The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe

Chapter 2

But Perry Mason was wrong in supposing that he was not to know of that which followed. He had disposed of his appointment and was studying a recent case dealing with the admissibility of evidence obtained through wire tapping, when Della Street opened the door from her secretarial office and said, “Miss Trent is in the outer office, asking if she can see you without an appointment.”

“Virginia?” Mason asked. She nodded. “Didn’t say what she wanted, Della?”

“No.”

“And she’s alone?”

“Yes.”

“All right,” Mason said, “bring her in and let’s get it over with.”

He cleared a space on his desk by the simple expedient of pushing back the law books. He was lighting a cigarette when Della Street escorted Virginia Trent into the office. At his first meeting, he had devoted his attention to the aunt. Now he studied the niece thoughtfully as she walked across to seat herself in the big, black leather chair near the left-hand corner of his desk. She was, he saw, a tall, thin girl, with a mouth which showed too much determination and too little lipstick, large, moist gray eyes, clothes which were cut along severe lines, and the slender, slightly nervous hands of one who is very sensitive. “Was there,” Mason asked, “something I could do for you?” and his voice indicated that he had quite definitely ceased to be the genial host and had become the busy lawyer.

She nodded and said, “It’s about my Aunt Sarah.”

“Yes?” Mason asked.

“You saw what happened at lunch. Aunt Sarah didn’t fool me, and I’m quite certain she didn’t fool you. She was shoplifting.”

“Why shoplifting?” Mason asked.

“I’m sure I haven’t the faintest idea.”

“Did she need the things?”

“No.”

“Doesn’t she have enough money to buy what she wants?”

“Of course she does.”

Mason settled back in his chair. His eyes showed interest. “Go ahead,” he said, “I’m listening — but strip it down to essentials.”

Virginia Trent’s gloved hands smoothed the pleats of her gray skirt. She raised her eyes and said, “I’ll have to begin at the beginning and tell you the whole thing. My aunt,” she went on, “is a widow. Her husband died years ago. My uncle, George Trent, never married. He’s a gem expert, buying and selling stones on commission, cutting and polishing, and redesigning. He has an office and a shop in a loft building at nine thirteen South Marsh Street. He keeps from two to four gem cutters and polishers constantly employed... Tell me, Mr. Mason, are you a student of psychology?”

“Practical psychology,” the lawyer said. “I don’t go much on theory.”

“You have to interpret facts in terms of theory in order to understand them,” she said didactically.

Mason grinned. “It’s been my experience that you have to interpret theories in terms of facts in order to understand theories. However, go ahead. What were you going to say?”

“It’s about Uncle George,” she said. “His father died when he was just a boy. George had to take on the support of the family. He did it wonderfully well, but he never had any boyhood. He never had a chance to play and never...”

“What does that have to do with your aunt?” Mason asked.

“I’m coming to it,” she said. “What I was trying to explain is that Uncle George has an innate repression, a subconscious rebellion against environment which...”

“Which does what?” Mason asked, as she hesitated.

“Makes him get drunk,” she said.

“All right, go ahead,” the lawyer told her. “Never mind the verbal embellishments. He gets drunk. So what?”

“He gets drunk,” she said, “periodically. That’s why I know it’s a subconscious rebellion against a routine environment which...” She checked herself as she saw the lawyer’s upraised hand, and hurried on to say, “Anyway, what I’m getting at is that he’ll be perfectly steady for several months at a time. Then something will happen and he’ll go on one of his benders. Poor Uncle George, he’s so methodical in everything that he’s even methodical about that. When he feels one of these spells coming on, he carefully locks up everything in the office vault, to which my aunt has the combination. Then he takes the ignition keys out of his car, puts them in a stamped envelope, addresses them to himself, puts the keys in the mail and then goes ahead and gets drunk. While he’s drinking, he gambles. Three days to a week later, he’ll show up, completely broke, his eyes bloodshot, usually he’s unshaven, and his clothes are a sight.”

“Then what does your aunt do?” Mason asked, with interest.

“Aunt Sarah takes it right in her stride,” she said. “There’s never a word of remonstrance. She bundles him off to a Turkish bath, takes his clothes, has them cleaned and pressed, sends another suit to the Turkish bath, and, when he’s thoroughly sobered and quite respectable, lets him go back to his office. In the meantime, Aunt Sarah has the combination to the vault. She gets out the stones the men are to work on, and sees that they keep busy.”

