The Case of the Haunted Husband

Chapter 16

Mason paced the floor of his office, thumbs pushed up in the armholes of his vest, head thrust forward in thought. Paul Drake, sprawled crosswise in the big leather chair, smoked silently.

“Hang it, Paul. It is so near being right, it almost proves itself, and then it all goes haywire, like one of those puzzles that you can almost work the obvious way. Then you run into trouble.”

“I know,” Drake grinned, “you think they made a mistake manufacturing the damn thing, and the wire should be bent a little bit so that other piece will slip through.”

“Uh-huh,” Mason said. “Only in the case of a wire puzzle, it is a trap that the manufacturer made for you to walk into. In this thing — well, I don’t know but what this is a trap someone made for me to walk into.”

Della Street came in from the secretarial office.

“Gosh, Della,” Drake said, “haven’t you gone home yet?”

She shook her head. “I was hoping someone would buy me dinner.”

“It is a swell idea,” Drake told her. “They might even buy mine while they were doing it.”

“News from the battle front,” Della said to Perry Mason. “Latest bulletin just in over the telephone.”

“What is it?”

“Hortense Zitkousky. She must be quite a gal.”

“I have an idea she is,” Mason said. “What about her?”

“She sounds as though she were getting just a bit high. She said it’s the first time she has had a chance to get away to the telephone. She is out with the chauffeur.”

“What has she found out?”

“The chauffeur isn’t the least bit worried about money. Homan fired him. The chauffeur’s spending dough like a drunken sailor. The automobile was driven seven hundred and thirty-two miles between the morning of the eighteenth and the time of the accident on the nineteenth.”

“How does he know?” Mason asked.

“He keeps a record of the speedometer figures. He has to service the car.”

Drake gave a low whistle.

“Was that all she had?” Mason asked.

“So far. She says to tell you she is not only getting to first base with the chauffeur, but is getting ready to steal second. She is trying to find out why he isn’t worried about money. And she thinks he may have something else on Homan.”

Mason said, “I hope she is smart enough to try and find out about Spinney. Homan may be right about that. It may have been the chauffeur who was calling Spinney, and whom Spinney was calling. Know anyone out around Hollywood, Della?”

“You mean movie people?”

“Yeah.”

“A couple of writers and an agent.”

“You might try the agent,” Mason said. “I would like to get some of the low-down on Homan and his meteoric success. There must be some gossip in connection with him. I would like to find out what it is. And I would like to get the low-down on his love life. That always helps.”

“I can put some men on the Job,” Drake said.

Mason shook his head. “A private detective in that atmosphere would stick out like a sore thumb on a waiter serving soup. The stuff I am after is the little inside gossip that would be confined to people who are in the game.”

Della said, “This agent is a card.”

“Man or woman?”

“Woman. Used to be a secretary, then did a little writing, and started handling screen stuff.”

“Stories or talent?”

“Stories.”

“Get in touch with her. See what you can find out,” Mason said. “Make it casual if you can.”

“I can’t.”

“Then take your hair down and get her to give you the low-down. How about meeting me in a couple of hours somewhere for a report? You should be able to get what we want in that time.”

“I will get on the phone and see what I can do.”

“Oh-oh,” Drake said, “there goes my dinner date.”

Della Street smiled. “You wouldn’t be any fun. You are getting to be a wet blanket, Paul. You are worrying too darn much. Why don’t you be like Homan’s chauffeur?”

“I used to worry about my work,” Drake admitted. “Now I am worrying Perry will get my license revoked. If I had no more to worry about than that chauffeur, I would be taking girls to dinner and spending money like a drunken sailor, too.”

Mason winked at Della Street. “Perhaps we could get that Hortense girl to take him out some night. It might cure him of worrying.”

“Meaning it may be the company I keep?” Drake asked.

Mason jerked his head toward Della Street’s office. “Go in and see if you can locate this agent friend of yours on the phone, Della. You can trust her?”

“Asking if she is a good friend?”

“Yes.”

“I shall say she is.”

“Well, come right out and tell her you want the low-down on Homan. After all, this case is in the papers. You couldn’t make a stall that would stick. She would see through any attempt.”

“Okay, I shall see if I can get her.”

Della Street went into her office. They could hear the dial on her telephone whirring.

Drake said to Mason, “Judge Cortright may turn Stephane Claire loose tomorrow. That Lions girl didn’t make a good impression on him... And I shall bet Tragg is interested in what we are uncovering. I wouldn’t doubt if he dropped in.

