The Case of the Black-Eyed Blonde

18

Carl Fretch answered the doorbell when Mason rang at Jason Bartsler’s residence.

“Good evening,” Mason said.

Carl Fretch put on a suave, polished, sophisticated manner. “Good evening,” he said with a voice that was well modulated. “Was Mr. Bartsler expecting you?”

“He should have been,” Mason said.

Carl Fretch maintained that air of aloof detachment, that utter boredom with the routine affairs of life which went with the part he was playing with himself. And he was careful to make it clear how unimpressed he was with’ the importance of his visitors.

“Won’t you come in?” he asked with courteous politeness, but no enthusiasm. “Just be seated for a few moments, if you will, please,” he added impersonally, and then vanished through the door into the other part of the house.

Della Street held her hands up and flexed the fingers. She pulled back her lips so that Mason could see her teeth. “If I could only get my hands on that lad,” she said.

Mason grinned.

“Of all the insufferable little beasts,” Della said. “I’d just like to see him put in some position where that pose of his would be punctured. He...”

The door opened. “Mr. Bartsler will be glad to see you,” Carl said in the voice of one who grants a very great favor. “I explained to him,” he added self-righteously, “that it seemed to be very important.”

“You’re so good to us,” Della Street spat at him sarcastically.

Carl Fretch raised his eyebrows with slow affectation. “Not at all,” he said in a drawl which might have been an attempt at being a man of the world, or might have been studied insolence.

Mason and Della Street went through the door, through the room beyond and into the library which Jason Bartsler had fitted up as an office.

“Good evening,” Mason said.

“Hello, Mason. How do you do, Miss Street. Sit down. What’s the cause of this visit?”

Mason said, “I’m calling on behalf of Diana Regis.”

“What about her?”

“I think you can give me some help.”

“In what?”

“In bringing about a dismissal of this charge against her.”

“I’m afraid not, Mason. The evidence looks pretty black. There are a few things you don’t know yet, things that I’ve learned confidentially from the prosecuting officers in connection with their questions. I’m not at liberty to divulge them, but I will say that you’re rowing upstream against a pretty swift current. I don’t think you can make it, Mason.”

Mason offered Della Street a cigarette. Bartsler declined one and took a cigar from his humidor. Mason, in turn, declined one of Bartsler’s cigars, and lit his own and Della’s cigarette.

Mason inhaled deeply on the cigarette, stretched his long legs out in front of him, crossed his ankles and smiled at Bartsler. He said, “A nice homey matronly heavy-set woman with a limp. What do you know about her?”

It was plainly not a question Bartsler had anticipated. He showed surprise that seemed puzzled as he studied Mason thoughtfully.

“Nothing.”

“Think again.”

“I don’t need to. I know nothing about any such woman.”

Mason said, “Perhaps I can refresh your memory, Bartsler.”

“I think you’d better.”

“We’ll go back to the night Diana Regis had her experience with your stepson. When she returned in the taxicab there was a woman waiting to see you, a woman who gave her name, but Diana didn’t remember it...”

“Oh, wait a minute,” Bartsler said. “Now I get it. Yes, some woman who wanted to see me on a crazy mining deal.”

Mason frowned. Bartsler’s voice had just exactly the right degree of sudden recollection. If the man was acting it was a consummate piece of acting.

“Well,” Bartsler asked, “what do you want? What does she have to do with it?”

“She may have a lot to do with it, Bartsler. Suppose you tell me exactly what she wanted to see you about.”

“About a mine.”

“Can’t we do better than that?”

There could be no mistaking the flush which darkened Bartsler’s features, nor the anger in his eyes.

“I don’t like your tone, and I don’t like that approach, Mason. As it happens, I’m telling you exactly what she wanted to see me about.”

“Rather an unusual hour for a woman to call on you with reference to the sale of a mine, wasn’t it?”

“That’s what I thought,” Bartsler said. “I couldn’t understand why Frank Glenmore let her in to see me. Of course she had a very plausible story about how she worked during the day and couldn’t possibly get in except in the evening; that she hadn’t intended to sell this mine until recently, and then she had been told that I sometimes bought up mines of this sort, and all of that stuff. But tell me, Mason, why do you think she is of any particular importance? I take it it’s because she saw Diana Regis getting out of the taxicab and loaned Diana money with which to pay off the cab driver. There certainly can’t be any question about that, and I can’t see that it has any bearing whatever on the case. The money she advanced was returned to her.”

