The Case of the Lucky Legs

Chapter 5

Perry Mason left his taxicab at Ninth and Olive.

"I'm going to want you for a while. You stick around," he told the driver.

He crossed the street to a drug store and found Paul Drake leaning against the marble slab of the soda fountain, smoking a cigarette.

"You were long enough getting here," the detective said.

"Bradbury was in the office," Mason told him, "and he wanted to tell me a lot of stuff about Doray."

"Yeah?" asked Paul Drake.

"And then," said Perry Mason, "he was offering Della Street a cigarette. He was doing it with something of a manner."

The men looked at each other and laughed.

"Well," Paul Drake said, "I don't know how you feel about it, but as far as I'm concerned, I don't care how impressionable he is. That's what's giving me the butter on my bread. Personally, I'd say he was laboring under the impression he was quite a ladies' man. Did you notice the way he smirked at Mamie down at the cigar counter?"

Perry Mason nodded curtly.

"However," Paul Drake went on, "you can't blame him. He's evidently a bachelor with plenty of money. You notice the way he dolls himself up. His tie must have cost more than five dollars. His tailored suit is a wonderful piece of work. And the particular shade of brown has been chosen with some care. You can tell, because it matches his complexion. And then he wears socks, shoes, tie and shirt all in a general color scheme of —"

Perry Mason made a gesture of disgust.

"Forget it," he said. "Let's get down to brass tacks. What about Patton?"

"I don't know much more than I told you over the telephone, but I want to work out a plan of campaign."

"All right," Perry Mason said, "here's the plan of campaign. You've got your car here?"

"Yes."

"You get in it and go on out to the Holliday Apartments. I've got a taxicab waiting out here. I'll go out in it. You may make a little better time in your car than the cab, so you'd better give me a start of about five minutes. I'll go out there and break the ice. You come busting into the apartment without knocking. I'll try and arrange things so the door is open."

"What do I do after I come in?" Paul Drake inquired.

"You follow my lead," Perry Mason said. "I'm going to start browbeating him. He'll either get frightened or righteously indignant, one of the two. You can tell which it is when you open the door.

"You can pretend you haven't got any connection with me, if you want to. Or you can put up any kind of a stall you want. Bradbury is going to be at my office within half an hour with original newspapers that we can use any way we want to. We can tell him that part of the newspaper subscription list went through the mail, and that therefore he'd used the mails to defraud."

"That'll be a good line," Drake said. "We should have the newspapers with us."

"I know it," Mason said, "but Bradbury forgot them and I didn't want to wait. Della Street is in the office, all ready to grab a taxi and come out as soon as we get him softened up a bit. He'll probably be hard at first, and I don't want Della to hear what goes on.

"Now, remember that I'm to take the general lead, but we can pull almost anything we want to. The district attorney can't use improper methods to get a confession; but we can use almost anything we want to get a confession. And then he can confirm it later on to the district attorney."

"And you're going to try to make him admit that his intention was to defraud?" asked the detective.

"That's the gist of the whole business," Perry Mason said. "We keep plugging away at him until we get that admission. After we get it, we don't care what happens."

"All right," Paul Drake said, "let's go. I'll give you five minutes. It'll take you almost twenty minutes to get out there."

"Not much over fifteen," Mason said. "You just give me five minutes' start, and don't worry about the time at the other end."

Paul Drake nodded, motioned to the attendant at the counter.

"A bromo seltzer," he said.

Perry Mason turned and flagged his taxicab from the opposite curb. As the cab swung around to him, he said, "The Holliday Apartments on Maple Avenue; 3508 is the number. Step on it."

He settled back in the cushions of the cab as the vehicle lurched into motion, and lit a fresh cigarette from the butt of his old one. He sat perfectly calm and steady, with no outward indication of tension or nervousness. He gave the impression of a fighter who would jockey his adversary about with the utmost patience until there was an opportunity to end the fight with one terrific punch.

