The Case of the Crooked Candle

Chapter 3

The West Narlian Avenue address was an apartment house of the better class. Evidently an attempt had been made to create an atmosphere of exclusive dignity, and the man at the desk in the lobby seemed to be at some pains to impress upon Perry Mason the fact that it was only owing to the labor shortage that the services of the switchboard operator had been discontinued.

“Mr. Fred Milfield,” he repeated after Mason. “And your name, please?”

“Mason.”

“He is expecting you, Mr. Mason?”

“No.”

“Just a moment, please — we’ve, had so much trouble keeping switchboard operators that we’re having to get along as best we can. Excuse me a moment, please.”

He moved over to a secretarial chair in front of the switchboard, plugged in a line and spoke into a shielded mouthpiece so that it was impossible for Mason to hear what he said.

After a few moments he turned back to Mason and said, “Mr. Milfield isn’t in. He isn’t expected until late this evening.”

“Mrs. Milfield there?” Mason asked carelessly.

The man turned once more to the telephone, then, after a brief conversation, turned back again. “She doesn’t place you, Mr. Mason.”

Mason said, “Tell her I called to discuss the Karakul sheep business.”

The clerk seemed mystified, but passed on the message. “She’ll see you. It’s apartment Fourteen B. You may go right up.”

A Negro in blue livery with a touch of gold braid operated the elevator with the unsure manner that indicated that he was a beginner.

The elevator stopped a good three inches short of the floor, then as the boy tried to compensate for that error, he overshot the mark by some five inches, dropped the cage back so that it was in a worse position than when he had started, grinned, brought it up to within a couple of inches of the floor and opened the door.

“Watch your step,” he cautioned.

“You may have something there,” Mason told him, and walked out of the cage and down the corridor while the perplexed lad in the elevator was puzzling over his comment.

Mason pushed on the button at Fourteen B, and a few seconds later the door was opened by a woman somewhere in the thirties. She had watched her figure, she had a well-groomed appearance, and her face showed alert awareness of life, but there was a peculiarly puffy look about the eyes.

“Yes?” she asked, standing in the doorway. “You wanted to ask me something about Karakul fur?”

“Yes.”

“Can’t you tell me what it is, please? My husband isn’t here at the moment.”

Mason, once more glanced up and down the corridor.

“I’ll go down to the lobby with you,” Mrs. Milfield said with cool detachment; then hesitated, apparently thinking of something which made her change her mind. “Oh well, perhaps you’d better come in.”

Mason followed her into a well-furnished apartment. Momentarily, she turned so that the light from a south window struck her face, and Mason saw the peculiar appearance of her eyes was due to the fact that she had been crying. The swollen appearance around the lids and underneath the eyes was unmistakable. This had been no sudden burst of tears over some petty annoyance, but had been a long drawn-out crying spell.

She seemed conscious at once of Mason’s deduction, and promptly seated herself with her back to the window. Indicating a chair which faced her, she said to Mason, “Won’t you sit down?”

Mason sat down facing the light. He took a cardcase from his pocket. “I’m an attorney.”

She took the card he handed her. “Oh yes, I’ve heard of you. I thought you handled murder cases.”

“All sorts of trial work,” he told her. “My office, carries on a general practice.”

“And may I ask why you’re interesting yourself in Karakul sheep?”

Mason said. “I have a client who wants money.”

She smiled. “Don’t all clients want money?”

“Most of them do. This one really needs it. I’m going to get it for her.”

“That’s nice of you. Does it concern my husband?”

“It concerns his Karakul sheep business.”

“Can you be more specific?”

“My client’s name is Kingman, Adelaide Kingman.”

“I’m afraid the name means nothing to me. You see I don’t know the details of my husband’s business.”

“It is very important that I see him at once.”

“I’m afraid he won’t be available until the first of the week, Mr. Mason.”

“Can you tell me how I can get in touch with him?”

“No. I’m afraid not.”

“Can you get in touch with him — immediately?”

She thought that over, then said, “Not immediately.”

Mason said. “As soon as you can reach him, tell him that I have a very sensitive nose and that I’ve been smelling around the Skinner Hills district, that what I smell doesn’t smell like karakul fur. Can you remember that?”

“Why — I guess so. What a strange message, Mr. Mason!”

“And tell him that if necessary I can have my client talk with her neighbors, but that it might be better if she didn’t — better for him. And remember to tell him the name is Adelaide Kingman.”

She smiled. “I’ll tell him.”

Mason said, “It’s important he understands my position and that he gets my message at once.”

“Very well.”

“You’ll try to see that he gets it?”

“Mr. Mason, you wouldn’t try to take advantage of me by reading my facial expressions, would you? I’m torn between a desire to be polite, and the urge to keep what is known as a poker face.”

She smiled at him and Mason saw that she had forgotten for the moment that her face showed the ravages of a crying spell.

Mason bowed, “I certainly wouldn’t even try to get you to betray your husband’s business secrets, Mrs. Milfield,” he assured her, “but I do want to impress upon your mind the necessity of getting my message to your husband at once.”

