The Ghost Phone Read online

  “Quit it!” he advised. “You’ll be a nervous wreck!”

  “I am a nervous wreck already,” his wife informed him. “Quit it, indeed. Stand idly by and let things go to the dogs, I suppose!”

  “I fail to see how you can better things,” Crend retorted.

  “Something must be done about it! Are you spineless? Haven’t you brains that can be put to some use?”

  “What can I do?” Crend asked. “Do you want Madison Purden for a brother-in-law?”

  “Not if it can be avoided,” Crend admitted. “Madison Purden isn’t quite my idea of a man. But what can I do about it? Can I go to Madge and demand that she cease receiving Purden? That would be the surest way of driving her into the scoundrel’s arms — and her fortune with her.”

  “I am glad that you finally thought of the fortune,” his wife said with some sarcasm in her voice. “If Madge does not marry again, I shall inherit her money. If he marries Madison Purden, we’ll not get a cent of it.”

  “Seems to me you’re shooting rather wild,” Crend observed. “Madge is a bit younger than you and is in excellent health. The chance are that she’ll outlive you by ten years or more.”

  “Accidents may happen,” Mrs. Crend reminded him. “A person never can tell.”

  “That is true, of course. But I do not anticipate any accident of a serious nature happening to Madge. She is the sort that always dodges accidents.”

  “That man, Madison Purden, has infatuated her,” Mrs. Crend declared. “He began to attract her before Lennek had been dead a month. He played on her sympathy. She’ll not listen to me any more. I told her the truth about Madison Purden — that he’s a schemer and a scoundrel, and that decent men won’t have anything at all to do with him. And she told me to attend to my own business, that she was capable of picking her friends without any outside assistance. Outside assistance! Her own sister!”

  “If you ask me what to do, I say drop the whole thing,” Crend said. “Ignore her little affair with Purden, or laugh at it. Kill it with ridicule. Let her get over it. Madge is a sensible woman. Purden will make some fool break that will show her just what kind of man he is. Leave it to Madge!”

  “She’ll marry him — that’s what she’ll do!” Mrs. Crend declared. “I’m a woman, and I can read the workings of another woman’s mind. Don’t you suppose that I can see how things are going? She’ll marry him — and he’ll run through her fortune. We’ll not get a cent of it.”

  “We haven’t a chance, anyway,” Crend assured her. “I’d just drop the whole thing.”

  “She is my sister, and I want to save her, aside from any thoughts of the money.”

  “That is very noble of you,” Crend replied sarcastically.

  The telephone rang. Since the maid had gone out for the afternoon, Mrs. Crend answered the call herself. The anger was gone suddenly from her voice. She did not know who might be at the other end of the line.

  “Hello?” she called.

  “Is that you, Laura?”

  “Yes, Madge.”

  “I just called you up to — to say good-by.”

  “Good-by? Madge, what do you mean?” Mrs. Crend cried.

  “That’s all — good-by!”

  The receiver at the other end of the line was snapped into place. Mrs. Crend whirled toward her husband.

  “Now, what do you make of that?” she asked, excited again. “That was Madge. She said she called up to say good-by.”

  “What?” Crend cried.

  “That’s all she said — and then she hung up. You — you don’t suppose she’s eloping with Madison Purden? That would be the last straw. Get your hat — we’re going right over there.”

  She rushed for her own hat. A little clock in the corner of the room chimed the half hour. Howard Crend glanced at it — half past three!

  A few moments later, Attorney Milton Garder, a successful man of fifty-five, sat in his library reading of an interesting case before the supreme court of the State. Attorney Garder handled but big things now, among others the fortune left by the late Mr. Lennek. A buzzer sounded, and Attorney Milton Garder put down the pamphlet he had been reading and reached for the telephone.

  “Hello!” he said.

  “Mr. Garder?”

  “Yes. That you, Mrs. Lennek?”

  “Mrs. Lennek — yes! I — I wish you would come to my apartment, Mr. Garder — at once.”

