Morning sun was streaming through the windows of Mason’s private office, as he opened the door from the corridor and stood regarding Della Street with a whimsical smile.
She was standing by his desk, putting the finishing touches to an arrangement of maps and circulars which completely covered the top.
“Ship ahoy!” Mason called. “Where are we — Java, Singapore, or Japan? Lower the gangplank so I can come aboard.”
She made motions of turning a windlass. “Okay, Chief,”she said, “watch your step. Those sampans are tricky things to step out of. Here you are. Now climb this ladder. Okay. Here, give me a hand.”
She stretched forth her right hand, clinging to the desk with her left. Mason gripped her hand, gave a long jump to reach her side and said, “How’s this?”
“That’s fine. Now you’re aboard. What do you think of it?”
“Wonderful! Is this my steamer chair?” he asked, indicating the office chair.
“Yes,” she said. “Just settle back and relax and look at the scenery. Over here’s Honolulu. That’s Diamond Head just beyond the beach at Waikiki. See the natives riding the surf with outrigger canoes? The circular says you get a speed of thirty or forty miles an hour, coming in for almost a mile, riding the crests of the huge breakers. Look at the way the water hissed up from the bow.”
“Too tame,” Mason told her, “I want to be the chap riding the surf board.”
“They say that takes lots of practice.”
“Well,” he told her, “it’d be fun learning. Where do we go from here?”
She indicated the next circular. “Tokio,” she said. “That is, the boat docks at Yokohama. We can see Yokohama and then take a run up to Tokio. And after that, here’s Kobe,” indicating another circular, “and then we cross the Yellow Sea and go up the river to Shanghai.”
“How about side trips?” Mason asked. “Do we stop off in between boats?”
“We can if you want, but what you need is a rest. So I thought it would be better to get on a ship, pack our stuff in staterooms. Take all we want, and not have to bother with loading and unloading it, getting it through customs, and into hotels. In case you don’t know it, you have a de luxe suite, all the way around the world. Starting Saturday afternoon you can unpack your trunks, put on your bathrobe and slippers, be where there are no telephones, hysterical women, or lame canaries.”
“That’s swell,” Mason said, grinning. “Speaking of lame canaries, do you suppose we could send a cablegram to Paul Drake and find out what’s happening in the present case? After all, you know, we have to make a living in order to pay for de luxe suites on the Dollar Steamship Lines.”
“Yes,” she said, “I presume we could reach him by cable, although I hope you won’t try to carry your business along with you.”
“Oh, not in the least,” he said, grinning. “Where are we now, in Kobe?”
“No. We were in Shanghai, the last stop. But, why bother with cablegrams? Why not use International Long Distance?”
“Now there’s a thought,” he said. “Let’s get him on the line.”
Della Street put through the call, said to Perry Mason, “Remember, you’re only as far as Shanghai, then you go down to Hong Kong, Manila, Singapore— Oh, yes, that’s one optional side trip. We can stop over at Singapore and run down to Bali, Java and Sumatra. I’ve arranged for that trip at your option.”
“Okay,” he told her, “let’s take that trip. We may as well see it all while we’re doing it. Besides, if we stay on one ship too long the captain might commit a murder and I’d have to represent him. Say, Della, how about stopping over in Honolulu, running down to Australia with Captain Johansen on the Monterey, and—”
She said into the telephone, “Hello, Mabel, this is Della. The boss is in and wants to talk with Paul... Okay, put him on... That folder up in the upper right-hand comer of the desk is the one on Bali, Chief. Better look at it... Hello... Just a minute, Paul. The boss wants to talk with you.”
Mason whistled and said, “Wait a minute. Is this Bali?”
“That,” she told him, “is Bali.”
“All right,” he told her, “we stop off at Bali... Hello, Paul. What’s new under the sun?”
“Read the papers?” Drake asked.
“Yes. I see that the police have taken a tumble to Packard, and are giving plenty of publicity to his disappearance.”
“Not only that,” Drake said, “but they aren’t getting anywhere. It’s no wonder I couldn’t locate him, with the limited resources which are available to a private detective agency. The police have been moving heaven and earth to find him and can’t even get a trace of him.”
