Case of the Beautiful Beggar

Chapter 10

Paul Drake was waiting in Mason’s office when the lawyer fitted his latchkey to the door of the private office and entered.

Mason glanced at Della Street. “Any calls, Della?”

She shook her head.

Mason turned to Drake. “What happened, Paul?”

“I can’t tell you for sure,” Drake said, “because I have been afraid to tip my hand by asking too many direct questions, but here’s the story in a nutshell.

“Yesterday afternoon, a girl who answers the description of Daphne Shelby stopped a brand new looking car in front of the sanitarium and said she had noticed the sign that they wanted domestic help.

“It seems the sanitarium is pretty well filled and they were badly in need of help. They wanted someone to go to work making beds, sweeping, cleaning, and doing a general job of practical nursing.

“The girl who had been on the shift from ten o’clock at night until seven o’clock in the morning had quit, and our friend Dr. Baxter was desperate. This girl — I’m going to call her Daphne because I’m satisfied that’s who she was — said she’d be back at ten o’clock to start work.

“No one got the license number on her car. She gave the name of Eva Jones, and said she’d had some nursing experience caring for aged people.

“Dr. Baxter didn’t waste any time examining her credentials. He just needed someone in the worst way and he took her on.

“She worked during the entire night, was alert, intelligent, and on the job. Dr. Baxter got up and checked her a couple of times and everything seemed to be running fine.

“They had a cook and two more so called nurses who came on duty at six o’clock in the morning to prepare breakfast and then, after breakfast, to make beds.

“Those were experienced people who had been with the institution for some time and knew the ropes. The big trouble they had was keeping someone on night duty — the so called ‘grave-yard shift’ from ten until seven o’clock in the morning.

“This new girl was last seen about five forty five in the morning. When the cook came to the sanitarium, the new girl was there. She was supposed to stay until seven and help get the breakfast ready, but no one saw her after the cook greeted her.

“For a while, everyone was busy with breakfast and getting things started, and then they went into Unit 17 to make up the bed and see what could be done for the occupant who had been giving them a lot of trouble. They’d had to forcibly restrain him.

“They found the bed empty. Horace Shelby had vanished and the new girl had vanished.

“They didn’t think too much about the significance of the girl not being on duty. Everyone thought she had misunderstood the hours she was to work, and they still feel that she’ll be on duty tonight at ten.

“I followed up your lead about the ‘Help Wanted’ signs, found out Eva Jones had been employed, and pretended that I was a credit man trying to get a credit rating on Eva Jones, asked about what they knew about her background, got her residence address, and — most important of all — the physical description.

“I went to the residence address. It was phony — a rooming house. They’d never heard of Eva Jones. What’s more, they didn’t have anyone who answered the physical description of Eva Jones living there.

“Now then, Perry, you can put two and two together. She bought a car she went out and parked it at the sanitarium she didn’t duck out during the night because that would have been too much of a coincidence she waited until the cook came on duty in the morning and then slipped in, cut the straps that were holding Horace Shelby to the bed, using a sharp butcher knife she had picked up from the kitchen. She got Shelby’s clothes on him, got him across the yard, through the gate and into the automobile.”

Mason nodded thoughtfully. “What about the car?”

“I’ve traced the records through the bank and the Motor Vehicle Department. Daphne Shelby bought a Ford automobile from a downtown agency yesterday and wanted immediate delivery. She paid for the car with a cashier’s check drawn on the Investors National Bank and signed by the cashier.

“Because she was in such a hurry, the automobile agency people were a little suspicious, but they took the check to the bank and cashed it, rushed through the registration and delivered the car.

“The license is LJL 851 — but, as I mentioned, no one got the license number of the car the so called Eva Jones had when she drove up to the sanitarium. Apparently, it was a new Ford.”

Mason, who had seated himself with one hip on a corner of his desk, one leg swinging back and forth, frowned thoughtfully.

“Our little naive, unsophisticated girl seems to have a head on her shoulders and a lot of initiative.”

“What’s the Court going to say about all that?” Drake asked.

“That depends,” Mason said thoughtfully.

“On what?” Della Street asked.

“On just what the facts are. If Horace Shelby is being railroaded into incompetency, that’s one thing.

“On the other hand, if Borden Finchley was acting in good faith and believed that Daphne had been wheedling Horace and insinuating herself into his good graces so that she could make away with a large chunk of money, that’s something else.

“Once Horace Shelby is interviewed by Dr. Alma he’ll tell the true story of how he was treated at the sanitarium, about being strapped to a bed, and all the rest of it.

“If the conspirators are railroading him, they can’t afford to have that happen. They’ll put a stop to it at all costs.”

“What do you mean ‘at all costs’?” Della Street asked.

“Murder,” Mason said.

“Murder?” Della exclaimed.

Mason nodded.

“But how will murder help?” Della Street asked.

“Murder in itself won’t help,” Mason said. “They’ll have to commit a murder that they can blame on Daphne Shelby. Their story will be very simple, that Daphne got Horace out of the sanitarium that she got him to make a will leaving everything in her favor that he died during the night. His death will seem to be of natural causes, but those causes were helped along by Daphne. We’ve got to find Daphne in order to protect her, from herself and from the others.”