  “My dear lady! Is it something that cannot wait until to-morrow?” the attorney asked. .

  “It — it is very important, Mr. Garder. Please come at once. It is a matter of — of life and death.”

  “My dear lady! What on earth — “

  Attorney Milton Garder realized at that instant that he was talking into a dead telephone. He grunted his disgust and returned the receiver to the hook. There had been something tragic in the words that had come to him over the wire, and in the tone in which they had been spoken. Mrs. Lennek, the attorney reflected, was not much given to tragic utterances.

  Attorney Garder punched a button that notified his chauffeur to get the car in front of the house as speedily as possible. He got up and hurried from the library toward the front of the house. From force of habit he glanced at his watch.

  It was three minutes after half past three.

  CHAPTER III.

  NOT SUICIDE.

  IT took Attorney Milton Garder about fifteen minutes to motor from his residence to the apartment house where Mrs. Madge Lennek had her expensive suite. On the way he fussed and fumed and told himself that it probably was nothing important at all, and that silly women who had been left fortunes were the bane of his existence.

  Mrs. Lennek probably had suddenly made up her mind to purchase a country place, or something of the sort, and thought that the matter of funds, title, and deed transfer could not wait for twenty-four hours. Attorney Garder told himself that he would be sarcastic with the lady.

  The apartment house reached, Attorney Garder got out of the car and turned a patient face toward his patient chauffeur. These two men understood each other well.

  “Wait,” the attorney ordered. “How long, I do not know. I am calling on a — er — a lady client. She says that it is a matter of life and death, so I am of the opinion that I’ll be at least ten or fifteen minutes.”

  The chauffeur, an old and valued employee, grinned, and Attorney Garder did not rebuke him for it. He turned his back, went up the steps, entered the apartment house, and stepped briskly up to the desk.

  “I presume that Mrs. Lennek is in?” he asked the clerk. “She telephoned me.”

  “I believe that she is, Mr. Garder,” the clerk replied. “Mr. and Mrs. Crend went up a few minutes ago.”

  Attorney Garder refused the elevator and walked slowly up the wide marble stairs. So Mr. and Mrs. Howard Crend were calling, were they? Possibly that explained things, the attorney thought. Mrs. Lennek and her sister always were quarreling. There were times, Attorney Garder told himself, when he was ready to take an oath never to handle another big estate. Members of the families always were quarreling, and he detested such things.

  He came to the top of the stair and started along the hall. Mr. and Mrs. Howard Crend came suddenly around the nearest turn. They rushed toward him, excitement in their manner, horror in their faces. Garder stopped and watched their approach in surprise.

  “Mr. Garder!” Mrs. Crend cried. “Oh, Mr. Garder!”

  “What is it?” Attorney Garder demanded, feeling a premonition that all was not right.

  “My sister! She — she is dead!”

  “Dead!” Garder gasped.

  “Killed herself!” said Crend.

  “Great heavens!” Attorney Garder exclaimed. “Why — what — It can’t be possible!”

  “She telephoned us — such a peculiar message — and we hurried right over her
e,” Mrs. Crend said. “And we found her — “

  “Try to be calm, Laura,” her husband advised.

  “She telephoned me, too,” Garder said. “Killed herself? You saw her?”

  “She — she was dead when we arrived,” Mrs. Crend explained. “The hall door was unlocked and open for about half a foot or so. She did not answer us when we rang, and so we hurried inside. Oh, Mr. Garder! My poor sister!”

  Attorney Milton Garder was an experienced and methodical man. He dealt with cold facts. After the first shock, violent death was nothing horrible to him. And now he glanced at these two, noticed the state they were in, and took charge of things.

  “Quiet!” he commanded. “Come!”

  His first instinct was to guard his client’s interests, though his client had ceased to exist, to make certain about the facts of the affair and prevent a scandal if possible. He hurried along the hall, and the Crends followed, but stopped at the hall door. Attorney Garder went inside the apartment.

