The Case of the Reluctant Model

Chapter Seven

Mason left the elevator the next morning, stopped in at the office of the Drake Detective Agency, said to the switchboard operator, “Paul in?”

She nodded, said, “He’s busy on the phone.”

“I’ll go on down,” Mason said. “Anybody with him?”

She shook her head. “He’s alone. Just getting phone calls right and left.”

Mason smiled. “I guess I’m responsible for that. I’ll go down and listen to him gripe.”

The lawyer walked on down the narrow passageway, past the doors of the cubbyhole offices, to Paul Drake’s office.

Mason opened the door.

Drake was talking on the phone. “Okay, Bill, stay with it. Get all you can. Keep on the job. Now, is there any chance you’ll need a relief up there?... I see... Well, it sounds a little naïve, but— Okay, if she’s preoccupied, that’s it.”

Drake hung up the phone, said, “Hi, Perry,” reached for a cigarette, said, “I’ve been up all night.”

“Glad to hear it,” Mason said. “You wouldn’t want to draw your money without doing something to earn it, would you?”

“Well, I’m going to draw a lot on this one,” Drake said. “I hope your client is well heeled.”

“The client right at the moment,” Mason said, “is Mr. Perry Mason. I’m doing this on my own.”

“You are!” Paul Drake exclaimed, pausing with a match halfway to the cigarette.

“That’s right,” Mason said. “I’m just taking out a little insurance to see that I’m not being played for a sucker. What do you know about Maxine?”

“Maxine,” Drake said, “is leaving a trail a mile broad. I had four operatives on the job.”

“I saw you had quite a gang,” Mason said.

“Were they obvious?”

“If you were looking for them, they were. But I had the impression Maxine was pretty much disturbed over something and wasn’t paying attention to her surroundings.”

“Well, your impression was right, unless the girl is a consummate actress,” Drake said. “She’s headed for someplace up north and just doesn’t seem to give a hang about anything except getting there. She pulled out last night right after she talked with you, drove to an all-night drug store, parked, purchased some creams, a hairbrush, a toothbrush, comb, and a pair of pajamas. Then she stopped at a filling station, got her car filled to the brim with gasoline and took off. She got as far as Bakersfield, went to a motel, got six hours’ sleep, then was on the road again and is at this moment in Merced.”

“Stopping there?” Mason asked.

“Grabbing a bit of breakfast, getting the car filled up, and ready to be on her way again,” Drake said.

“How many men have you got on the job?” Mason asked.

“Only two at the moment,” Drake said, “because that’s all that’s needed. I told the others to come on back home. I have one man keeping ahead of her, one man staying behind. They swap positions once in a while so that she doesn’t feel she’s wearing a tail, but frankly I don’t think she’s thinking about it at all.”

“What have you found out about her background?” Mason asked.

“She worked as a model in New York, she came on to Hollywood thinking she might crash the portals here, did some modeling work, started getting a little heavy, turned to a technique of photo portrait painting, and that seems to be about it.”

“Boy friends?” Mason asked.

“Haven’t found any yet that she’s taken any particular interest in. She seems to be pretty much in love with her work. That is, she’s ambitious and keeps on plugging away at her work.

“An art dealer named Lattimer Rankin has been throwing some work her way and may have a little personal interest there. She knows a few of the models, a few of the artists, is well liked, and that’s about it so far. I’m working on it. She’s probably had a few affairs.”

“What about Durant?”

“Durant,” Drake said, “is a phoney. He has some kind of a medical discharge out of the army. He dabbled around in an art appreciation course, became a self-styled art dealer, started putting on a series of lectures; talks learnedly, knows very little, is rather resourceful, likes to ride around in fancy cars which he gets second or third hand and has had a couple of them repossessed when he couldn’t meet the payments. He’s two months behind in the rent on his apartment and I don’t think he stayed in his apartment last night. If he did, he’s sleeping late this morning.

