The Case of the Fan-Dancer's Horse

Chapter number 2

It was in his office the next day that Della Street reminded Perry Mason of the auto accident. As she handed him a sheaf of letters, she said, “That automobile accident, Chief. You telephoned the police at El Centro last night. They were going to notify you.”

Mason said, “Get them on the phone, Della. We can’t have fan-dancers running around naked.”

Della Street laughed, put the call through, and nodded to Mason when his party was on the line.

Mason picked up the receiver, said, “Hello. This is Perry Mason. I left a memo there yesterday about being called in connection with an automobile accident. I have some property which was taken from a car that was crowded off the road. There was a woman with a broken arm. You were going to get her address and call me back.”

“Oh, yes,” the man said. “I have the memo on my desk, but I didn’t call you back because there’s been no report of an accident.”

“No report made by anyone?”

“No.”

“That’s strange. The accident took place two or three miles north of Calexico.”

“There’s a car overturned by the side of the road down there. We investigated and found out the car belonged to a Ramon Calles, who lives in Calexico. He says the car was stolen a couple of days ago.”

“Did he report it to the police at the time?” Mason asked.

“No, there’s no record of it. He doesn’t seem particularly interested. There’ll be a repair bill on the car and the cost of towing it to a garage. Calles doesn’t seem to think the car is worth that much. You know how these people are. It’s pretty hard to get anything out of them when they want to be evasive. They just go around in circles with you in the center. You can’t ever get any nearer to what you’re trying to find out. Of course, there’s nothing much we can do about it. Were you a witness to the accident?”

“I saw it,” Mason said. “A big sedan sideswiped the car and sent it off the road out of control. An old woman was driving this jalopy. Apparently she talked very little English, if any. I would say she was around sixty-five to seventy, with white hair and a rather lined face.”

“You can’t tell much about these people. Did she give her name?”

“Maria Gonzales.”

“Could you identify her if you saw her again?”

“Certainly.”

“Of course,” the man at the other end of the line said, resignedly, “if we get her and you identify her, then Calles will change his mind about the car being stolen. The driver will turn out to be his grandmother, or his Aunt Mary, or someone and she took the car without telling him about it and it’s all right and that’ll be that. However, we’ll look into it.”

“My interest,” Mason said, “is in returning some property that was in the back of the car.”

“Okay, we’ll let you know. And you might put an ad in the local paper — about the property.”

Mason hung up, said to Della Street, “Know anything about fan-dancing, Della?”

“Were you suggesting I take up the profession?”

“Why not?” Mason asked. “We seem to have been left with a complete wardrobe.”

“No information down there?”

“Not a scrap. The car that was crowded off the highway is supposed to have been stolen. I don’t know who would want to steal a car like that. Ring up the newspaper down in the Valley, Della, and put an ad in the lost-and-found. Make it in general terms. ‘If the fan-dancer who has lost certain property will communicate with box so-and-so, she can have her property restored to her.’ Then have the newspaper forward any replies to the office here. Okay, let’s look at that mail.”