Mason asked very casually, “Remember her name?”

“Yes, it was Kennard, and she had what is known as a prospect rather than a mine. In other words, there was a showing of rather good ore, but nothing had been blocked out, and taken by and large, it certainly wasn’t the type of mining deal that I’m interested in at all.”

Mason studied Bartsler and smoked thoughtfully. His face might have been carved from granite. “Your visitor, Mrs. J. C. Kennard, resides at thirty-six ninety-one Lobland Avenue,” he said. “Up to the date that she called on you, she had rather an interesting and somewhat unusual business. Perhaps we should call it a profession.”

“What was it?” Bartsler asked, “and how do you happen to know so much about her?”

Mason said, “She ran a nursery for children of various ages. Does that mean anything to you?”

“Does it!” Bartsler all but shouted. “You mean she might have been in a position to know something about my grandson? She...”

“There is every reason to believe that she had your grandson in her custody,” Mason went on. “And following her visit to you, she has skipped out. Now then, suppose we quit beating around the bush and...”

Bartsler’s hand shot out to the table, his thumb frantically jabbed a bell button. In another room could be heard the sound of a buzzer. “You’re damn right we’ll find out,” he said angrily.

A moment later, Frank Glenmore thrust his head into the room, saw the visitors, smiled a greeting. “Good evening, Miss Street. Good evening, Mr. Mason. What was it, Jason?”

Bartsler said, “Come in here, Frank, and sit down.”

Something in the tone of his voice caused Glenmore to give the man a somewhat quizzical glance.

“You remember Mrs. Kennard who called on us two or three nights ago?” Jason asked without preliminary.

“Yes. Rather heavy set. Let’s see, I believe she had a slight limp. Her property was in that district that has been so intensively prospected of late...”

“What did she tell you she wanted to talk with me about?” Bartsler asked.

Glenmore’s eyebrows elevated. “Why, about selling you her mine, of course.”

“And you were present when she talked with me?”

“Yes.”

“All of the time?”

“Yes.”

“And what did she talk about? What did we discuss?”

“Why, her mine, of course. She brought samples which she showed you, and there was a chain of title, location notices and things of that sort. And...”

“And you were present during die entire interview?”

“Yes.”

“And who showed her out when she left?”

“We both did.”

Bartsler said to Mason, “Owing to the shortage of servants, we are just running things on a hand to mouth basis. I trust you see what I’m getting at?”

Mason nodded.

“May I ask what this is all about?” Glenmore asked, his tone giving every indication of puzzled curiosity.

Bartsler said, “Mason seems to think that Mrs. Kennard might know something about my grandson.”

“About your... What?” Glenmore asked.

“Grandson,” Bartsler said, regarding his associate with narrowed eyes. “There is some reason to believe that several months after my son died his wife had a baby. It came out in court today.”

“Why... why!... Good heavens, Jason, you never told me... why, that’s been almost three years! A grandson!”

“And this grandson was concealed from me.”

“Concealed! Couldn’t you have secured a court order?”

“In fact, Robert’s widow denied that there ever had been a child. Only today, on the witness stand did she admit it.”

Glenmore had nothing to say to that. His face gave every indication that Bartsler’s statement was a great shock to him.

“Now then, Frank, let’s go back to...”

“The time she came here?” Glenmore interrupted. “I remember it very clearly on account of thinking at first Diana had come with her. Diana explained that she hadn’t but...”

Jason Bartsler came suddenly upright in his chair. “How do we know she didn’t, Frank?”

“Why they both said...” Glenmore’s voice trailed away into the silence of one who realizes a sudden doubt.

“Go ahead,” Bartsler snapped. “Let’s get the straight of this. How do we know they didn’t come together and fix up a story — anything to prove they didn’t come together, Frank?”

Glenmore said in the slow diction of one who is thinking, “I guess there isn’t any proof... If you want to get right down to brass tacks.”

