The Case of the Buried Clock

Chapter 8

Harley Raymand realized with some surprise that the events of the day had not dragged him down as much as he had anticipated. His sleep in the cool, crisp air at the mountain cabin had rested his nerves and given him the feeling that he was “over the hump.”

The sheriff’s office had been very thorough. The mattress and bedding had been removed from the bed and taken to Los Angeles for expert examination. Harley gathered there was quite a question in the minds of the authorities as to whether Hardisty had been shot while he was lying in the bed, or whether the body had been transferred to the bed within a short time after the murder had been committed... And now Harley was working with definite objectives in mind: to find moist, reddish-brown clay — to find the clock — to locate the spade which had been in Hardisty’s car, and, in general, to pick up any stray clues which might have been overlooked by the police — those things which a person actually living in a place might notice, but which would escape the attention of a more casual investigator.

Vincent Blane had asked him if it would make him nervous staying alone in a cabin where a murder had been committed... Harley smiled every time he thought of that; he who had been trained to carry on while comrades were shot down all around him; he who had become so familiar with death that it had ceased to inspire him even with healthy respect, let alone fear, being afraid to sleep in a cabin simply because a man had been shot in it!

The rays of afternoon sunlight were once more slanting across from ridge to ridge while the valleys cradled purple shadows. Harley strolled across the pine-scented, sloping flat where the clock had been buried. Whoever had removed that clock had made a very cunning and thoroughly workmanlike job of replacing dirt in the hole, tamping it down, cleaning up each particle of surplus earth, and spreading moss and pine needles over the place.

Not only was there no sign of the clock, but Harley was forced to admit that if he, himself, had not seen the buried box at this particular place, he would have doubted the word of anyone who told him a clock had been buried there.

The moss and pine needles were a cushion under his feet.

The tall, straight trees caught the golden sunlight, cast long shadows... Some sparkling object reflected the sun’s rays with scintillating brilliance and a rim of color.

Harley moved over toward the rock outcropping, with the realization that the object reflecting the sun’s rays must have come from a seam in the rock.

Upon approaching the rock, however, he could find nothing that could have caused the reflection. The seam in the rock held a threadlike line of pine needles which would furnish a background of dark green contrast to any metallic object which might have been there.

Puzzled, Harley retraced his steps to the point where he had first seen the shimmer of reflected sunlight, and moved back and forth, up and down, until suddenly he once more caught the glittering reflection. This time, he marked the place carefully and walked toward it without taking his eyes from it.

Just as he reached the rock, something urged him to turn.

Lola Strague was less than twenty feet behind him.

“Hello,” she said with a little laugh, “what are you zig-zagging back and forth about?”

Slightly irritated, Harley said, “And may I ask what you were stalking?”

“Was I stalking?”

“You were very quiet.”

“Perhaps your attention was concentrated on what you were doing, and you didn’t hear me.”

Harley became dignified. “Were you,” he asked, “looking for me?”

“Not definitely.”

“Then may I ask what you were looking for?”

She laughed. “I presume, when you come right down to it, I’m a trespasser, although the property lines aren’t very clearly marked around here. No fences, or signs, you know... And I found a gun here earlier in the day. That should give me the right to return.”

“I’m not worried about the trespassing,” he said, “but I had the distinct impression you were looking for something, and that you were being just a bit — well, furtive.”

“Did you, indeed! That interests me a lot. Do you trust the impressions you form that way, or do you find they are sometimes misleading? I’m collecting data for an article I intend to write on the subject.”

He said, “I trust my impressions. My first impression was that you were looking for something, just as my present impression is that you are stalling around, trying to avoid answering my question until you can think up just the right answer.”

She laughed. “I guess your impressions are all right, Mr. Raymand. I’ll be fair with you. I was looking for the clock.”

“And why so interested in it?”

“I don’t know. I’m always interested in the mysterious, in those things that aren’t explained... And now, since I’ve answered your question, I’ll ask you one. What are you looking for?”

“Health, rest, fresh air and relaxation,” he said.