“But surely,” Mason said, “they must have been able to uncover something about him in Altaville.”
“Not a trace,” Drake said. “At any rate, nothing they can work on. Packard is the most important witness in this case, and he’s wandering around the city somewhere, in a daze. The probabilities are his amnesia came back on him and he doesn’t know who he is.”
“You’ve been running down all the leads?”
“I’ll say so. I’ve covered the hospitals, jails and every other lead I can think of. The police have been doing the same. They’ve combed the city, looking for an amnesia victim. They’ve uncovered drunks, idiots, crooks and bums, but not a trace of Packard.”
“How about his coupe?”
“The police figure he might have contacted some garage to come and move the car, and perhaps given an incorrect address. I understand they’ve covered every garage which has a tow car and still haven’t learned a thing.”
“Have they moved the wreck?”
“No. They’re leaving it there, hoping Packard may come back to it or send after it. If he shows up, they’ll grab him.”
Mason frowned thoughtfully at the telephone for several seconds, then said, “Come on in here, Paul. I have an idea I want to talk over with you.”
He hung up the receiver and indicated his desk with a sweeping gesture. “I’m sorry, Della, vacation’s over.”
“You aren’t going to stay in Shanghai?”
“No,” he told her. “We’ll have to let the boat sail without us, and come back on the clipper.”
“That’s what I was afraid of,” she said, picking up the folders one at a time. “Listen, Chief, you aren’t going to back out on this vacation, are you?”
“No,” he told her with a grin, “we sail, as per schedule, if I can clean up this case of the lame canary. And that case begins to look more and more complicated, and our sailing that much more uncertain.”
Paul Drake tapped lightly on the panels of the corridor door, and Della Street let him in. Drake crossed over to slide into the big overstuffed leather chair, and said, “What’s on your mind, Perry?”
“Simply this,” Mason said. “That doctor out at the hospital was a little too self-satisfied, a little too positive, a little too definite in his diagnosis.”
“What do you mean?”
“That traumatic amnesia business,” Mason said. “The man had been in an accident. He had amnesia. Immediately the doctor decided it was traumatic amnesia. Nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of a thousand, it would have been. But then the patient wouldn’t have left the hospital and had a return attack. Now then, Paul, suppose that it wasn’t traumatic amnesia, but was a case of chronic amnesia? Suppose it was amnesia which leaves a man on the border-line of normalcy?”
“Is there an amnesia like that?”
“I don’t know. I’m not trying to study medicine, I’m trying to list causes and get results. I want to add figures and get the answer.
“Now I’ve never had amnesia myself, but I’ve forgotten names that I wanted to remember lots of times, and I suppose a man who forgets his own identity has just about the same symptoms as someone who forgets the identity of another person. In other words, he has spells during which he can almost get it. The name does everything but pop into his mind, but vanishes again just as soon as he tries to concentrate on it.”
“I know what you mean,” Drake said. “Go on from there.”
“If that’s the case,” Mason said, “this man Packard leads sort of an intermittent life. He wakes up in the morning, or has a shock of some sort, and can’t remember who he is. He starts groping with the problem. He can almost remember, but not quite. He thinks he’s Carl Packard of Altaville. He goes under that name for a while. Then something happens and he forgets it. A man gently reminds him of Altaville, and the association of ideas brings the name Packard back to his mind. For a moment he thinks he’s Packard, but just as soon as the effect of suggestion is withdrawn, he can’t remember who he is.”
Drake said, “What you mean is that the man’s name may be something like Packard, and he probably does come from Altaville.”
“That’s it,” Mason said. “Now, there aren’t many names which sound like Packard. But Packard is the name of an automobile. Now, suppose you start men at work in Altaville, looking up every person who has disappeared, and particularly seeing if you can’t locate someone by the name of Ford or Lincoln, or Auburn, who is taking an automobile trip somewhere and hasn’t written to any of his friends for several weeks.”
Drake nodded and said, “It’s a good hunch, anyway.”