“Will you work with him, Perry?”

“It depends. I am going to get my client out from under. He can solve his own murders. Next time I give him a tip, he will follow it.”

“What tip did he muff this time?”

“Homan.”

“Be your age. Homan would have gone in to the big shot in his company, and said, ‘Mr. Whosis, I can’t work on that script, because this lawyer has put the police on me, and they are asking me questions about what I had for dinner last Wednesday.’ Then the big shot would pick up the telephone, call the Mayor. The Mayor would call the Chief. The Chief would call the Captain, and... you get the sketch.”

Mason smiled. “Homan has to be lying about that car.”

“Well, Tragg can’t dig down into the hopper, pull out your dirty linen, and...”

Della Street emerged from her office to say, “I have located her, Chief. She is in her office. Still want me to run out there?”

“Yes. Take my car. I will wait.”

“Here?”

“Uh-huh. Let’s eat when you get back.”

“Okay, I shall grab something to tide me over and meet you here.”

“You, Paul?” Mason asked the detective.

“No. Della says I am a wet blanket.”

“Snap out of it,” she said, smiling. “There is nothing the matter with you that four good cocktails won’t cure.”

Drake said, “I shall let you know later. I hate to turn down a chance to dance with Della.”

She laughed. “You hate to waste a chance to eat your way through a deluxe dinner. Be seeing you. When I come back, I shall have all the inside Hollywood gossip. Give this girl a couple of drinks, and she talks a blue streak.”

Drake said, “Watch her, Perry. She is getting ready to turn in an expense account consisting of a lot of bar cheques. I know the symptoms.”

“You should,” Della Street retorted, putting on her hat and coat in front of the mirror in the cloak closet. “It is a trick I learned from auditing your swindle sheets.” She drew on her gloves. “It will take about two hours, and if I draw a blank, don’t be too disappointed.”

“I won’t,” Mason said.

Mason and Drake listened to Della Street’s steps in the corridor of the deserted office building.

“One in a million,” Drake said.

“Make it ten million, Paul.”

They smoked in silence for several seconds. Steps approached the door. Mason frowned as knuckles beat an authoritative tattoo.

“Sounds like a cop,” Drake said.

“You don’t need to be a detective to tell that,” Mason remarked, opening the door.

Lieutenant Tragg said, “Hello, boys. Trying to make one thought grow where two grew before?”

Mason looked at his watch. “I shall bet it is bad news.”

Tragg walked in, and sat down.

“Things didn’t go so well for you in court today, Mason,” Tragg said.

“Oh, I don’t know. I am satisfied.”

Tragg said, “I have a murder on my hands. You have got an intoxicated-driver manslaughter case. That case is in the county. I don’t care a hell of a lot about it. The murder case is right down my alley. If I solve it, I get a pat on the back. If I don’t, I get a kick in the pants.”

Mason said, “I believe you are leading up to something.”

“I am.”

“Spring it.”

“How would you like to be working with us for a change instead of against us?”

Mason said, “I don’t know. For all I know you might be trying to pin the murder on my client before you got done.”

Tragg said, “Well, we can go into that right now.”

“What about it?”

“There are a couple of clues which point her way.”

Mason sat rigidly erect in his chair. “For the love of Mike, Tragg! All a person needs to do is to be a client of mine, and the police immediately...”

“Keep your hat on,” Tragg said. “I am giving you a break.”

“Go ahead. Give it to me.”

“Let us talk about your client a while first.”

“All right, what about her?”

“Her rich uncle showed up, plunked down a certified cheque for the bail, and took her out of the hospital where she was being held under detention and rushed her to the Adirondack Hotel. And where is the Adirondack Hotel with reference to the Gateview?”

Mason said, “Let’s see. From Seventh and... it’s four blocks.”

“That’s right. A person could walk those four blocks in less than five minutes.”

“Go ahead. I presume my client had the murder gun in her handbag when you searched it?”

“No, but she had something else.”

“What?”

“Well, you see she went to the hospital. It was a homicide and a county job, but they asked me to check on a couple of angles. I heard her story. She said she had taken a key out of the ignition switch on the automobile. I checked up with the garage to which the car had been towed. The ignition was locked. Naturally, I made an investigation of the girl’s purse.”

“Without her knowledge?”

“Oh, certainly.”

“Go ahead.”

“Well, there was a key ring with three keys on it. Now then, Mason, before I go any further, I want to know whether that was a plant.”

“I don’t get you.”