He was just finishing his cigarette when the cab slowed down and pulled toward the curb.

Perry Mason leaned forward and tapped on the glass. As the driver turned and slid the glass partition back, Perry Mason said. "Don't stop right in front of the Holliday Apartments. Better stop half a block this side."

The driver nodded, crossed an intersection and pulled in toward the curb.

"How's this?" he asked.

"This is fine," the lawyer said. "Now, I may be gone an hour—perhaps longer. I may not want you at all, but if I do want you, I'll want you in a hurry. Here's ten dollars. Park right along in here some place and start your motor every five or ten minutes so it'll be warm. I may want you to go places in a hurry."

The cab driver grinned and pocketed the bill. Perry Mason got to the curb and located the illuminated sign which marked the location of the Holliday Apartments. He pounded down the pavement with quick, aggressive, purposeful strides, and was within twenty feet of the entrance when he saw a young woman emerge hastily from the door.

She was in the early twenties. She wore a white coat with a fox fur collar, white shoes and a small white hat with a red button on the top. Her figure was trim and graceful, and there was a certain subtle ease about her stride which made her walk with an effortless glide.

Perry Mason caught a brief glimpse of a very white face with wide blue eyes; then the face was hastily averted, and remained averted as she walked past Perry Mason, her heels clicking on the pavement.

Perry Mason paused to stare at her. There had been something almost of panic in the blue eyes, and the face was held so rigidly averted that she might have been some one who was acquainted with the attorney and trying to keep him from recognizing her.

The coat fitted snugly around the back and hips, and Perry Mason could see the smooth play of her muscles beneath the cloth as she walked.

He watched her until she had crossed the intersection and then pushed his way into the Holliday Apartments.

There was a desk in the lobby but no one was at the desk. Back of the desk was a rack of pigeonholes over each of which was the number of a room. In some of the pigeonholes were keys, and in some were bits of paper or envelopes.

Perry Mason looked at number 302 and saw that there was no key in the box. He walked to the elevator, opened the door, entered the smelly cage, pushed the button for the third floor, and rattled slowly upward.

When the elevator came to a jarring stop, Perry Mason opened both doors, walked out into the corridor. He found a right angle turn in the corridor, turned to the left, walked the length of the corridor and came to apartment 302. He started to rap with his knuckles when he noticed a bell button to the right of the door. He pushed his thumb against the bell button and heard the whir of a buzzer on the inside of the apartment.

There was no sound of motion.

Mason waited and pushed his finger on the buzzer once more. When there was no response, he pounded with his knuckles on the panels of the door. He saw light in the apartment and bent to the keyhole.

He waited for a few silent seconds; then, frowning, tried the knob. The knob turned readily, the latch clicked and the door swung open.

Perry Mason stepped into a room which was fitted as a combination sitting and diningroom. There was a small kitchenette on the right. On the left was a closed door. The room was empty. On the table lay a man's felt hat, a cane, a pair of gray gloves and two slips of paper.

Perry Mason walked over to the table and picked up the slips of paper. Both of them were telephone calls which had been received and evidently placed in the pigeonhole at the desk, to be given to the occupant of apartment 302 when he should call for his key.

One of the messages simply said, "Mr. Patton: Call Harcourt 63891 and ask for Margy–6:05 P.M.»

The other message read, "Mr. Patton: Tell Thelma Margy will be about twenty minutes late–8:00 P.M.»

Perry Mason stared frowningly at the two slips of paper, dropped them back on the table, picked up the gray hat and looked at the initials on the band. They were F.A.P.

Perry Mason stared toward the closed door on his left.

He let his right hand drop to the edge of the stained table and made little drumming motions with his fingers. Then, reaching a decision, he strode toward the door and opened it.

There were lights burning in the bedroom just as they had been burning in the room he had entered. To the left of the door was the door of the bathroom, which was open. In the opposite corner was a bed and across from the bed was a dresser. The mirror on the dresser showed a reflection of the corner beyond the bathroom which Perry Mason could not see from the door in which he stood.