“I want to get right down to brass tacks,” Bartsler announced.

“Well I remember I heard the bell. I thought Carl might answer it. It was getting pretty late, and I thought it must be someone for — for that end of the house.”

“I understand. Go on.”

“Well, after I’d waited for perhaps a minute, or a minute and a half, I went to the door.”

“Had the bell been rung for the second time?”

“I believe it had, but I can’t be certain. I remember I waited until I was afraid the person might go away. I knew Carl was upstairs and thought he’d be certain to come down.”

“He didn’t make any move to do so?”

“No. He was... well, that’s when Diana says he was...”

“I understand,” Bartsler interrupted. “Let’s get back to what happened when you opened the door.”

“Well, let’s see... This woman was standing right in front of the door, as though she’d been the one who had rung the bell, and then there was Diana, and right back of Diana the taxi driver...”

“Only the one taxi?”

“That’s right.”

“That settles it then.”

“No, Jason, I wouldn’t be too certain. I’m not even certain that I didn’t hear some other car drive away — and, of course, this woman could have come on a street car. She looked the type.”

“Did she tell you she’d paid Diana’s fare?”

“I’m trying to think. I think it was Diana who said, ‘I’ve left my purse somewhere and had to borrow my taxi fare from this woman,’ and I told Diana I’d take care of it, and Diana swept on past me and ran up the stairs in a hurry. Hang it, Jason, I don’t think they came together.”

“What makes you think they didn’t?”

“Just the way the whole thing was done. It was all natural and... I just don’t think they’d have been good enough actresses to have put it across... and then there was the cab driver. He was still there putting money in his pocket. He heard what Diana said and didn’t show any surprise. He would have if they’d arrived in the same cab.”

“Not if Diana had made some crack about it being her turn to pay, and then gone through the motions of not having her purse.”

“I suppose so. It could have been; but somehow I don’t think it was. And I’ll tell you something else, Jason. If this woman had anything else on her mind except selling her mine, she was an artist. There wasn’t a move she made, not a thing she said that didn’t just fit into that picture, the picture of a middle aged woman who has a mine she’s inherited or had wished off on her as the result of some financial investment or wild speculation. Shucks, she had all the regular reactions, the idea that her mine was so good she wanted to keep an interest in it — you know how they act.”

“I’ll agree with you on that one,” Bartsler said. “I’ve been doing a little thinking on that since you started talking. Her whole approach was so typical it darn near has to be genuine. She wouldn’t possibly have had all those typical symptoms unless she actually did have a mine to sell... Look here, Mason, is there any chance you’re off on the wrong track here?”

“I could be,” Mason admitted, “but the evidence I have leads me to believe she had your grandson in her custody.”

Bartsler’s face showed sudden expression. “Look here, Mason, couldn’t it have been the other way around? Couldn’t she have come here to sell me her mine, and then, while she was here, or after she had left... No, that wouldn’t help. That’s impossible... Or is it? Couldn’t she have acquired the child later — or even had the child without knowing who it was, and then connected the name later? What I’m getting at is that we may be barking up the right tree but after different game. You get what I mean, Frank?”

“Yes. I was thinking along those lines myself, but I didn’t want to say anything...”

Bartsler said, impatiently, “You say anything that comes into your mind. Those others are nothing to me — at a time like this.”

“I don’t want to stick my nose in, that’s all.”

“This means so much to me that everything else is insignificant beside it. Speak up and to hell with the others.”

Glenmore said, “I’d be inclined to think that if she knows anything about a grandson she acquired that knowledge after her visit here — or during that visit.”

“Whom did Mrs. Kennard see before she talked with Mr. Bartsler?” Mason asked.

“No one. She made a telephone call, gave me her name, and told me that she had a mine she wanted to sell; that she had assays showing the presence of ore that had a very high value; that she had done some development work, and that it would be necessary for her to talk with us at night. And would it be possible to make an appointment.”

“Then what?” Mason asked.

“I suggested that she might drop by some evening that week. I’d hardly anticipated she’d come that night — or that she’d come so late any night. When she said evening, I thought she meant early evening.”

“And no one else saw her?”

