The Case of the Runaway

Chapter 3

The DC-3 puddle-jumped the bumpy air after it left Marysville, skimming over small communities mailed by clustered lights, over the dark spaces of fertile rice fields, past the glow that marked the location of Oroville, then swept low over Chico and into the landing field.

A taxicab took Mason and Della Street up to the center of town where Mason was successful in renting an automobile on a mileage basis. They found the road to Paradise and started climbing up the long grade.

Light from a three-quarter moon showed them something of the country, brought a startled gasp from Della at the sheer beauty of the scenery as the road skirted the edge of a lava cap and they looked down into the depths of a canyon, where crags of lava threw inky black shadows.

Mason glided past the group of stores which marked the center of the community, found the road where he turned left, and had no difficulty in locating the sharp curve which was the signal for another left-hand turn.

On each side of the road were modem, livable houses, among tall pines, bordered with green lawns. Up at this elevation all of the smoke and smog of the lower valley had vanished and, despite the moonlight, the brighter stars shone with steady splendor.

Della Street took a deep breath. “Just notice the air, Chief,” she said. “Pure and pine-scented, clear as crystal. And aren’t those beautiful homesites?”

Mason nodded.

“Do you suppose Ed Davenport’s place is like these?”

“We’ll know in a minute,” Mason told her, turning the wheel to the left.

They came to the end of pavement, crunched along on a groveled road past a neat house with a green fence, and then, as the road ended, turned right on the graveled driveway which swept them through a grove of pines, past thick manzanita, a few apple and pear trees, and brought them abruptly to the porch of a house which, despite the darkness within, seemed somehow to have a friendly, homey atmosphere.

Mason switched off the lights, turned off the ignition, walked around the car, and followed Della Street up on the porch.

“Suppose we’d better ring the bell just in case?” Della asked.

Mason nodded.

Della Street’s gloved thumb pressed against the bell button. Musical chimes sounded from the interior of the house.

“Ring once more,” Mason said after an interval, “and then we’ll try the key.”

Della Street rang the second time. After some ten seconds Mason inserted the key in the lock. The bolt clicked smoothly back. Mason turned the knob and the door swung open.

“Now what?” Della Street asked. “Do we use a flashlight or—?”

“We turn on lights,” Mason told her. “Using a flashlight would indicate a surreptitious visit. A surreptitious visit would indicate a consciousness of guilt. After all, Della, we’ve drawn cards in a game where we know very little about the other players and I’m darned if I know what the limit is.”

“But we’re playing for high stakes?” Della Street asked.

“Definitely,” Mason said, groping for a light switch.

The reception hallway flooded into brilliance, showing a hat rack made of deer horns and manzanita. A Navajo rug and two rustic chairs gave the place an atmosphere of sturdy simplicity. A big, oval, antique mirror hung on the wall. The aroma of good, strong tobacco clung to the place as though someone who lived there spent much time smoking a pipe.

Mason went through the door to the left, and switched on lights in a big living room. Della Street followed him through the house, taking one room at a time, switching on the lights until the long, rambling, one-story building had been fully illuminated.

“Now what?” Della asked.

“Ostensibly,” Mason said, “we’re simply taking charge on behalf of Mrs. Davenport. Actually we’re looking for a letter which may have been concealed somewhere in the premises. The question is where?”

“It seems such a silly thing to do,” Della Street said.

“What?”

“Write a letter to be delivered to the authorities in the event of his death and then leave that letter just hanging around anyplace without making some arrangements for its delivery.”

Mason nodded.

Della Street said, “He must have made some arrangements for the delivery of that letter.”

“Exactly,” Mason told her, “which is why we’re going to start our search with the secretarial desk in this office.”

“I still don’t get it,” Della Street said.

“We’re following the wishes, in fact, the instructions of our client,” Mason told her, “and at least we’re finding out what it’s all about.”

Mason slid back the drawers in the steel desk, disclosing stationery of various sorts, carbon paper, and in a bottom drawer of the desk a whole thick file of correspondence in a jacket marked “For Filing.”

Mason glanced at the dates on some of the letters, said, “Ed Davenport’s secretary seems to feel that there’s no hurry about keeping up the files.”

“Perhaps she was waiting for enough correspondence to accumulate to make filing worthwhile.”

Mason tried the right side of the desk and found that all of the drawers were locked.