Abruptly she said, “Mr. Mason, I’m going to confide in you. I need you. I... I’m going to tell you something.” She paused, seemed to brace herself, inhaled a deep breath as one does who is starting a rush of words.

The ringing of the telephone bell froze the first of those words on her lips. She looked at the instrument with definite annoyance.

Her embarrassment was sufficiently evident so Mason couldn’t resist saying, “Perhaps that’s your husband now.”

She bit at her lip, moved uneasily in her chair. The telephone rang once more.

Mason sat quietly waiting, saying nothing, putting the next move definitely up to her.

Her hesitancy became the more marked as she quite apparently debated with herself whether it would be more awkward to accept what was very evidently an unwelcome call in Mason’s presence, or betray herself by refusing to answer the telephone while he was there.

Abruptly she snapped, “Excuse me,” and picked up the receiver. Her face, turned now so that the light shone on her profile, was a graven mask.

“Yes?” she asked in the carefully modulated voice of one who is guarding against betraying her thoughts by any vocal inflection.

Mason watched her face, saw it change into puzzled perplexity. “Why no, I don’t know a Mr. Tragg... Lieutenant Tragg. No I don’t... Oh, I see... Tell him my husband won’t be back until sometime late this evening... He does? I can’t... He is...? Oh!”

She dropped the receiver back into place, said angrily to Mason, “The nerve of the man! He’s on his way up here. I simply won’t answer the bell.”

“Wait a minute,” Mason said rapidly. “Do you know who Lieutenant Tragg is?”

“I suppose he’s some lonely soldier who...”

“Lieutenant Tragg,” Mason said, “is not a soldier. He’s a lieutenant of police. He’s from headquarters and connected with the homicide squad. I don’t know why you’ve been crying, Mrs. Milfield, but Lieutenant Tragg doesn’t mix around with petty crime. If you’re connected with a homicide, you’d better start thinking — and think fast!”

She turned to him and he saw the blank dismay in her eyes.

Mason regarded her steadily. “Whom do you know that’s been murdered?”

“Good heavens! No one, except perhaps my...”

“Go on,” Mason prompted as she checked herself in mid-sentence.

“No. No! No one.”

“You said ‘my’ and then stopped,” Mason reminded her. “That possessive pronoun is a giveaway. Were you going to say ‘my husband’?”

“Heavens no! Whatever gave you that idea? What are you trying to do — put words in my mouth?”

“Why have you been crying?” Mason asked.

“Who said I’d been crying?”

“Look. We haven’t all day to talk things over. Incidentally, if anything has happened to your husband, and Tragg should find me here, it would put you in a spot. You’d never be able to explain to him that I hadn’t called on you at your request. Is there a back way out?”

“No.”

“Got any onions in the house?”

Her eyes widened with perplexity, “Onions! What do onions have to do with it?”

Mason said, “I’m going to duck into the pantry. Don’t tell Tragg I’m here. Don’t let him know you know me. Put some onions in the sink. Put on an apron. When he rings the bell, go to the door with a knife in your hand, and tell him you were just peeling some onions — that is, if you want to save yourself a lot of trouble. That’s just a gratuitous tip from a casual acquaintance. You...”

The buzzer on the doorbell sounded explosively.

Mason picked up his hat, grabbed Mrs. Milfield around the waist, rushed her back to the kitchen. “Where’s an apron?”

“Hanging up — there.”

Mason put the loop of the apron over her head, hastily knotted it behind her waist.

“Get the onions. It’s the only way you can account for those, swollen eyes.”

She opened a bin, and Mason dumped onions into the sink.

The buzzer sounded again — a prolonged, harsh, strident summons.

Mason pulled open a drawer, found kitchen knives, took one out, sliced an onion in half, grabbed Mrs. Milfield’s right hand, smeared onion on it, said, “All right, I go to the door. Be careful what you say. Remember to tell him you were just fixing onions, and above all, don’t say anything about my having been here. Good luck!”

Mason patted her shoulder, gave her a gentle push toward the door, just as Lieutenant Tragg rang the bell for the third time.

Mason moved silently across the kitchen, opened the door of the pantry, found a stool and settled himself as comfortably as he could.

He heard the front door open, heard the sound of voices in the first tentative preliminaries of conversation, heard the door close and the voices become louder and the words more rapid. He couldn’t distinguish their words, but he could hear the rumble of Lieutenant Tragg’s voice, and the higher pitched notes of Mrs. Milfield’s answers.

Abruptly Mason heard Mrs. Milfield give a half suppressed scream; then there were several moments of silence — a silence which was eventually broken once more by the insistent murmur of Lieutenant Tragg’s voice.

After that, the conversation was lowered, finally died away altogether.

Mason impatiently glanced at his wrist watch, opened the pantry door an inch and listened.

He could hear people moving around in the front room. He heard a door open and close, and then once more the sound of Tragg’s voice. He was asking some question about shoes.

Mason gently closed the pantry door, went back to his position on the stool, let his eyes rove around in an appraisal of the food on the pantry shelves, and eventually yielded to the temptation of a carton of crisp soda crackers.

The lawyer raised the lid, thrust in his hand and, locking his heels in the rungs of the stool, started munching soda crackers.