Tragg said, “Naturally, I wanted to know about those keys. One of them looked like the key to an automobile ignition. I thought it would be better to find out first and ask the questions afterward. So while your client was laid up in the hospital, I had an expert locksmith bring an assortment of blanks. The nurse had slipped the keys out of the purse, and the locksmith made duplicates. I took the duplicate keys down and tried them on the car. The automobile key fitted the ignition okay. That left me with two other keys. I didn’t know what they were for. Somehow or other, Mason, I distrusted those keys. It looked like the fine Italian hand of a master dramatist.”

“Go ahead.”

“You started beefing about Homan, so I made a quiet trip out to Homan’s place, and tried the other two keys on his doors just to see if they would fit.”

“What was the big idea of all the secrecy?”

“Oh, I just wanted to see what little surprises you had thought up for the D.A.”

“Well, did the key fit?”

“No, not the door — but one of those keys is to Homan’s yacht.”

“The hell you say!”

“Surprised?”

“Yes. Go on.”

“Well, I didn’t say anything. I just sat back on the sidelines, waiting for the time to come when you would explode your bombshell.”

“I am listening.”

“Well, that time came this afternoon,” Tragg said. “I naturally expected that you would build your case around those keys, which, by the way, the girl had already accounted for and introduced in evidence. I thought, of course, you would say to Homan, ‘Mr. Homan, is this the key to the ignition on your automobile?’ Homan would, of course, admit that it looked as though it might be the key to his car. Then you would ask him casually if he knew anything about the other keys or if they looked at all familiar to him. He would then either say with some surprise that one of them was the key to his yacht, or else he would say they didn’t look at all familiar to him, and then you would ask him to produce his keys so that you could check the...”

Mason pushed back his chair and got to his feet.

“Hell!” he said with disgust in his voice. “And I missed doing just that! I am going to find my client, give her back her fee, and beg her pardon.”

Tragg was watching him narrowly. “Why didn’t you go after Homan on those keys, Mason?”

“Lieutenant, I don’t know. I was thinking about an entirely different angle of approach. I knew, of course, it was an ignition key to his car, but I...”

Tragg studied him for a moment as Mason ceased talking.

“You had something else on your mind, something you are trying to develop, something you haven’t told me about?”

“Well?”

Tragg said, “When you didn’t spring that key business, I began to think that perhaps it wasn’t a plant after all.”

“It wasn’t.”

“You didn’t plant them?”

“Absolutely not. What is the third key?”

“I haven’t found out yet.”

“It isn’t Homan’s?”

“No.”

“How about...”

“About what?” Tragg asked as Mason hesitated.

The lawyer picked up a pencil from his desk, slid his thumb and forefinger up and down the smooth sides of the wood. “This,” he said, “goes a long way toward refuting Homan’s story that the car was stolen.”

“Unless he left his keys in it,” Tragg said.

“They would hardly be his keys,” Mason pointed out. “There are only three keys on the ring. One of them is to the ignition of the automobile. One is to Homan’s yacht. Homan would have had more keys than that, keys to his house, keys to his office in the studio.”

There were several seconds of silence, then Mason made a little bow to the police detective. “All right, Tragg, you win.” He turned to Drake. “Tell him about the Warfield woman, Paul.”

“How much?”

“Everything.”

“And about this man Spinney,” Tragg said. “I am interested in Spinney.”

Mason said, “Shoot the works, Paul. Begin at the beginning, about the telephone bills, and what you have done on Spinney.”

Drake took a notebook from his pocket. Refreshing his recollection from that, he told Tragg the whole story. When he had finished, Tragg scowled. “And you guys were holding this out?” he asked.

“I told you,” Mason said, “that if you didn’t go after Homan, you would have to ask us questions. We answered all your questions.”

“Someday,” Tragg said to Drake, “you are going to cut things just a little too fine.”

Drake glanced at Mason.

Mason said, “When Drake works on a case under me, he follows my instructions. I am responsible.”

Tragg grinned at him. “All right, let us come down to earth. I want to clear up this murder. You want to get Stephane Claire acquitted of driving the car. You haven’t closed your case. That key ring should give you something to work on. Homan told me he was very careful to lock the car up when he left it, that he had his keys with him. The idea being to prove that whoever was operating the car was operating it without his permission. All right, Homan had his keys. The chauffeur must have keys. Now then, how is Homan going to explain the fact that the man who was driving the car had a key to his yacht?”

Mason paced the floor, thumbs pushed up in the armholes of his vest, his head bent slightly forward. He said, “He isn’t going to explain it. He can’t. He’s got to change his story.”