“Got a nail file, Della?”

“Are you going to try and pick that lock?”

Mason nodded.

“Chief, do we have the right to look in there?”

“Why not?” Mason asked. “We’re searching for papers for the surviving widow.”

“It seems sort of—well, we’re intruding upon someone’s privacy.”

Mason took the nail file Della Street gave him and worked away at the lock. After a few moments a bolt clicked back and the drawers on the right side of the desk came open.

“Those are personal things,” Della Street said sharply.

“I know,” Mason said, “but we’re looking specifically for—What’s this?”

“That,” Della Street said, “very definitely is a lockbox.”

Mason shook the lockbox. “There seems to be just one document in it,” he said. “This may be what we want. Despite the look on your face, Della, my curiosity is rapidly overcoming my scruples. I don’t suppose you would have such an article as a hairpin on you.”

She shook her head.

Mason tried the end of the nail file on the lock. ‘I ‘m going to need something smaller than this nail file. A little piece of stiff wire would do it.”

“Where,” Della Street asked, “did you learn that technique?”

“A client taught it to me,” Mason said, grinning. “My only fee for defending him on a burglary charge.”

“I suppose you got him acquitted.”

“He was innocent.”

“Yes, I suppose so. He learned that lock-picking in a correspondence school I take it.”

“Strangely enough,” Mason said, “he really was innocent. The lock-picking was a carry-over from his lurid past. Ah, here’s a paper clip made of good, stiff wire. Now it only remains to bend the wire, so … to insert it in the back, rotate it slightly, and—Ah, here we are, Della.”

Mason opened the lid of the box and took out a fat manila envelope. On the back of the envelope, scrawled in a firm handwriting, had been written, “To be opened in the event of my death and the contents delivered to the authorities,” and underneath the writing was the signature “Ed Davenport.”

“Now, Mr. Attorney,” Della Street said, “perhaps you can tell me the technical rules of law. Is this the property of the widow, does it belong to the authorities, or is it the property of the secretary in whose desk it was located?”

“We’ll find out what’s in it,” Mason said, “and then we’ll be able to answer some of your questions.”

“It might be better to answer them first.”

Mason smilingly shook his head. “We have to know the contents before we can determine our responsibilities, Della.”

Mason went to the kitchen, filled a teakettle with water, switched on the electricity in the stove.

“You certainly are making yourself right at home,” Della Street said.

Mason grinned. “The story is that a watched pot never boils. Perhaps we’d better look around some more in the office.”

Mason led the way back into the office, prowled through Ed Davenport’s desk, looked through the files, reading letters, opening drawers.

“Are you looking for something specific?” Della Street asked.

“I’m trying to get the people pictured in my mind,” Mason said. “Davenport evidently has a great deal of confidence in his secretary. Apparently she makes out and signs the checks. There’s a balance of one thousand, two hundred and ninety-one dollars in the bank here in Paradise. There’s some correspondence in relation to mining matters. It is interesting to note that whereas certain letters are addressed to Mrs. Edward Davenport there are answers from Mr. Davenport stating definitely what his wife will and will not do.”

“Then—”

“Apparently he didn’t consult her,” Mason went on. “Carbon copies of replies show that several times letters went out on the same date they were received.”

“Perhaps he kept in touch with her by long-distance telephone.”

“The bill for last month for the entire telephone service was only twenty-three dollars and ninety-five cents,” Mason said, “including the federal tax.”

“And all this time,” Della Street said, “he had a fear that his wife might he planning to kill him—and then he had to go and die a natural death.”

Mason raised his eyebrows.

“Why do you do that?” she asked. “You don’t…. Chief, you don’t suppose that … that it wasn’t a natural death?”

“Why not?” Mason asked.

“But, good heavens! Why … then what are we doing here?”

“We’re protecting Mrs. Davenport’s best interests,” Mason said, “but there are certain things which we can’t do. We can’t suppress evidence or tamper with evidence, but we really can’t tell whether it’s evidence until after we get a look at it, can we, Della? Come on, I think that pot is boiling now.”

Mason returned to the kitchen. Very carefully he steamed open the sealed envelope, reached inside, took out the papers and unfolded them.

Della Street’s sharp gasp sounded above the singing of the teakettle as the water continued to boil.

