The Case of the Negligent Nymph

Chapter 9

PAUL DRAKE, SEATED IN HIS CUBBYHOLE OF A PRIVATE OFFICE, a green plastic eyeshade pulled down over his eyes, studied a series of reports. Telephones on his desk kept him constantly in touch with the men who were out in the field. On the wall an electric clock silently paced the seconds.

Perry Mason and Della Street, using the prerogative of long friendship and the relationship of steady employers, marched unannounced down the narrow corridor, tapped perfunctorily on the door of Drake’s private office, and then Mason held it open so that Della Street could enter first.

Drake looked up from his reports, grinned, glanced at the clock, rubbed his eyes, and said, “I was just getting ready to knock off and go home. Where have you folks been?”

Mason slipped his arm around Della Street’s waist. “Dining, dancing and relaxing, Paul. At this stage we’re hiring you to do the work.”

Drake said wearily, “Maybe you think it isn’t work! These birds who think a private detective has glamorous adventures, plays tag with cops, spends his free time fighting off beautiful babes, should try keeping two dozen operatives working so they get results and don’t fall all over each other’s feet.”

“What’s new?” Mason asked.

“Lots of things. Nothing startling, just a lot of details that we can button up into a package by morning. Things always slow down a little around this time of night. You can’t get people to talk after they’ve gone to bed, no matter how many men you have on the job, so I usually start laying men off, and plan on an early morning start”

“You find out anything about Corrine?” Mason asked.

“Evidently she was despondent because a close friend had walked out on her. That friend, incidentally, was Minerva Danby who was washed overboard from George Alder’s yacht.

“George Alder flew to South America when he heard his half sister was mentally sick. He arrived the day she disappeared. Circumstances indicate suicide over despondency, but her body was never found.

“Carmen Monterrey, Corrine’s maid and companion, is back in this country somewhere. I’ve put ads in all the papers—routine wording, If Carmen Monterrey will communicate with the undersigned, she’ll learn something very much to her advantage.’ I’ve had a blind box number on the ad, so … “

The right-hand phone on Drake’s desk rang insistently.

The detective motioned excuses to Mason, picked up the telephone, said, “Hello … Okay, go ahead… What? I … The hell! … Okay, give me details … All right, get details and feed them in here just as fast as you can. I’m sending a couple more men down to help you get the dope. I want facts … All right, I'll be right here … you start digging. I’ll have two men down there within half an hour … All right, get them.”

Drake slammed up the phone, said, “Just a minute, ! Perry, hold everything.”

He grabbed the phone on his left and barked an order to someone in the office. “Get two men down to the Alder residence on the island. I want them to help Jake. Get them started fast … No, I don’t care what two men you take. This takes precedence over everything… only get good men. This is hot!”

Drake dropped the receiver into place, pushed the green eyeshade up on his forehead and said, “George Alder’s been murdered.”

“The devil he hasl When?”

“Apparently within the last few hours. Sally Bangor, employed as a servant, made the discovery, and surprised the murderer red-handed in the study. Death apparently by gunshot Body lying sprawled out on the floor of his study. Outer door open. Dog inside a converted closet where George kept him shut up when he was expecting visitors.

“The man I had assigned to keep the house covered just got there. He found police cars around the place, got a flash that Alder had been murdered, and beat it to a phone to give me die news. Now he’s gone back to prowl around and contact someone who will talk—a newspaper photographer, reporter, friendly cop, or someone. He has contacts and we should hear from him in a few minutes.”

“Why didn’t you have him on the job before this?” Mason asked irritably.

“Have a heart, Perry. There was no indication there was anything urgent about covering the house. In fact, I debated whether to put anyone on there before morning. I … “

“It’s all right, Paul,” Mason interrupted. “I’m jumpy.”

Drake said, “Excuse me a minute and I’ll go out to die switchboard and start directing activities from there. I can gain a little time that way and I may be able to pick up some stuff from one of the newspaper offices here.”

Drake left the room and Mason exchanged glances with Della Street, then started pacing the floor.

Della Street sat motionless, watching him, her short-hand notebook poised on her knee, a pencil held over it ready to take down any instructions Mason might give. But the lawyer continued to pace thoughtfully back and forth across the narrow confines of Drake’s office, his chin on his chest.

After some ten or fifteen minutes, Drake came bustling back into the room and said, “I have a whole flock of lines out, Perry, but it’ll take me awhile to get details. Want to wait or get ‘em in the morning?”

Mason grinned, perched himself on the one uncluttered corner of Drake’s desk and said, “Foolish question … we’ll wait.”

