“The one that’s left.  Tell him there will be none left if he continues this gum-shoe work.  He had better let well enough alone, and let that little girl get out of town as soon as possible.  The papers will go crazy over a scandal like this, and some one is apt to grab Van Cleft.  That’s all.  Good-bye!”

Silently Shirley shut off the lever of the machine, to catch up the receiver.  As before his endeavor to locate the call resulted in a new address:  this time in the Bronx!

“Ah, the lady leaps from the business district to the Bronx in half an hour.  That is what I call some traveling.”

Van Cleft studied him with open mouth, as he withdrew the phonograph record, coating it with the preservative to make the tiny lines permanent.

“In the name of common sense, who was that?  And what’s this phonograph game?” he demanded.

“The second question may answer the first before sunrise, unless I am badly mistaken.  I have heard an old adage which declares that if you give a man long enough rope he will hang himself.  My new application is that you let him talk enough he is apt to sing his own swan song, for a farewell perch on the electric chair at Sing Sing!”

Then he lit a cigarette and packed up the phonograph.

CHAPTER V

THE MISBEHAVIOR OF THE ’PHONE

Still befuddled by the unusual events of the day, Howard Van Cleft was unable to delight in a theoretical discovery.  Personal fear began to manifest itself.

“Mr. Shirley, you’re going at this too strong.  We know the guilty party—­this miserable girl in the machine.  We want to hush it up and let things go at that.”

“We’re hushing it, aren’t we?” demanded Shirley, as he placed the record in the grip.  “Don’t you see the wisdom of knowing who may systematically blackmail you after secrecy is obtained.  This is a matter of the future, as well as the present.”

“But I don’t want to lose my own life—­I am young, with life before me, and I want to let well enough alone, after these threats.”

“I am afraid that you have a yellow streak.”  His lip curled as he studied the pallid features of the heir to the Van Cleft millions.  Fearless himself, he could still understand the tremors of this care-free butterfly:  yet he knew he must crush the dangerous thoughts which were developing.  “If you mistrust me, hustle for yourself.  You have the death-certificate, the services will be over in a few days, and then you will have enough money to live on your father’s yacht or terra firma for the rest of your life, in the China Sea, or India, as far away from Broadway chorus girls as you want.  That might be safe.”

He gazed out of the window, toward the twinkling lights far away across the East River.  His sarcasm made Van Cleft wince as though from a whip lash.  The latter mopped his forehead and tried to steady his voice, as he replied with all humility.