“Well, there we are,” Mason said cheerfully. “Six sheets of perfectly blank paper.”

Della Street’s domestic tendencies came to the front. With her eyes still on the blank pages she turned off the burner under the tea-kettle.

“Now what in the world?” she asked, and then, after a moment, added, “Do you suppose there’s any secret writing on them?”

Mason moved the teakettle to one side, held one of the sheets of paper over the still-glowing burner on the stove, heated it thoroughly, then tilted the sheet first one way and then the other so that the light would fall on it from every angle.

“Of course,” he said, “there could be some secret writing which could be developed only by iodine fumes, but—well, we don’t dare to assume that there is, and yet it may be dangerous to assume that there isn’t.”

“Why in the world would a man go to all the trouble of leaving an envelope with instructions that it should be opened in the event of his death and then have nothing in it but blank sheets of paper?”

“That,” Mason said dryly, “may be something to which we’ll have to find an answer.”

“How do you mean?”

“Was there a tube of mucilage there in the office, Della?”

She nodded.

“Well,” Mason said, “we’ll seal this envelope and I think under the circumstances it may be a good idea if I am careful not to leave fingerprints.”

Mason dried off the flap of the envelope over the warm burner of the stove, went back to the office, carefully sealed the envelope, put it back in the lockbox, dropped the lockbox into the drawer, and, by using Della Street’s nail file, again locked the drawers on the right-hand side of the secretarial desk.

“Chief, you seem to have some idea,” Della Street said, “that …” She hesitated.

“That things have been just a little too opportune?” Mason asked.

“Well, yes, in a way.”

“They have been very opportune,” Mason said. “Ed Davenport died and—”

A woman’s voice said sharply, “What are you doing here? Who are you?”

Mason turned.

The tall, rather good-looking young woman who stood in the doorway abruptly whirled without waiting for an answer. Mason heard the sound of running steps, then from the living room the whirring of the dial on a telephone.

Mason grinned at Della Street, walked across to the desk, and picked up the receiver from the telephone.

He could hear the woman’s voice on the extension telephone saying, “Operator, get me the police at once. There’s an emergency. I’m Mabel Norge, at the Davenport house on Crestview Drive. Someone is in the house ransacking the place. Send police at once.”

Mason dropped the receiver back into place. He heard the front door slam.

Della Street raised her eyebrows. “Police?” she asked.

Mason nodded.

“How long will it take them to get here?”

“That depends,” Mason said. “Probably not very long.”

“Do we try to get out?”

“Oh certainly not. We stay and talk with them.”

Mason settled himself in the chair behind Ed Davenport’s desk, lit a cigarette.

“Chief,” Della Street said nervously, “there’s no reason why we couldn’t get out the back way.”

“Our rented car’s out front,” Mason said. “The young woman undoubtedly has the license number by this time. It was because of the car standing there and the lights being on that she made such a quiet entrance. She must have tiptoed softly down the passageway. Incidentally I heard her give her name over the phone. It’s Mabel Norge. She’s Davenport’s secretary.

“Definitely, Della, we remain here, and we remain in possession. We have no choice in the matter. When you stop to think of it, we’ve left rather a broad back trail. Flight would, of course, indicate a consciousness of guilt.”

“Nevertheless there’s something about this whole thing I don’t like,” Della Street said.

“So far,” Mason said, “we’ve done everything that was expected of us. Now let’s try to be a little more independent.”

“What do you mean? Do you … ?”

They heard the sound of a siren growing louder.

“That,” Mason said, “will be the police. That’s good service. Keep very quiet, Della, because they may be a little nervous, perhaps a little quick on the trigger.”

They heard the front door again, the sound of voices, then heavy feet. A man with a shield on the lapel of his coat, a gun in his hand, thrust a cautious head into the room, said, “Get ’em up.”

Mason, tilted back in the swivel chair at the desk, took the cigarette from his mouth, blew a stream of smoke into the air and said, “Good evening, Officer. Come in and sit down.”

The officer remained in the doorway, the gun in his hand. “Who are you,” he asked, “and what are you doing here?”

“I’m Perry Mason, an attorney,” Mason said. “Permit me to introduce my secretary, Miss Street. I am at the moment engaged in taking charge of things on behalf of the widow of Edward Davenport.”

The girl screamed, “He’s dead? He’s dead?”

