The Case of the Fan-Dancer's Horse

Chapter number 11

Mason had been with Paul Drake for less than ten minutes when Della Street invaded Drake’s private office.

“Guess what?” she said.

“Another horse,” Drake said gloomily.

Della shook her head, smiled at Mason. “Another fan-dancer. Lois Fenton. I think this one is the real thing.”

Mason scraped back his chair. “See you later, Paul.” He started down the corridor with Della Street. “How’s she dressed, Della?”

“In exactly identical clothes, has almost exactly the same color hair, and looks very much like the other girl.”

“How about Gertie?” Mason asked, grinning.

“Gertie is having kittens. She thought at first it was Cherie Chi-Chi back in the office. Now she’s talking about going on a diet and she’s trying to walk seductively, the way the fan-dancers do.”

“Let’s have a look at her,” Mason said, opening the door of his private office.

Della Street crossed over to the telephone, said, “Send her in, Gertie.” She hung up the phone and opened a stenographic notebook.

The young woman whom Gertie escorted into the room crossed the office toward Perry Mason and gave him her hand, almost exactly as Cherie Chi-Chi had done.

Mason, on his feet, bowed, shook hands, and said, “My secretary, Miss Street. That’s all, Gertie.”

With obvious reluctance and a sigh which could be heard across the office, Gertie slowly closed the door and went back to the switchboard and the reception office.

“Won’t you be seated, Miss Fenton? Miss Street is my confidential secretary who keeps things lined up for me and I have no secrets from her. She makes notes on the things clients tell me, but you can trust her discretion.”

Lois Fenton sat down, found that the big leather chair made it impossible for her to keep her short skirt anywhere near the level of her knees, so she twisted to one side, doubled her legs with a swift, lithe gesture, and said to Perry Mason, “I understand Arthur Sheldon spoke to you about me?”

“Yes?”

“He said that I was to come to you and that you’d take care of me in case the going got rough.”

“And it’s getting rough?”

“You heard about what happened to John Callender?”

“Yes.”

“You knew he was my husband?”

“I heard he was.”

She said, “I was preparing to file suit for divorce. What difference does that make?”

“No difference. You’re his widow. If he left a will disinheriting you, that’s one thing, except for your community property. If he didn’t, you’re entitled to a share of his whole estate.”

“I don’t care about the money, only I’m thinking about — about my brother, Jasper Fenton.”

“Of course,” Mason pointed out, “the fact that there was bad blood between you and your husband makes quite a difference so far as the police are concerned.”

“You mean they’ll think I killed him?”

“Perhaps.”

“Does that mean probably?”

“Yes.”

“Perhaps you’d better ask me questions.”

“Suppose you tell me exactly what happened last night, Miss Fenton, and then I’ll be in a position to know more about it.”

“You knew that I was in Arthur’s room when you called?”

“Yes.”

“How did you know?”

“I found cleansing tissues you had left in the waste-basket.”

“I was in the bathroom. I could hear what was being said. I kept waiting for Arthur to say something about my being there. He didn’t. I was terribly nervous. When you knocked, I thought it might be my husband. I rushed to the bathroom and locked the door. Then when I found it was you I was almost hysterical. I... anyway, I had a good cry there in the bathroom. When you left and I returned to Arthur’s room I knew that my face was a sight.”

“What did Arthur say?”

“He said I must get out of there immediately; that I was to phone him and let him know I’d made it all right.”

“What did you do?”

“I stood there in front of the mirror making up my face as best I could, and told him that I couldn’t go down through the lobby looking like that; that the house detective would think I was the fag end of a misspent life.”

“Then what happened?”

“I knew that John Callender had a room directly across the corridor. I knew that he had sent for my brother Jasper. I knew that he was trying to blackmail Jasper and trying to reach me through my brother.”

“Go ahead.”

“Well, I left Arthur’s room, closed his door, looked across at the door of 511 and suddenly realized that if I could definitely impress upon John that no matter what he did he could never get me back, he might cease his persecution of Jasper. It was one of those wild impulses that come to a woman at times and...”

“Never mind accounting for what you did,” Mason said. “Tell me what you did. Give me facts — and be quick. Time may be short.”

She said, “I crossed over to 511. I knocked very gently. John opened the door. I went in and had it out with him. I told him that if he tried to make any trouble for Jasper I would never speak to him again as long as I lived. I told him that the time had passed when he could get me to come back to him by blackmailing Jasper; that I was finished with him definitely, finally, once and for all.”

“Then what did you do?”

“I walked out of the room. Very sardonically, he held the door open for me. I think he might have tried to stop me leaving, only a maid happened to come along the corridor just then, so he said, ‘I guess it’s good-by then.’ I didn’t say anything, but started for the elevator. He closed the door, and all of a sudden I knew I was afraid of him. It looked like a long ways to the elevator. I remembered having seen a door marked stairs only a short distance from his room. I turned back, frantically tugged that door open and raced down the stairs.