“I have a man on the job who can get in after the maids get on duty but couldn’t get in last night. However, his best guess is Durant is out somewhere. His car isn’t in the apartment garage. He—”

The phone rang. Drake took the cigarette out of his mouth, picked up the phone, said, “Drake talking.”

The detective listened for a moment, said, “Okay. That’s the way I had it figured. Stay on the job until I give you instructions to the contrary.”

Drake hung up and said, “That’s the operative out at the apartment house. Durant wasn’t in last night. The bed hasn’t been slept in.”

“A man like that would have been married at least once,” Mason said.

“Twice we know of,” Drake said. “Once, a young girl before he went in the army. She had a child four months after the marriage. She’s working to support the child.

“After he got out of the army he married into rather a wealthy family, but he reckoned without the old man. The old man had detectives on his trail, got all the dope he needed, waited until the daughter became disillusioned and then they threw Mr. Collin Durant out on his ear without a dime by way of settlement.”

“How long ago?” Mason asked.

“Four years.”

“What’s he been doing since — I mean for his love life?”

“Playing the field,” Drake said. “He has a good line of patter and he’s deadly on models who pose in the nude, young female artists who want a chance to get ahead — all the general rackets.

“I haven’t had a chance to check on him too much, because of the outlandish hour I started working... My God, Perry, I’ve run up a bill for you. If you’re footing this, it’s going to give you a jolt when you get the statement, but I thought you wanted results and... well, I sort of thought Otto Olney was the one who was back of all this and I just haven’t spared expenses in order to get results.”

“Don’t spare them,” Mason said. “I want results. In fact I have to have them.

“You have a description of Durant’s car?”

“Sure,” Drake said. He picked up a card, tossed it over to Mason. “There’s the make, model, license number, color — everything about it.”

Mason regarded the card thoughtfully.

“What about Maxine’s background? Any particular reason why she should be headed where she is headed?”

“We don’t know where she’s headed yet,” Drake said. “It could be Sacramento, it could be Eugene, it could be Portland, it could be Seattle, it could be Canada. Give her time. One thing’s certain. She’s headed on a long trip, she’s short of cash, and she’s trying to get where she’s going in a hurry.”

“How do you know she’s short of cash?”

“Haggling over the motel room, for one thing. It took her half an hour in Bakerfield to find a place where the rate suited her. She’s drinking coffee and not eating much. She started out with premium gasoline; then she started mixing premium and standard, now she’s running on standard grade gasoline.”

“No credit card?” Mason asked.

“No credit card. She’s paying cash.”

“Okay,” Mason said, “stay with her, Paul. I’ll be seeing you.”

Mason left the detective, walked on down the corridor, opened the door of the private office, and said to Della, “Well, how did it go?”

“Wonderful,” Della Street said.

“Good night’s sleep?”

“Fine.”

“And you took a cab to work?”

She smiled and said, “No, Chief, I didn’t. I knew that this was on you, that you weren’t going to bill Olney, so I took one bus, transferred, took another bus and got here right on the nose.”

Mason frowned. “You should have taken a cab.”

“I saved you four dollars and ninety cents,” she said, “not including a tip.”

Mason was thoughtful a moment, then said, “It’s that spirit of loyalty that makes me feel...”

“Yes?” Della prompted.

“Sort of humble,” Mason said. “I hope I can deserve it.”

“What do you hear from Drake?” she asked abruptly. “I told him I thought you’d stop in on your way here.”

“I stopped in,” Mason said. “Durant has holed up somewhere and disappeared.”

“What about Maxine?”

“Maxine is making tracks north. She’s just about running out of cash.”

The phone rang.

Della Street picked it up, said, “It’s Paul, Perry.”

Mason picked up the telephone on his desk and said, “What is it, Paul?”

“Another line on your friend, Maxine Lindsay.”

“What about her?”

“She wired Mrs. Phoebe Stigler at Eugene, Oregon, to wire twenty-five dollars to her care of Western Union, Redding, and waive identification.”

“How do you know?”