“Now here’s another one,” Mason said. “Let’s suppose this man has one of these spells, and there isn’t some doctor available to adroitly suggest to him that he really is Carl Packard of Altaville. Then he’d be apt to take some other name. Now, we don’t know how long he’s been here in the city. So, in addition to the Altaville angle, start men working on every disappearance which has been reported within the last two months. In other words, if a man walks out of a hotel or apartment and doesn’t come back, but leaves his things, under circumstances which make it look as though he wasn’t trying to beat a hotel bill, we may have a live lead. I don’t think it’s going to be very difficult to find those cases because the police will have records of all of them. Get in touch with the Missing Persons Bureau at headquarters, and sift through their records. Do it in a rush, because the police may have the same hunch, and I’d like to talk with Packard before the district attorney sews him up. And don’t forget Doctor Wallace said he was headed for San Diego. So do some work on that angle, too.”
Drake nodded and said, “I’ll get at that right away. Now here’s something else, Perry: I’m uncovering a lot of stuff about Prescott. Most of it doesn’t have any particular significance and won’t mean anything until I’ve got enough stuff to be able to put it all together in a complete report. But here’s something you can get a lot easier than I can: Prescott had an account over at the Second Fidelity Savings & Loan. Naturally, they aren’t passing out information to strangers about the accounts of their customers, but I did find this out: There’s something fishy about it. Large deposits were made in the form of cash. And, unless Prescott’s business was a gold mine, he was getting some cash from outside sources.”
“Sure he was,” Mason said grimly. “He got twelve thousand bucks out of his wife, and I only hope his account shows where he deposited that much in cash.”
Drake said significantly, “If my information’s correct, Perry, twelve thousand dollars isn’t a drop in the bucket. He deposited over seventy-five thousand dollars since the first of the year.”
“He did what?” Mason asked.
“Deposited over seventy-five thousand dollars. There’s something over sixty thousand dollars in the account right now in the form of cash. Mind you, Perry, I’m doing a lot of guessing on this business; naturally, the bank isn’t putting out any official information.”
“You’re all wet,” Mason told him. “Whoever gave you the information has been making some bum guesses.”
“Well, that’s the way I figured it at first,” Drake admitted, “but my information isn’t so much a matter of guesswork as you might suppose. Now, here’s my idea: You’re representing his widow. She’s entitled to letters of administration, if there isn’t a will, or to be executrix if there is — unless, of course, the will specifically disinherits her. But, even so, some of this is community property. Now, suppose you go down to the bank, have a talk with them, put your cards on the table, and see if you can’t get the information.”
Mason said slowly, “They probably wouldn’t turn loose with anything until after she’d actually been appointed.”
“Don’t be too sure,” Drake said. “That’s a nice, juicy account. They won’t want to be too technical and antagonize the person who’s going to inherit it, once they’re satisfied that she is going to inherit it.”
“Well,” Mason said, “it’s worth a try, anyway. I—”
The telephone on Della Street’s desk rang. She picked up the receiver, listened for a moment, then turned to Perry Mason and said, “Don’t let me interrupt, Chief, but Karl Helmold’s on the line. He’s so excited he can hardly talk. He wants to see you right away.”
Mason nodded, picked up his desk phone and said, “All right, Karl. What is it?”
“Ja! Ja! Quick!” Helmold said explosively, and hung up the receiver.
Mason dropped his phone back into position, grinned across at the detective, and said, “Most cases hit you an awful wallop right in between the eyes with a mess of complicated circumstances which gradually simplify themselves when you start unraveling them. This case starts out with a lame canary and goes on from there in a big way. Every time we find a new thread, it makes the snarl that much worse.”
Drake nodded. “One other thing, Perry: You could drop into the Doran Building and talk with George Wray, the surviving partner. Even if you can’t get anywhere with the bank, you can certainly get places with Wray, because he’ll have to account to the widow, and, as her attorney, you could make things rather disagreeable for him if you wanted to. You see, that’s a partnership, and, as I understand it, on the death of one partner the surviving partner has to wind up the business. Is that right?”
Mason nodded, picked up his hat, grinned at Della Street and said, “I’m on my way, Della. That’s what comes of hiring a high-class private detective to do the leg work. He drifts into the office with a lot of routine reports and sends me running errands around the city. I m going to get shaved, then if anything urgent comes up and you want me, I’ll either be at Prescott & Wray’s offices in the Doran Building, or down at the Second Fidelity Savings & Loan. Come on, Paul, and walk as far as the elevator with me. There are a couple of questions I want to ask you. How about the gun the police found? Was it the weapon with which the murder was committed?”