“I ran all the way down the stairs to the fourth floor, then down to the third and second. Then the stairs ran into the mezzanine balcony around the lobby. There was a writing room there and I moved over to one of the tables as though I’d been writing, picked up a sheet of paper, folded it, put it in an envelope, walked down the stairs big as life, pushed the envelope into the mail box and walked out.”

“Then what did you do?”

She said, “I tried to find my brother.”

“Where did you go trying to find your brother?”

“Various places. I looked into some night spots where I thought he might be.”

Mason said, “Now I want an answer to this and I want a truthful answer. I want it without any beating around the bush. Did you return to the hotel at any time after that?”

“You mean the Richmell?”

“Yes.”

“No. Definitely not.”

“You didn’t return to call on Callender at about twenty minutes past two?”

“No.”

Mason got to his feet, began pacing the floor, paused, whirled, shot a question at her. “You didn’t return to that hotel lobby about two-twenty, didn’t start for the elevator, didn’t have someone stop you?”

She shook her head.

“This man was the house detective. He asked you where you were going and you told him you were going to call on a guest; he demanded to know which guest and you finally told him John Callender.”

“No. Definitely not. Nothing like that.”

“You didn’t go to the telephone with the house detective, have the house detective call Callender’s room, have Callender answer, have the house detective put the phone in your hands, have you tell Callender you were there in the lobby and have him tell you to come on up?”

“Definitely not.”

“At any time when you called on Callender did you carry a violin case?”

“No.”

“Do you own a violin?”

“Yes.”

“Have a case for it?”

“Yes.”

“Where is that case?”

“It’s with my personal things in the back of my car. You see, when I left John I was in something of a hurry and made up my mind that I’d go out and make my own living. I took what few things I had, my own really personal belongings, put them in the back of my old car and had my brother Jasper take that car to town. I rode my horse in. I knew the Valley Club at Brawley needed entertainers. I went there and got a job.”

“And while you were there your horse was stolen?”

“Either strayed or stolen. I always thought it was stolen. I had him saddled and bridled. I’d been riding him. It was along about dusk. You know, it’s hot down there and you don’t ride an animal during the middle of the day. You go out in the evening. I’d been riding him just before it was time for me to trot to work and when I finished it was touch and go as to whether I’d make it in time to come on for my first act. I climbed out of the saddle and asked the man who was boarding the horse to wait a couple of hours before taking off the saddle and bridle.”

“Why?”

“Because, for one thing, the horse was sweaty and I didn’t want him to get to water until after he’d cooled off, and then again I thought my brother might want to take a ride.”

“Had he asked you if he could ride the horse that night?”

“Yes. There was a moon and he knew, of course, I had to be working there at the night club.”

“So what happened?”

“I never saw the horse again. When I went out the next morning and asked the man if he’d taken off the saddle and bridle, he said no. He said he presumed my brother had taken the horse out for a ride and hadn’t brought him back. I knew, of course, that was absurd. I found jasper and asked him about it. He said that he went out to ride but the horse was gone. He presumed the man had unsaddled him, so Jasper just turned around and went back.”

“Did you tie the horse up?”

“No. Just dropped the reins over the hitching rack. It never occurred to me that he’d wander away.”

“And you think he did?”

“Frankly, Mr. Mason, I think the horse was stolen. There was opportunity for almost anyone to walk in there and lead the horse out if he had nerve enough.”

“All right,” Mason said. “That brings us back to your act in the Imperial Valley. What did you do after you left Brawley?”

She said, “That’s a long story.”

“I want it.”

“From the first day I started out to be a fan-dancer, I made a hit. There’s something about the way I put on my act. I try to be graceful and try to make the act a symbol of grace and freedom. I don’t just prance around naked the way so many fan-dancers do. I try to really do something interpretive. You’ll laugh, but I do. I’m free of clothes, free of conventions. People don’t like always being a slave to conventions and... oh well, you can’t put it in words.

“There was a girl who was built almost exactly the same as I, who wanted to become a fan-dancer. I’d known her in the carnival. She’d been one of the show girls. That’s a pretty poor life for a girl. They have to take a lot of things — bumps and grinds, and blow-offs. Of course, lots of places don’t stand for that, but if you’re a show girl in a carnival you have to be prepared to... well, I guess it depends on the carnival. But anyway, nothing made this girl car sick. She rode right along. But she naturally wanted to get ahead. This other girl, Irene Kilby, came to me when I got married, said that I had made a reputation for myself and was well booked up; that there was no need of just canceling those dates. Why couldn’t she take my name and go ahead and take over the bookings that I had? She’d use the name of Lois Fenton, but the stage name of Cherie Chi-Chi, and would get people to refer to her as Cherie Chi-Chi just as quickly as possible, and then gradually leave my name out of it.”

