“Here it is! In my other bag – the one I haven’t used lately.”
“Let’s have it.” Chip reached. The paper felt real enough to let him know he had actually obtained what the Phantom had to have. He glanced at the round, girlishly scrawled name and address, and shoved it in his pocket. “Thanks. You’ve been a big help. The cigarette case never was found?”
“Not here.”
Outside, Chip let the writing he had read form into words. The name on the torn piece of wine card was Victoria Selden and the address was Central Park West. A telephone number was included.
At the corner, Chip Dorlan debated. It was close to one o’clock in the morning. But that didn’t mean too much. He knew the Phantom would want to handle Arthur Arden’s blonde girl-friend alone. So Chip reluctantly dropped the idea of riding a cab to Central Park West and the address she had jotted down.
Instead, he continued on to the first drug store he found and a telephone booth in its rear.
There he called Frank Havens. The newspaper publisher was always available when the Phantom was on a case. Tonight was no exception. Havens’s familiar voice greeted Dorlan over the wire.
“I don’t know where the Phantom is,” Havens said. “He’s been at Headquarters up until a couple of hours ago. Let me have your message, and I’ll see that he gets it.”
CHAPTER XI
EXACTLY at nine o’clock the next morning, the Phantom walked into the anteroom of Frank Havens’s office, high up in the Clarion Building.
Miss Marsh, the publisher’s secretary, gave the Phantom a distrustful glance as he moved over to her desk. She didn’t like his looks particularly. Somehow she had the impression he was a broken down newspaperman about to proposition her boss for a job.
The Phantom said, “The name is Gray. Mr. Havens expects me,” and Miss Marsh snapped to attention.
One of the most rigid rules of the office was that anyone giving the name of Gray was to be admitted instantly to Mr. Havens’s sanctum. For months, the Phantom in his various disguises had used that name. Miss Marsh had her own ideas concerning the identity of the ubiquitous “Mr. Gray”, but was careful never to voice them. She was fully aware that the man who paid her the generous salary she received every Friday was the one who pressed the button to bring the Phantom Detective out of the mists of obscurity.
The Phantom walked into Havens’s sumptuous office.
“One arrest.” The Phantom shrugged. “A small time character, working for a man higher up who gave me the slip yesterday afternoon. The small timer’s name is Daniel Fordyce. Neither his prints nor his picture has a listing.”
The Phantom dropped into a chair. Interested, Havens said, “That’s what kept you at Headquarters so late.”
“Gregg’s men worked Fordyce over for hours. He stuck to his story. He doesn’t know anything. A month ago someone who calls himself Pennell approached him and put him on his payroll. He was to open a mail-order business, selling novelties, on the third floor of a building in the West Thirties.”
The Phantom shrugged as he stopped speaking. Frank Havens leaned back in his swivel chair.
“Gregg’s holding him?”
“On a Sullivan violation, technically. I’ve had Fordyce locked up until I can pour some light into the case. He may be lying, I don’t know. Anyway the Inspector will keep him away from shyster lawyers until he hears from me.”
“What do you make of Arthur Arden’s murder?” Havens queried bluntly.
“I haven’t begun to uncover even the hint of a motive,” the Phantom said, frankly. “From what I’ve run into so far, I know that there’s a deep-laid, well-constructed plot back of his killing. Someone with brains and intelligence has been at work. Neither Fordyce, nor the others I’ve encountered can be called ‘underworld’ or the ‘gangster’ type of criminal. Which indicates there is a certain gloss to the case that takes it out of the usual, subterranean-crime category. Despite,” he added, “Arden’s penchant for Broadway.”
“Chip called early this morning.” Havens reached for a memo, handed it to the Phantom, and repeated Dorlan’s telephone message.
The effect was almost electrical. The Phantom was on his feet instantly.
“So Dorlan found her! Splendid.” He ran an eye over the name and address Havens gave him. “This is the girl Matthew Arden said was friendly with his son. The one I’m sure had a cocktail with Arthur shortly before he was shot. A girl who dropped her gardenia out on the driveway of the lodge.”
“Chip didn’t do anything about it,” Havens said. “He didn’t check the address or the telephone number.”
“Good. I’ll get after it at once. I have a feeling -” the Phantom smiled tautly – “that Miss Victoria Selden is going to turn on some of that light I mentioned a minute ago!”
THE address on Central Park West was in the upper Seventies. A four-story, bulge-front, aristocratic-looking private house was wedged in between tall apartment buildings on either side. The Phantom, stepping out of a taxi, had the impression of glimmering windows, expensive curtaining, and a well-polished bell close to double vestibule doors. His brief ring brought a neat, colored maid in a starched uniform.
“I’d like to see Miss Selden,” the Phantom said. “This is a personal matter.”
The maid ushered him across a rug-strewn length of parquet and into a well-furnished reception room. She left him there and went on. The Phantom was examining a painting on the wall when he heard footsteps coming in. He wheeled around, anxious for a glimpse of the blonde Miss Selden.
Instead, he found himself confronting a gray haired little woman dressed completely in black. Her hair was modishly arranged on her well-shaped head. Old-fashioned jewelry was at throat and wrist. The frothy white of a handkerchief showed from the edge of one black sleeve.
“My maid,” she said, her voice cultured and quiet, “tells me that you are calling on Miss Selden.”
“That’s right.”
The Phantom waited. The woman went on, “My name is Mrs. Wayne. This is my boarding establishment. Miss Selden has been a guest here for several months. But she’s no longer with me. She left yesterday morning.”
The Phantom looked directly into Mrs. Wayne’s eyes. They met his gaze steadily. “Let me have the details, please. This is police business. You’ve probably read of the Arden murder in New Jersey. Miss Selden is wanted for questioning in connection with it.”
“Oh!” Mrs. Wayne looked startled.
“What were the circumstances of her leaving?”
“She – Miss Selden told me she received a telegram from her father – from somewhere in Minnesota. She seemed very much upset. She said her mother was ill, dangerously ill. She had to go to her at once. She paid me what she owed up to yesterday morning, and I called a cab for her. I – I had no idea -”
The Phantom’s brow wrinkled into thought lines. Abruptly, he said, “What do you know about Miss Selden? Was she employed? Did friends come here? Do you know any of their names?”
“I know hardly anything at all about her.” Mrs. Wayne breathed harder. “She was employed, but I never knew where. I don’t pry into the private lives of my guests.”
“Friends?”
“They didn’t come here – ever. I know different men brought Miss Selden home and left her at the door. But I never knew any names, or who they were.”
“How about telephone calls?”
“She seldom made any. A few times a week she received some.”
The Phantom’s mouth tightened. He took a quick step away from Mrs. Wayne, his mind clicking with thought. He wheeled around, as an idea struck him.