Mason nodded.

“Then he was murdered!” she said.

“Tut-tut!” Mason admonished. “You’re doubtless unstrung but you shouldn’t make such wild assertions.”

“You’re representing Mrs. Davenport?” the officer asked.

“That’s right.”

“Got any authority?”

“She gave me the key to the place,” Mason said, “and a letter of authorization.”

Mason casually produced the letter, handed it to the officer.

The officer looked at the girl. “Do you know these people, Miss Norge?”

She shook her head.

Mason said, “I take it you’re Mr. Davenport’s secretary, the one whose initials on the letters are M.N.”

“I’m Mabel Norge,” she said. “I’m Mr. Davenport’s secretary, and in case he’s dead I …I have something to deliver to the officer.”

“Indeed,” Mason said.

“Mr. Davenport had anticipated this situation,” she said.

“What situation?”

“His murder.”

“Murder!” Mason said.

“Exactly,” she snapped. “I have something to deliver to this officer which will prove it.”

“Go ahead and deliver it then,” Mason said.

She walked over to the secretarial desk.

“Here, wait a minute,” Mason interposed. “What are you doing there?”

“Getting the thing that I want to deliver to the officer.”

Mason smiled and shook his head. “No, no,” he said chidingly.

“What do you mean?”

“You mustn’t touch anything belonging to the estate.”

“You’ve been in here touching things.”

“Why not?” Mason asked. “I represent the wife. She’s the owner of one-half the property absolutely. The other half will come to her by right of succession.”

“Why, you… you…”

“Take it easy,” Mason said.

The officer holstered his gun. “Now let’s get this straight. What’s the idea anyway?”

Mabel Norge said, “She killed him. He knew that she was going to try to and he left an envelope giving evidence that could be used against her.”

“What do you mean, he left it?” Mason asked.

“He gave it to me.”

“And told you to keep it?”

“Told me that in the event of his death he wanted me to open the letter and see that the information was delivered to the officers.”

“Did you open it before his death?”

“Certainly not.”

“You don’t know what’s in it then?”

“Well … well, only what he told me.”

“Did he tell you what was in it?”

“He told me that—well, he said enough so that I knew he was anticipating he might die at any time.”

“Certainly,” Mason said. “The man was suffering from high blood pressure, arteriosclerosis, and I believe there was a renal involvement. His doctors had told him he might go at any time. I think it’s only natural for a man to prepare—”

“But it wasn’t that kind of a letter. I mean that wasn’t what he had in mind.”

“How do you know?”

“From what he said.”

“What did he say?”

“He told me that in the event of his death I was to open that envelope and see that the officers got the papers, but that if anyone tried to get that letter during his lifetime I was to destroy it.”

“In other words he retained control over the letter?”

“During his lifetime, yes.”

“And if he had wanted you to deliver the letter to him at any time you’d have done so?”

“Why certainly. It was his letter.”

“Where is it?” Mason asked.

She started to tell him, then thought better of it and said, “I’ll get it when I need it.”

Mason yawned. “I dare say you will,” he said. “Well, Officer, let’s close up here and, under the circumstances, in view of the fact that Miss Norge says there’s a letter here which may contain something in the nature of an accusation I take it it would be well to see that no one removes anything from the premises.”

“We’ll remove that letter,” Mabel Norge said determinedly. “I’m going to open it right now and give the contents to the officer.”

“Oh no you’re not,” Mason said, smiling.

“What do you mean?”

“Your employment has terminated as of the date of Mr. Davenport’s death. You were his agent, his employee, his personal representative. His death terminates your employment, subject, of course, to your right to compensation. But you have no right to touch anything here.”

The officer said, “Now wait a minute. I don’t know law but I don’t want to have any evidence disappear.”

“Certainly not,” Mason said. “I would suggest that you lock all the doors, and since Miss Nonge quite evidently has a key—”

“How did you get in?” she asked.

“I told you I have a key,” Mason said. “I have Mrs. Davenport’s key.”

“She wouldn’t have given you a key. I know she wouldn’t.”

Mason smiled. “In that case, Officer, Mrs. Davenport wouldn’t have given me a key, because this girl says she wouldn’t. Therefore I couldn’t have used that key to get in. Hence I’m not here. Disregard me.”