“Rather a nice arrangement all around, I’d say,” Mason observed. “They make a nice team.”

“Yes,” she said, “but you don’t realize what all of this is doing to Aunt Sarah. The strain on her nervous system must be terrific. All the more so, because she never gives any external evidences of it.’

“Bosh!” Mason said. “Your Aunt Sarah is a woman who’s looked the world in the face and isn’t afraid of it. She knows her way around, and doesn’t quarrel with life. I venture to say she doesn’t have a nerve in her body.”

“She gives one that impression,” Virginia Trent said austerely, “but I feel quite certain, Mr. Mason, that if we are to account for this peculiar shoplifting complex, we will find that it’s due to a reflex subconscious disturbance.”

“Perhaps,” Mason said. “How long’s this shoplifting been going on?”

“Today was the first intimation I’ve had.”

“And what explanation did your aunt make?” Mason asked, his voice showing his interest.

“That’s just it. She didn’t make any. She managed to avoid me almost as soon as we left the department store. I don’t know where she’s gone. I’m afraid she’s still emotionally upset. I’m afraid her psychic balance has been affected by...”

“In other words, you mean you’re afraid she’s shoplifting again, is that it?”

“Yes.”

“And you think she’s been arrested, and want me to find out. Is that what you’re leading up to?”

“No,” she said, “not exactly.”

“Well,” Mason told her, “let’s make it exact. Just what do you want?”

She shifted her eyes uneasily, then took a deep breath and said, “Very well, Mr. Mason, specifically, I’m afraid that Aunt Sarah has stolen the Bedford diamonds.”

The lawyer leaned forward. “Tell me about the Bedford diamonds.”

“They’re some diamonds belonging to a Mrs. Bedford. They were left with Uncle George to be completely redesigned, placed in more modern settings and brought up to date. There was some recutting to be done. I don’t know all of the details of the order.”

“Am I to gather that your Uncle George is on one of his sprees?” Mason asked.

“Yes. He didn’t come home Saturday night. We knew what that meant. Of course, there was no mail delivery on Sunday, but Aunt Sarah went up to the office and got things all ready for Monday morning.”

“Opened the vault?” Mason asked.

“I believe so, yes. Then, this morning, she went up to the office early, got in touch with the foreman, and they planned out the day’s work. Sure enough, the keys to Uncle George’s car were in the first mail delivery. But there was nothing to indicate where the car was. It wasn’t until shortly before noon, the traffic department rang up to tell us it was parked in a thirty-minute zone... You see, it had been left there Saturday night after the parking restrictions had been removed, and then, of course, Sunday didn’t count. But this morning, the traffic tickets started piling up on the car.”

“So you went and moved the car?” Mason asked.

“Yes. Aunty and I went together. We picked up the parking tickets, and moved the car into a garage. Aunt Sarah had some shopping she wanted to do, and I wanted to get a pair of shoes. We went into the department store, and I was getting my shoes and thought Aunt Sarah was standing right behind me. Then suddenly I missed her... You know what happened after that.”

“And you found her up in the tea room?” Mason asked.

“Yes, I’d been looking all over the store for her. I found her up there just before... well, you know.”

“All right,” Mason said, “tell me some more about the Bedford diamonds.”

“The Bedford diamonds,” she said, “came to us through Austin Cullens.”

“Who’s he?”

“He’s an old-time friend of the family. He’s known George and Sarah for years. He does a great deal of traveling, is quite a gem collector, and knows lots of interesting people. Uncle George does work quite well and very cheaply, and Mr. Cullens is frequently able to get him some very lucrative business. You see, Mr. Cullens spends a lot of time on shipboard, gets to talk with people about gems, knows a good many gem collectors, and, all in all, is a very valuable business connection for Uncle George.”

“When did the Bedford diamonds come in?” Mason asked.

“Saturday. Mr. Cullens brought them in. Mrs. Bedford was to come in later on in the week.”

“When did you first realize they were gone?”

“About half an hour ago. I decided to come to you at once.”

“Go ahead,” Mason told her.

“After I missed Aunt Sarah, I became completely exasperated. I went back to Uncle George’s office, thinking she might be there. The foreman showed me a note Uncle George had left, giving directions about working out sketches and designs for the Bedford diamonds. But... well, the Bedford diamonds weren’t there.”

“The vault was open?”

“Yes. Aunt Sarah had opened it this morning.”

