“You’re a brick, and I don’t mean to offend you.  Today has been terrible, you know:  this tornado has swept me from my moorings.  I don’t know where to turn.”

“I am thoughtless,” and Shirley’s warm hand grasped the flaccid fingers of the young man.  “Forgive me for letting my interest run away with my sympathies.  I’m thinking of the future, more than mere protection from newspaper scandal.  This crime is so ingenious that I believe it has a more powerful motive than mere robbery.  You are now at the head of a great house of finance and society.  You must guard your mother and your sister, and those yet to come.  A deadly snake is writhing its slimy trail somewhere:  here—­there—­’round about us!  Who knows where it will strike next?  Who knows how far that blow may reach—­even unto China, or wherever you run?”

He hesitated, studying the effect upon Van Cleft, who dropped limply into a chair, his eyes dark with terror.  The psychological ruse had won.  Selfish cowardice, which temporarily threatened to ruin his campaign, now gave way to the instinct of a fighting defense.

“There, Van Cleft, it is ghastly.  You have the significance now:  we must scotch the snake.  That girl is over at the Holland Agency, and we should see her at once, to learn what she knows.  Cronin has arranged for my coming with you, so introduce me under my real name.

“Wait here fifteen minutes after I leave, so that I may get the phonograph in readiness, for you will undoubtedly be shadowed, and that may mean another telephone call.  You were not a coward in college—­I do not believe you are one now!”

Van Cleft straightened up proudly.

“No, I will fight them with all I have.  But why these phonograph records:  isn’t one enough?”

“No, I want autographs of all the voices.  I will go now.  Don’t hurry in following me.  Do not fear to let any shadowers see you —­it will help us along.”

Before many minutes he had been admitted to the corridor of the Holland Agency by a sharp-nosed individual who regarded him with suspicion.  The operatives were undoubtedly expecting trouble from all quarters, for three other large men of the “bull” type, heavy-jowled, ponderous men, surrounded him as he presented his card.

“I am the friend of Howard Van Cleft, about whom Captain Cronin telephoned you from Bellevue.  I am to help him interview the girl:  may I wait until he arrives?”

“Oh, you’re wise to the case?  Sure then, come into the reception room on the right.  What’s that in your grip?” asked the apparent leader of the men.

“Just an idea of Van Cleft’s,” said Shirley, as he followed into the adjoining compartment.  “It’s a phonograph.  Have you received any phoney ’phone calls to-night?  Queer ones that you didn’t expect and couldn’t explain?  Van Cleft has, and he decided to take records of them on this machine.”

The superintendent nodded.  Shirley opened the grip and drew out the instrument, and made ready on the small table, near which was the desk telephone.