The officer said, “If there’s a letter that he left to be opened in the event of his death, a letter that gives any clues as to how he died, we’d better get that letter and put it in the hands of the D.A.”

“The point,” Mason said, “is that no one knows that this letter contains any accusation against any person or would give any clue. That envelope may contain a will for all anybody knows.”

“Well, let’s have a look at it,” the officer said. “You’re representing the wife. The secretary is here. I’m representing the law. We’ll have a look at it.”

“No one is going to open that letter until the wife says so,” Mason said.

“Now wait a minute. You’re being hard to get along with,” the officer told him.

“Not as long as you do things according to law. What’s your name?”

“I’m Sidney Boom, an officer out of the sheriff’s office. This territory is unincorporated. It’s county territory.”

“That’s fine,” Mason said. “Now do you want to do things according to law or don’t you?”

“Certainly I want to do them according to law.”

“All right,” Mason said. “As far as the personal property in here is concerned it’s community property and the surviving widow has a one-half interest in it and always did have. It’s hers. The other half will come to her through probate administration. Technically she has the title to it right now, but the title can’t be validated until after the estate has been through probate and the debts paid.”

“Well, I don’t know the law,” Boom said, “but I want to get this thing straight. If there’s any evidence here I don’t want anything to happen to it.”

“That’s exactly the point,” Mason said. “On the other hand if it isn’t evidence but if it is some valuable property I want to make certain that it doesn’t leave the estate.”

“What do you mean?”

Mason said, “How do I know that this envelope which is to be opened in the event of his death isn’t a will? Or perhaps it may be some negotiable securities that he wanted to give to this secretary. For all we know it may be cash.”

“Well, the best way to find out what it is is to open the letter and find out.”

“On the other hand,” Mason said, “it may be something that is of vital importance to the estate, something that should be kept confidential.”

“But he gave the letter to his secretary.”

“That’s exactly it,” Mason said. “He didn’t. He let her keep the letter. He didn’t give it to her. She has admitted herself that at any time he called for it she’d have given it to him.”

“Well, that isn’t what I meant,” Mabel Norge said. “I meant that he’d given it to me to give to the officers at the time of his death.”

“Did he say give it to the officers?” Mason asked.

“It was to be opened in the event of his death.”

“He didn’t say give it to the officers?”

“Well—I don’t remember exactly what he did say.”

“There you are,” Mason said.

“She’s taking notes,” Mabel Norge said, pointing to Della Street. “She’s taking down everything we say.”

“Any objection?” Mason asked.

“Well, I don’t think that’s fair.”

“Why? Did you want to change some of the things you’re saying now after you’ve had a chance to think them over?”

“I think you’re horrid.”

“Lots of people think so,” Mason said.

The officer said doggedly, “That isn’t getting past this question of evidence. Now I don’t know what’s going on here but this young woman who works here says that there’s an envelope to be opened in the event of his death, and that there’s information in it that may lead to … to—”

“To apprehending the person guilty of his murder,” Mabel Norge said firmly.

“Are you now stating he was murdered?” Mason asked.

“He may have been.”

“But you don’t know that he was.”

“I know that he expected he might be.”

“You also knew that he was under treatment from a physician, didn’t you?”

“Well, yes.”

“And that he had been advised that with his blood pressure and the condition of his arteries he might pop off at any time?”

“He didn’t confide in me in all of his personal matters.”

“He confided in you about his wife.”

“Well—not exactly.”

“Then you don’t know what’s in that letter except by inference?”

“Well, I know what I thought was in it. We can soon enough find out.”

Boom said, “Where is the letter?”

“In my desk, in a lockbox.”

“Get it,” Boom said.

“Now wait a minute,” Mason said. “This procedure is highly irregular and highly illegal.”

“I’m taking a chance on it,” the officer said. “I’m going to see that this young woman doesn’t take anything out of the desk except that letter, but if there’s a letter there I want to make mighty certain that nothing happens to it. I don’t know who you are but apparently you’re representing the widow. You got on the job mighty fast.”

“And probably a good thing I did,” Mason said, smiling affably. “I’m trying to conserve the estate.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Mason nodded toward Mabel Norge, who was unlocking the right side of the desk. “What was she doing here at this time of night?”

“She works here.”

“At night?” Mason asked.

The officer frowned. “Say,” he said, “what were you doing here?”