“How about the men in the shop? Can you trust them?”

“I think so, yes.”

“And what makes you think your Aunt Sarah has the diamonds?”

“Well... well, you saw what happened this noon. And when a person once gets a complex... well, I don’t know whether you’ve studied much about kleptomania, Mr. Mason, but it’s most devastating. Kleptomaniacs simply cannot resist the impulse to take things which don’t belong to them... Well, anyway, Aunt Sarah was up at the office on Sunday, getting things lined up for this morning. She came back to the house yesterday afternoon, and said she’d been seized with a very peculiar dizzy spell while she was at the office; that her mind had gone completely blank for a period of what must have been half an hour; that she didn’t have the faintest recollection of what she was doing. She thought it must have been her heart. I wanted her to call a doctor. She wouldn’t do it. She said that when she regained consciousness she had the most peculiar feeling of having done something she shouldn’t. She felt as though she’d killed someone, or something of that sort.”

“Did you get a doctor?” Mason asked.

“No, she went to her room and slept for a couple of hours, and then said she felt better. At dinner, she seemed to be very much her normal self.”

“Well,” Mason said, “I don’t know just what you want me to do. As I see it, you’d better find your aunt and take some steps to locate your Uncle George. His haunts should be fairly well defined. A man who goes on these periodical drinking sprees usually...”

“But,” she said, “Mrs. Bedford wants her stones back.”

“Since when?” Mason asked.

“She rang up at noon, while I was out, and said that she’d changed her mind that she didn’t want anything done to her stones that she had a prospective buyer who was interested in antique jewelry, and she was going to offer the stones and settings to this buyer.”

“Did you talk with Mrs. Bedford?” Mason asked.

“No. The shop foreman did.”

“What did he tell her?”

“Told her Uncle George was out at the time, but he’d have him call as soon as he came in.”

“Well,” Mason said, “you might get in touch with police headquarters and find out if your aunt has suffered any relapses. That spell may well have been her heart. She may have had another and been taken to the emergency hospital. Or...” He broke off as the door from the outer office opened, and the girl from the information desk tiptoed quietly into the room, to stand just within the doorway. “What is it?” Mason asked.

“A Mr. Cullens is in the outer office,” she said. “He seems to be very much excited and says he must see Miss Trent immediately.”

Virginia Trent gave an exclamation of dismay. “You’ll have to hide me somewhere,” she said to Mason, and then to the girl, “Tell him I’m not here. Tell him I’ve left. Tell him...”

“Tell him nothing of the sort,” Mason interrupted. “Let’s get this thing straight. How did he know you were here, Miss Trent?”

“I left word at the office that if Aunty came in she was to call me here. I guess Mr. Cullens went to the office and the foreman told him.”

“And Cullens was the one who brought your uncle the Bedford business?” She nodded. “You’ve got to see him sooner or later,” Mason told her. “You’d better make it sooner. After all, he’s entitled to some sort of a break. I presume he vouched for your uncle to Mrs. Bedford.”

“Yes,” she said dubiously, “I guess he must have.”

Mason nodded to the girl who stood in the doorway. “Tell Mr. Cullens he can come in,” he instructed.

Virginia Trent’s hands became nervous on her lap. She said uneasily, “Oh, I can’t face him! I don’t know what to say. I just can’t think of the proper thing to tell him.”

“What’s wrong with telling him the truth?” Mason asked.

“But I don’t know the truth,” she said.

“Well, why not tell him that?”

“Because... oh, I don’t know. I just can’t bear to...”

The door from the outer office was pushed open by a beefy individual in the late forties, who ignored Mason entirely, to stride across to where Virginia Trent was seated in the big leather chair. “What the devil’s all the run-around, Virgie?” he asked.

She avoided his eyes. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Where’s your aunt?”

“I don’t know. She’s uptown somewhere. I think she’s shopping.”

Cullens turned briefly to Mason, surveying the lawyer with swift appraisal. Then his incisive eyes swung back to Virginia Trent. A huge diamond on his left hand glittered in a coruscating arc as his hand grasped her shoulder. “Come on, Virgie,” he said, “out with it. What the devil’s the idea of running up to see a lawyer?”

She said in a thin, small voice, “I wanted to talk with him about Aunt Sarah.”

“And what about Sarah?”

“She’s been shoplifting.”