“I’ll say it was. Not only that, but they’ve tied it up to Driscoll by a manufacturer’s number and a sales record. All three of the fatal bullets were discharged from that gun, and at close range. There were powder bums on the clothing and skin.”
“What time did death occur?” Mason asked, holding the door open for the detective.
“The autopsy surgeon isn’t too definite,” Drake said. “You know how it is, Perry. They used to probe around in a guy’s digestive apparatus, talk about rigor mortis, and give you a time as though they’d been standing by the side of the victim, holding a stop watch, when he croaked. Then that Thelma Todd case, and the Rattlesnake Murder case, and a couple of others hit them right where they lived, and they’ve been so cagey ever since they won’t fix a definite time.”
“I know,” Mason told him, ringing for the elevator. “What’s the best they can do in this case?”
“Between noon and two-thirty, and that’s as far as they’ll go.”
“My God!” Mason exclaimed, “they found the body before five o’clock, didn’t they?”
“Something like that, but between noon and two-thirty is the best you can get them to do. That suits the police all right, because it brings the earliest time limit just within the time Jimmy Driscoll was seen in the house with the gun.”
Mason rang again mechanically for the elevator. His eyes were slitted in thought. “Wouldn’t it,” he said, “be a funny trick for Rita to play on her sister if—”
The elevator cage slid smoothly into position. The door glided back and Mason said, “Okay, Paul, keep working on those other angles. Get in touch with me if you find out anything.”
He was still frowning in thoughtful contemplation as he entered Helmold’s pet store. “Well, what is it?” he asked of the excited proprietor.
“They took it, Herr Counselor. They took it!” Helmold said excitedly.
“You mean the canary?”
“Ja! Ja! They came, the police, with many questions, and they took the canary.”
“Did they ask you about his being lame?”
“Not asked. But they looked at his feet.”
“Did they seem to know anything about canaries?”
“Not them, but they talk of taking him to an expert.”
Mason nodded and said, “Well, don’t let it bother you, Karl. It’s just one of those things. I tried to get that canary out of the way, but I couldn’t do anything without involving you, and I didn’t want to do that.”
“It is evidence?” Helmold asked.
Mason nodded and said, “They think it is, anyway. All right, Karl. Thanks a lot for telling me.”
Mason dropped in at his barber shop and was shaved. Then he called a cab, went to the Doran Building, saw from the directory Prescott & Wray were in 382, took the elevator to the third floor, walked down the corridor to the inside offices, pushed open the entrance door, and said to a red-headed girl who surveyed him with snappy blue eyes, “I’m Perry Mason. I want to see George Wray. Tell him it’s important.”
He watched her idly while her deft fingers flipped over a telephone key, and heard her transmit the message. She nodded toward a door marked “Private,” and said, “Mr. Wray said for you to come right in.”
Before Mason had reached the door, it was pushed open by a chunky man of forty, who clamped Mason’s outstretched hand in a cordial grip and said, “Mr. Mason! This indeed is a pleasure! I’ve heard a lot about you, read a lot in the papers, but hardly expected to be so fortunate as to meet you in the flesh. Come in! Come right in! Come in and sit down.”
Mason turned to say over his shoulder to the red head at the desk, “If anyone should call, asking for Mr. Mason, will you see that I’m connected?”
Her eyes showed interest as she looked him over in frank appraisal. “Sure,” she said.
Mason allowed Wray to pilot him to a chair. The automatic door check swung the door firmly shut.
“Well, well, I’m glad to see you,” Wray said, assuming the conversational aggressive at once. “I’d thought some of coming to your office; but I realized how busy you were, and didn’t want to intrude on you. This is a most unfortunate occurrence! Doubly unfortunate because Walter’s wife is involved. I can’t understand how the police could suspect her of anything like that.”
“ You don’t?” Mason asked.
Wray shook his head vehemently. “Indeed not,” he said with booming finality. “I’ve known her for eight or nine months. She’s every inch a lady.”
“You knew her before the marriage then?”