  He passed through the lavishly-furnished living room and hurried to the door of the boudoir. It stood open. Attorney Garder looked inside and gasped.

  Mrs. Lennek’s body was stretched across a divan. She was dressed in a becoming afternoon gown. Attorney Garder could see her face from where he stood in the doorway; it showed that she had died in agony.

  On the floor beside the divan was a tumbler. Attorney Garder knelt and picked it up, examined it, sniffed at it, and then put it back exactly where it had been. The tumbler, he saw, had contained milk. It also had contained poison.

  He stood up and glanced quickly around the room. Mrs. Lennek’s desk, which stood in a corner against the wall, was in disorder. Everything else seemed to be as usual.

  Attorney Garder hurried back to the hall door and beckoned the Crends inside.

  “This is an emergency where we must control our grief for a time,” he said, “in order to bring our minds to bear on the problem and serve the best interests of all. The coroner and the police will have to be notified, of course. Sit down, please, and I’ll telephone down to the office.”

  The Crends sat down. Mrs. Crend began weeping softly. Her husband sat beside her, staring straight ahead, his face white and lines of horror in it. Attorney Garder was compelled to return to the boudoir of tragedy to use the telephone on the desk there. He was careful to touch nothing else.

  Garder notified the clerk in the office below and then telephoned the coroner and police headquarters. And then he went back to the living room and sat down before the Crends.

  “This is indeed terrible,” he said. “I cannot understand it at all. I saw Mrs. Lennek yesterday morning on business — she called at my office downtown — and at that time she was looking into the future, making certain plans about some of her property. She certainly did not act like a person about to commit suicide.”

  “Something terrible must have happened,” Mrs. Crend replied. “Her telephone message to me was very peculiar. She — she said that she had called up just to say good-by, and that was all. I — I was rather afraid that she was going to elope with a certain man. I wanted to prevent that, so we hurried right over. I didn’t suppose, when she said good-by — “

  “Calm yourself, Laura,” her husband begged.

  “Let us all be calm,” said Attorney Garder. “We’ll get at the bottom of it when the coroner and police arrive.”

  “The scandal!” Mrs. Crend said. “Is there no way — “

  “My dear lady, I am handling the Lennek estate,” Attorney Garder said. “I knew the late Mr. Lennek well and admired him greatly. You maybe sure that I’ll do everything possible for the best. But in a case like this there are certain formalities that must be observed. Let us hope that nothing — er — highly unusual is uncovered. Let us keep quiet and wait until the officials arrive.”

  The superintendent of the apartment house arrived at that moment. He seemed glad to find a man like Attorney Garder in charge of matters. He knew that Garder was a man of broad experience, and that there would be as little fuss as possible. A first-class apartment house or hotel does not like to advertise its tragedies.

  The superintendent hurried down the stairs again, to lay in wait for the coroner and police and get them into the apartment Without attracting too much attention. They arrived within a few minutes, Attorney Garder’s telephone messages having had that effect.

  Attorney Garder knew the assistant coroner who answered the call. He had a reputation as a physician, also. He entered the boudoir and began his work, while Garder returned to the living room and continued an intermittent conversation with the Crends.

  Then the representative of the police arrived. He was Detective Sam Frake, a member of the homicide squad known for his excellent work in unraveling mysteries. He, too, knew Attorney Garder. He asked a few questions, glanced at the Crends, and then went into the boudoir after the coroner’s assistant.

  “This is terrible — terrible!” Mrs. Crend was moaning. “If there is anything that can be done — “

  “Nothing for the moment, my dear lady,” said Attorney Garder. “We must wait until this preliminary investigation is at an end. If the coroner decides that it is a case of suicide, they may look around for the motive, of course. And what the motive can be is more than I can think.”

  “It must be something of which we know nothing,” Crend replied. “I saw her a couple of days ago, and she did not seem despondent at all then.”