“She wired from Merced,” Drake said. “My man got on the job, insisted the girl at the counter had lost the telegram he’d handed her and she started looking through the file. My man became thoroughly disliked but got a look at the wire Maxine had sent.”

“Okay, Paul,” Mason said. “Check on Phoebe Stigler at Eugene. Find out all about her.”

The telephone rang. Della Street picked up the instrument and said, “Yes, Gertie? What is it?... Just a minute.”

She turned to Perry Mason and said, “Mr. Hollister of Warton, Warton, Cosgrove and Hollister, is calling.”

Mason’s eyes narrowed. “All right,” he said. “I’ll take it.”

He picked up the telephone, said, “Good morning, Mr. Hollister. How’s everything this morning?”

“Perhaps not so good,” Hollister said.

“In what respect?” Mason asked.

“This witness, Maxine Lindsay.”

“What about her?”

“I have been analyzing the situation,” Hollister said, “and our whole case hinges upon her, and upon the availability of her testimony.”

“Well?” Mason asked.

“At the start I had of course thought that the situation hinged upon the question of whether the painting which Rankin had sold our client, Otto Olney, was a genuine Phellipe Feteet.

“I had felt that since Rankin’s veracity and integrity as a dealer had been put into question, the main issue in the case would depend upon establishing the authenticity of the painting which Rankin had sold our client.”

“Exactly,” Mason said.

“However, there seems to be absolutely no question about the authenticity of the painting. It would seem that the way the situation shapes up at present, the only issue of fact is whether Durant made the statement that the painting was spurious. Now, it has occurred to us this morning that this hinges entirely upon the testimony of one witness.

“I may point out to you, Mr. Mason, that we have an office conference every morning at eight-thirty, discussing the problems which we have in connection with our litigation, and Mr. Warton, our senior partner, pointed out that the entire litigation at this point seems to depend upon establishing the fact that Durant made this remark, and that in turn is dependent upon the testimony of only one witness.”

“Well, one witness can establish a point all right,” Mason said.

“You have no question but what that witness is acting in good faith?”

“Why should I?” Mason asked.

“Suppose,” Hollister said, “that — well, suppose this witness should marry Collin Durant before the case came to trial. Then she would be unable to testify against her husband and my client would find himself in a very precarious position.”

“Did you have any information on which to base that?” Mason asked.

“No information — one of the partners raised the point.”

Mason said, “I don’t have any partners, Hollister, and therefore I don’t have any office conferences with people who think up things to worry about.”

“I thought I’d let you know our thinking in the matter,” Hollister said stiffly.

“Okay,” Mason said, “why not cut the Gordian knot right now? Why not serve notice on Durant that you’re going to take his deposition? Why not ask him the question right out in the open, did he or did he not make a statement to Maxine Lindsay that the Phellipe Feteet that was hanging in the salon of Otto Olney’s yacht was a fake?”

“I’ve thought of that,” Hollister said.

“Well, what’s wrong with it?”

“I guess there’s nothing wrong with it. I... I’ll... I think I’ll discuss that with my partners.”

“Do that,” Mason said. “If the fellow says he never made any such statement, then you know what his defense is. If he says he made it and the picture is spurious, then you know what you’re up against. In any event, let’s find out what the score is... What makes you think she’s going to marry Durant?”

“Well, at our partnership meeting we just started thinking about what could happen, what the possibilities were. If something should happen that... Well, that we had got our client out on a limb, we wouldn’t like that, Mr. Mason.”

“I wouldn’t like it either,” Mason said.

“Well, I’m glad to have had this opportunity to talk with you,” Hollister said. “The more I think of it, the more I feel that we should find out where we stand and I think taking Durant’s deposition is perhaps the best course immediately available. I will prepare the necessary papers and we’ll proceed at once.”

“Do that,” Mason said.

He hung up the phone, turned to Della Street, said, “Here we are standing on a rug with somebody ready to jerk it out from under us.”

“So what do we do?” Della Street asked.

Mason grinned and said, “Spike the rug down so that when the guy jerks, he loses a set of fingernails.”