“Well,” Tragg said, “so far as I am concerned, Mason, I am satisfied now your client didn’t steal the car, and I am pretty well satisfied she wasn’t driving it. For the sake of argument, let us say Greeley was. She hadn’t known him before. She hadn’t known Homan. She undoubtedly had left San Francisco that morning.”

Mason said, “All right, Tragg, we will put all the cards right on the table. From the time the chauffeur last saw the car, which was on Tuesday morning, until Wednesday, the car had been driven seven hundred and thirty-two miles. Now then, if Homan is telling the truth, that car was driven seven hundred and thirty-two miles between noon on Wednesday and around eleven o’clock, the time of the accident. Well, suppose it had been operated steadily at sixty miles an hour. That would be six hundred and sixty miles. It is an absolute impossibility.”

Tragg said, “It could be done. That bus will do around a hundred miles an hour.”

“The bus will,” Mason said, “but the roads won’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t care how fast you drive. You can pick the very fastest roads in the country, and by the time you have driven eleven hours, you will find you can’t have covered more than six hundred odd miles. Of course, you could pick a straight, fast, desert road and drive back and forth on it and average more. But a person wouldn’t do that. In three or four hundred straight-road miles, you are going to encounter grades, curves, detours, cities, bottlenecks, boulevard stops. Seven hundred and thirty-two miles means that the car was driven about four hundred miles away from the city, then turned around and driven back toward the city. The accident happened about sixty miles from Los Angeles.”

Tragg said, “That is interesting.”

Mason said, “Paul and I have been thinking about the man who was driving the car...”

“Conceding for the sake of the argument that your client is telling the truth,” Tragg interrupted.

“Naturally,” Mason said. “I take that for granted whenever I start in on a case.”

“I can’t take anything for granted.”

“Well, conceding it for the sake of the argument,” Mason said, “that this man either came from or went through Bakersfield around ten o’clock. He was wearing a dinner jacket. When a man puts on a tuxedo, he is usually attending something which doesn’t begin before seven-thirty or eight at the very earliest. It is rather unusual for him to leave such an affair at quarter to ten. Now then, if this man didn’t come from Bakersfield, we can probably stretch that time at least another hour. He must have left at quarter to nine or perhaps eight-thirty.”

“Left what?”

“Whatever he was attending, dinner, dance, or whatever it was.”

“It might have been a lodge.”

“It might have been.”

“But Greeley was in San Francisco the night of the accident.”

“I am coming to that,” Mason said. “Greeley was in San Francisco at quarter past five. He hadn’t taken a tuxedo to San Francisco with him, just a double-breasted gray business suit. At ten o’clock that night he was in Bakersfield wearing a tuxedo. Now stop a minute and figure what that means.”

“What does it mean?”

“He couldn’t have driven from San Francisco to Bakersfield in approximately four hours and forty-five minutes.”

“Go ahead. You are doing fine.”

“If he had been wearing a gray business suit at the time,” Mason said, “he would hardly have taken a plane, kept a rendezvous with someone, picked up the car, changed to a tuxedo, and still been at Bakersfield at ten o’clock.”

“All right. We will pass that for the moment. He might have done it, but let us hear the rest of it.”

“That brings us to the question of whether he was wearing the tuxedo at five o’clock. And, since he hadn’t taken a tuxedo with him, it must, in that case, have been some other person’s, one that Greeley had rented, or one he kept in San Francisco. But why would he have been in the Southern Pacific Depot at five-fifteen in the evening wearing a tuxedo? That is pretty early in the day for a dinner jacket.”

“Keep right on,” Tragg said.

“The tuxedo must have been twenty-four hours old,” Mason announced. “In other words, he must have put it on for some function he was attending the night before, something from which he had been called away very suddenly and hadn’t had an opportunity to change his clothes.

“If Greeley didn’t have a chance to put on a tuxedo after he left San Francisco, he must have had it on before.”

Tragg frowned thoughtfully. “Don’t say anything for a minute. Let me think that over.”

He shifted his position in the chair so that he was sitting forward on the extreme edge of the seat. He spread his knees far apart, put his elbows on his knees, raised his hands to his chin, and sat staring down at the carpet.

Abruptly, he straightened. “Mason, you should have been a detective. You are right.”

“Of course,” Mason said, “it is hard to back-track a man under ordinary circumstances, but a man who wears a tuxedo in daylight is very conspicuous.”