Cullens drew back and laughed. It was a deep-chested, jovial, booming laugh which seemed somehow to clarify the atmosphere. He turned, then, to Perry Mason, extended his hand and said, “You’re Mason. I’m Cullens. I’m glad to know you. Sorry to butt in this way, but it’s important.” He turned back to Virginia Trent. “Now, Virgie, come down to earth and give me the low-down. What’s happened to Mrs. Bedford’s diamonds?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, who does?”

“Aunty, I guess.”

“All right, where is she?”

“I tell you, she’s been shoplifting.”

“More power to her,” Cullens said. “She’d make a grand shoplifter. I suppose George is on one of his bats?”

She nodded. Cullens said, “Mrs. Bedford telephoned me. She said she wanted her diamonds back. She’d tried to reach George on the telephone, and didn’t like the way she’d been talked to. She thought someone was giving her a run-around, so she called me. I knew right away what had happened. But i also knew that George would mail in the keys to his car and that your aunt would get into the vault and carry on the business. Now then, Lone Bedford has a customer who’s in the market for her stones. Naturally, she doesn’t want to lose the sale. She wants the stones and needs them now.”

Virginia Trent’s mouth became a firm, straight line. She raised her eyes defiantly and said, “I tell you, Aunt Sarah has been shoplifting. You laugh if you want to, but that happens to be the truth. If you want to know, you can ask Mr. Mason. While she’s had one of her spells, she’s taken Mrs. Bedford’s diamonds and hidden them.”

A perplexed frown appeared on Cullens’ forehead. “You’re not kidding me?” he asked, and then turned to Mason. At what he saw in the lawyer’s eyes, he said slowly, “Well, I’ll be damned!” He drew up a chair, selected a cigar from his waistcoat pocket, clipped off the end with a thin, gold knife and said to Virginia, “Tell me about it.”

“There’s nothing to tell,” she said. “Aunt Sarah has been laboring under a terrific emotional strain. Also, I think she’s suffering from a fixation. However, we don’t need to go into that now. There are periods during which she has a complete lapse of memory. During those times she becomes a kleptomaniac, taking anything she can get her hands on. She was caught in a department store this noon, and I had to check out nearly every penny in my bank to keep her from going to jail.”

Cullens lit his cigar, studied the flaming match for a moment in thoughtful contemplation, then shook it out, and said, “When was the first time, Virgie?”

“This noon.”

“Were those the first symptoms?”

“Well, she went up to the office yesterday and had a dizzy spell and couldn’t remember anything which had happened for about half an hour. When she came to, she had a peculiar feeling of guilt, as though she’d murdered someone. I think that was when she took the Bedford gems and concealed them somewhere. She...”

Cullens’ diamond glittered as he raised his hand to take the cigar from his mouth. “Oh, bosh!” he said, “forget it. She’s no shoplifter. She’s trying to cover up for your uncle.”

“How do you mean?”

“When she went to the office yesterday,” Cullens said, “she found the Bedford diamonds were gone. Just between you and me, that’s the thing which has always worried her — that some day when your uncle starts on one of these benders he’ll forget that he has some stones in his pocket. Your aunt pulled this shoplifting stunt to fool you, and to fool me if it became necessary. She’s out looking for George right now.”

“I don’t think Aunty would do that,” Virginia Trent said.

Cullens said shortly, “You don’t really think she’d turn shoplifter, do you?”

“Well... well, I have the evidence of my own eyes.”

Cullens said, “All right. Let’s not argue about it. Let’s tell Lone Bedford what she’s up against.”

“Oh, we mustn’t tell her! No matter what happens, we must keep her from finding out...”

Cullens ignored her, to turn to the lawyer. “I’m sorry,” he said, “to have to handle things this way, Mr. Mason, but I think I’d better stay right here for the moment. This thing is important. It means quite a good deal to me. Those stones were worth twenty-five to thirty thousand dollars. My car’s down in front, a green convertible with the top down. Mrs. Bedford is waiting in the car. I wonder if it would be possible for you to have one of your girls...”

Mason turned to Della Street. “Go on down, Della,” he said. “Find Mrs. Bedford and bring her up.”

Virginia Trent said very firmly, “I don’t approve of this in the least. I don’t think Aunt Sarah would want it handled this way.”

“Well, I want it handled this way,” Cullens said, “and after all, I’m the one chiefly concerned. Remember, I’m the one who brought the stones in to your Uncle George in the first place.” He turned to Perry Mason. “If it’s a fair question, Mr. Mason, where do you stand in this?”

