How, then, had the knowledge reached the Black Star? Three men knew of that plan—himself, Riley, and Muggs. Then either Riley or Muggs, on the face of things, must have conveyed the information to the Black Star.
“I can’t believe it—I can’t!” Verbeck told himself.
He considered Muggs first. He believed in Muggs’ loyalty, had received many manifestations of it. Muggs also had entered the first chase of the Black Star with zeal, had in reality effected the crook’s capture. Would he turn traitor now?
There was that affair of the evening before, when Muggs had received the blow on his head. There was the affair of the stars on the bread. Search had revealed that nobody was in the house. Who had put the stars on the bread then, and who had struck down Muggs and stamped his forehead? Had Riley been right? Was Muggs a Black Star man? Had he stamped that bread himself, given himself a wound, and pretended to be badly injured for a time just to carry out the orders of the master criminal?
Then he considered Detective Riley. He would as soon believe Muggs guilty as Riley. His father had been Riley’s benefactor. Riley had known him since he was a baby, had taught him how to play baseball, how to swim. Yet in the last few years he had not seen much of Riley, and maybe he had been caught in the net of official graft. Maybe he was no longer honest, save on the surface. Perhaps, angered at last because he had not received the promotion he deserved, he had turned crook and was trading on his reputation for honesty.
Muggs had said Riley had gone out and prowled around the house about midnight. He had a chance, then, to communicate with some agent of the Black Star. That would give the Black Star just about time to write the letter to the paper and have it delivered so that it would reach the newspaper office by two o’clock.
Back and forth, back and forth across the veranda, Roger Verbeck paced, trying to fight down suspicions he did not believe worthy of him. Muggs disloyal? He could not believe it! Riley turned crook? He could not think it!
Yet there was the morning paper. No one but Riley and Muggs had heard those plans. They had been discussed at the table in the center of the living room, with all the doors closed, and they had been discussed in low tones as the three men bent over the table. Why, it was doubtful if a man could have overheard, had he even been in an adjoining room and listening—and Verbeck knew no man had been in an adjoining room.
“I can’t believe it!” he told himself again. “Yet here it is—and must be believed! I’ll say nothing—I’ll just let them read the papers. And I’ll watch! If either Riley or Muggs has turned against me, my faith in human nature is gone! Can’t I have even one honest ally? Must I fight this master criminal alone?”
Muggs called to him from the doorway, wanting to know whether Verbeck was not cold without his coat. He looked at Muggs. He saw the seamed and wrinkled countenance, the eyes that twinkled kindly, the doglike look of devotion in the face—Muggs, who had fought for him scores of times, who had been willing in some of their adventures to lay down his life for the man who had saved him from the Seine. No—Muggs could not be disloyal!