was dark and still.
Sloan led the way to a remote quarter of the city, and into a street which bore a particularly bad reputation. Here he stopped, and said: