The Case of the Lazy Lover

6

It was three-thirty when Mason’s unlisted telephone rang sharply. This unlisted telephone was on Mason’s desk. Only Della Street and Paul Drake held that number, and the lawyer, scooping up the telephone, said, “Yes, Paul. What is it?”

Drake’s voice, sharp with urgency, said, “We’ve located the girl who rented the car from the drive-yourself agency, Perry!”

“Great stuff!” Mason said. “What about her?”

“She took it out about nine o’clock this morning, giving the name of Jane Smith, and a phony address in Denver,” Drake said. “She put up a large cash deposit and said she’d return the car about two this afternoon. We had that much uncovered about an hour after my men started work. I didn’t notify you because there wasn’t anything particular to go on at that time. I simply put operatives around to tail her when she drove back.”

“Go ahead,” Mason said.

“She came back a little over an hour ago,” Drake said, “and wanted to make a deal by which she could rent a car by the week. She said she was going to be living in one of the suburbs, and there wouldn’t be any great amount of mileage run up on the car, that she wanted to use it just for running back and forth. The drive-yourself agency worked out the deal with her and, of course, my men picked up her trail as soon as she left.”

“Did she have any idea she was being tailed?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Where did she go?”

“I don’t know yet, Perry. My men are shadowing her. I’ve got a couple of damn good men on the job and they’ll run her to earth. I just wanted to be sure you’d be standing by.”

“The same woman?”

“No question about it. The description fits to a T. It’s the only Chrysler that’s been rented to a woman who comes anywhere near answering your description. It looks like pay dirt to me.”

“It does to me too,” Mason said.

“Okay, I’ll have something most any minute now.”

The lawyer hung up and Della Street said, “Gertie says George Jerome is in the office waiting.”

“Jerome?” Mason asked, frowning.

“Mr. Allred’s partner in some mining deals. He wants to see you, but won’t say what it’s about. He says it’s highly confidential.”

Mason said, “All right. Hold everything open for that call that’s coming in from Paul Drake. As soon as we get that woman in the Chrysler located, I want to get in touch with her. Send Jerome in.”

Della Street went out to the reception room to usher Jerome into Mason’s private office.

George Jerome was plainly impatient, a man who was not accustomed to waiting anywhere for anyone. He was tall, barrel-chested, rawboned with high cheek bones and from under shaggy brows gray eyes looked out upon the world in cold appraisal.

He was perhaps fifty-five or sixty, and the man radiated awkward strength as he lumbered across the office to shake hands with Mason.

“Sit down,” the lawyer invited. “I’ve been wanting to see you.”

“What about?”

Mason smiled. “About the thing you want to see me about.”

Jerome returned the lawyer’s smile. “If you’re a mind reader, then there’s no point of my saying anything.”

Jerome settled himself in the big client’s chair and the size of the man made the chair shrink in proportion until it seemed to lose its atmosphere of deep comfort.

“What’s Allred up to?” he asked.

“I’m afraid I can’t help you on that,” Mason said.

“Are you Allred’s lawyer?”

“No.”

“Whose?”

Mason said, “At this time I feel there is no need to make further concealment of the name of my client. I am Mrs. Allred’s attorney.”

“Have you actually seen Lola Allred?”

“Why?”

“I just wanted to know.”

“You’ve talked with Allred?” Mason asked.

“I’ve listened to him.”

“You’re his partner?”

“In a way, yes. That is, I’m his partner in some things. We’re in process of settling up our affairs. We were supposed to have settled them Saturday. He was to have made a take-it-or-leave-it proposition. I didn’t want to act until after I’d talked with Fleetwood.”

“May I ask why?”

“He’s a bright boy. He’s been Allred’s right-hand man — but if I bought Allred out, I think Bob Fleetwood would come over to work with me. I think he would. I’d want to make certain.”

“Is he that valuable?”

“He knows lots of details no one else does.”

“Then your intention is to buy Allred out?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“You implied it.”

“I might imply lots of things. Have you talked with Lola Allred personally?”

“Why do you keep coming back to that question?”

“Because you keep avoiding it.”

Mason laughed.

Jerome said, “You’re a deep one, Mason.”

The lawyer shook his head. “Flattery won’t get you anywhere, Jerome.”

“What will?”

“Candor.”

Jerome said, “All right, I’ll try that. I want you to get hold of Fleetwood. I want to have a secret conference with him. I want to see whether he will come over to me, pull with me, play the game my way. When I go into a business deal, I try to drive the best bargain I can. But when I make a deal, I stand by it. I’m not like Allred. He’s always squirming around. You make an agreement with him and he remembers it some other way, and he never will put anything in writing. He always says that’s up to his lawyer and his lawyer stalls along just as much as he does.

“Bob Fleetwood is a good kid. Allred says Bob ran away with his wife. If you ask me, I think it was something that was wished off on Bob. I think that Mrs. Allred may have gone for him pretty strong and, the first thing the kid knew, he was being taken for a ride. I’m not saying so, you understand, but that’s one explanation.”

“Is there another?”

“Yes.”

“What?”

“The other explanation is that Mrs. Allred isn’t alive at all, and Bert is trying to account for her disappearance. You’re a lawyer. I don’t need to dot the i’s or cross the t’s with you, Mason. I’m giving you an idea.”

“And in that event, where would Fleetwood be?”

“Now then,” Jerome said, “you’re beginning to talk the way I want to hear you talk.”

“Yes?” Mason asked.

Jerome said, “I’m making you a proposition, Mason. If you can get me a chance to talk with Bob Fleetwood before Allred sees him, I’ll pay you a thousand dollars. And if Fleetwood sees things my way, and I’m satisfied he will, you get two thousand dollars. You hire detectives if you have to. I’ll stand their charges, anything up to a thousand dollars.”

“That’s all right,” Mason said, “but I can’t accept any employment from you which might be adverse to the best interests of my client.”

“I know you can’t. I know your reputation, Mason. You’re just as clean as a hound’s tooth and as smart as a steel trap. That’s why I came to you. Forget it, unless it turns out that you can do it without interfering with the interests of your client. You’re representing Mrs. Allred. You go ahead and represent her, but if you find that you can give me a break on this thing, you’ve had my proposition.

“If you’re Mrs. Allred’s attorney, she’s going to get in touch with you sooner or later. If Bob Fleetwood is running away with her, you’ll have a chance to get word to him through her, or directly to him, that I’ve got to see him. That’s all there is to it. And if Lola Allred isn’t alive, then you’re going to find that out, and when you do, you may find Fleetwood. The proposition stands win, lose or draw.”

“What makes you think that Mrs. Allred may not be alive?”

Jerome looked steadily at Mason, then he closed one eye in a slow, calculating wink.

He got up from the chair, said, “I think I’ve made my proposition plain, Mr. Mason.”

He turned to Della Street. “You’ve got all this straight, young lady?”

She nodded.

“Good. How do I get out of here?”

Mason indicated the exit door.

Jerome said, “Here’s my card, Mason. There’s a number on there you can call. I’ll have someone at that phone day and night, twenty-four hours a day. The minute you call that number, you’re in touch with me. And you can tell Fleetwood that well, damn it, tell him what I want. Fleetwood knows me and he knows Allred. Thank you, Mr. Mason. Good day.”

And Jerome strode out of the office without bothering to shake hands or to even look back over his shoulder.

Mason turned to Della Street, but before he spoke the unlisted phone rang sharply.

Della Street picked up the receiver, said, “Hello... yes, hold the line, Paul.”

Mason grabbed the phone.

“Just had a report from my men who trailed this auto-rental girl, Perry.”

“Good! What happened?”

“She went directly to Las Olitas, stopped in at a garage there, the Central Garage & Machine Works on Eighth Street, was in there about five minutes, then she came out and drove to the Westwick. That’s an exclusive apartment hotel.”

“Calling on someone there?” Mason asked.

“She lives there, Perry.”

“The devil she does!”

“That’s right.”

“What name? Jane Smith?”

“No, Maurine Milford. She rented apartment 802 there recently, and she’s expecting her aunt to come from the East and join her. Tells a perfectly straightforward story. She put the rented car in the garage at the Westwick and tipped the attendant at the apartment garage five bucks, and told him her aunt was coming to visit her, that she was going to be doing quite a bit of running around, that she had rented this car, that she’d like to have it kept dusted off and the windshield cleaned.”

“How long does she intend to be there?”

“She told the management about thirty days.”

“Why did she stop at the Central Garage & Machine Works, Paul?”

“I don’t know. Probably some minor trouble with the car, a spark plug or something. My man didn’t try to go in there and find out. He just stuck around the entrance and waited for her to come out; then he followed her to the Westwick.”

“Okay,” Mason said. “That’s fine. What else is new? Anything?”

“Nope. Still working on the runaway couple,” Drake said. “Here’s a funny one, Perry. There’s another detective agency on the job.”

“You sure?”

“Yes.”

“Who’s hired them?”

“I don’t know, but there are private detectives combing the country. Somehow I have an idea they’re after the man instead of the woman.”

“You mean Fleetwood?”

“That’s right.”

“Any idea why?”

“Only that they’ve been paid by someone to get information on him. When they ask questions, they ask about Fleetwood first and describe the man before they describe the woman.”

“What’s Fleetwood’s description?” Mason asked.

“Around five foot seven or seven and a half. Weight about a hundred thirty-five pounds. Dark eyes, wavy hair, rather romantic looking.”

“No wonder Mrs. Allred is supposed to have gone overboard for him,” Mason said.

“That’s the way it looks,” Drake said, “but this Mrs. Allred is quite a dish herself. She may be forty-two, but from all the dope I can get, she looks around thirty.”

“Any pictures yet?”

“I’ve got one of her in a bathing suit that isn’t too good as far as the face is concerned, but it’s swell for the figure. And believe me, she’s got one!”

“Have you been able to find Patricia yet?”

“No. She dusted out shortly after breakfast and hasn’t been back since.”

“Okay,” Mason said, “keep plugging. I’ll go see this Milford gal. Keep your man on the job until I get there, then he can go.”