The reflection in the mirror showed the slippered feet of a man, the toes pointed upward at an angle. Above the slippers was a glimpse of bare leg, and then the fringe of a bathrobe.

Perry Mason stood absolutely motionless for a second or two, his eyes staring at the reflection in the mirror.

He looked over toward the bed and saw a man's coat, shirt, tie and trousers flung on the bed, apparently without any attempt whatever at order. The coat was wrinkled and one sleeve was pulled up inside of itself; the trousers were flung in a heap. The shirt was at the opposite corner of the bed.

Underneath the bed were shoes and socks. The shoes were tan oxfords, the socks were gray. Mason looked at the necktie. It too was gray. The trousers and coat were gray.

Perry Mason stepped into the room and walked around the corner of the bathroom.

He stood staring at the body which lay on the floor.

The body was that of a man approximately fifty years of age, with gray hair, closecropped, grizzled mustache, and a mole on his right cheek.

The body was attired in underwear, with a silk bathrobe thrown over the shoulders, the right arm through the sleeve, the robe lying loose over the left shoulder, and the left arm bare. One hand was sprawled out with the fingers clutched; the other hand was lying across the chest. The man's body lay on its back, and the eyes were partially open and glazing in death.

There was a stab wound in the man's left breast from which blood had spurted and was still welling in a thick viscid pool which stained the bathrobe and discolored the carpet. A few feet away from the body there lay on the carpet a longbladed knife of the sort that is frequently used for cutting bread. It was a knife that had a blade some three inches wide at the base, and which tapered uniformly to a point. The blade was some nine inches long. The knife was covered with blood, and had evidently been dropped after it had been pulled from the man's body.

Perry Mason carefully avoided the blood, bent down and felt of the man's wrist. There was no pulse. The wrist was still warm.

The lawyer looked about the room at the various windows. One of them—the one by the bed—opened on a fire escape, and the bed was slightly indented, as though a person had either lain on it, or had crawled across it. Mason tried the door which led from the bedroom to the hallway. It was locked and bolted from the inside. He took his handkerchief and carefully wiped off the doorknob where his fingers had touched it. He walked back to the door which led from the sittingroom to the bedroom and polished the knob of that door with his handkerchief. Then he did the same thing to the knob of the door which led from the livingroom to the corridor.

As he was polishing the doorknob, his eye noticed some object lying on the floor near the corner of the room. He walked to it. It was, he saw, a leathercovered billy, or blackjack, with a leather thong on the end to be looped over the wrist.

He bent to examine it, without touching it, and noticed that there was blood on it.

Lying on the floor, near the table on which the hat, gloves and stick reposed, was some brown wrapping paper which had not been crumpled, but had evidently been dropped to the floor and was stiff enough to have retained something of its original shape.

Perry Mason noticed that the wrapping paper was creased as though it might have been wrapped about the knife that he had seen in the other room.

He opened the door to the corridor, taking care to hold his handkerchief over his fingertips as he did so. He started to polish the outer knob of the door, then thought better of it. He stepped into the corridor and pushed the door shut with his right hand, making no effort to keep his fingers from touching the outside knob.

He was just closing the door when he heard the clang of the elevator door and a woman's voice saying, "… you can hear her just as soon as you get opposite the door. She's crying and laughing and saying something about lucky legs."

There were pounding steps in the corridor, and a man's gruff voice said, "Probably just a woman having hysterics over a love affair."

"But I heard something fall, Officer. It sounded like a body. It was a jarring thud…"

Perry Mason looked toward the far end of the corridor. It was a blind corridor with no window. He looked back toward the bend in the corridor, whipped some passkeys from his pocket, selected one and inserted it in the lock of the door. The key worked smoothly. The bolt clicked into place, and Perry Mason was slipping the key back into his pocket as an officer in uniform barged around the bend in the corridor and came to an abrupt stop as he saw Perry Mason in front of the door of apartment 302.