Tragg said, “Give me some paper, Mason.” He whipped a pencil from his pocket, braced the pad of paper which Mason gave him over his knee and started making swift notes. “We will look up Spinney in San Francisco. Now then, we will start checking with service stations to see if a man in a tuxedo bought gasoline for an automobile. We will check those stations all the way down the valley route, and we will check the air lines, and see if a man in a tuxedo didn’t get aboard a plane out of San Francisco sometime on Wednesday night.”

“And while you are about it, try late Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning,” Mason said.

Tragg looked up from his writing. “I don’t get that.”

Mason said, “It is just an angle. Let us try it. You know he may have been wearing his tuxedo all Tuesday night and all day Wednesday, because his double-breasted gray suit may have been in Homan’s house.”

“What makes you think that?”

“When he left home, he was wearing a gray suit. On the Ridge Route, he was wearing a tuxedo. When he got home, Mrs. Greeley says he wasn’t wearing a tuxedo. Yet he didn’t take any baggage with him when he slipped out of Homan’s car up on the Ridge Route.”

“Well, I can’t give you much on it, but it’s an angle. Okay, let me phone headquarters.”

“You can use Della Street’s office,” Mason said.

Tragg said, “I am going to get some immediate action on this.”

“You can’t start the wheels grinding any too fast to suit us.”

Mason and Drake sat smoking while they listened to Tragg putting through the telephone calls in Della Street’s office, instructing headquarters to make a check-up, sending out inquiries to the state highway police, and asking the San Francisco police to check on what had happened at the airport.

“How about going out and grabbing a bite to eat?” Tragg asked, returning from Della’s office.

Mason said, “We are waiting for Della Street. She went out to Hollywood to get a line on Homan.”

“Can’t you leave a note for her?”

“I could,” Mason said, “but I am watching. I thought perhaps there would be a call from her.”

Tragg said, “It will take me an hour or so before I begin to get reports from my end, and I thought it would be a good time to eat. We may be busy afterwards.”

“You folks go out, and I will wait,” Mason suggested.

Tragg said, “Oh, I shall just run down to a counter and pick up a hamburger sandwich. I...”

The phone on Mason’s desk rang.

Mason picked up the telephone, said, “Hello,” and heard a feminine voice say, with every indication of relief, “Oh, I am so glad I caught you at your office, Mr. Mason. I must see you at once.”

“Who is this?”

“Mrs. Greeley.”

“What is it?” Mason asked. “No, wait a minute. Hold the phone just a moment, please.” He cupped his hand over the receiver, said to Tragg, “Mrs. Greeley on the phone. She is getting ready to tell me something, sounds rather excited. You should better listen in on the extension — just in case.”

“Where?” Tragg asked.

“Go in Della Street office and push that left-hand button...”

“I will show him,” Drake said.

Mason waited until Tragg had plugged into the line, then he said, “Yes, Mrs. Greeley.”

“What was that click I just heard? Did someone else...”

“I thought it would be better to use another telephone,” Mason said. “There were some people in my office. What is it?”

“Mr. Mason, I am afraid I have — well, I don’t know. I... I wanted to ask you about something.”

“What?”

“I feel very guilty.”

“Why?”

She said, “I may have done that young woman injustice.”

“In what way?”

“I... well, you perhaps know something of how I feel. Mr. Greeley and I were very close. I... I have been feeling so absolutely all alone and completely lost. Tonight I just felt I had to do something, so I started packing up some of my husband’s clothes to give away. I couldn’t bear walking into his room and seeing his clothes in his closet and everything, and...”

“Yes, go on,” Mason said.

“Something happened, and I... well, I found something.”

“What are you getting at?” Mason asked.

“I... well, Mr. Mason, one of my husband’s dress shirts has a long red streak across the front, and the smear made by a woman’s lips. I...”

“Where are you now?” Mason asked.

“Out at my flat.”

“How long ago did you find this shirt?”

“Why, just a few minutes ago — oh, perhaps five minutes. I found it in the bag of clothes he had ready to go to the laundry. I don’t think my husband could possibly have been driving that car, but... well, you understand, Mr. Mason, I want to be fair. I simply couldn’t put that young woman in a false position. I thought you ought to know.”

Mason said, “I would like very much to see that shirt at once, Mrs. Greeley. Suppose I drive out?”

“Can’t it wait until tomorrow?”

“No. I want to see that shirt at once — just as you found it.”

“Well, I... I will tell you what I will do, Mr. Mason. If you will be at your office for a little while, I will drive by on my way to dinner and bring it in.”

