"Maybe we could turn around and get back to our launch," his man suggested.

"Fool! In the first place, we'd lose valuable time, and then, when we did come up the river, we'd have to clash with the police boat again.

Also, my brainy friend, if our launch is where we left it, you may be sure there is a police guard there waiting for us to return. If you happen to have any brains, try to use them."

The Black Star's man gulped and kept silent.

"Go back to the cars and have all the men come here, bringing Muggs and Verbeck," the master criminal ordered.

The man obeyed; within two minutes all were grouped around the Black Star, and the unconscious prisoners were on the ground at the foot of a tree. The Black Star explained their predicament.

"You chauffeurs, get back in the cars, turn on the lights, and drive on to the bridge," he instructed. "When the police question you, simply say you have been out to that road house on the river bank earlier this evening-which will be true-and not finding fares there, or prospects of any, are on your way back to the city. Admit you heard firing back on the road, and saw men rushing through the trees. Say you didn't stop because you were afraid of being held up-there have been several automobile holdups in that vicinity recently. And argue with the police as long as possible, while we do our part."

The chauffeurs hurried away. They ran some risk, they knew. They might be put under arrest, but they had little fear of that. Both held licenses as public chauffeurs, and they had established the road-house alibi on the master criminal's orders. And, if held, the Black Star would see that they were bailed out-and then they'd simply jump their bail.

"We're going through that bridge and to the city, and we're going in the police launch," the Black Star told the others. "That'll be rather rubbing it in, but the police deserve it. I'll write a letter to the papers afterward, telling just how we did it. There is only one man in the launch. We must seize it and make a quick get-away. Run under the bridge and straight up the river. We'll desert the police boat a short distance down the stream. I've arranged for two taxicabs to be there.

I wasn't exactly sure where it would be best to leave our own launch, and I always prepare for emergencies."

He led the way through the brush on the bank of the river. They had but a short distance to go, and they were directly opposite the police boat and about a hundred feet from it when they heard the two automobiles run up on the bridge and stop at the command of a policeman.

The Black Star was a wise general; he did not send all his men forward at once. Had he done that, the engineer of the launch would have been suspicious and instantly sounded an alarm. The master criminal selected one man, and had him walk boldly through the brush and down to the launch. In the semidarkness the engineer of the launch would believe him to be one of the plain-clothes men returning with orders.

The Black Star's man was within a dozen feet of the boat before the engineer was aware of his approach, for he was busy with the searchlight. He turned when he heard the man splashing through the mud at the edge of the river, and before he could ask a question he received a shot from a vapor gun and collapsed in the bottom of the boat, unconscious.

The searchlight had been playing on the bridge approach. The Black Star's man swerved it aside for a moment, and then back into position, thus notifying his master that his work had been accomplished.

Down through the brush crept the Black Star and his men, carrying their two prisoners. They reached the launch and boarded it, and the master criminal's engineer hurried to his machinery. The police engineer had been tossed out on the sh.o.r.e.

But the escape was not to be made without trouble. There was a captain in charge of the police squad who thought quickly. When the two empty automobiles reached the bridge, and the questioning of the chauffeurs began, this captain ordered half his men to return to the launch and go back up the river to look for traces of their quarry. They broke through the brush just as the launch's engineer was put on the sh.o.r.e.

The mere sight of men aboard the launch was enough to tell the police what had occurred. They charged forward, shooting wildly and yelling alarms to their companions up on the bridge. Bullets smashed into the sides of the craft as it backed slowly away from the sh.o.r.e. The engineer was doing his best, but he could not turn and put on speed until safely away from the shallows.

It was a perilous moment for the Black Star and his men. The criminals returned the fire, but made no attempt to hit their targets, for the master crook's orders always stood against inflicting wounds or causing death, unless it was absolutely necessary. Crouching in the bottom of the launch, they waited for the engineer to back out into the stream. More police were hurrying down from the bridge, and soon would be firing at the launch. And they would be able to keep up their volleys until the launch was some distance away, endangering the Black Star and his men and prisoners every moment of the time.

But the master criminal, it appeared, though he pretended to abhor all violence, was no physical coward. He sprang to his feet, away from the protection of the bulwarks, and jumped forward to the searchlight.

While bullets rained around him he reached the light and turned it. It flashed straight into the faces of the foes on the sh.o.r.e, blinding them at that short range, making them easy targets, and rendering them incapable of aiming at the men on the launch.

Some continued firing in the path of light; others sprang for cover in the brush, expecting the men on the boat to fire a volley. The laugh of the Black Star rang out; he continued playing the light on them.

The launch was out in the stream now and turning; a moment later the engineer gave her the maximum amount of speed, and she dashed beneath the bridge and toward the city.

