And there was a busy and dangerous night before him.
[CHAPTER VII—IDENTICAL ORDERS]
Eight o’clock that night found Roger Verbeck in the Black Star’s headquarters, the room put in order, and the candles burning. He was sitting at the end of the long table, in robe and mask, and with the little rubber stamps he was busy writing out orders. All the orders were identical; the ones previously written by the Black Star had been destroyed.
Promptly at nine o’clock the little bell on the wall tinkled, and Verbeck, shutting the drawer in the table and holding his automatic in readiness beneath his robe, went to the wall and pressed the button that opened the door. He hurried from the room, and waited.
Presently he entered again, to find a masked and robed figure standing before the blackboard. Number and countersign were given, and Verbeck handed the man his orders and a twenty-dollar bill taken from the drawer in the table. The man bowed and went out.
Nine-thirty brought another man, and the same ceremony was observed. Ten o’clock brought the member of the band to whom Verbeck had given orders the night before. After he had written his number and countersign, Verbeck whirled to the blackboard.
“Report,” he wrote.
“Browning Club meeting was postponed, and I missed the person you mentioned,” the other scribbled on the board. “I followed her, and spoke with her later in a tea room. She will wear her jewels, including the famous ruby collar.”
Verbeck nodded for the man to erase. Again he found himself wondering at the identity of this man who could talk so freely to Freda Brakeland. And now he wrote on the blackboard himself:
“Why did you not carry out orders?”