Her eyes were laughing at him. “Go on.”

“And the clock,” he admitted.

“And why were you so interested in the clock?”

“Because I have an idea the police are half convinced that I’m lying about it.”

“You had a witness, didn’t you?”

“Adele Blane, yes.”

Lola Strague made her next question casual — perhaps just a little too casual. “Where is Adele Blane now?” she asked.

Harley frowned, said, “I presume she’s trying to get in contact with Milicent — Mrs. Hardisty, you know. That’s her sister.”

“I see,” Lola said, making the words sound quite unconvincing. “Wasn’t she up here last night?”

“She was up here with me yesterday afternoon.”

“And she came back afterwards?”

“I don’t know. I went to the hotel and slept.”

The tall, slender girl moved over to the outcropping, adjusting her pliable young body to the irregularities of the rock. Her eyes regarded Harley Raymand with disconcerting steadiness. “Are you going to join us up here, or are you just vacationing?”

“What do you mean?” he asked, managing to seat himself in such a position as to conceal the exact point in the rock seam from which he had caught the reflected light.

“Oh, you know. Are you going to live a leisurely life, or run in the breathless pursuit of success?”

“I don’t know. Right now, I’m getting acquainted with myself, taking a breathing spell. I haven’t blueprinted the future.”

She picked up a little twig and traced aimless designs on the surface of the rock. “This war seems sort of a nightmare. It will pass, and people will wake up.”

“To what?” Harley asked.

She looked up from her design tracing. “Sometimes,” she admitted, “I’m afraid of that.”

They were silent for a space of time, while Harley watched the creeping shadow of a pine limb move from her shoulder up to the lobe of her ear.

“Somehow,” she said, “society got off on a wrong track. The thing people pursued as success wasn’t success at all.”

Harley kept silent, clothing himself in the luxury of lazy lethargy.

“Look at Mr. Blane,” she went on. “He’s an exponent of that system — driving himself. Now he’s around fifty-five. He has high blood pressure, pouches under his eyes, a haunted expression. His motions are jerky and nervous... You can’t think that life was intended to be that way. He never relaxes, never takes a good long vacation; he has too many irons in the fire. And they say he isn’t getting anywhere; that the income taxes are taking all he makes, and keeping his nose to the grindstone.”

Harley felt that loyalty to Vincent Blane demanded speech. He aroused himself to say, “All right, let’s look at Mr. Blane. I happen to know something about him. His parents died when he was a child. His first job paid him twelve dollars a week. He educated himself while he was working. He’s responsible for two banks, one in Kenvale, one in Roxbury. He’s put up a big department store. He gives employment to a large number of people. He built up the community.”

“And what does it get him?” Lola Strague asked.

Harley thought that over, said, “If you want to look at it that way, what does it get us? He’s a representative American, typical of the spirit of commercial progress which has changed this country from a colony to a nation.”

“Are you,” she asked abruptly, “going to work for him?”

“I don’t know.”

“Are you working for him now?”

“Is that — well, shall we say, pertinent?”

“You mean, is it any of my business?”

He shook his head. “I didn’t express it that way.”

“But that was what you meant?”

“No. I wondered if it might actually have some bearing.”

“On what?”

“On — well, your attitude toward me.”

Her eyes flashed quick interest, then were hastily averted as the end of the pine twig she was holding started scratching away at the rock again. “What were you doing out here?” she asked.

“When?”

“When I walked up just now.”

“Looking at the place where the clock had been.”

“And at something else on the rock,” she said.

“Were you watching me?”

“Only just as I moved up. And when you sat down you acted as though you were concealing something.”

He smiled at that, but said nothing.

“After all,” she said, “I can sit here just as long as you can, if you’re sitting on something to cover it up. It’ll still be there when you get up.”

“Of course, I could point out that you’re trespassing.”

“And eject me?”

“I might.”

“In that event, you’d have to get up. I doubt if anyone has ever ejected a trespasser sitting down.”

“And what makes you think I’m sitting here to conceal something?”

