The Case of the Cautious Coquette

Chapter 15

Paul Drake was waiting in Mason’s office the next morning when Mason came in.

Della Street flashed Mason a warning glance and took his overcoat and hat.

Paul Drake studiously avoided Mason’s eyes, said, “I’ve been trying to call you, Perry. Della thought you might be in early this morning so I decided to wait. It’s about this man, Hartwell L. Pitkin, you wanted me to look up.”

“Oh, yes,” Mason said. “I saw the papers this morning. Seems he committed suicide in the garage of Lucille Barton’s apartment house.”

“That’s what the papers said, Perry.”

“Strange coincidence, isn’t it, Paul.”

“Certainly is. She’d been married to him years ago.”

“To Argyle’s chauffeur, Paul? Good heavens, you mean that...”

“That’s right,” Drake interposed, still refusing to meet Mason’s eyes.

“What other details do you have, Paul?”

Drake said, “Sometimes, Perry, you get so damn smart that you have us all running around in circles and meeting ourselves coming back.”

“I don’t get it,” Mason said.

“There are lots of goofy things about the case. The police received a report from Lucille Barton. She was hysterical. She’d opened the garage door to put her car away for the night and found the body. She had a girl friend who was going to spend the night with her. They didn’t touch anything but left the car right there with the motor running and beat it to the telephone in the apartment house. They notified the police.”

“I see,” Mason said.

“Hartwell L. Pitkin had been shot with a .38 caliber revolver,” Drake went on, methodically. “The gun was found by his right hand.”

“So I saw in the paper, Paul. No question but what it’s suicide?”

“The police are investigating.”

“What do they think?”

“They aren’t taking me into their confidence.”

“No, I suppose not.”

“Now then,” Drake said, “I have some other information for you.”

“What?”

“That gun you wanted to know about, the Smith and Wesson .38 number S65088.”

“Oh yes, what about it, Paul?”

“Well, that gun was sold, just as I told you, to a jobber who in turn sold it to the Rushing Creek Mercantile Company.

“A chap by the name of Roscoe R. Hansom is the proprietor of the Rushing Creek Mercantile Company. The revolver was sold about a month ago to a man who signed the gun register as Ross P. Hollister.”

Mason said, “That’s interesting.”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Drake went on.

“No?” Mason asked, settling himself back in his swivel chair. “What’s the other half, Paul?”

Drake said, “I got that information last night. You remember you were in a hurry, and I had a man from Santa del Barra drive up to Rushing Creek. He managed to get Hansom out of bed and talked him into going down to the store and looking at the records. Of course you were in a hurry to get the information, and — well, that’s the way it is. When you want things in a hurry, you want them.”

“Right you are,” Mason said, grinning. “No use dilly-dallying around. So you got the information. Thanks a lot, Paul. That’s good work.”

“And,” Drake went on, “naturally the fact that we were in such a hurry for the information impressed Mr. Hansom.”

“Well, naturally,” Mason said. “However, I fail to see what connection that has with the matter. If he wants to live out in the country and go to bed with the cows and chickens he’ll have to realize that we can’t gear ourselves to his schedule.”

“Oh, sure, sure,” Drake said, “but I just thought you should know.”

“Why, Paul?”

“Because,” Drake said, “when the body of Hartwell L. Pitkin was found, the gun with which he had either shot himself, or had been shot, was lying by his right hand. Someone who had a nice little emery wheel had ground every number off the gun, the number on the tang, the number on the inside of the cylinder mechanism, the numbers that are on the little concealed places, everywhere.”

“Well, well,” Mason said, his voice showing relief. “Then they couldn’t trace the gun, Paul?”

Drake kept his eyes averted. “But the guy who had filed off the numbers didn’t know too much about guns. On that model of gun, the Smith and Wesson, the number of the gun is also stamped on the inside of the wooden grip. You have to take a screw driver and remove one of the wooden grips to see it.”

“Go on,” Mason said.

“The police did that. They found the number. It was S65088.

“Of course, the police got busy and started tracing the number. When they got Roscoe Hansom out of bed for the second time to find out about the sale of the gun, naturally Hansom wanted to know if it had become a habit, and...”

“The devil!” Mason said, straightening himself abruptly in his swivel chair, and frowning.

“Exactly,” Drake said. “Of course, Hansom didn’t know the name of my operative from Santa del Barra, but he has a pretty good description and putting two and two together, the police are apt to make four at any moment. When they do, you’re going to have some explaining to do.

“Now, then,” Drake went on, still avoiding Mason’s eyes, “there are two or three other things you should know about.”

“Okay, Paul,” Mason said, his voice sharp with anxiety, “let’s hear them. Spill em fast. I may have to start moving.”

Drake said, “Naturally, the police wondered why no one had heard the sound of the shot. Quite evidently the shot had been fired there in the garage. The nature and extent of the hemorrhage shows the man dropped almost immediately when the shot entered his brain.”

“Go ahead, Paul.”

“They made inquiry around and found that one of the automobiles was doing a lot of skipping, backfiring, and banging. It caused some annoyance on the part of the occupant of the building across the alley. He looked out of the window. It was beginning to get dark, but he saw a man and a woman standing in front of the garage at 208. The man was a tall, distinguished-looking gentleman with a light topcoat. The woman was wearing a plaid coat, had a dark hat. They were opening the door of the garage. They had some conversation and then the motor was shut off and they walked away and left the car there. The car had been making a terrific noise from a series of backfires, and police think the shot must have been fired at about that time. If that’s true, of course, that would make it murder. A man would hardly have committed suicide in the presence of two witnesses; and if he had, and the witnesses didn’t report it — well, you can see the police reasoning.”