A few moments later he spied a jar of peanut butter. He spread the creamy, golden mixture on crackers with his pocket knife, and was fairly well covered with crumbs by the time the pantry door was jerked open.

Mason didn’t glance up until he had finished spreading peanut butter on the soda cracker he was holding.

Lieutenant Tragg said, “It’s okay, Mason. You can come out now.”

“Thanks,” Mason said nonchalantly, “I’ve been wanting a glass of milk.”

“It’s in the icebox,” Mrs. Milfield said. “I’ll get it for you.” Her voice, was syrup smooth.

Tragg looked Mason over and suddenly burst out laughing. “What,” he asked, “was the idea?”

Mason said, “I was just giving you a break, Lieutenant.”

“Giving me a break!” Tragg exclaimed.

“That’s right.”

“I don’t get you.”

Mason said, “I was calling on Mrs. Milfield in connection with a matter of business. I didn’t know what your business was, but I realized that if you found me here, it would put her in an embarrassing position and start you off on a wrong scent. So I decided to keep out of the way until after you had left.”

Mrs. Milfield said, “Here’s the milk, Mr. Mason.”

Mason took the quart bottle of milk over to the drain board of the sink. Mrs. Milfield gave him a glass. Mason poured out a glass of milk and grinned at Lieutenant Tragg over the rim.

“Here’s looking at you, Lieutenant.”

Tragg said, “You didn’t think you were really going to slip this on over on me, did you, Mason?”

Mason, his mouth full of crackers, managed to enunciate clearly enough to be understood. “Certainly not. I was merely trying to keep you from slipping one over on yourself. Who’s the victim this time, Lieutenant?”

“What makes you think there is a victim?”

“Isn’t this a professional call?”

“Let’s talk about your call, first.”

Mason grinned. “I have nothing to conceal. I just dropped in for lunch.”

Tragg said irritably, “This isn’t getting us anywhere, Mason.”

“It’s getting me a darn good lunch. Very nice peanut butter, Mrs. Milfield. Permit me to compliment you on it.”

“Thank you.”

Tragg said, “All right, wise guy. Mrs. Milfield’s husband has been murdered.”

“Too bad,” Mason mumbled, his mouth full of cracker.

“I don’t suppose you know anything about it,” Tragg said.

“Only what you’ve told me.”

Tragg looked at the onions in the sink.

“These the onions you were peeling?” he asked Mrs. Milfield.

“Yes.”

“Where are the peeled ones?”

“I... I had just started when you rang the doorbell.”

Tragg said, “Humph!” and after a moment shot Mason a suspicious glance.

“Where was her husband murdered?” Mason asked conversationally, taking two or three swallows of milk.

Tragg grinned. “By a technicality, Mason, it’s within the city limits of Los Angeles.”

“Makes it nice,” Mason observed. “Gives you something to do. Who did it?”

“We don’t know.”

“Sounds interesting,” Mason commented.

Tragg said nothing.

“How did you know I was here?” Mason asked abruptly.

“I told him you were,” Mrs. Milfield said.

“Why?” Mason asked, pouring himself another glass of milk.

Tragg said, “You’re making me hungry, Mason.”

“Help yourself,” Mason told him cordially. “It’s one of the police prerogatives, you know. Why did you tell him, Mrs. Milfield?”

“I thought I’d better, after I found out what it was all about. I didn’t want to be placed in a false light.”

“Certainly not,” Mason observed, washing his hands at the tap in the kitchen sink, and tearing off a paper towel from the roll above the drainboard.

“I explained to Lieutenant Tragg,” she went on. “That you were calling on me in connection with another matter — something that had to do with my husband’s business; and that when you heard Tragg was here, you thought it would be better if he didn’t find you.”

Tragg grinned. “You don’t need to coach him, Mrs. Milfield. He knows all the lines, even yours.”

Mason shook his head, dolefully. “I told you so, Mrs. Milfield. He doesn’t trust me. Well. I’ll be on my way. I’m sorry about your husband. I don’t suppose Lieutenant Tragg gave you any particulars?”

She said, “Why yes. He gave me all the details. It seems that...”

“Hold it!” Tragg interrupted sharply. “What I told you wasn’t to be passed on.”

She lapsed into silence.

Tragg moved over to look at the onions in the sink. He was frowning thoughtfully.

Mason said, “Well. I’m on my way. My sincere sympathies, Mrs. Milfield.”

“Thank you.” She turned to Lieutenant Tragg. “That,” she said, “is everything I know. I’ve told you frankly the entire situation.”

Tragg, still regarding the onions in the sink, said, “I’m glad you did. It always pays to be absolutely frank with the police.”

She was talking quickly now, apparently giving him her fullest confidence. “It was,” she explained, “Mr. Mason’s idea that you shouldn’t find him here. I, of course, didn’t have any idea why you were coming. I’m terribly shocked to hear about Fred, but after all, I felt that I should tell you just exactly...”

Mason said, “Here’s where I came in.”

Tragg regarded him thoughtfully. “You mean here’s where you go out.”

In the doorway, Mason turned and smiled. “It amounts to the same thing as far as I’m concerned, Lieutenant.”