Drake said, “I’ve got men shadowing Daphne from the time she left the courthouse. We’ve got the license number of the automobile she’s driving, and we should know where she’s holed up within the next few minutes.”

Mason looked at his watch. “She may have decided not to go directly to the hideout.”

“What do we do when we get her located?” Drake asked.

“Notify Dr. Alma, take him out there and let him examine Horace.”

“And if Shelby is confused and disoriented?”

“Then we’ll put him in a good hospital under the care of Dr. Alma, go to court and see what we can do about getting another conservator appointed.”

“And if he isn’t confused?”

Mason grinned. “Then we accuse the Finchley’s of criminal conspiracy, get them thoroughly discredited, get Horace Shelby declared competent and then — if he wants to, and apparently he does — let him make a will leaving all of the property to Daphne. And, by that time, the show will be over.”

“The Finchley’s are gambling for high stakes,” Drake said.

Mason nodded.

The unlisted telephone rang.

Della Street answered it, said, “It’s for you, Paul.”

Drake picked up the instrument, said, “Drake speaking... Yes, hello, Jud— What?... How did that happen?”

Drake listened for a full minute, then said, “Where are you now?... Okay, wait there for instructions.”

Drake hung up the telephone, turned to Mason and said, “I’m sorry, Perry, but they lost her.”

“Lost her!” Perry Mason exclaimed.

“Well, they didn’t lose her she gave them the slip.”

“How come?”

“I had to work fast,” Drake said. “I had a man waiting at the courthouse to pick her up when she came out. There was a parking problem and she got a little head start. But I don’t think that was what caused it. What really caused it was that she knew she was being tailed and was smart enough so she never let on.”

“What makes you think that?”

“Because she took elaborate precautions to see that no one could follow her.”

“What sort of precautions?”

“She was moving along with traffic, apparently entirely oblivious of her surroundings. She turned into a side street and suddenly whipped the car into a U-turn which was illegal, right in the middle of a busy boulevard — not a freeway, but a pretty important through boulevard.

“Of course, when you pull a maneuver like that you’re able to pick the time and the place where you can make a quick U-turn without giving any signal. If an officer happens to pick you up, you’re hooked. But if you get away with it, you’re pretty apt to be in the clear because the maneuver takes the person who is following entirely by surprise. But if the boulevard is reasonably busy, by the time he gets his own car in a position where he can make a U-turn, it’s too late.

“That’s what happened in this case. Daphne made a U-turn right in front of a whole stream of cars that were bunched up because they’d been held up by a traffic signal a couple of blocks down the street. By the time my operative managed to make a U-turn, fifteen or twenty cars were between him and Daphne. And Daphne swung down a side street, went around the block, came to an intersection where she could have either gone straight ahead, to the right or the left. My man assumed she hadn’t gone straight ahead because he couldn’t see her. He had a choice of right or left. He chose right because usually a person trying to get away from someone will make a right-hand turn if it’s clear.

“Well, it’s the same old story. Once you’ve lost a person you’re very lucky if you get them back in your sights. He came to another intersection, had the same choice to make, and somewhere along the road he made the wrong choice.”

“Now,” Mason said, “Daphne has really got herself in a jam. If she isn’t on the square, the Court is going to feel that she is deliberately interfering with the process of the Court and if she is acting in good faith and Borden Finchley can find her before we do, she’s in danger and Horace is in danger.”

“You really think they’d resort to murder?” Della Street asked.

“I don’t know,” Mason said. “All I know is it’s a big possibility in the case, and it’s up to a lawyer to look at possibilities.

“Paul, round up every man you can get on short notice. Put them on the freeway leading into El Mirar. Watch for Daphne Shelby’s car.”

“She wouldn’t be in El Mirar,” Paul Drake said. “She wouldn’t dare.”

“I think that’s the only place she does dare to be,” Mason said.

“Put yourself in her position. She went out to the sanitarium at El Mirar to see if she could get a job. In the event she could get a job, she intended to make an escape with Horace Shelby, and she was smart enough to figure out the details of that escape so she could pull it at a time when it wouldn’t attract too much attention

“On the other hand, she couldn’t be certain that someone wouldn’t see them leaving the place or that, through some circumstance she hadn’t anticipated, the escape would be discovered before they had been gone very long.

“Therefore, the smart thing for her to have done was to have driven out to El Mirar in the afternoon, gone to some motel, explained that she wanted twin units, that her uncle was going to join her later.

“Then, when she had the stage all set, she simply showed up with the uncle.

“I was interested in the statement she made to me about being late for court. She said that traffic on the freeway was terrible and it had taken her longer than she had anticipated.

“At the time, I didn’t know she was driving a car and I wondered just what she meant.

“I think it was a case of blurting out the simple truth before she realized what a statement of that sort would mean.”

Drake nodded. “Okay, Perry,” he said. “Let me go down to my place. I can get better action on the men I want to put out down there.”

Mason said, “Cover the motels at El Mirar. See if you can’t find Daphne Shelby’s new car parked in front of one of the units.”