Perry Mason raised his knuckles and pounded upon the panel, keeping his face toward the door.

From the corner of his eye, he saw the officer hold out his left hand and restrain a rather fleshy woman of middle age who had rounded the corner in the corridor just back of the officer.

Perry Mason banged on the panels of the door; then pressed his thumb against the button on the buzzer.

After a moment, he turned away with an air of dejection, raised his eyes and then, apparently for the first time, saw the officer and the woman.

He stared at them.

"Just a minute, buddy," said the officer, moving forward. "I want to talk with you."

Perry Mason stood still.

The officer turned to the woman.

"That the apartment?" he asked.

The woman nodded.

Perry Mason turned to face the woman. She wore a rather wrinkled dress, shoes, and no stockings. Her hair was badly disarranged. There was no makeup on her face.

"Who were you looking for, buddy?" asked the officer.

Perry Mason jerked his head toward the door of apartment 302.

"I wanted to see the man who lives in there," he said.

"Who's the man who lives there?" asked the officer.

"His name is Frank Patton," Perry Mason said, " — that is, I have reason to believe that's his name."

"What did you want to see him about?"

"About a matter of business."

The officer turned to the woman.

"Do you know this man?" he asked.

"No," she said, "I've never seen him before."

Perry Mason frowned irritably.

"You don't need to wonder about who I am," he said.

He pulled a leather card case from his pocket, took out one of his business cards, and handed it to the officer.

The officer read it, and there was a note of respect in his voice as he looked up and said, "Oh, you're Perry Mason, the big lawyer, eh? I've seen you in court. I remember you now."

Mason nodded, smiled affably.

"How long you been trying to get in the apartment?" asked the officer.

"Oh, perhaps a minute, perhaps a little longer," Mason said.

"There's no one home?" the officer inquired.

"I couldn't hear a sound," Mason said, "and it's strange, because I had every reason to believe that Patton was in. I pushed the button on the buzzer, and I could hear the buzzer sounding in the apartment. Then I pounded on the door, but I didn't get any answer. I thought perhaps he was in another room, or changing his clothes or something, so I waited a little while and then started all over again. I was just giving up in disgust when you came around the bend in the corridor."

"This woman," said the officer, "heard a girl having hysterics in there and then she heard something bang, as though some one had fallen to the floor. You didn't hear anything, did you?"

"Not me," Mason said. "How long ago was it?" he asked the woman.

"Not very long ago," she said. "I was in bed. I hadn't been feeling well and I went to bed early. I jumped up and pulled on a dress and put on some shoes and went out to find the officer. I brought him up here just as soon as I found him."

"Did you try the door?" the officer inquired.

"I rattled the knob," Perry Mason said. "I think the door's locked. But I didn't really turn the knob and press against it to find out. I just rattled it. I don't mind telling you, Officer, that I'm very much interested. I'm anxious to see Frank Patton. If he's in there, I'd like very much to see him."

The officer regarded the woman with frowning contemplation; then moved over to the door of apartment 302 and banged with his knuckles on the panel. When there was no answer, he took out his night stick and rapped sharply with the end of that. Then, he tried the knob of the door.

"Locked," he said.

He turned away from the door and said to the woman, "You've got the apartment across the hall?"

She nodded.

"Let's go in there," he said. "I want to locate the manager and see if he's got a passkey, and will let us in."

Perry Mason looked impatiently at his wristwatch, then faced the woman.

"Would you say that it was as much as ten minutes ago that you heard the noise in there?" he asked.

"Just about, I guess," she said.

"Just what did you hear?"

"I heard a girl sobbing. She kept saying something about lucky legs, or about her legs being lucky."

"Was she talking in a loud tone?" Mason asked.

"Yes, you know the way a woman does when she's having hysterics. She was sobbing and crying out words."

"You couldn't hear all the words?"

"No."

"Then what did you hear next?"