“Now wait a minute... Let’s see. I took her in and talked with her. Then I came in and talked with Jason and told him the woman was waiting, told him generally about what she had, and suggested that he might like to talk with her.”

“That’s right,” Bartsler said. “You outlined the proposition, and I told you I didn’t think we’d be interested, but since she was here, I’d like to talk with her for a few minutes.”

“And during that time,” Glenmore said, “she was in the reception room and there’s just a chance that... But then, I don’t see what difference it would make.”

“Chance that what?” Jason Bartsler asked.

“Mrs. Bartsler or Carl Fretch might have passed through the room. But certainly there wouldn’t have been any opportunity for more than a few words.”

For several seconds there was silence, then Bartsler said meaningly to Glenmore, “Check that, will you, Frank?”

Glenmore seemed embarrassed. “It might be a little difficult now.”

“We’ll try it.”

“And it might be embarrassing from my own viewpoint. You can readily understand.”

Bartsler said crisply, “Well, if you feel that way... Tell Carl to get in here fast — and ask Mrs. Bartsler if she can make it a point to get here as soon as possible. Tell her it’s very important.”

Glenmore nodded, left the room.

Bartsler chewed at his cigar. “Damn it, Mason,” he said, “the thing’s impossible, and yet, that’s the way it must have happened.”

“Perhaps,” Mason said, “inasmuch as it’s your wife and your stepson, you’d better cross the i’s and dot the t’s so that there’ll be no possibility of misunderstanding. I wouldn’t want to assume something that might have no actual existence, particularly something about the state of your own mind.”

Bartsler said, “My wife and I have been married long enough for the keen edge of romance to wear off. I know now that it was purely a business transaction with her. She wanted cash. She wanted position. She wanted influence. And, as is usual when someone tries to sell something that shouldn’t be put up for sale, the buyer never gets what he thinks he’s buying.”

“And your stepson?” Mason asked.

“My stepson,” Bartsler said with some feeling. “Let’s not have any misunderstanding about that little brat. He needs a swift kick in the spot nearest his center of gravity. He’s a four-flushing, grandstanding, hypocritical, selfish, conceited jackass.”

“That,” Mason said, “seems to cover quite a bit of territory.”

“If I had a little more time to think of new ones, I could cover it better,” Bartsler said. “I wouldn’t put anything past him. He’s so completely obsessed with the idea that he has to live the life of a successful actor that he’d do anything... anything... except work. He’s just another little nincompoop who wants to begin at the top.”

“And his mother?” Mason asked.

“Is very devoted to him. Thinks he’s all of the famous male leads in Hollywood rolled into one.”

“And would do anything to further his ambitions?”

“Yes.”

Mason said, “Of course the subject is a delicate one.”

“Damn it, it doesn’t need to be,” Bartsler said angrily. “When I say ‘anything’ I know what that implies the same as you do. She’d lie. She’d steal. I don’t know but what she’d even kill in order to...”

“Whom are you talking about,” asked a cold cultured voice from the opposite end of the room.

Bartsler looked up, saw his wife, got to his feet, said, “You remember Mr. Mason, dear, and Miss Street.”

“Good evening,” she said coldly, and then to Bartsler, “About whom were you talking, Jason?”

Jason met her eyes. “Damn it, if you want to know, I was talking about you.”

“I see. And were you, by any chance, asking Mr. Mason to represent you in a divorce action?”

Bartsler said, “No, and let’s not...”

Her smile was frosty. “If you had been, it would have been a bit premature. I am filing a petition in my own divorce case tomorrow afternoon.”

Bartsler was silent for the space of two quick breaths, then said in tight-lipped anger, “Well, I guess that winds it up.”

“Oh no it doesn’t,” she said sweetly. “That’s only the first gun. Mr. Mason will tell you that our property matters will have to be adjusted.”

Bartsler said angrily, “If you think I’m going to disgorge any money for you and that brat of yours...”

“That will do, Jason,” she said sharply, interrupting him- “You may, of course, abuse me, because that seems to be your privilege as a husband. But I think my son can very well be left out of it. I am supporting him. He isn’t dependent on you in any way.”

“You’re supporting him!” Bartsler snorted. “You get money from me and pass it over to him.”