“I thought so when we started talking. I’m certain of it now.”

“Why?”

“Otherwise, when I accused you of it, you’d have jumped up and looked around at the rock to see if there actually was anything to conceal.”

“Perhaps I’m not as obvious as that.”

“Perhaps.”

“Very well,” he said, “you win,” and got up.

“What is it?” she asked.

“I don’t know. Something was reflecting the light.”

“There doesn’t seem to be anything here.”

“It must be a piece of glass. I can’t understand anything else that — yes, there it is!”

“Looks like part of the lens from a pair of rimless glasses,” she said, as Harley turned the curved piece of glass around in his fingers.

He nodded. “It must have fallen into these pine needles. They cushioned the shock and prevented it from breaking; also held it propped at just the right angle so it reflected the sun’s rays just now.”

“What do you make of it?” she asked.

Harley dropped the glass into his pocket. “I don’t know. I’ll have to think it over.”

She laughed suddenly and said, “You’re a cool one.”

“Am I?”

“Yes.”

He judged the time was ripe for a counter-offensive. “Why,” he asked, “were you so upset when you learned Rodney Beaton was returning from town with Myrna Payson?”

Her face flamed into color. “That’s an unfair question. You’re insinuating that—”

“Yes?” Harley prompted as she ceased speaking abruptly.

She said, “It’s a personal, impertinent and unfair question.”

“You’ve been asking me questions,” he said, “about my plans, and—”

“Simply being sociable,” she interjected.

“And,” Raymand said, smiling, “trying to find out something about my future moves and how long I’d be here. Hence, my question. Are you going to answer it?”

She caught her breath, preparatory to making some indignant comment, then seemed abruptly to change her mind. “Very well,” she said with cold formality, “I will answer your question because apparently you think it’s relevant and material. If you think I’m jealous, you’re mistaken. I was merely piqued.”

“There’s a difference?” he asked.

“In my case, yes.”

“And why were you piqued?”

“Because Rodney Beaton had stood me up. We had a date to go out and patrol the trails together.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

She said, “Rodney is getting a collection of photographs of nocturnal animals. He has three or four cameras rigged with flashguns, and clamps them on tripods in strategic places on the trails. During the early part of the evenings he’ll patrol the trails, finding the camera traps that have been touched off by passing animals. Then he’ll put in fresh plates, reset the shutter, and put in a new flashbulb.”

“And you accompany him?”

“At times.”

“And last night he had given you some specific invitation?”

“Oh, it wasn’t like that. It was just casual. He asked me if I was going to be doing anything, and I said no, and he said ‘if you’re around, we might take a look at the cameras,’ and I told him I’d be glad to. That’s what makes me angry. It wasn’t a definite date — and he’d evidently forgotten all about it. If he’d made a definite date with me, and then broken it to go to town with that... that... with Mrs. Payson, I’d at least know where I stood. But it was casual and informal, and he simply forgot all about it. That puts me in the position of having to pretend that I forgot all about it, too. It’s quite possible that Rodney will remember it later — and then it will be mutually embarrassing. And I think Mrs. Payson knew about it — and deliberately inveigled him into taking her to town. She’s a widow, one of the — oh, let’s not talk about her! Now then, that’s the whole story. You see, it’s a very commonplace affair. I think any young woman hates to be stood up... But I don’t want you to get the idea that I’m setting my cap for Mr. Rodney Beaton.”

“Did I give you the impression that I thought that?”

She met his eyes fairly. “Yes,” she said.

“While we’re on the subject,” he said, smiling, “since we’ve disposed of Rodney Beaton, what can you tell me about Myrna Payson?”

“Not much. She’s a widow. She inherited some money. She’s gone in for cattle ranching.”

“Has a place up here?”

“She has a small ranch up here. She has two other ranches, and — well, she goes around with Rodney, taking care of the cameras quite frequently.”

“Rodney seems to be very popular.”

“He’s a very interesting man, and — I don’t know how I could describe it so you’ll appreciate it, but there’s a terrific wallop in this camera hunting.”