“All right,” Mason said, “and there is something else I want you to do.”

“Yes. What is it?”

“Check through your husband’s clothes that are in the closet. Find his tuxedo and bring that along.”

“I was just going to ask you about that, Mr. Mason, whether you wanted it.”

“Yes, I do.”

“It will take me half an hour to get ready. You will be there?”

“Yes, yes, I shall be here.”

“I wouldn’t want to make the trip unless...”

“I will be here.”

“Very well, Mr. Mason.”

The receiver clicked at the other end of the line.

Mason hung up the telephone, walked in to Della Street’s office where Tragg was still sitting at Della Street’s desk staring at the telephone.

“Well?” Mason asked.

“That’s your case,” Tragg said. “Put her on the stand tomorrow, and your client goes free as air.”

Mason said, “That is a load off my shoulders. How do you feel?”

“I feel like hell,” Tragg said.

“Why?”

“Because I don’t think Greeley stole Homan’s car. If Greeley was driving Homan’s car, he was driving it with Homan’s consent. That means I have got to go after Homan. And you know what that means.”

“You have certainly got enough to justify you in...”

“It isn’t a question of whether I am justified or not, Mason. Look here, how about getting you to be the goat in this thing?”

Mason said, “When the police department needs a cat’s-paw, it certainly does cooperate.”

“Nuts to you,” Tragg retorted. “Remember, I brought you those keys.”

“You did at that. What do you want?”

“Call Homan back to the stand tomorrow. Hold this dress-shirt evidence back, and go after him. Use these keys as a basis for your cross-examination. Rip him wide open. See if you can’t catch him in some contradiction, and when you do, put the screws on him.”

Mason said, “I think it is all right, Tragg, but I want to think it over a bit.”

Tragg said, “Well, I shall go out and grab that sandwich, Mason. You can think it over. How about it, Drake? Want to come with me?”

Drake grinned. “You are a great guy, Tragg — at times. But I can’t dance with you.”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“Della Street is coming back,” Drake said, “and Mason is going to buy a dinner.”

Tragg smiled. “Wise guy,” he said.

“Don’t be too certain,” Mason said. “The way things are breaking now, it looks like a busy night. We shall probably grab a hot dog and be lucky to get that.”

“Just the same, Perry, I shall wait.”

Tragg picked up his hat as he started for the door. “Well, personally, I am going to grab a sandwich while the grabbing is good. I don’t want to seem to be putting any high pressure on you, Mason, but it might not be a bad idea for you to give the department a break. You might need it sometime.”

“It is all right,” Mason told him, “if I can work it out so it doesn’t affect my client’s interests.”

“Shucks, she is out of it,” Tragg said. “You could send Mrs. Greeley to the D.A., and he would dismiss. You know that.”

“I shall think it over, Tragg. I think it is okay, but there are a couple of angles I want to check.”

“All right, be seeing you in about twenty minutes.”

Tragg went out. As the automatic door-closing device clicked the latch shut, Paul Drake turned to Mason. “Why not grab at it, Perry?”

Mason said, “It’s all right. I just didn’t want to seem to be too eager. I don’t want Tragg to get the idea he can use me as a stalking horse any old time he wants to and have me fall all over myself doing just what he wants.”

“Well, you have got your client out of the mess on this one.”

“As a matter of fact, Paul, I would do just about what Tragg wants, anyway — whether he had suggested it or not. I hate to see a man with money start putting the screws on a hitchhiker just to get himself out of a mess.”

“But why is Homan doing it? Just to avoid a few thousand dollars in civil liability? You would think that a man in his position and with his means would...”

“Throw money to the birdies for champagne,” Mason interrupted. “When he takes a bunch down to Tiajuana or Palm Springs on a party he does, but when it comes to something of this sort, he is tight as the bark on a tree.

“He...”

The telephone rang.

Mason said, “This will be Horty again... Hello.”

Hortense Zitkousky’s voice sounded harsh and high-pitched. “Is this Mr. Mason?”

“Yes.”

“Horty, Mr. Mason. You got a minute?”

“Why, yes.”

“Listen, could you get out here right away? There is — well, I can’t tell you over the phone what it is.”

“I am afraid not,” Mason said after a moment. “I am waiting for a woman to come to my office with some evidence which will put Miss Claire entirely in the clear. I...”

“Listen, can’t you please come? It is awfully important.”

“Where?”

“The Adirondack Hotel, room five-twenty-eight. If you could come quick, it would help a lot.”

