The Case of the Buried Clock

Chapter 10

At the hotel Mason found Della Street waiting in the lobby.

“Hello,” she exclaimed. “I’m starved! What do we do about it?”

“We eat,” Mason proclaimed.

“That’s swell. Paul Drake’s here.”

“Where?”

“Up in his room. They gave him a room next to yours, with a communicating door... They say the hotel dining room is a fine place to eat, one of the best in the city.”

“We can eat,” Mason said, “on one condition.”

“What’s that?”

“That Jack Hardisty was killed before seven o’clock last night.”

“But that’s just the time Milicent was up there. You don’t want the murder to have been committed while she was there, do you?”

“If it was,” Mason said, “it’s unfortunate, but there’s nothing I can do. If it was committed later, it’s also unfortunate, but there’s a lot I’m going to have to do.”

“What?”

“For one thing, I’ve got to take a chance — that the person to whom Milicent would turn when she was in desperate trouble, in whom she’d have utter and complete confidence, and who had recently been able to put two brand-new tires on his automobile, would be the family physician.”

Della Street thought that over, said, “It sounds logical.”

“Okay. Go telephone Vincent Blane. Make your question sound just as casual as possible. Ask him what physician in Roxbury could give us a certificate that Milicent is in a precarious nervous condition due to the strain of her domestic relations.”

“Then what?” she asked.

“That’s all. Just note the name of the doctor. Then come up to Paul Drake’s room... Is the local evening paper out?”

“Yes.”

“Anything in it about Milicent?”

“Not a line. They haven’t released a bit of information about the arrest.”

“The story of the murder is in there?”

“Oh yes. Not a great amount of information, just the statement expanded and amplified and rehashed — the way they do with news nowadays.”

“All right. Go put through that call. I’ll run up to see Paul.”

“Do you want me to telephone from my room or from the lobby?”

“Booth in the lobby. The girl at the switchboard might be curious.”

Della Street nodded, moved over toward the telephone booth. Mason went up in the elevator, unlocked the door of his own room, crossed through the communicating door to the adjoining room, and found Paul Drake standing in front of the mirror just finishing shaving with an electric razor.

“Hello, Perry,” Drake said, disconnecting the razor and splashing shaving lotion on his face. “What’s news?”

“That’s what I came up to find out.”

Drake put on his shirt and knotted his necktie.

“Well?” Mason asked.

Drake said nothing for the moment, concentrating his attention on getting his tie knotted just right. He was tall, limber, loose-jointed, and his appearance was utterly at variance with the popular conception of what a detective should be. In repose, his face held a lugubrious lack of interest; his eyes, which missed nothing, seemed to be completely oblivious of what was taking place about him. Behind this mask a logical mind worked with mathematical certainty and ball-bearing speed.

“What’s the matter?”

“That Milicent girl.”

“What about her?”

“You told me to find her, that I could pass up all the tips that she’d be easy to find. You gave me a pretty broad hint that I’d hear she was in her house but that that was just a gag you’d thought up to hand to the cops. Well, I put a flock of men—”

“I know,” Mason interrupted, “I was fooled worse than you were.”

Drake looked at him, trying to read more meaning into the lawyer’s words. “It wasn’t a stall you’d thought up for the police?”

Mason merely smiled.

“It floored me,” Drake went on. “I was looking in all the hideout places, and here she was at her father’s house, tucked safely in bed, with a housekeeper answering all inquiries by saying, ‘Yes, she’s here, but she can’t be disturbed.’ ”

“And there she was,” Mason said.

“Exactly.”

“Well, Paul, you’ve crabbed from time to time that I gave you jobs that were too tough. This was an easy one. All you had to do to locate her was phone her father’s house.”

Drake said, “Don’t give me any more of those ‘easy’ ones or I’ll go nuts.”

“What else have you done?” Mason asked.

“Think I’ve got some place with the Kern County idea. The D.A. over there could use a little publicity.”

“What’s he doing?”