“Yes, I met her almost as soon as Walter did. They’ve been married about six months, going on to seven, I think.”
“It was a brief courtship?”
Wray nodded and became suddenly noncommittal, his booming, genial manner obscured by a screen of cold, watchful caution.
Mason said, “Of course, under the circumstances, routine matters of administration will be delayed, but sooner or later, Mrs. Prescott will be entitled to some share of the estate, how much depends upon whether Walter Prescott left a will. I thought perhaps you’d like to talk things over informally in a preliminary way.”
Wray regained his geniality immediately.
“Now listen, Mr. Mason, I’m only too glad to cooperate with you in any way. Mrs. Prescott won’t be dependent on any will or any estate.”
Mason offered Wray a cigarette, took one himself,snapped a pocket lighter into flame and asked, “Why not?”
“Because it’s all taken care of.”
“How?”
“Walter took care of it. We have business insurance covering the death of a partner. His life is insured in my favor for twenty thousand dollars, my life is insured in his favor for twenty thousand dollars. The articles of partnership provide that in the event of the death of one of the partners, the wife of the deceased partner will receive the twenty thousand dollars in cash, in lieu of any interest in the partnership.”
“Twenty thousand dollars, eh?” Mason asked.
Wray nodded.
“Rather a large amount, isn’t it? If you liquidated your business, do you think it would run to a gross of forty thousand?”
“No, I don’t,” Wray admitted, and added with a grin, “In fact, I know damn well it wouldn’t. That was the idea of making the insurance large enough so there couldn’t be any question about it. In other words, the widow of the deceased partner would be tickled to death to take the cash instead of the half interest in the business. In that way, the survivor could keep the business going without having to wind it up. And then, of course, we paid the premiums on the insurance policies out of our partnership funds and those insurance policies were in the nature of a partnership asset which automatically increased our assets proportionately.”
“And this was handled in a partnership agreement?”
“Yes.”
“Did Mrs. Prescott sign that partnership agreement?”
“Oh, yes. She signed it, and my wife signed it. It’s all drawn up legal and ship-shape. I’m surprised Mrs. Prescott didn’t tell you about that. Probably she didn’t fully understand it. And I presume she has plenty on her mind right now — tell me, do they actually have her in jail?”
“They’re detaining her,” Mason said.
“Well, it’s a damn shame — perhaps she doesn’t understand about this partnership agreement. You might explain it to her. This insurance isn’t part of the estate. The money will come to me and I’ll turn it over to Mrs. Prescott, accepting from her her release as to any right in the partnership assets.”
“Mind if I take a look at that agreement?” Mason asked.
“Not at all,” Wray said. “In fact, I’ve been rather anticipating you’d want to see it and have had Rosa dig it out of the safe.”
“Rosa the girl in the outer office?” Mason asked.
“Yes, Rosa Hendrix.”
“Been with you long?”
“Not very — four or five months. Very efficient and very attractive.”
Mason nodded and unfolded the legal-backed document which Wray handed him. After he had read it, he nodded and said, “That seems to be well drawn.”
“It is,” Wray assured him. “Counsel for the insurance company checked it over after our lawyer had drawn it.”
Mason said, “As I understand it, when you executed that agreement, you automatically froze the value of a one-half interest in this partnership as twenty thousand dollars. If the partnership assets were worth a great deal less that that, the surviving widow would, nevertheless, receive twenty thousand dollars. And if, on the other hand, the partnership assets should increase in value, the widow couldn’t possibly receive more than twenty thousand dollars.”
“We intended to take care of that by increasing the insurance in the event the partnership assets should show any sudden increase,” Wray explained.
“I see,” Mason observed. “Would you mind giving me an offhand estimate of the actual value of the partnership assets?”
Wray lowered his eyes, to stare at the surface of the desk for a few moments, then said, “Well, Mr. Mason, that’d be pretty hard to do.You see, this is a personal effort partnership. That is, we don’t have assets of the kind you’d have in a merchandising business, and—”
“I understand all that,” Mason interrupted, “but what I want to know is generally what would be a fair valuation of the partnership assets.”
“Why, whatever our good will’s worth,”
“What’s that worth?”