"Too bad our prisoners could not have been conscious and enjoyed this little battle," he told his men. "Really, Muggs and Verbeck are not in the thick of it at all to-night. Generally they cause a part of the trouble, but to-night all our trouble has come from others."

He chuckled as if well pleased with himself.

"Some joke this-stealing the enemy's boat," he observed.

CHAPTER x.x.x-MUGGS IN ACTION

For fifteen minutes they ran in silence, and then the Black Star went forward and stood beside the engineer.

"Put in at the alley between National and Washington Streets," he ordered. "Out with your lights, and make as little noise as possible.

The two taxicabs should be waiting at the end of the alley. Get ready, men, and pick up Verbeck and Muggs. We don't want to lose any more time-we've lost enough already."

He was not chuckling now; he spoke in a stern voice, and his men knew that the Black Star was thinking only of the big-planned crime now, of getting the money and securities from the vault of the National Trust Company and removing the fortune to his headquarters. Then the band would scatter as usual, and in the morning the police would discover that the lodge hall of the Knights of Certainty had been a crooks'

workshop and the robbery made possible because of it-but they would make the discovery too late, as usual.

They would find little black stars pasted in the lodge hall and on the vaults, and none of the members of the Knights of Certainty would be seen again. The Black Star and his men would leave behind a couple of hundred dollars' worth of furniture-and take away between two and three hundred thousand in coin and negotiable securities. And the next blow perhaps would be struck in a different section of the city and at an unexpected moment, as usual.

The lights of the launch went out, and her speed was cut down until she scarcely crept through the water. Closer and closer she slipped to the sh.o.r.e, inside the shadows of large warehouses. She pa.s.sed the end of a street, went in closer, and came finally to the alley. Silently the men lashed her to piling there.

The two taxicabs were waiting, and the transfer to them took but a few minutes. With curtains up, they crept to the mouth of the alley, turned into a street, and sped along it toward the business district.

There was nothing unusual in the appearance of the taxicabs. A score of police officers would have glanced at them once, and then turned away. Repeatedly they were held up at crossings by the theater and cafe crowds pa.s.sing. They were caught in traffic jams, but their chauffeurs puffed at cigarettes and waited nonchalantly until they could go ahead.

They reached the front of the building where the Knights of Certainty had their hall, but did not stop there. They went into the alley and pulled up at a little side door. One of the men got out, rapped on the door, and gave a pa.s.sword when a slot in it was opened. The Black Star and his men got out, glanced around, carried their prisoners from the cabs, and went into the building. The door was closed again; the two taxicabs drove away.

An elevator made two trips to the third floor, and the Black Star and his men entered the lodge hall. Guards took up the positions that had been a.s.signed to them. The doors were bolted securely; the windows had been fitted with opaque gla.s.s and heavy curtains.

"Well, here we are," the Black Star said. "Mask, gentlemen! Now bring our prisoners back to life, and we'll let them see how easy it is to take money."

While his orders were being obeyed the master criminal went to one of the walls and pressed against a certain spot there. A section of the wall swung out, and in the aperture a masked man stood.

"Everything all right?" the Black Star asked.

"All safe, sir," came the reply.

"The watchmen--"

"Not a hitch there, sir; they are all unconscious and our men in their places. We have reported regular for four hours, and not a suspicion at headquarters or they'd have investigated before this. The patrolman on the beat even looked in at a window once and waved at our man on the first floor."

"Excellent!" the Black Star said, rubbing his hands in satisfaction.

He walked back to the end of the room. His prisoners were revived now and had been placed side by side in chairs before one of the curtained windows in the rear of the hall.

"Ah, Mr. Verbeck and Mr. Muggs!" the master criminal smirked. "You are conscious again, then? 'Twas a pity you didn't see the little fight we had with the police. I'd tell you all about it, but we haven't the time to spare, and you can read about it in to-morrow's papers. Well, here you are in the hall of the Knights of Certainty. You see the aperture in the wall? My mechanics have arranged a pa.s.sageway between the walls of the two buildings. We have a sort of glorified dumb-waiter, and by its use can descend to the first floor of the National Trust Company's building. Simple, eh? I regret I cannot explain the method we are going to use to get into the burglar-proof vaults. Did it become public property, the manufacturers might invent some means of counteracting it. Kindly sit still, gentlemen, while I have my men prepare the way."

He deliberately turned his back and walked to the center of the hall again and called his men to him, all except the guards near the doors.

He issued instructions, and two men hurried to the aperture in the wall and disappeared. The Black Star was the commanding general now, and his followers were eager to obey.

For fifteen minutes perhaps he paced the floor, glancing at his prisoners now and then, and often stopping to issue some whispered instruction. Then one of the men he had sent below returned.

"All ready, sir," he reported.

"The vaults are opened?" the Black Star asked.

"Yes, sir, and every strong box. All you have to do is take out the swag, sir."