“Nothing violent yet, but he’s sitting up and taking interest. If we could dig up a spectacular angle on the case, I think he’d fall for it... You know, the newspapers like to get an interesting handle they can tack onto a murder — the Tiger Woman Case, the White Flash Case, the Snake-Eyes Murder... Thought maybe you could work out something with that buried clock that would be an angle. Then the city newspapers would go to town on it, and when that happened I think Kern County would move in.”

“What time was the murder committed?” Mason asked.

“Can’t tell you that yet,” Drake said. “I’ve got a man working on that angle.”

Mason frowned. “The autopsy surgeon must have made at least a preliminary report.”

Drake said, “That’s the queer part of it. They’re not releasing anything based on a preliminary report. Makes it seem there’s something in the case that doesn’t fit.”

Mason nodded.

Drake said, “You don’t seem very enthusiastic about that, Perry.”

“I’m always suspicious of the things in cases that don’t fit,” Mason said. “I’ve seen too many lawyers grab hold of some isolated fact that didn’t fit and brandish it around in front of a jury. Then something would click and that particular fact fitted into a particular interpretation that hung the client.”

When Drake was thinking, he always sought for complete bodily relaxation, propping himself against something or sprawling all over a chair. Now he placed an elbow on the back of a chair, then after a moment, sidled around so that he was sitting on the rounded overstuffed arm, his elbow resting against the back, his hand propping up his chin. “What I’m afraid of is that the D.A.’s office isn’t going to pay any attention to that buried clock. They think it’s a fairy story. If they play it down the newspapers won’t play it up.”

Mason said, “I can almost give them a theory on that clock, Paul.”

Drake said, “Give me a theory that will hold water, and I’ll show you some action.”

“Ever hear of sidereal time, Paul?”

“What’s sidereal time?”

“Star time.”

“Are you kidding me?”

“No.”

“Why is star time different from sun time?”

“Because the stars gain a day on the sun every year.”

“I don’t get you.”

“The earth makes a big circle around the sun and returns to the place where it started once each year. The effect of that circle is to make the stars rise about two hours earlier every month, or a total gain of twenty-four hours in the twelve months. By keeping clocks that run about four minutes fast every day, astronomers can keep star time instead of sun time.

“Time really is nothing but a huge circle. You divide a circle of three hundred and sixty degrees into twenty-four hours, and you get fifteen degrees of arc that is the equivalent of each hour.”

“You’re getting too complicated for me,” Drake said. “I don’t get it.”

Mason said, “It’s simple enough, once you get the idea. What I’m trying to point out is that by using sidereal time, astronomers know the exact position of any given star at any given moment.”

“How?”

“Well, they give each star a certain time position in the heavens, which is known as its ‘right ascension.’ Then, by knowing the right ascension, looking at a clock and getting the sidereal time, they can know the exact position of the star. That’s the way they work the astronomical telescopes. They get the position of the star at a given moment, turn the telescope so that the angle is exactly right, set it for latitude on another graduated circle known as the star’s ‘declination,’ look in the finder telescope — and there’s the star.”

“All right,” Drake grinned, “there’s the star — so what?”

Mason said, “So, it’s a newspaper headline.”

Drake thought that over. “I believe you’ve got something there, Perry — if we could make it stick. What makes you think this clock was geared according to this sidereal time you’re talking about?”

Mason said, “Look at it this way, Paul. Twice during the year, sidereal time must agree with civil time — once when it hits it right on the nose, and again when it’s gained twelve hours, which would have the effect, on a twelve-hour clock, of—”

“Yes, yes, I know,” Drake said. “I can figure that out.”

“One of these times when sidereal time agrees with civil or sun time, is at the time of the equinox on September twenty-third.”

“And then the clock goes on gaining four minutes a day?” Drake asked.

“That’s right.”

“But this clock was twenty-five minutes slow.”

“Thirty-five minutes fast,” Mason said, smiling.

“I don’t get you.”

“You’ve forgotten that our time has been advanced an hour. Therefore, our war time is an hour ahead of sun time, so that a clock that was twenty-five minutes slow on our war time would be thirty-five minutes fast on our sun time... That gives us something to think about.”