“I—I was driving by and I saw lights,” she said.

“Where were you driving to?” Mason asked.

“Just by.”

“This is a dead-end road,” Mason pointed out.

“Well, I—all right, I drove by. I—”

“Were you coming in?” Mason asked.

“That’s none of your business,” she blazed.

“There you are,” Mason said. “She was here. She had no business being here. She doesn’t have any work to do at this hour. What was she doing?”

“Now look,” the officer said, “this thing is all mixed up. I don’t want to get in bad.”

“You’re getting in bad right now. The minute you use your authority to touch any article in this room you’re in bad.”

The officer moved over to stand by Mabel Norge. “I don’t want you to touch anything except that one letter,” he said. “Now where is it?”

“In a lockbox in this drawer.”

“All right. Now I’ll take the letter out.”

“The box is locked,” she said, opening the drawer.

Boom picked up the box, said, “It isn’t locked.”

“Well—I thought it was. It should have been.”

Boom opened the box, looked at the envelope.

“I advise you not to touch that envelope,” Mason said.

Boom regarded the envelope in the box, then slowly closed the lid.

“What do you think should be done with it?”

“Turn it in to court as part of the estate.”

“Suppose something should happen to it?”

“See that it doesn’t.”

“You mean I’m to—?”

“Exactly,” Mason interposed. “Lock it up. Take it to court. Have the judge of the probate court open it in the presence of inheritance tax appraisers.”

Mabel Norge stamped her foot. Tears of exasperation were in her eyes. “Open it, you fool!”

Mason held the officer’s eyes with his. “Suppose it’s filled with money, perhaps thousand-dollar bills that he wanted to give to his secretary in the event of his death? Do you want to be responsible for tearing open the envelope, asking a probate court and an inheritance tax appraiser to take your word for the amount of money there? Suppose they claim you took out a couple of thousand-dollar bills?

“You know what the law is on a safe-deposit box. You wouldn’t dare to open that. Neither would the bank dare to open it. It has to be sealed until it’s opened in the presence of an inheritance tax appraiser.”

“That’s right,” Boom said, turning to Mabel Norge.

“You fool!” she blazed.

Boom’s face turned red.

“I tell you,” Mabel Norge charged, “that his wife was planning to kill him. He knew it. There’s evidence in there that will connect her with one other murder.”

Mason shrugged his shoulders and said, “It’s your responsibility, Officer. I take it you’re under bond.”

The officer hesitated.

“Go ahead and open it,” Mabel Norge said. “Can’t you see he’s just talking, trying to keep you from getting the very evidence Mr. Davenport wanted you to have.”

The officer picked up the envelope.

“Wait a minute,” Mason said. “Don’t take your legal advice from me. Don’t take it from that girl. You have a district attorney here. Call him up. Ask him what to do.”

“Now there’s an idea,” Boom said

He moved over to the telephone.

Mason said, “It is my suggestion that this envelope can be opened only when an inheritance tax appraiser is present. I also suggest that if there is any doubt on your part as to what may happen, that the contents of this evidence be impounded”

“What do you mean, impounded?”

“It’s in a lockbox,” Mason said. “Take it and put it in a safe-deposit box. But you want to be very, very careful to see that no one tampers with the contents of that envelope.”

“Don’t let him talk you out of doing your duty,” Mabel Norge said. “Open it. Get the evidence.”

Mason yawned. “Really this is rather tiresome. I don’t like to wrangle. As far as I’m concerned I ‘m perfectly willing to let you take the envelope in to the district attorney, provided proper precautions are taken to see that the envelope isn’t opened by any unauthorized person.”

“Well, let me talk with the district attorney,” Boom said.

He picked up the telephone, placed the call, then said to the district attorney, “This is Officer Boom. I’m out at Paradise. I’m sorry to bother you at this time of night, but I’m up against a question. I’m dealing with a lawyer here who says he’s representing an estate—Ed Davenport died. There’s a letter in his office that’s to be opened in the event of his death. This lawyer who is representing the widow says no one has authority to open it except in the presence of an inheritance tax appraiser…. No, it isn’t addressed to the officers. It simply says on the envelope, ‘To be opened in the event of my death and contents delivered to the authorities.”

Mabel Norge said, “Tell him that he gave it to me, that it was in my possession.”