“What do we do next?” Della Street asked.

“Now,” Mason said, “we gently ease ourselves out of the office without telling anyone where we’re going, and we go to the apartment of Maxine Lindsay and see just what we can find.”

“You mean we take the canary?”

“We take the canary,” Mason said, “and while we’re there we go through the place with a fine-toothed comb. We look for any sort of a clue we can get.”

“And then what?”

“Then,” Mason said, “we ask Mr. Hollister of Warton, Warton, Cosgrove and Hollister if he would like to have associate counsel in the case.”

“The associate counsel being who?”

“Being me,” Mason said. “It’s about time someone with guts got into the thing. We take the deposition of Collin Durant. We ask him a series of the most embarrassing questions imaginable. We ask him whether he has ever been sued before for proclaiming a painting spurious. We ask him whether he did or did not state that the Otto Olney Feteet was spurious. We ask him how long he has known Maxine Lindsay. We ask him if he has ever been married. We ask him the names of his wives. We ask him the places where he got divorces.”

“Is all that pertinent?”

“Sure, it’s pertinent,” Mason said. “If the guy thinks he’s going to sneak up to Oregon and marry Maxine and then come back here and smile at us, we’re going to try to prevent it. We’re going to see if all his previous marriages have been dissolved or whether one may still be in force. If we can find a valid outstanding marriage, we’re going to arrest the guy for bigamy the minute he marries Maxine, and then we’re going to force Maxine to testify on the ground that she isn’t the legal wife of Collin Durant. It seems that the guy is the marrying kind, and if this lawsuit racket is a habit with him, he’s married other witnesses to keep them from testifying.”

“What makes you think they’re having a rendezvous to get married in Oregon?” Della Street asked.

“Well, we’ll look at it this way. Where is Collin Durant? He hasn’t been home, his car is missing, and Maxine was in a hurry. She had to leave last night. She evidently had a meeting place that had been definitely pinpointed somewhere.”

“It begins to add up,” Della Street admitted.

“Come on,” Mason said, “let’s go.”

“Are you going to tell Paul where we’re going?”

“We won’t tell anyone,” Mason said.

After they were in Mason’s car, Della said, “She gave me a key. That makes anything we do legal, doesn’t it?”

“She gave you a key in order to get the canary,” Mason said, “but something seems to tell me you won’t be able to find the feed for the canary and you’ll have to look around some to find out where she kept it.”

“In the kitchen?” Della Street asked.

“Well, of course you can’t tell with a girl like Maxine,” Mason said. “She might have kept it in the bedroom or in one of the closets. Or again, it might have been in a suitcase somewhere, or down in the bottom of a bureau drawer. A package of birdseed could be kept almost anywhere — and then of course there’s cuttlebone. I think you have to use cuttlebone to keep a canary healthy and — oh, I can think of lots of things that might be around there in various places.”

“So we’re going to look in various places.”

“Don’t make any mistake, Della, we’re going to look in all the places.”

They drove in silence, Della Street apparently speculating on the various possibilities.

Mason said, “We don’t need to go blind very much longer, Della. The trail is pretty well blazed. The fact that Warton, Warton, Cosgrove and Hollister are beginning to worry is something to think about. If this is a racket, it’s about time some lawyer shows up stating he represents Durant and wants to start talking settlement.”

“And you think Olney will settle?”

Mason said, “His attorneys are corporation attorneys. They aren’t accustomed to rough-and-tumble fighting. They begin to realize now what a horrible mess their client could be in and naturally they don’t want to have it get around the courthouse that they got Olney out on a limb, any more than I want to have it get around that I got a client out on a limb. The only difference is that when the going gets tough I’ll fight regardless of whether the situation is disagreeable or not. I don’t think those other lawyers will.”

Della Street said, “This is her apartment house. We should be able to find a parking place at this hour of the morning— Here’s one right here.”

Mason said, “That’s rather a long walk. I think we can find one closer.”

He suddenly braked the car to a stop.

“What’s the matter?” Della asked.