“I don’t stand,” Mason told him, grinning. “I’m sitting on the sidelines. It happens that I was present when Mrs. Breel staged what was apparently her first public demonstration of shoplifting. It also happens that it was a most edifying experience.”

Cullens grinned. “It would be. What happened?”

“Well,” Mason said reminiscently, “she carried it off remarkably well. And after that, she and her niece were good enough to join me at lunch. I hardly expected to hear any more of the matter, until Miss Trent came in to consult me. I haven’t, as yet, found out exactly what it is she wants me to do, but I felt you were entitled to an explanation. As nearly as I can tell, you’re getting it.”

Cullens turned to Virginia Trent. There was a flash of dislike in his eyes. “I suppose you wanted to duck out and leave me holding the sack, didn’t you?”

“Most certainly not!”

He laughed unpleasantly. “And it was Mason who insisted you should see me, wasn’t it?” She said nothing. “What did you want Mason to do?” he asked.

“I wanted him to locate Aunt Sarah for me, and to... well, to figure some way of stalling things along until we could find out where we stand.”

“We can find out where we stand without stalling things along,” Cullens said.

“That’s what you think,” she told him. “You’re saving your own bacon at the expense of Uncle George’s reputation. Mrs. Bedford will claim he’s stolen the stones and... and it’ll be an awful mess.”

Cullens said, “You don’t know Lone Bedford. She’s a good scout. She can take it. What we’re interested in is finding those stones.”

“Well, I don’t know just how you think you’re going to go about it,” Virginia Trent said.

“Neither do I,” Cullens said affably — “yet.”

Della Street’s rapid heels sounded in the corridor. She unlatched the door of Mason’s private office, and escorted a woman in the thirties through the doorway. “This,” she announced, “is Mrs. Bedford.”

“Come on in, Lone,” Cullens said, without getting up. “Have a chair and make yourself at home. This is Perry Mason, the lawyer. Your diamonds have gone bye-bye.”

For a moment, Mrs. Bedford stood in the doorway, surveying the occupants of the room with dark, languid eyes. Slightly heavier than Della Street, she possessed an attractive figure, which showed to advantage through a rust-colored frilled blouse and gray tailored suit. Her hat matched her blouse, as did her slippers, whose high heels served to emphasize her short foot with its high instep. She crossed over toward a chair, paused for a moment as she saw Mason’s open cigarette case, raised her eyebrows in a gesture of silent interrogation, and, at his nod, helped herself to a cigarette. She leaned forward for his light, then went over to the chair and said, “Well, now that’s something. Tell me about it, Aussie.”

“I can’t tell you much until I get the details,” Cullens said. “I’m getting them now — or trying to. George Trent is just what I told you, one of the best gem men in the country. His work is dependable and reasonable. He’s thoroughly honest. He has one vice, and only one vice. He’s a periodical drunkard. When he gets drunk, he gambles, but he does even that methodically. He puts all of the gems in the vault, leaves himself a limited amount of money in his pocket, mails in his car keys, and then goes out and gets drunk and gambles. When he loses his money, so he can’t buy any more liquor, he sobers up, comes home and goes back to work. This time, he seems to have inadvertently taken your stones with him. I gave them to him Saturday afternoon. He started his drink Saturday night. That, my dear, is the bad news in a nutshell.”

She inhaled a deep drag from the cigarette, exhaled the smoke in twin streams through appreciative, distended nostrils. “Why the lawyer?” she asked, jerking her head toward Perry Mason.

Cullens laughed. “Virginia Trent, over here — George’s niece — thinks that her Aunt Sarah has become suddenly seized with kleptomania. She thinks the aunt took the stones while her mind was a blank and did something with them.”

“What’s the matter?” Lone Bedford asked the niece in a rich, throaty voice. “Been reading Grimm’s fairy tales, dearie?” Virginia Trent drew herself up indignantly. Her mouth tightened into a formless gash.

“Not fairy tales,” Cullens answered easily, “psychology — fixations, complexes and all that stuff. The girl studies, if you know what I mean — Freud, sex, crime...”

“It happens,” Virginia Trent said acidly, “that my aunt has surrendered in public and in the presence of witnesses to these impulses of kleptomania. She was caught shoplifting less than four hours ago.”