Mason said, “It may mean a lot if I leave here. Can’t you tell me something of what it is?”

“I... No. You have got to come, right away.”

Mason said, “Wait for me in the lobby.”

“I think I would better wait here in the room, Mr. Mason.”

“All right.”

Mason slammed up the telephone.

“Who is it?” Drake asked.

“Hortense. Something has happened that is damnably important. I wouldn’t go for anyone else but that young woman has a most unusual and priceless possession — horse sense.”

Drake nodded.

Mason reached the coat closet in four swift strides, jerked his coat from the hanger, struggled into it, and clapped on his hat.

“Listen, Paul, you have got to hold the office. I will be back before Mrs. Greeley gets here. Tragg may be back before she arrives. Tell him I had to talk with Stephane Claire and get her consent before I agreed to cooperate with him. Tell him it is a matter of form, just my idea of professional ethics.”

“And I will tell him you went to see her?”

“Yes.”

“Wouldn’t it sound a little more like it if I told him that you had telephoned her and tried to explain it to her, and she couldn’t understand so you had to go on up and see her?”

“Perhaps so. Use your own judgment. Don’t be too voluble. Take it as a matter of course. I am on my way.”

Mason grabbed a taxicab from a stand in front of his office building. “Adirondack Hotel,” he said, “and drive like the devil.”

The cab-driver said, “I can make it in five minutes.”

“Try making it in four. Stop across the street if it will save time.”

The cab shot forward. Mason didn’t relax against the cushions, but kept a precarious position on the edge of the seat, hanging on to the door handle, watching the traffic whiz past.

It began to sprinkle before the cab had gone a block, and was raining steadily by the time the cab-driver pulled up in front of the hotel, but directly across the street.

“If you want to spring across, Captain, you can save a full minute. I would have to go around.

Mason jerked the door open.

“Want me to wait?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, I shall be right in front of the place, all ready for you.”

Mason ran across the wet street. Once in the hotel he walked rapidly across the lobby, stepped into the elevator, said, “Five, please,” and was whisked on up to the fifth floor. The elevator operator looked at him curiously, apparently trying to ascertain whether Mason was registered in the hotel or merely a visitor. The lawyer, turning to the left without the slightest hesitation, walked confidently down the corridor.

After he had given the elevator time to drop back to the lobby. Mason examined the numbers on the doors, and saw he was going in the wrong direction. He retraced his steps past the dark elevator shaft, found room five-twenty-eight and knocked.

A woman’s voice called softly, “Who is it?”

“Mason.”

The door opened. Hortense Zitkousky said, “Come in.”

She looked garish below her make-up. The splotches of rouge on her cheeks, the dark red on her full lips seemed in startling contrast to the pallor of her skin where the make-up failed to cover it.

“What is it?” Mason asked.

She crossed the bedroom, placed her hand on the knob of a door, then drew back. “You do it.”

Mason impatiently jerked the door open, then recoiled at what he saw.

A pillow lay crumpled on the floor of the bathroom. From the interior of this pillow, white, fluffy feathers had drifted out over the floor, over the bathroom, over the body which hung balanced over the bathtub, the head down, the arms outstretched. From the back of the head, near the base of the brain, sinister streams of red welled upward to trickle down the neck and jaw, and drop into the bathtub. There was a faint acrid odor of burnt, smokeless powder in the room, and the ejected cartridge from a small-caliber automatic glistened in the light, the newness of the yellow brass glinting as though it had been freshly minted gold.

“I am sorry,” Horty said. “You see how it is. I couldn’t tell you over the phone. Cripes, Mr. Mason, this has got me. I am going to get sick if I stay in here.”

Mason said with crisp authority, “Snap out of it.” He stepped forward, bent down, and looked at the bullet hole. There were little powder marks tattooed in the skin. The rip in the pillow on the floor had a burnt discolouration around the edges.

Mason bent forward and reached for the man’s wrist.

“He is dead as a herring,” Hortense said.

He turned the man’s head. It was Ernest Tanner, the chauffeur.

Mason stepped back. “How did it happen?” he asked.

“Let us get out of here... Okay... We got to feeling pretty good. He was a good egg. He knew something. He was sore at Homan. I strung him along. You know the play. After a while, he started making passes.”

“What did you do?” Mason asked.

“What did you think I was going to do? Think I was going to take him out, kid him along, and then slap his face when he got fresh? Not me. I took it in my stride, and strung him along.”