“Whatever we could count on taking in through our joint efforts.”
“Perhaps,” Mason told him, “I can get at it another way. Would you mind telling me how much you each took out of the business during the last year?”
Wray avoided Mason’s eyes, swung from his office chair and started for the safe. Halfway there, he changed his mind, turned around, came back to the desk, sat down and said, “I think we took out about six thousand apiece.”
“Each of you drew out six thousand dollars?”
“Around that, yes.”
“Then,” Mason said, “Walter Prescott couldn’t have put any money into the business.”
Wray suddenly smiled. His eyes met Mason’s, and he said, “Oh, that’s it. You’re wondering about that twelve thousand dollars Rosalind Prescott said she gave Walter to put in the business.”
Mason nodded.
Wray said, “To tell you the truth, Mr. Mason, she’s all wet on that. She didn’t put any money into this partnership.”
“Do you think she gave him twelve thousand dollars?”
“Well, it’s hard to say about that. If she says she did, then I’d be inclined to agree with her.”
“And if Walter said she hadn’t given him any money, would that change your views any?”
“That’s rather a tough question.”
“I know it is.”
“Well,” Wray said after a moment, “my answer stands.”
“In that event,” Mason asked, “what would Walter have done with the money?”
Wray laughed nervously. “Now you’re asking me to be something of a clairvoyant.”
“No,” Mason told him, “I’m not asking you to do anything more than make a guess.”
“I couldn’t guess.”
“How about women?”
“Oh, no,” Wray hastily assured him. “No women. Walter wasn’t that kind.”
“What makes you think he wasn’t?”
“You didn’t know him personally?”
“No.”
“Well,” Wray said, “if you’d known him, you’d realize what I mean. He was sort of — oh, sort of cold-blooded — gave you the impression of having ice water in his veins — more the bookkeeping type. He didn’t make friends readily and wasn’t much of a mixer. I brought in most of the business. I like to circulate around. Walter—”
He was interrupted by the ringing of the telephone on his desk. Wray dove toward the receiver with an eager alacrity which showed he welcomed the interruption, said, “Hello,” then nodded to Mason and said, “It’s for you, Mr. Mason.” He passed the telephone over, and Mason said, “Hello,” heard Drake’s voice saying, “Okay, Perry, you win.”
“What do I win?” Mason asked.
“You win on hunches. I’ve done some fast work and located this Carl Packard under another name.”
“What’s the other name?” Mason asked.
“Jason Braun.”
“Brown?” Mason asked.
“No,” Drake said, “it’s B-r-a-u-n, Jason Braun.”
“Okay,” Mason said, “what about Jason Braun?”
“He disappeared about two weeks ago, had an apartment on West Thirty-fifth Street, a bachelor place with maid service, rent paid up in advance, a few friends, a speaking acquaintance with the landlady, subscription to the daily newspaper, a couple of girl friends who occasionally dropped in for a cocktail, and the usual background a young salesman would have.
“Then he vanished from sight. Newspapers piled up in front of the door. The bed hadn’t been slept in. Mail came and laid unclaimed in the box. A suit at the cleaners he’d been most anxious to have ready at a certain time wasn’t called for. One of the girl friends rang up the landlady, said he’d had a date with her and hadn’t kept it. She felt sure something must have happened to him. After talking with her, the landlady notified the police. The police found out that he’d taken his car from the garage, as usual, and disappeared. He’d told the landlady he was a salesman. No one seemed to know exactly what it was he was selling. The police tried to check back on him and came up against a blank wall. He wasn’t registered as a voter. They couldn’t find where he was employed. The theory of the police was that his employer would probably make a report if it was a genuine disappearance. When they didn’t hear anything further, they just let the matter drop. They have a complete file on the case at the Missing Persons Bureau.”
“How do you know that he’s the man we want?” Mason asked.
“Through the car,” Drake said. “I went to the garage where he kept his car, found he’d had some work done on it recently, got the mechanic who did the work, took him out to the wrecked car, showed it to him, and he identified it absolutely, pointed out some of the work he’d done on it. We’re out there now. I’m telephoning from that drug store.”
“Any explanation of how this car happens to be registered in the name of Carl Packard?”
