He held up a gloved hand, and made a mysterious sign which brought a shudder to Prokop’s huge shoulders.
While Prokop still nodded his acknowledgment of these instructions, the masked man arose and walked from the table. He strode across the room, and stood with one hand upon the knob of the door.
“I leave now,” he said, as Prokop watched him. “I shall visit you again in the near future. Be untiring. Be unfailing. Remember all that I have said.”
He placed the forefingers of one gloved hand against the crimson mask that obscured his face. Prokop made a similar sign in acknowledgment.
It was the sign of the secret order which was directed by the controlling hands of those in Moscow.
The lights in the room were suddenly extinguished. The man at the door had pressed the switch. Prokop groped his way across the room, and turned on the lights. His visitor was no longer in the apartment.
CHAPTER V
VINCENT GOES ON DUTY
TEN o’clock in the morning. The phone bell rang beside Harry Vincent’s bed. Harry yawned as he answered it.
He had only awakened a few minutes before. Living in New York, at the Hotel Metrolite, he was accustomed to retiring late at night and rising late in the morning.