“And you consented?”

“I got big-hearted and told her to go ahead.”

“Anything in writing?”

“Yes. That was where I was foolish. I gave her a letter saying she could use my name and my bookings until I wanted them again; but at any time I wanted them I could have them back. We both signed it, but I didn’t keep a copy. She has the letter. My husband was a witness to it. When he signed his name as a witness, he said that would protect me because he knew the terms.”

“What happened when you left Brawley?”

“I saw no reason for going back and having to carve out my own career all over again. I rang up Mr. Barlow and told him I’d lost my booking schedule somehow, and asked him to please read it to me over the telephone. He read it to me and I wrote it down. Then I sent Irene a wire at the place where she was supposed to be, telling her that she’d have to be on her own from now on because I was taking over the next date.”

“And what did she do?”

“Wired back that she’d used up all of the bookings I had when I left to get married, and that what she had now belonged to her and were for the most part in the name of Cherie Chi-Chi, and I could go get myself other bookings. She knew I didn’t have any copy of that letter I’d signed and my husband wouldn’t lift a finger to help me. He wanted me to make a flop. He’d even given her my favorite fans.”

“What did you do?”

“I decided I’d fool her. As a matter of fact, Irene is no great shakes as a fan-dancer. She simply takes her clothes off and wiggles things around. She uses the fans as an afterthought and tries to make herself just as voluptuous as possible. That goes all right with a certain type of audience, but you have to remember that quite a few people in these night clubs are respectable; that is, they’re putting on an act of respectability because they have their wives or girl friends with them, and they don’t want to see anything that’s too suggestive. So I made up my mind I’d simply move in on the next date, get there before Irene did and put on one of my shows. Then when Irene showed up and claimed she was the one who was entitled to the date, I’d let her go out in front of the audience and let the manager choose between us. I knew there’d be nothing to it after that.”

“But you didn’t do that?”

“Irene beat me to it. She was up in Palomino before I could get there. Her quote boy friend unquote, Harry, had fixed things for her. So, I decided to let her play that date out. I intended to go to the next place before I was billed, tell the manager that I’d finished up my other date early, and offer to go on as an extra attraction for a couple of nights if he’d pay me half price, or something like that.”

“After you left Callender in the Richmell Hotel,” Mason asked, “could you by any chance dig up an alibi for yourself?”

She shook her head.

Mason said, “I’ve got to keep you out of circulation for a while, Lois.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re hotter than a stove lid. The police will be looking for you by this time. They’ll have covered the hotel registers, they’ll have broadcast a description and every radio car in the city will be after you.”

“It’s a big city,” Lois Fenton said.

“It’s a big city, but you’re just about as inconspicuous as a mermaid trying to get on a street car. You have other clothes?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“At the hotel where I’m stopping.”

“Registered under your own name?”

“Yes.”

Mason shook his head and said, “That’s out. You have your car. Any clothes in it?”

“No. There’s some junk stuff in the trunk but no clothes.”

Mason, pacing the floor, said, “I can’t afford to let you go back to your hotel. I can’t afford to make it seem that you’re running away from anything. They can prove flight as an indication of guilt. Flight would be the worst thing that could possibly happen... I’ve got it! I’ll take you to a place where the police won’t find you, yet a place that is so logical that you would naturally be expected to go there in a hurry and without going back to the hotel to get a change of clothes.”

“There isn’t any such place,” she said.

“Yes there is,” Mason told her. “You’re going to see your horse. We’ve located it in the Imperial Valley. I’m having it brought in.”

Her face lit up. “Oh, that’s marvelous! Tell me, Mr. Mason, is he hurt?”

“No. He seems to be all right except for a scratch. There’s a bullet in the cantle of the saddle.”

She said, bitterly, “That’s one of John’s frame-ups — the way he handles things. It’s typical. It’s part of some scheme. I don’t think anyone tried to rob the place at all, and...”

“Never mind that,” Mason said. “John’s dead. The point is that you’re very much attached to this horse, this... What’s his name?”

“Starlight.”

“All right. You’re very much attached to Starlight. You come to my office. You learn that Starlight has been found; that he’s being brought in to some stables on the outskirts of town. You also learn that he’s slightly hurt. There’s a scratch along the rump, perhaps where a bullet creased the skin. It’s only natural that you insist on dropping everything and rushing out to see the horse. After you see the horse, you’ll be worried about him and be afraid that perhaps someone will try to steal him again. You’ll want to stay with him. You should be a pretty good actress.”

“What does that have to do with it?”

“Hell’s bells,” Mason said, “I’ve given you the plot. Do I have to write your lines?”