“That car,” Mason said, pointing to a large pretentious automobile parked at the curb.

“What about it?”

“It’s the same general description as Collin Durant’s. I got the description from Paul Drake just a short time ago — and I think it’s the same license number. Skip out and take a look at the registration on the steering post, will you, Della?”

Della whipped open the door of the car, jumped to the ground, took a quick look at the registration then hurried back to the car and said, “That’s right, it’s Collin Max Durant’s automobile.”

“The plot thickens all to hell,” Mason said. “Now, what do you suppose Durant is doing here?”

“Trying to see Maxine?” Della Street asked.

“In that event,” Mason said, “he has been here for a long time, or else the guy likes to walk. When he parked his car, there weren’t many parking places available near the apartment house, which means either that the people hadn’t gone to work early in the morning or that he came in at night after people had come home from the offices and had taken up most of the readily available parking spaces.”

“Well, since we know she wasn’t in her apartment all last night,” Della Street said, “that would seem to indicate he had come this morning and—”

“Or has been waiting for her all night,” Mason said, “in which event he probably found some means of letting himself into her apartment.”

“Perhaps he has a key.”

“Could be,” Mason said. “Those things have happened.”

The lawyer eased his car into motion and drove up to one of the vacant parking places near the main entrance to the apartment house.

“What’s her number, Della?” he asked.

“Three-thirty-eight-B.”

“Well,” Mason said, “we’ll go up and see what gives.”

“If he’s waiting in the apartment, what do we do?” she asked.

“Play it by ear,” Mason said. “But I think we get tough. If it’s a fight he wants, we can let him know it’s going to go the limit.”

They went up in the elevator, oriented themselves on numbers, walked to Apartment 338-B, and Della Street silently handed Mason the key.

Mason carefully inserted the key in the lock so as not to make the slightest noise, pressed gently against the key. Nothing happened. “The wrong key?” Della asked.

Mason tried the knob. “No, the door seems to have been left unlocked.” He twisted the knob, pushed open the door.

The apartment was empty and in perfect order.

Mason stood in the doorway, looking the place over. Della Street, standing directly behind him, placed one of her hands on his arm.

“No one’s here,” she said.

“That’s either a kitchenette out there or a bedroom,” Mason said. “Probably a kitchenette.”

The lawyer gently closed the door of the apartment, crossed over to the swinging door, pushed it open to disclose a tidy kitchenette with a pocket-sized refrigerator.

“There must be a wall bed,” Mason said. “Apparently that’s all there is to the place, except there’s a bath.”

Mason walked over, opened the door to the bathroom, then recoiled.

Della Street stifled a scream.

The body of a man was lying face down, the legs sprawled across the tiles, the upper part of the body lying in the shower stall.

Mason bent over the body.

“Is it...?” Della Street’s voice failed.

Mason said, “It’s Collin M. Durant, our obnoxious friend of last night, and he’s dead as a mackerel. Evidently these are bullet holes in the back.”

Mason bent over to touch the still form.

“How long has he been dead?” she asked.

“That,” Mason said, “is going to be the big question. Notice that all the lights are on, Della.”

“Then he must have come up here after he left us last night,” Della Street said. “The lights were on. Maxine would normally have turned them off — and Durant’s bed wasn’t slept in last night.”

“And,” Mason said, “was he up here before Maxine left her apartment or not? Can Maxine prove that she was waiting at a pay station telephone booth? We’ve got to get Homicide on the job right away, Della. Minutes are precious. They’ve got to determine the time of death and let’s not throw any obstacles in the way of an accurate determination— Hello, what’s this?”

“What?” Della Street asked.

Mason turned back the coat slightly. “Look at that inside pocket,” he said, “filled with hundred-dollar bills. And this is the boy who lost a couple of cars because he couldn’t keep up the payments, the man who was two months behind in the rent on his apartment, the fourflushing playboy who didn’t have any ready cash.”

“How much is in there?” Della Street asked.