“Nevertheless, it is my money when I pass it over to him.”

“And that accounts for his damn smirking independent attitude,” Bartsler said. “He acts as though he didn’t owe me a thing in the world, not even respect.”

“I was not aware that he owed you anything,” Mrs. Bartsler said icily. “One either commands respect or one doesn’t get it.”

“Well, I’ll command it all right! And if he’s done what I think he’s done...”

“What do you think he’s done?”

“I think he’s... Well, we’ll wait and find out what he has to say about it.”

Frank Glenmore came tiptoeing back into the room. He shook his head gently.

“Not here?” Bartsler asked.

“No.”

“If you’re looking for Carl,” Mrs. Bartsler said, “he won’t be in until quite late. He has a date, I understand.”

“Whose car?” Bartsler asked.

“Don’t worry, Jason, he took my coupe.”

Bartsler said, “That damn spoiled four-flusher! If he’d only get out and...”

“I don’t think you need to discuss him, Jason. Really he has no connection with you whatever. He is purely and entirely my responsibility. He is, of course, bitterly disappointed that he can’t be overseas with his more robust comrades...”

“Disappointed!” Bartsler stormed. “That’s a good one! That little yellow-livered coward wouldn’t risk his skin within twenty- five thousand miles of...”

“That will do, Jason.”

Bartsler went on as though she hadn’t spoken, “...a front line trench. When he hears a champagne cork pop, he has to fight himself to keep from crawling under the table! Give him a gun and...”

“You wished to see me?” Mrs. Bartsler interrupted. “I take it there is some reason for your request. If it was merely to put me in a humiliating position by discussing your fancied grievances against my son, I warn you, Jason, that my divorce complaint has not as yet been filed, and it can be changed to include any humiliating experiences you now inflict upon me. Mr. Mason and Miss Street will bear witness that I was called in here, apparently for no other purpose than to listen to a profane tirade against my son.”

Bartsler sighed, said, “What’s the use? You know a woman named Kennard?”

She puckered her brows, “Kennard... Kennard...? No, Jason, I think not.”

“She’s a rather heavy-set woman somewhere around sixty who walks with a limp. She has a rather beaming matronly expression,” Bartsler said. “She was here, I believe, on the evening of the twenty-fourth. You may place it because that was the night Carl hit Diana...”

“Jason, I do wish you’d refrain from condemning Carl in that manner. Carl did not hit that creature. You have placed me in a most embarrassing position by acting upon the assumption that in the first place Carl would hit a woman, and in the second place, that his word is absolutely without value. That is one of the things which has made it impossible for me to further continue to live with you, or under your roof. It has been the most refined form of mental cruelty sufficient to...”

“Sufficient to give you something with which you can run to a lawyer and pick on me for alimony,” Bartsler interrupted.

“Really, Jason, I see no need for prolonging this discussion. If you are going to insist on bringing Carl into it, I’m afraid I shall have to withdraw. But if there is any information I can give you, anything which will be of advantage to you in your business, or anything that will help you...”

“You remember this woman? Did you ever see her?”

“I think, now that you have mentioned it, I saw her, yes.”

“Where?”

“She was, I believe, waiting in the reception room. I didn’t pay very much attention to her, simply noticed that there was a woman of that general description there.”

“See her walk?”

“I did not.”

“Did Carl see her?”

“You’ll have to ask Carl.”

“Where is Carl?”

“He’s out.”

“With whom?”

“I don’t know that it makes any difference,” she said, “but simply because I don’t want you to feel I am withholding anything that may be of advantage to you in connection with any business matter, I’ll tell you. He’s out with a very refined, nice-, appearing young woman. However, as nearly as I can see, it makes absolutely no difference to you where he is. I don’t think that you have the slightest sympathy or affection for the boy, and therefore what he does is no concern of yours.”

Bartsler said, “Affection hell. I don’t want to kiss him! I want to know whether he talked with that Kennard woman.”

“I’m quite certain that he didn’t, Jason. If the woman was here to see you, I’m quite certain that Carl would keep entirely out of the picture. You know as well as I do that he is scrupulously careful never to interfere in any way, never to give you the slightest cause for...”