“It wasn’t in your possession,” Mason said. “It was in your desk. Your employment has been terminated.”

“Oh, will you be quiet! I hate you!” she flared.

“You probably would,” Mason told her.

“And tell the district attorney that this woman here is taking down everything that’s said,” Mabel Norge said.

“Hush,” Boom told her. “Let me listen.”

Boom listened at the telephone for a while, then said, “This lawyer is Perry Mason…. Oh, you have heard of him? … Well, the name’s rather familiar…. That’s right…. He says he has no objection to the envelope being kept in a lockbox and kept in your custody until it’s opened in the presence of the court and an appraiser. He thinks there’s money in it.… Okay.”

Boom hung up.

Mason said, “We are, of course, going to hold you personally and officially responsible, Mr. Boom.”

“That’s right. I’m responsible.”

“You II take that box in to the district attorney.”

“I’ll see that it gets to the district attorney.”

“You’re taking it in at once?”

“Not at once. I’ve got a job to do out here. I’ll take it in to him tomorrow. He said tomorrow would be all right. But I’ll take care of it and see that nothing happens to it in the meantime.”

“That’s fine,” Mason said. “I object to your taking it, but if you insist upon taking it I shall expect you to see that the envelope is unopened.”

“Well, I’ll take it with me,” Boom said. “Now in order to get this thing straight I want to have one of your cards, and in case it should turn out that you’re not representing the widow—Well, you’re a lawyer. I don’t need to tell you your business.”

“That’s right, you don’t,” Mason said cheerfully. “Here’s one of my cards.”

Officer Boom, with the lockbox under his arm, started back toward his car.

“I’m going with you,” Mabel Norge said

Della Street waited until the front door had banged shut, then she looked up at Mason.

“Get that teakettle off the stove quick,” Mason said. “Incidentally you might run a rag over it to make sure there aren’t any fingerprints, and also polish off the controls on the stove. They may think of that before they’ve gone very far.”

Della Street dashed into the kitchen. A few moments later she was back. “Everything’s okay,” she said.

“All right,” Mason told her, “we’ll turn out the lights and let it go at that.”

“Chief, that secretary is going to talk Boom into opening that letter.”

“Not right away,” Mason said “Our main problem, Della, is to keep that letter intact until after the mucilage has had a chance to dry thoroughly. If they get to fooling around with it too soon they’ll realize that the envelope has been steamed open and sealed shut again.”

“Well, she’s going to talk him into opening it.”

“Not until after he’s gone to the district attorney.”

“You want to bet?” Della Street asked.

Abruptly the telephone bell shattered the silence.

Mason glanced across at Della Street.

The phone rang again.

“Do we answer it?” Della Street asked.

Mason nodded. “You take it, Della. Be noncommittal. Find out who is talking before you say anything.”

Della Street picked up the telephone, said, “Hello”

She was silent for a moment, then said, “Yes,” and, putting her hand over the mouthpiece, said to Perry Mason, “Bakersfield is calling from a pay station. They’re dropping coins.”

“Any name?” Mason asked.

“Just Bakersfield, calling station-to-station.”

Abruptly Della Street took her hand from the mouthpiece, said, “Hello.”

For a moment she seemed puzzled, then grabbed her pencil and made swift notations on a sheet of paper.

She glanced at Perry Mason, her eyes puzzled. “Hello,” she said. “Hello … hello … hello. … Operator, my party seems to have been disconnected. I was talking with Bakersfield…. You’re certain … ?”

Della Street gently replaced the receiver.

“What was it?” Mason asked.

“As soon as I said hello a man’s voice came on the line,” she said. “It was a station-to-station call from a pay telephone booth in Bakersfield. The man said, ‘Pacific Palisades Motor Court, San Bernardino, unit thirteen’ and then the connection broke. I thought we’d been disconnected. The operator says he hung up.”

“Now what the devil!” Mason said. “He didn’t give any name?”

“No, it was just a man’s voice.”

“And on a station-to-station call.”

“That’s right.”

Mason got up from his chair and started pacing the floor.

Della Street watched him anxiously.

“What will happen if and when Mabel Norge gets Boom to open that envelope?” she asked.

“Then,” Mason told her, “there’s going to be hell to pay. Whenever that envelope is opened the assumption will be that I took out the pages which contained evidence, statements relating suspicions, conclusions and accusations, destroyed them and substituted pages of blank paper.”