  “And she certainly was not despondent when I saw her yesterday,” Attorney Garder declared. .”She made another engagement with me, for day after to-morrow. She had decided to sell some of her property while the market was high.”

  Then there was silence for a time, save for Mrs. Crend’s light sobs, and finally even those ceased. Attorney Garder got up and walked to a window, and stood looking down at the busy street. After a time Detective Sam Frake and the coroner’s assistant came from the boudoir. Attorney Garder turned and looked at them, his brows raised in question.

  “Poison — instant death,” the coroner’s assistant said.

  Attorney Garder shuddered. “Poor lady!” he said. “Anything else?”

  “Detective Frake will handle the rest for the time being,” said the coroner’s assistant.

  Garder glanced at him quickly. To the attorney, it seemed that there was something in the doctor’s tone that gave a hint of trouble to come.

  Detective Sam Frake had been standing in the doorway listlessly, but now he stepped forward rapidly and sat down in the chair Garder recently had vacated.

  “Who are these persons?” Frake asked.

  “Mr. and Mrs. Howard Crend,” Garder replied. “Mrs. Crend is Mrs. Lennek’s elder sister.”

  “They found the body?”

  “They have told me so — yes.”

  “Before you came, Mr. Garder?”

  “Yes. I walked up the front stairs, and as I started down the hall, Mr. and Mrs. Crend came around the turn and told me of the tragedy.”

  “I see. You were making a formal call, Mr. Garder?”

  “No,” said the attorney. “I received a peculiar telephone message from Mrs. Lennek. She seemed excited about something and asked me to come to her at once, said it was something that could not wait, a matter of life and death.”

  “Um!” Detective Frake grunted. “What time did she telephone you, Mr. Garder?”

  “Not more than two minutes after half past three. I remember glancing at my watch as I hurried out to the car.”

  “You are sure of that?”

  “Absolutely,” said the attorney.

  “And you were making an unusual call?” Frake asked, turning toward the Crends.

  “We received a telephone message also,” Mrs. Crend said. “It was from Madge — that was my sister’s name. She talked very peculiarly. She — she said that she had just called
me up to say good-by, and then she rang off.”

  “What did you think?”

  “I — I didn’t know. We came right over, because it was so peculiar.”

  “Did you think she meant that she was going to kill herself?”

  “No. We never thought of such a thing,” Mrs. Crend replied.

  “Thought she was going on a journey?”

  Mrs. Crend hesitated. “I suppose it would be better to tell you the truth,” the said.

  “It’ll save time,” said Frake. “I’d get at it somehow, anyway.”

  “Well, my sister has been receiving the attentions of a certain man, of whom my husband and I do not approve,” said Mrs. Crend. “I thought her message meant that she was going to elope with him. So we hurried right over to make an effort to stop her.”

  “Um!” Frake grunted. “Who is the man?”

  “Madison Purden.”

  “I know of him,” said Detective Frake. “So you did not approve of him?”

  “No, we did not,” Mrs. Crend replied.

  “What time did you receive that telephone message?”

  “At three-thirty. I remember that distinctly,” said Crend, speaking for the first time since the detective had started asking his questions.

  “Then we are to suppose that Mrs. Lennek telephoned both you and Mr. Garder about three-thirty?”

  “I suppose so,” Crend replied. “If she contemplated taking her own life, we are the ones she would telephone, if she telephoned to anybody. We were her only living relatives, and Mr. Garder is attending to her estate.”

  “I see,” said Sam Frake. He walked across the room to the window, then turned and looked them over. “For the first five minutes or so,” he added, “it looked to me like an ordinary case of a high-strung woman taking her own life in a moment of despondency. It is often done — money matters, a lovers’ quarrel, something like that. Then the coroner’s assistant made his report to me, and we compared notes and began to look around a bit.”

  “What do you mean, Frake?” Attorney Garder asked.

  “In the first place, you are sure about those telephone calls being at three-thirty?”