“Something to think about is right,” Drake said. “If we can tie this murder in with astrology, or even astronomy, we’ll give it so much notoriety the district attorney of Kern County will grab at it like a hungry dog grabbing a bone.”

Mason said, “Well, it’s an angle to think over. All it is, is just a publicity gag for the newspapers, but it’ll give them a handle — a tag line.”

“I’ll say it will,” Drake said. “When can I go to town with that, Perry?”

“Almost any time.”

Della Street’s knock sounded on the door. “Everybody decent?” she called.

“Come on in, Della.”

Della Street entered, grinned a salutation at the detective, and walked across to slip a folded piece of paper into Mason’s hand.

Drake, whose eyes apparently were centered with fixed interest on some object at the far end of the room, said, “You’re ruining that girl, Perry.”

“How so?”

“It’s the legal training. She’s getting so she doesn’t trust anyone. You tell her to get some information, and she knows you’ll be in here talking with me, so she writes it out on a piece of paper and slips it to you.”

Mason laughed, said, “She knows you have a one-track mind, Paul. She doesn’t want to distract it.” He unfolded the paper.

Della Street had written merely a name on a sheet of paper torn from her notebook. “Dr. Jefferson Macon, Roxbury.”

Drake said, “There’s a story going around that Hardisty had been dipping into funds at the bank. I suppose you’re not going to tell me about that. You—”

The telephone rang.

Drake said, “This is probably one of the boys with a report.” He picked up the receiver, placed it to his ear, said, “Hello,” and then let his face become a mask while he digested the information which was distinguishable to the other occupants of the room only as harsh, metallic noises emanating from time to time from the receiver.

“You’re certain?” Drake asked at length. Then, evidently being assured that there was no doubt about the matter, added, “Stay where you are. I may call you back in about five minutes. I’ll want to think this over.”

He hung up the receiver, turned to Mason and said, “The report of the autopsy surgeon shows Jack Hardisty was killed sometime after seven o’clock, probably around nine o’clock. The time limits are fixed as being between seven o’clock and ten-thirty.”

Mason pushed his hands down deep in his trousers pockets, studied the pattern on the faded hotel carpet intently, suddenly snapped a question at the detective. “Was the fatal bullet in the body, Paul?”

The question jarred expression into Drake’s face, shattering the mask of wooden-faced disinterest with which the detective customarily masked his thoughts. “Perry, what the devil put that idea in your mind?”

“Was it?” Mason asked.

“No,” Drake said. “That’s the thing the autopsy surgeon can’t figure. That’s one of the reasons he held up his report until he’d made a double check. The man was undoubtedly killed with a bullet, probably from a thirty-eight caliber weapon. The bullet didn’t go clean through the body — and the bullet isn’t there!”

Mason nodded slowly, thoughtfully digesting that information.

“You don’t seem surprised,” Drake said.

“What do you want me to do — throw up my hands and say ‘my, my’?”

Drake said, “Bunk! You can’t fool me, Perry. You anticipated that very thing.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Your question.”

“It was just a question.”

“And I’ll bet this is the only murder case in which you ever asked it.”

Mason said nothing.

“Well,” Drake told him, “in any event that lets Milicent out.”

“What does?”

“The fact that the murder took place after she left the cabin.”

Mason shook his head slowly. “No, Paul, it doesn’t let her out; it drags her in. I’m sorry, but I’m having to pass up dinner. Take Della — on the expense account.”

Drake said, “There are times, Perry, when you get some very commendable ideas.”

“Do I know where I can reach you, in case anything turns up?” Della Street asked Perry Mason.

He nodded.

“Where?”

The lawyer merely smiled.

Della said, “I get you.”

“And I don’t,” the detective protested.

Della Street placed her fingers on his arm. “Never mind, Paul. We’re going to dinner — on the expense account... Do your dinners include cocktails, Paul?”

“They always have when they’ve been on an expense account,” Drake said, “although Perry probably doesn’t know it.”

Mason grinned, took the sliver of glass from his pocket.

“A piece of a spectacle lens, Paul,” he said, handing the sliver to the detective.

Drake turned it over in his fingers. “What about it?”

Mason started for the door. “That’s what I’m paying you for, Paul.”