To determine the order of a matrix, we need to identify the number of rows and columns it contains. The order of a matrix is typically expressed as "rows × columns".
From the given matrix:
\[ \begin{bmatrix} -2 & -9 & 2 & -1 \ -2 & -6 & 8 & 4 \end{bmatrix} \]
we can see that there are 2 rows and 4 columns. Therefore, the order of this matrix is \(2 \times 4\).