“Well, come on,” Mason said, looking at his wrist watch. “Get down to brass tacks. Just how did this happen?”

“I wish I knew.”

“We will have to call the police, so let us get the facts. Get them out. Don’t make statements and then wait to see how I take them.”

“Well, I got this man feeling pretty good. I was trying to get him loosened up and convivial, and I guess I overdid it. I kept talking to him about how he could get even with Homan by giving Stephane a break. He was tight-lipped at first, but later on he loosened up. I saw he was getting in the mood to tell what he knew and made up my mind that I was going to have him where I could get action fast.”

“You mean getting him in touch with Stephane?”

“No, with her uncle. I thought a man could...”

“I understand. What happened?”

“Well, I kept working him down in this direction until we finally wound up at the Adirondack Bar. And then — well, then was when I found I had miscalculated. He had taken aboard a little too much. But he was getting ready to come through with some real information. Gosh, Mr. Mason, I didn’t know what to do. Under circumstances like that, a girl has to think fast. Well, I asked him to excuse me a minute, and telephoned up to Stephane’s room. She wasn’t in. I telephoned her uncle. No answer. I wasn’t going to let him get out of my hands, so I decided to take him up to the uncle’s room, and wait for him to get feeling better and Mr. Olger to come in.”

“How did you work it?”

“It was a cinch,” she said. “I simply walked up to the desk, bold as brass, and asked for the key to five-twenty-eight. I knew that was the suite. The room clerk was busy talking with someone, and he just reached in the pigeonhole and slid the key out on the counter. I went back and got Tanner and took him up to the room. Of course, he got sick right away, and headed for the bathroom. I didn’t know just where I could get in touch with Stephane, so I thought I should better call you, tell you the whole business, and see if you knew where Mr. Olger was, or if you wanted to come and talk to this lad. I hated to bother you with it, but...”

“Go on.”

“Well, you know how it is in these hotel bedrooms. You can hear what a person says over the telephone if you are in the bath. Those doors are thin, and the telephone is by the head of the bed, right near the bathroom door. I felt Ernest would be pretty well occupied for a while. I guess I wasn’t thinking quite so clearly myself. We have been having quite a few. I remembered there were telephones in the lobby in booths. So I dashed to the elevator, went down to the lobby, and called your office. I kept getting a busy signal. So then I came back up here to make certain Ernest didn’t walk out on me. As soon as I came down the corridor, I saw the door was slightly ajar...”

“You had locked it when you left?”

“No, I hadn’t. I had just closed it and...”

Mason pressed the down button, and almost instantly an elevator cage slid to a stop. The operator was the same one who had taken Mason up to the fifth floor. He gave them both casual glances, then slid the door shut, and dropped the cage to the lobby.

Mason said, “Take my arm. Don’t look at the clerk. He may think you are going to ask for information. Move up along by the desk, slide the key over on the desk very gently so it doesn’t make any noise. All ready? Here we go.”

“Now what?” she asked.

Mason said, “I have a taxi outside. The driver’s waiting. He will be watching for me. I don’t want him to see you with me. A few minutes after I leave, go out and walk down to the corner. Take a streetcar for a few blocks, then get out, pick up a cab, and go home.”

“Why not go home in a streetcar?”

“I want you to get there faster than you can in a streetcar. I want you to go home in a cab with your mad money. Do you get it? The man got insulting, and started making passes at you. You called the party off, and went home in a taxi.”

“Why not on a streetcar?”

“He would have followed you on a streetcar. You ran out and grabbed a taxi. Pick one that’s in front of a bar. Come running out as though you were in a hurry, jump in, and give your address. Got it?”

“Get you.”

“Got any money?”

“A little.”

Mason slipped a bill into her hand. “Take this,” he said, “and you will have more. And keep your head. As soon as you get home, brew yourself a pot of strong coffee. Lay off the booze from now on.”

He felt her hand squeeze his arm. “Gosh, you are a grand guy,” she whispered with feeling.

Mason said, “It is our only chance to get a murderer and it is the only way to keep Stephane out of it. The Greeley business was one thing — but this — right in her hotel room — no, they would have us all on the grid until the clues all were lost — the ones I am working on at any rate. Keep your head now, and don’t cross me up.”

“I won’t.”

He walked calmly out of the lobby. His taxi drew up to the loading zone. The doorman held an umbrella and opened the door with something of a flourish.

Mason stepped into the taxi and said, “All right, back to where we came from.”

He settled back in the cushions, lit a cigarette, and inhaled a deep drag.