“I know,” Bartsler interrupted, “he’s been carefully coached.”

She bowed submissively, turned and swept from the room, head up.

“All right,” Bartsler said angrily, “I’m in a hell of a mess. Don’t look at me like that, Mason. I know I played right into her hand. I know this will sound like hell when she puts it in a divorce complaint, about how in the presence of business associates I called her in and impugned her motives, berated her son’s character, and, in general, exposed her to the scorn and ridicule of my friends and business associates, all of which caused her great and grievous mental suffering.”

Mason said, “That leaves us as far as ever from finding out about Mrs. Kennard.”

“No it doesn’t,” Jason said. “I know the answer now. Mrs. Kennard came here. She used that mining deal as a stall to get in. That’s all it was. While she was waiting to see me, my wife got hold of her, found out what she was really here for and decided a grandson would upset her apple cart. Damn it, Frank, find out everything you can about this woman. Get a line on her! Get detectives working on it! I want that woman. I want to find out just what was said to her, and by whom.”

“I’ll do that right away,” Glenmore promised. “If you’ll excuse me for a minute, I’ll telephone to the detective agency that handles our work and get them started.”

The telephone rang.

Glenmore moved over to the instrument, picked up the receiver, said, “Hello,” then said, “Yes, just a moment, please.”

He turned to Mason, extending the telephone receiver. “For you, Mr. Mason,” he said. “A client who says it’s most important.”

Mason picked up the receiver, said, “Yes. Hello.”

Paul Drake’s voice came, over the wire. “Now listen, Perry, I don’t want you to think this establishes a precedent. After all, it’s just luck. We located this man Thurston and he has her address. She didn’t think there was any possibility anyone would try to get in touch with her through Thurston. Looks like Thurston is a sort of a favorite boy friend. She let him know her address as soon as she’d pulled out.”

“He know why she changed?” Mason asked.

“You mean took a powder?”

“Yes.”

“No. Get your pencil and I’ll give you that address. I’m going to keep Thurston sewed up so that he doesn’t tip her off that someone’s looking for her.”

“By taking him to dinner, I suppose,” Mason said.

Drake chuckled. “That’s what I thought,” he said. “I’ve invited him to join us for dinner.”

“You and your stomach,” Mason groaned. “What’s the address?”

“Staying with a sister name of Ruffin, eleven ninety-one Kill- man Boulevard. And now if you’ll excuse me, Perry, I think Mr. Thurston is hungry, and I wouldn’t want to let him out of my sight. I’m ordering nice thick, juicy tenderloin steaks with French fried potatoes, cocktails, head of lettuce salad, mince pie a la mode — and on the expense account. Oh boy! How’s your chocolate bar setting?”

There was a click at the other end of the line.

Mason hung up the telephone, said to Bartsler, “Well, I think this woman either had your grandchild, or knows who did — that is, if you really have a grandchild. I wanted to find out what was back of her visit, and that’s the only reason I called on you.”

“We’ll find out, all right,” Bartsler said.

“And what was Carl Fretch doing in Diana’s apartment?” Mason asked.

“Says he wasn’t there,” Bartsler said. “He still sticks with the story that he was out with a girl. They parked the car and got out. Someone stole the car. He finally kicked through with the name of the wren he was with. Police checked up. She confirmed his story — so there you are.”

Mason said, “I’ll be going. If you find out Carl talked to this Mrs. Kennard, I’d appreciate it if you’d let me know.”

“I will,” Bartsler promised, “but when I locate the woman I’m not going to tell you where she is until after I’ve talked with her. It’s each man for himself on that end of it.”

“I understand,” Mason said. “And now we’ll say good night. We have quite a bit of work to do.”

Jason Bartsler escorted them to the door. “I think we’re on the homestretch now,” he said as he closed the door.

Out in the car, Della said, “Not a word about patching up his differences with Helen.”

Mason nodded, his manner preoccupied.

“Was that Paul who telephoned?”

“Uh huh.”

“Had he located Mrs. Kennard?”

“Thinks he had.”

“We going out there now?”

Mason spun the car into a tight turn at the corner. “Going out there right now,” he said.

Della Street sighed. “Hand me one of those chocolate bars, will you, Chief?”