Lone Bedford raised inquiring eyebrows in the direction of Austin Cullens. Mason noted that it was evidently an habitual gesture with her, noticed also that they were good-looking eyebrows, and that the mannerism served to direct attention to eyes which were undoubtedly beautiful. Nor did Lone Bedford give any indication that she failed to realize the beauty of her eyes, or the graceful lines of the trim leg which her short skirt disclosed to advantage.

Cullens said, “That’s just a stall, Lone. If you saw Sarah Breel for just ten seconds, you’d realize that it’s a stall. When the foreman started checking over the work orders this morning, he found your gems were missing. Sarah knew at once George had them. So she started the old cover up — bless her soul! It’s meant well, but it isn’t going to get us any place.”

A huge emerald on Mrs. Bedford’s hand showed to advantage as she flicked ashes from the end of her cigarette with a graceful little finger. “Just what,” she asked, “is going to get us any place?”

Cullens said, “I’m going to get out and start looking for George Trent. He’s in a gambling house somewhere, beautifully plastered. Your stones are wrapped up in tissue paper and carried in a chamois-skin belt next to his skin, and he’s completely forgotten that he has them. But, if he gets drunk enough and desperate enough, he may hock them with some gambler.” Cullens turned to Mason and said, “How about it, Mr. Mason, can we claim embezzlement and get them back if he does?”

“Probably not without a lawsuit,” Mason said. “It will depend somewhat on circumstances, somewhat on the manner in which the stones were given to him, and by whom.”

“I gave him the stones,” Cullen said, “but we don’t want any lawsuits, do we, Lone?”

She shook her head and flashed Mason a smile. “No one makes any money out of lawsuits,” she said, “except lawyers.”

Mason matched her grin, “And they don’t make half enough,” he told her.

Cullens ignored the byplay. “Okay, Lone, what do we do?”

She studied the tip of her cigarette meditatively. “Suppose he’s hocked them,” she said musingly. “How much do you s’pose he’d have been able to raise on them, Aussie?”

“Not over three or four thousand at the most,” Cullens said. “Being drunk, wanting the money for gambling, and with the strong possibility of a kick-back, it’s a cinch no gambler would take a chance for more than a fifth of their clear market value.”

She turned to Perry Mason. “How much would a lawsuit cost?” she asked.

Mason grinned. “Is three or four thousand, at the most, the answer you’re waiting for?” he asked.

“Yes,” she said, and once more the emerald flashed as her hand made a gesture of dismissal. “That settles it, Aussie. Find Trent. If he has the stones, get them back. If he hasn’t, find out where he’s hocked them, and pay off the loan. That’s cheaper than a lawsuit — and faster.”

She turned to Virginia Trent and said, “I understand exactly how you feel. Poor child! I suppose you were afraid of me. You needn’t have been. After all, it’s not your fault.”

Virginia Trent said, “I’m not a child. I’m an adult. What’s more, I still feel there’s something back of my aunt’s conduct, that there’s some emotional upset which...”

Cullens got to his feet. “Well, come on, everybody,” he interrupted, “we have work to do, and there’s no use taking up more of Mr. Mason’s time.”

He shepherded them toward the exit door. Virginia Trent, once more, started to talk about psychology as she stepped out into the corridor. Lone Bedford flashed Cullens a roguish glance, then said to Virginia Trent, “And what do you know about suppressed emotions, dearie?”

Virginia Trent drew herself up in rigid dignity. “I wasn’t discussing suppressed emotions,” she said with calm finality.

Mason, watching Della Street hold the door, ready to close it behind the departing visitors, could have sworn that the rapid flicker of Lone Bedford’s right eyelid as she smiled a farewell at him was not accidental.

When the door had clicked shut, Mason grinned at Della and said, “And only this noon I was talking about people being mediocrities, marching inanely through life.”

“A combination of characters like that,” Della Street said, “should be able to scare up something.”

“Not a mystery, I’m afraid,” Mason rejoined. “They’re all so beautifully normal. Aside from Virginia Trent, there isn’t anyone who has so much as a nerve.”

“Where do you suppose the aunt is?” Della Street asked.

Mason’s eyes narrowed. “Having seen her in action,” he said, “I’m inclined to agree with Cullens’ explanation. I think she’s trying an elaborate cover-up for her brother. But, just as a concession to the vagaries of a whimsical fate which has catapulted us into the situation, Della, we’re going to find out. Call up police headquarters. See if she’s been arrested or is in an emergency hospital anywhere. Check on automobile accidents and ambulance calls.”