Drake pulled out a package of cigarettes from his desk drawer, made a gesture of invitation to Della Street, who shook her head, and to Mason, who said, “Thanks, Paul, I have one of my own.”

Mason opened his cigarette case and he and Drake lit up.

“This is the sort of stuff that drives you nuts in this business,” Drake said. “I have two dozen men on the job. It gets around to the slack time and I start calling them in. Then something like this breaks. I’m like a runner with too short a lead off first base with the batter rapping out a short single. I’m falling all over myself trying to get started.”

“If you feel that way about it,” Mason said, “think about me.”

Drake shook his head. “Your job hasn’t started yet. I’m getting you the facts. After I get them, you can take whatever action is indicated—probably nothing, now that the guy’s been murdered.”

Mason glanced at Della Street, grinned, and said, “Listen to the detective telling the lawyer how easy the life of an attorney is.”

Drake said, “You think a detective has a cinch. Remember I have a reputation. I’m supposed to get you the facts all wrapped up in a neat package so you can go to work on them. Tell me, Perry, what will this thing do? Will it close out your interest in the case?”

“I don’t think so,” Mason said. “I’m gunning for bigger stakes.”

Drake glanced at him, raised an inquiring eyebrow, but didn’t put the question into words.

Della Street picked up the evening paper that was on the floor beside the chair she occupied and started reading.

Mason said, “I hate to hold out on you, Paul”

“It’s okay,” Drake said. “Sometimes I can be of a little more help if I know what you’re working on, that’s all. From where I sit, it looks as though Dorothy Fenner was out in the clear right now. The D. A. won’t be able to prosecute without someone to swear that certain specific property is missing. From all I can hear, you gave Alder quite a going over in the courtroom this afternoon.”

Mason said, “There’s more to it than Dorothy Fenner’s case, Paul.”

“Yeah, I know,” Drake said. “That’s what I gathered.”

Mason said, “This has to be in strict confidence, Paul.”

“I’ve never let you down yet, have IF’

“Nope,” Mason said, “but when you take a look at this, you’ll see that it’s loaded with dynamite.”

Mason took from his pocket the copy of the letter which had been contained in the bottle and passed it over to Paul Drake. “Take a look at that, Paul.”

Drake read the letter, at first with nervous impatience, his eyes on the sheet of paper, but his ears listening for the telephones. Then suddenly he snapped his attention to sharp focus on the letter, and muttered half under his breath, “For the love of Mikel”

“Some dynamite, eh, Paul?”

Drake didn’t answer. He remained utterly engrossed in the letter.

Della Street looked up from the newspaper, started to say something, then folded the paper and waited until Drake had finished reading.

Mason adjusted himself to a more comfortable position, interlaced his fingers over his kneecap.

One of the telephones rang.

Drake, with his eyes still on the letter, groped absently for the telephone.

With swift efficiency, Della Street picked up the phone and put it in Drake’s groping hand.

“Thanks,” Drake said. Then, into the telephone, “Yes, hello?”

He listened to words which came rattling from the receiver, said, “Well, that’s a lot better! Give me some more facts.”

He listened for a few seconds, then put down the letter he was reading, picked up a pencil, and started making notes.

For some two or three minutes the receiver made noises and Drake kept on taking notes.

“That all?” he asked.

He listened to some more talk on the receiver, said, “Okay, I think you’re doing good. Now, you’ll have help down there in just a little while. I want to get all the facts I can and I want to find out what the police are doing. HI be sitting right here. Keep feeding in the facts.

“Good lord, Perry,” Drake said, “that letter is really something. Where did you get it?”

Mason said, “Apparently it was found in a bottle that had drifted ashore and was picked up by a beachcomber who turned the thing over to Alder. Now, that’ll show you something of what I have in mind. What did you leam just now, anything new?”

“Looks like a real break for your client,” Drake said.

“Shoot.”

“That is,” Drake went on, “unless Dorothy Fenner went back to Alder’s house to finish the job she started Saturday night.”

!®

“Don’t be silly,” Mason told him. “Dorothy Fenner is a good little girl. She’s following my instructions. I took her home, and she’s staying at home.”

“How do you know?”

“I told her what to do. I think she has enough confidence in me to do exactly what I told her. What have you found out, Paul?”

Drake said, “That was my man down at Alder s place. He contacted a deputy sheriff who gave him all the dope. It looks as though the same prowler that was down there Saturday night came back and went to work again. This time she didn’t jump out of the window. The dog was shut up in the closet and when Alder surprised her, she gave him the works with a thirty-eight caliber double-action revolver.”