"Then I heard something bang to the floor."

"You didn't hear any one go in the apartment?"

"No."

"Didn't hear any one go out?"

"No. I don't know as I would have heard that. You see, the way the apartment is arranged, I can hear sounds that come through the bathroom window, but I can't hear things that go on in the apartment."

"But you heard the sound of the jarring fall?"

"Yes, that even jarred the pictures on the wall."

"And you heard this girl sobbing about her lucky legs?"

"Yes."

"She must have been in the bathroom."

"I think she was."

Perry Mason looked over toward the officer.

"Well," he said, "I guess there's nothing more I can do. If there was a woman in there, it doesn't look as though she's there now, and, anyway, I wanted to see a man. I've got to go back to my office."

"I can reach you there any time?" asked the officer. "You may be wanted as a witness. I don't know what's in there. Maybe nothing, but I don't like this business about the jar that shook the pictures on the wall."

Perry Mason nodded, extended his hand with a five dollar bill folded between the fingers, holding it in such a position that the officer could see the bill but the woman could not.

"Yes, Officer," he said, "I can be reached at my office any time. There's nothing that I know. There was no commotion when I got up here. The apartment was silent just the way it is now."

The officer slipped the five dollar bill from between Perry Mason's fingers.

"Very good, Counselor, we'll reach you if we should want you for anything. I'm going to get a passkey and see what's in the apartment anyway."

The woman took a key from her purse and opened the door of the apartment opposite 302. The officer stood aside for her to enter; then followed her in and closed the door. Perry Mason moved swiftly down the corridor and didn't bother to wait for the elevator, but found the stairs and took them two at a time. He slowed to a leisurely walk as he went through the lobby of the apartment house. There was, however, no one at the desk.

Perry Mason walked rapidly down the street and picked up his taxicab.

"Run straight down the street. Keep your eye open for a place where I can telephone, after you've gone about a dozen blocks, but I don't want to telephone from any place in the neighborhood."

The driver nodded.

"She's all warmed up ready to go," he said, and slammed the door as the lawyer settled into the cushions, and jerked the cab into almost immediate motion. He ran for eight or ten blocks; then slowed.

"The drug store over there on the corner," he said.

"That'll be fine," Mason said.

The cab pulled in by a fire plug.

"I'll keep the motor running," the driver said.

"It may be a little while to wait," Mason told him, and entered the drug store. He found a telephone booth, dropped a coin and dialed the number of his office.

Della Street's voice answered.

"Is Bradbury there, Della?" asked Perry Mason.

"Not right now," she said, "he's due any minute. He called up from the Mapleton Hotel about fifteen minutes ago; said that he had the newspapers and that he had some other stuff, some communications that had been written to the Chamber of Commerce, some contracts that were used by the merchants, and some samples of the scrip, and a lot of that stuff. He asked if I thought you'd want that as well as the newspapers. He said he had it all in a brief case."

"What'd you tell him?" asked Mason.

She laughed.

"I didn't know whether you wanted it or not," she said, "but I figured it would keep him out of mischief, so I told him sure to bring it along. He should be in—here he comes now."

"Put him on the phone," Perry Mason said, "I want him."

Mason could hear the sound of her voice, coming faintly over the line.

"Mr. Mason is on the line, Mr. Bradbury," she said, "and he wants to talk with you. You can take the call from that phone over there on the table."

There was a click in the connection; then Bradbury's eager voice.

"Yes?" he asked. "Yes, what is it?"

Perry Mason's voice was low and impressive.

"Now listen, Bradbury," he said, "I'm going to tell you something, and I don't want a fuss made over it."

"A fuss," Bradbury asked, "what sort of a fuss?"

"Shut up," Mason told him, "and keep quiet until I can tell you just what the situation is. Just answer yes or no. I don't want my secretary to know what's going on. Do you understand?"

"Yes," said Bradbury.

"You've been to your hotel?"

"Yes."