“Can anyone tell that the envelope was steamed open?” she asked.

“Sure. An analysis of the adhesive on the flap will show that it came from this mucilage container and was not the prepared substance that is used on the flap of an envelope to be moistened and sealed.”

“And then what will happen?’

“Once the accusation is made,” Mason said, “we’ll find ourselves in a county where we have no friends, where we are looked upon with suspicion and where the authorities may well take action predicated on suspicion.”

She smiled. “Which is a roundabout way of saying we may be arrested?”

“I may be.”

“Then wouldn’t it be advisable to … ?”

Again the phone rang.

Mason nodded to Della Street.

She picked up the receiver, said, “Hello…. Yes….”

She covered the mouthpiece with her hand and said, “Can you take a call from Fresno, Chief?”

“Find out who’s talking.”

“Who’s calling?” Della Street asked.

She looked up. “Mrs. Davenport.”

Mason nodded and Della Street handed him the receiver.

“Hello,” Mason said.

“Is this Mr. Perry Mason, the attorney?”

“That’s right.”

“Just a moment. Mrs. Davenport is calling.”

A moment later Mason heard the flat, toneless monotone of Myrna Davenport’s voice.

“Mr. Mason, there’s been a terrible mistake. He’s gone.”

“Who’s gone?”

“My husband.”

“That’s what Sara Ansel told me. He died this afternoon and—wait a minute, is that what you meant?”

“No. I mean he’s gone. He’s really gone.”

“You mean he isn’t dead?”

“Yes, Mr. Mason, that’s what I mean. He isn’t dead. He wasn’t dead at all. He couldn’t have been He’s gone.”

“Where?” Mason asked

“I don’t know.”

“When did he go?”

“I don’t even know that. He got in a car and disappeared.”

Mason, fighting back anger, said. “What kind of a run around is this? What are you trying to put over? Sara Ansel told me distinctly that Ed Davenport was dead. That was around three o’clock this afternoon. She said he had died about fifteen minutes earlier.”

“That’s what we thought. That’s what the doctor told us. We all thought he’d passed away, but evidently he was only unconscious. We didn’t know where to catch you before you got to this number and by that time we were pretty much confused because—”

“Where are you now?”

“We’re at a drugstore, but we’re leaving right away. We’ll go back to Los Angeles.”

Mason said, “Don’t go back to Los Angeles. Catch the first available plane, train or bus for San Francisco, whichever is the first available means of transportation. Go to the San Francisco Airport. Go to the mezzanine floor. Sit there and wait. Now do you understand those instructions?”

“You.”

“Will you do that?”

“I’ll have to ask Aunt Sara.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s right here.”

“Well, ask her,” Mason said impatiently.

He held the phone for a moment, conscious of Della Street’s anxious eyes, then heard Myrna Davenport’s voice, “Very well. We’ll follow your instructions.”

“Don’t talk to anyone. If anyone should ask you questions, don’t answer. That relates to anyone. Do you understand? Anyone.”

“I understand what you’re telling me but I don’t understand why.”

“Never mind understanding why. Do what I tell you,” Mason said.

Mason hung up the phone.

He strode angrily toward the light switch.

“What is it?” Della Street asked anxiously.

“Apparently,” Mason said, “we have been made the victim of a beautiful double cross.”

“And Ed Davenport isn’t dead?” she asked.

“According to the latest report he is very much alive and has disappeared—perhaps he’s on his way up here or he may have been the man who telephoned from Bakersfield leaving the cryptic message.”

“So what is your legal position now?”

“That of having assumed charge of an estate before there was any estate, of having rifled a ‘dead’ man’s effects while the man was still alive.”

Della Street thought that over for a moment, then moved into the kitchen, making certain that things were replaced as they had found them, polishing off fingerprints and turning off lights.

Mason met her at the front door. “Let’s go, Della.”

“Where?”

“Back to Chico, where we turn in this car and catch the first available means of transportation out. We stop over long enough to ring up the Drake Detective Agency and tell Paul Drake to have two operatives cover the Pacific Palisades Motor Court at San Bernardino, to keep an eye on unit thirteen, to report to him as soon as the unit is occupied, by whom, and then keep the place covered. We also have Paul check on Ed Davenport. Come on Della, let’s go.”