“I don’t get it.”

“You set your camera, put in a flashbulb, string a black silk thread across the trail. If you’re after animals the size of a coyote, you put it at a certain height. If you’re looking for deer, you’ll raise the thread. If you’re after the smaller animals, you put it just an inch or two above the trail. Sometimes you string out three threads. You walk away, making a round of the other cameras, and come back at an interval of perhaps an hour. When you find the thread broken, the shutter tripped, and the flashbulb exploded, you know you’ve got a picture. Then you get down on your hands and knees and study the tracks in the trail to see what animal tripped the shutter... Skunk pictures are usually cute. Deer pictures are hard to get, and quite frequently, deer photographed under those conditions seem angular and ungraceful. Foxes usually make beautiful pictures. Wildcats have a sinister look about them.

“Rod is a very expert photographer. He has infinite patience. He’ll prospect for days to get just the right camera location — a smooth, fairly level stretch where there’s no background to show—”

“Why no background?” Harley interrupted.

“Because Rod only wants the animal against a dead black background. He uses a small flashbulb and a wide-open lens. He says most flashlight pictures give an effect of unreality because they show garish foreground and black — but you must get Rod to show you his collection. It’s wonderful.”

“Does Mr. Beaton develop the films here?”

“Oh yes, he has a little darkroom in the cellar of his cabin. We go down there when we get back from our patrol and develop the films that have been exposed. That’s when it gets exciting, seeing what you’ve got on the film, whether it’s a good picture, whether the animal was facing the camera or facing away from the camera, or just trotting along the trail when it set off the flashbulb.”

“Ever get pictures of human beings?” Raymand asked.

“No, silly, of course not.”

“What’s to prevent someone walking along a trail and blundering into one of those camera traps?”

“Why — nothing, I guess, except that no one ever has done it so far. There’s no reason for people to go prowling around these hills at night.”

“And Myrna Payson takes an interest in night photography?”

Lola Strague became suddenly economical of words. “Yes.”

“And there is a certain element of rivalry?”

“No.”

“But you and Myrna Payson aren’t particularly intimate?”

“I think I can settle that very quickly, Mr. Raymand. It’s absolutely none of your business, but we’re quite friendly. Up here, we all try to get along with one another, be friends, and — mind our own business.”

“Ouch!”

“You asked for it.”

“I did, indeed. What’s more, I’m going to ask for more from time to time.”

“If your questions are frank, you’ll have to pardon me if my answers are also frank.”

“Just so I get the information,” Raymand grinned, “I don’t care what sort of a verbal package it’s wrapped in.”

“I see. And precisely what information are you angling for?”

“I want to know why a good-looking young woman like Myrna Payson should be marooned up here—”

“She came up here a few weeks ago to look over her property. She intended to stay two days. It was just a trip of inspection.”

“And she met Rodney Beaton?”

“Yes.”

“And she has now been here for some several weeks, you say?”

“Yes.”

“Then it took longer for her to investigate—”

“I don’t know,” Lola Strague interrupted irritably. “I’m really utterly incapable of reading Mrs. Payson’s mind. I don’t know what your object is, Mr. Raymand, but if you’re up here trying to play detective, and are starting on the surmise that Myrna and I are engaged in some sort of a struggle for the affections or companionship of Rodney Beaton, you’re... you’re all wet. And now, if you’ll pardon me, I’ll be on my way... Unless there are further questions?” Her manner was one of cold anger.

Harley said, “I’m simply trying to get the picture in focus in my mind. I—” He broke off to listen. “A car coming,” he said.

She had caught the sound almost at the same time he had. They stood there wordlessly, waiting for the car to make its appearance, both yielding to a common curiosity, yet maintaining their dignified hostility.

Harley Raymand was the first to recognize the man who drove the car up out of the shadow-filled canyon to the gentle slope in front of the cabin. “It’s Perry Mason, the lawyer,” he said.

Mason saw them standing there, and swerved the car over to the side of the road, shut off the motor and came walking across to join them.