"Did you get the papers?"

"Yes."

"You have them there with you?"

"Yes."

"And there was a brief case with some other stuff in it that you brought?"

"Yes."

"The one you telephoned my secretary about?"

"Yes."

"All right," Mason said, "Now we located Frank Patton a little while ago."

"You did," exclaimed Bradbury. "That's great. Have you talked with him yet?"

"He's dead," Mason said.

"What?" yelled Bradbury, his voice shrill with excitement. "What's that? You mean to say you found him —"

"Shut up," barked Perry Mason into the telephone. "Use your head. I told you to sit tight and listen. Don't make a lot of exclamations."

There was a moment of silence. Then, Bradbury's voice, lower in tone, said, "Yes, Mr. Mason. Go ahead. I couldn't hear you very well."

"Now get this," Perry Mason said, "and get it straight, and don't make a commotion about it. We located Frank Patton. He's living at the Holliday Apartments and he has apartment 302. Those apartments are out on Maple Avenue. I went out to see him. I wanted to try and get a confession out of him before you entered the picture. I figured your presence might simply lead to argument, and not do any one any good.

"Frank Patton had been killed about ten minutes before I got there. Some one had stuck a bread knife into his chest. He was lying in his apartment, stone dead."

"Good God," said Bradbury, and then added, almost immediately, "Yes, Mr. Mason. I was just thinking of something. Go ahead and tell me some more."

"Just as I was about to go into the apartment house," Mason went on, "I saw a girl coming out. She was around twentyone or twentytwo. She had snaky hips and wore a white coat, with a fox collar. She had on white shoes, and a little white hat with a red button on it. Her eyes were very blue, and she looked as though she might be running away from something.

"Now, I want to know if that was Marjorie Clune."

Perry Mason could hear the gasping intake of Bradbury's breath over the line.

"Yes, yes," he said, "that description fits. I know the coat and hat."

"All right," Perry Mason said, "figure it out."

"What do you mean?"

"She may be in a jam."

"I don't understand."

"She was leaving the apartment house just as I went up. There was a woman in an adjoining apartment who had heard quite a racket in Patton's apartment and had gone out to get a cop. She showed up with the cop about five minutes after I got there. There's a pretty good chance the cop may have seen Marjorie Clune. There's also a chance that they may find out she was in the apartment. There was some girl in the bathroom having hysterics and screaming about her lucky legs. That would seem to tie in with Marjorie Clune. Now, what do you want me to do about it?"

Bradbury's excitement burst the bounds of selfcontrol.

"Do about it?" he screamed. "You know what I want you to do about it. Go ahead and represent her. Go ahead and see that nothing happens to her. To hell with Frank Patton. I don't care anything about him, but Margy means everything in the world to me. If she's in a jam, you go ahead and get her out of it. I don't care what it costs. You send the bill to me and I'll foot it."

"Wait a minute," Perry Mason told him. "Keep your shirt on. Don't throw a fit. And, after you hang up the telephone, if Della Street starts asking you questions, don't tell her anything. Tell her that I told you I thought I was going to have some news for you in about an hour, or something of that sort. Stall her along and tell her to wait there. Do you understand?"

"Yes," Bradbury said, but his voice was still highpitched with excitement.

"You wait right there," Perry Mason said.

"Not here," Bradbury told him, "I'll go to my hotel. You can call me there at my room. You know the number, room 693. Be sure and ask for my room number. I'll be there."

"You'd better wait there in the office."

"No, no, I want to be where I can talk. I've got a lot to tell you, and I want to find out all about what's happening. Will you call me at my room in fifteen minutes, and tell me exactly what's happened?"

"Snap out of it," Perry Mason told him. "I told you not to spill all this information. I'm busy, and I haven't got time to argue with you."

He slammed the receiver savagely on the hook, and strode out of the drug store.

"Go to the St. James Apartments," he told the cab driver. "That's at 962 East Faulkner Street, and drive like the devil."