“Go ahead,” Mason said.

“Now then,” Drake went on, “when the police answered Lucille Barton’s call, they found she was wearing a plaid coat and a black hat. On the strength of those garments, the witness now makes an identification of Lucille Barton as being the woman he saw. Lucille denies that she was anywhere near the garage at that time.”

“What time?”

“Somewhere around six o’clock. The witness isn’t positive as to the time.”

“What about the man?” Mason asked.

Drake said, “So far, they have only a general description of the man, but when police fingerprinted the gun they found a print on the inside of the gun where someone had probably been holding it while he tried to remove the numbers, or it could have been in ejecting shells. They think it’s the print of a man’s right index finger. It’s a pretty good print.”

“I see,” Mason said.

Drake said, “By pulling a lot of wires with the newspaper boys I was able to get a photographic copy of that print.”

He reached in his pocket, pulled out a wallet, took out a small photograph of a fingerprint, handed it to Mason, and said, “That’s enlarged about three times, Perry.”

“Any other fingerprints?”

“No. The outside of the gun had been wiped clean of fingerprints, but apparently the person who had been handling it forgot to remove the fingerprint on the inside.”

“I see. Anything else?”

“Some other stuff,” Drake said, “but I don’t know what it is. The police are suspicious about the whole setup. They’re particularly suspicious about Lucille Barton. She was out with a girl friend named Anita Jordon. Anita knows Lucille, and she knew Hartwell Pitkin. She gives Lucille an alibi, but for some reason she isn’t too happy about it. Police have an idea she’s going to weaken on her alibi before they get done with her.”

“A lot of commotion,” Mason said, “over the mere finding of a body under circumstances which would indicate suicide.”

“The trouble is,” Drake said, “that when they went through the pockets they found around five thousand dollars in nice crisp currency. There was a package of hundred-dollar bills which still had the sticker from the bank wrapped around them, and the initials of a cashier. The police traced that money and found it had been drawn out a few days ago by a Mr. Dudley Gates. Dudley Gates is a business associate of the Stephen Argyle who employed Pitkin as his chauffeur. He’s also a friend of this Ross P. Hollister, who seems to have bought the gun and then gone out on a business trip and neglected to communicate with any of his friends telling them where he’d be. Dudley Gates apparently accompanied Hollister.”

Mason pinched out his cigarette, drummed nervously on the edge of the desk.

“That’s probably all right, Paul. I happen to know something about Ross Hollister. He’s a sharpshooter who handles oil leases and investments of that sort. He’s on a business trip and he’ll communicate with his friends by mail. His girl friend doesn’t have a telephone so he usually drops her a line as soon as he gets located, or sends her a telegram and lets her know where his is.”

Drake said, “Well, I got a little stuff on Hollister. He lives at Santa del Barra, divorced, decree not final for a couple of months yet. Has a nice place there, a housekeeper comes in by the day. She comes early to get breakfast, goes home at four-thirty. Hollister was there Monday when she left at four-thirty, but was expecting to leave at six that night. She hasn’t seen him since. His business trips usually take about ten days. She never hears from him while he’s gone. That oil lease business is secretive.”

“And Dudley Gates is with Hollister?”

“That’s right. Argyle, Gates and Hollister are partners of a sort. Hollister is the big shot. The other two guys are yes men.”

“It’s all tied in with that damn apartment of Lucille Barton’s,” Mason said.

Drake said, “Well, that’s the general situation. Of course, finding all that money on a corpse is bound to attract attention, and naturally police are going to wonder about the cash transaction between Dudley Gates and Hartwell Pitkin.”

“And police are interviewing Stephen Argyle?”

“Yes, they got Argyle up out of bed early this morning and started talking with him. Argyle says the last time he saw his chauffeur was out here in front of your office. He says he had driven to your office to see you and left his car outside. Then when he realized you weren’t in the office, and weren’t apt to come in within the next few minutes, he went down and told the chauffeur to take the car and drive it back to the house, put it in the garage, and then Pitkin could have the night off.”

“Well?” Mason asked.

“Apparently Pitkin did just that. He must have driven the car out to the house and put it in the garage. It was there this morning when Argyle went out to look for it after the police had got him out of bed. By the police time schedule that would have put Pitkin back in Lucille’s garage at just about the time the witness heard the car doing all the backfiring. The man must have been talked into entering that garage — and he was killed as soon as he walked in.”

Drake got up out of the chair. “Keep that photograph of the fingerprint if you want, Perry. I’ll let you know about new developments.”

“Thanks, Paul.”

Drake said, “So long, Della.”

“So long, Paul.”

The detective left the office. Mason glanced at Della Street, said, “Hand me that ink pad from the rubber stamp outfit, will you, Della?”

She wordlessly placed it on the desk. Mason pressed his right index finger on the pad, then on a blank sheet of paper.

Della Street came to look over his shoulder and compare his fingerprint with the photograph of the fingerprint police had found on the gun which had been responsible for the death of Hartwell Pitkin.

“Good Lord, chief,” Della Street gasped, her fingers digging into his arm.

“Take it easy, Della,” Mason said. He pushed back his chair, walked over to the washstand, carefully soaped his hands, and removed all traces of the ink. “And I thought the guy who was masterminding this business was crude!”

Della Street picked up the inked impression of Mason’s fingerprint, struck a match, burned the paper, and then crumpled the ashes in the ash tray.

“Where does all this leave you, chief?” she asked.

“Right behind the eight ball,” Mason told her thoughtfully. “But that doesn’t mean I have to stay there.”