“Hello,” he said. “You look very serious, as though you were engaged in a council of war.”

“Or an altercation,” Lola Strague said with a smile.

“Tell me, what have they done with Mrs. Hardisty?” Harley Raymand asked.

“I’ve got a writ of habeas corpus for her. They’re going to have to bring her out into the open now. They’ve had her buried in some outlying town... Were you people looking for something?”

“I came out here looking for the clock,” Harley said.

“Find anything?”

“Not a sign. I’ve listened at various places — holding my ear to the ground. Can’t hear a thing.”

“You could hear it ticking fairly plainly when you first discovered it?”

“Yes. The sound seemed to carry well through the ground. It was quite audible.”

Lola Strague regarded Harley Raymand with amused eyes. “Well,” she asked, “are you going to tell him?”

Raymand reached his hand in his pocket. “While I was looking for the clock,” he said, “I found a piece of glass. It looks as though it had been broken from a spectacle.”

Mason took the piece of glass in his fingers, turned it around thoughtfully, said, “Just where was this, Raymand?”

Harley showed him.

Mason started looking along the needle-filled seam in the rock. “We should be able to find the rest of this. This is only about a half of one lens.”

They searched the little fold in the rock carefully. Then Mason gave his attention to the surrounding ground. “That’s mighty peculiar,” he said. “Suppose a pair of spectacles were thrown against that rock and cracked into pieces. You’d naturally expect to find little pieces of glass around here on the ground. There doesn’t seem to be a sign of anything, not even — wait a minute. What’s this?”

He crawled forward on his hands and knees, picked up a wedge-shaped sliver of glass. “Looks as though this is also from a broken spectacle lens,” Mason said. “And that seems to be the only other piece that’s anywhere around here.”

“What should I do with this piece that I’ve found?” Harley Raymand asked him. “Do you think I should report it?”

“I think it would be a good idea.”

“To the sheriff’s office?”

“Yes. Jameson, the resident deputy, is a pretty decent sort. You might get in touch with him. You can tell him about the piece you found. I’ll tell him about the one I found.”

Lola Strague smiled. “Much as I would like to hang around and wear my welcome out, I think I’d better be getting back. And, since I didn’t find anything, I won’t say anything to anyone.”

Mason watched her walking down the trail, a slight smile twinkling at his eye corners. Then he turned to Harley Raymand, said, “I want to look around a little, and I’d better do it before sundown... Where do cars customarily park up here?”

“Just about any place, I believe,” Raymand replied. “I’m a little out of touch with things, but before I left, and when they’d have parties up here, people parked their cars wherever they found shade. There’s eighty acres in the tract, which makes for quite a bit of individuality in parking automobiles.”

Mason digested that information. “When I was here this morning, I noticed the deputy sheriff’s car was parked under that tree. Did it stay in that one place?”

“Yes. Later on, when the Los Angeles men arrived during the first part of the afternoon and took the body away, they parked their cars right close to the porch on that side.”

Mason strolled over to look at the tracks along the road, then walked leisurely to the back of the cabin. “This seems to be a fairly level place—”

“It’s reserved for barbecues,” Raymand said. “At least it was the last time I was a regular visitor here.”

“Nevertheless,” Mason observed, “a car seems to have swung around here, a car which left very distinct tire prints.”

“That’s right,” Raymand agreed. “Those prints of two wheels certainly are distinct.”

“The rear wheels,” Mason pointed out. “You can see where they crossed over the tracks of the other wheels... You don’t know when those tracks were made, do you, Raymand?”

“No sir, I don’t. I got up here quite a bit after dark last night, and — wait a minute. I know they weren’t here yesterday afternoon, because I walked around back of the house to go to the spring. I’m quite certain I’d have noticed it if these car tracks had been here then.”

Mason half closed his eyes in thoughtful contemplation. “Oh well, I guess the police have covered the ground... Just ran by to see how you were making it, Raymand. I’ll be at the hotel in case anything turns up.”