“Heaven knows,” Mason said, “and I don’t want to take the responsibility of counting it. We’re not supposed to touch anything.”

The lawyer straightened.

“How long does it take rigor mortis to develop?” Della Street asked.

“It’s a variable,” Mason said. “It depends on temperature, on the activity of the body just prior to death, on the degree of excitement. It usually takes eight to twelve hours, but it can last for eighteen hours after it develops. Notice that rigor has fully developed in this body and hasn’t as yet begun to leave.”

Della Street said, “Good heavens! This changes the complexion of the entire case, doesn’t it?”

“It not only changes the complexion,” Mason said slowly and thoughtfully, “it changes the case. Come on, Della, we’ve got to telephone Homicide and let our friend, Lieutenant Tragg, interrogate us as to how it happened we discovered another body.”

They started for the door. Abruptly Mason said, “Della, I’m going to have to put you out on the firing line.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re going to have to telephone Homicide and tell them the story.”

“What story do I tell them?”

“Tell them that Maxine Lindsay was a witness in a case, that while I was not an attorney of record I was interested in the case, that she told you last night she was leaving and gave you the key to her apartment and asked you to see about the canary.”

“Heavens, yes, the canary,” Della Street said. “I almost forgot about it. Where is it?”

“And that’s a good question,” Mason said, looking around the place. “There isn’t any sign of a cage, no sign of a bird — no sign that there ever was a bird — nothing to indicate that she ever owned a canary.”

Della Street exchanged glances with the lawyer. “And what would that mean?” she asked.

“That might mean lots of things,” Mason said. “Della, be very, very careful. Tell the police the exact truth about the time that we met Maxine. Don’t tell them about the time she telephoned us, about the number she gave us, the place where she said she was.”

Della Street said, “Gosh, Chief, I just made a note of that number long enough to call her and then tossed it in the wastebasket because she said it wasn’t her apartment but was a phone booth.”

Mason’s eyes were thoughtful. “Tell them she gave you the key to her apartment,” he said. “Tell them that you don’t feel that you can tell anyone what reason she gave until you have an okay from me. She gave you the key to her apartment and that’s all — that’s it, period. You took the key and came up here with me. You can’t tell them anything about the case until you have my permission. You must, however, tell them everything connected with the discovery of the body, all about the time and how we happened to be here, and that we found the door unlocked.”

“Do I tell them you were here with me?”

“Sure.”

“And where do I tell them that you are? They’ll want to know.”

“Tell them I couldn’t be detained at the moment, I had to go out on business. They’ll be furious but with me, not with you.”

“Aren’t you supposed to report a body just as soon as you find it? Aren’t you supposed to hold yourself available and—”

“I’m reporting it,” Mason said. “That is, you are, and you’re my employee. What I do through my agents I do myself. On the other hand, I can’t afford to stick around for a lot of police questioning right at the moment. I’m going to have to go places.”

“Where?” Della Street asked.

Suddenly before Mason could answer she said, “Oh, I know. You’re taking a plane north.”

“Exactly,” Mason said, “and you’re not to tell anyone where I’m going and we aren’t going to let the police know anything about Paul Drake being on the job and putting a lot of shadows on Maxine. We’ll tell them that later.”

“Can you get there in time?” Della Street asked.

“I think so,” Mason said. “I’ll get a plane to San Francisco and then charter a plane if I have to. I may be able to get a through plane to Sacramento and then pick up a Pacific Airlines plane or charter one. — Anyway, I’ll get there, Della.”

“And I’m to tell no one where you are.”

“That’s right,” Mason said. “You don’t know.”

“And I telephone the police now?”

“Right now,” Mason said. “Ask for Lieutenant Tragg at Homicide — and you’d better lock up here and use the phone in the lobby. There may be fingerprints on that telephone the police would like to save.”

Mason gently turned the knob and held the door open for Della Street.

“Take the elevator,” he said. “I can beat it going down the stairs. You’ll have to take a cab back to the office.”

The lawyer hurried to the stairway, took the stairs two at a time.