“What makes them think it’s the same one?” Mason asked, his eyes narrowing.

“Because of what police refer to as ‘modus operandi,’ the person who was in the study ran out through open French doors at the back of the study. These French doors open on the bay side. Sally Bangor, the servant who made the discovery of the body, had enough presence of mind to close the gate across the bridge when she ran back to the mainland. That left the murderer marooned on the island.

“The maid’s screams got action from a passing motorist, and radio cops were on the job within a matter of minutes. When they heard Sally Bangor’s story they drew their guns and started making a routine search of the premises, leaving a committee of curious citizens who had gathered to stand at the mainland end of the bridge and see that no one doubled back behind them and got off the island that way.”

“And?” Mason asked.

“And they found precisely nothing,” Drake said, “no sign of the murderer. The only way that the murderer could have escaped was by water, just as she did the other night.”

“What’s the rest of it?” Mason asked.

“Well, George Alder was lying face down in a huge pool of blood. He’d been shot through the neck with a thirty-eight caliber revolver, and the bullet had severed one of the big arteries, gone clean on through the neck and apparently didn’t lodge anywhere in the room. That gives police the line of fire. The woman who shot him must have been standing right by the desk. Alder apparently fell in his tracks.”

“How do the police figure she was standing by the desk?”

“Because only in that case could the bullet have gone through Alder’s neck and then out through the open French doors. Alder pitched forward. The girl must have thrown the gun at him as he fell.”

“How come?”

“The gun was found under the body, all crusted with blood, and one shell fired. So there they have things in a nutshell, Perry.”

“Where was the dog all this time?”

“Locked up in a closet where apparently he stays most of the time when Alder is entertaining visitors in his study. The dog is rather unsocial. He’s been trained as a combat dog … not the type that does much barking, but the kind that goes into action. He had the regular routine Army training, pursuing people, dragging them down, and all that stuff.

“As I understand it, if a person stands perfectly still with his hands up in the air, the dog is trained to crouch and not do anything, but the minute the person moves or assumes a threatening gesture, the dog will tear him apart.”

“And what was the dog doing all the time the murder was taking place?”

Paul Drake looked completely blank. “How the dickens — Oh, I see. I’ll get my man to look into it and let you know later.”

Mason said, “How long ago did all this take place, Paul?”

Drake said, “As nearly as police can tell from a superficial examination, the murder must have taken place around nine o’clock this evening. It was the servant’s night out and she didn’t return until around ten o’clock.”

“So the murderer must have been in there searching for an horn-?”

“Apparently so.”

Mason looked at his watch. “Hell, Paul, it’s twelve o’clock now.”

“I told you,” Drake said, “that I probably made a slipup by not having a man down there covering the house sooner. As it was, I sent this fellow down, told him to go on duty at midnight and keep the place under observation until eight in the morning, when I’d have a relief for him. Cosh, Perry, you wanted dope on Alder, but you didn’t want anybody tailed, and I even debated with myself whether to put anyone on watch at the house or not, but finally decided I’d do it just to get the license numbers of cars that might drive up, and … “

“It’s all right,” Mason said, “I think I'll go get Dorothy Fenner out of bed and tell her about it. That may forestall some interviews with the newspaper, and … “

Della Street, who had been waiting for a break in the conversation, said, “Before you go, Chief, you might take a look at this.”

“What?”

Della Street raised the paper and said, “Here’s a want ad ‘If Carmen Monterrey, who was in South America nine months ago, will communicate with the undersigned, she will receive information to her financial advantage. Box 123J.’”

“Sure,” Drake said, “that’s the ad I put in the paper.”

“And how did you get it in the afternoon paper?” Della Street asked.

Drake suddenly jerked upright to startled attention. “What?” he yelled. “Let me have that paper.”

Mason said, “Looks as though someone might be one jump ahead of us, Paul. Better try to find out if you can what that Box 123J is. Della, get yourself a taxi and go on home and try to get some sleep. I’m going down, get Dorothy Fenner out of bed, and beat the police to the punch.”

“Think they’ll call on her?” Drake asked.

“Oh, sure,” Mason said, “unless they have already. However, I’ll have a nice little heart-to-heart talk.”

“You don’t want me with you?” Della Street asked, somewhat wistfully.

“No. You go get some sleep.”

“Gosh, I don’t feel as if I ever wanted to sleep.”

“Take a pill,” Mason advised. “You’re going to have to be on the job in the morning.”

“But how about you?” she asked.

“I,” Mason said, somewhat grimly, “am going to have to get on the job right now.”