“No, but it’s Braun’s car, all right, but the manufacturer’s serial numbers on it don’t agree with the serial numbers on that registration certificate.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, the mechanic just pointed that out to me. When he’d worked on the car it had different license plates on it and had been registered to Jason Braun. The present license numbers agree with the registration certificate to Carl Packard, and the make and model of car is the same. The rest of it is all haywire.”
Mason frowned thoughtfully. “Well, Paul, we’re getting somewhere now. We can start tracing the registrations and that other car should give us a lead. Keep working on it. I’ll give you a ring after a while.”
He hung up the telephone and said to Wray, “Well, getting back to this partnership business, I’m wondering if—”
“I beg your pardon,” Wray interrupted, “but you mentioned the name of Jason Braun over the telephone. He’s not in any trouble, is he?”
Mason kept expression from his face, picked up his cigarette from where he had laid it on the desk when he answered the telephone, and asked casually, “Know him?”
“Why, yes,” Wray said. “I know him rather well.”
“How long since you’ve seen him?” Mason inquired.
“Yesterday.”
“Morning or afternoon?”
“Morning. Tell me, is anything wrong?”
“He was missing from his apartment,” Mason said, “and his landlady notified the police.”
Wray boomed into heavy laughter. “That,” he proclaimed, “is a good one! Jason Braun missing! Good Lord, he’s been right around town all the time. I’ve seen him two or three times during the past two weeks, and he was here in the office yesterday morning.”
“What’s his line?” Mason inquired, sitting back in the chair and crossing his long legs in front of him. Insurance?”
“Not exactly,” Wray said.
Mason showed that he was waiting for Wray to answer the question in greater detail. The insurance adjuster fidgeted uneasily and said, “Well, after all, Mr. Mason, since you’re representing Mrs. Prescott, I feel you’re one of the family and I know I can trust your discretion. Braun represents the insurance underwriters.”
“A salesman of some sort?” Mason asked.
“No, not a salesman. He investigates fires to determine whether they’re of incendiary origin. If they are, he knows what to do. He’s highly specialized.”
“Something in the nature of a detective?” Mason inquired.
“Yes.”
“What was his business with you yesterday?” Mason wanted to know.
“Oh, he didn’t have any particular business,” Wray said. “He dropped in for a social chat. As a matter of fact, he’s my wife’s cousin.”
“Any idea where I could get in touch with him now?” Mason asked.
“Through the Board of Underwriters,” Wray said. “But, look here, Mason, I’d a lot rather you didn’t let them know I’d tipped you off to what he’s doing. It’s highly confidential, you know.”
“The other insurance adjusters don’t know about it?”
“Good Lord, no!”
“How about your partner, did he know about it?”
“No, he’d never met Braun. You see, Jason kept his identity pretty well masked because so many times he had to pose as a fire-bug in order to trap the people he was after. And, incidentally, that’s why this business about his disappearance is a joke. I happen to know that right now he’s working on a big case. There have been no less than twelve fires in the last six months which can be traced back to one gang of fire-bugs — no proof, you understand, but the underwriters are morally certain.”
Mason said, “Look here, Wray, I’m going to ask you to do me a favor, something which will be of the greatest benefit to Mrs. Prescott. I want you to get in touch with Jason Braun for me. I want you to arrange for a confidential meeting at the earliest possible moment. I want to see him before he sees anyone else. Do you think you can do it?”
“Why, sure,” Wray said. “Why, I can get Claire — that’s the wife — to locate him within an hour.”
“Remember,” Mason said, “he left this apartment two weeks ago and hasn’t been heard from since. He had an engagement with a girl friend and stood her up on that engagement. Confidentially, there’s some evidence to indicate he may be suffering from an impaired memory. Circumstances which I won’t discuss now indicate that—”
“Oh, I’m sure there’s nothing like that,” Wray said. “He’s working on a case, that’s all. Claire will know about it. Why, I was talking with him myself yesterday morning and he was perfectly normal.”
“He recognized you then?”
Wray said, “Of course he recognized me. My God, Mason, I don’t know what you’re after, but whatever it is, you’re barking up the wrong tree. Jason’s all right. Naturally, he’s secretive in his methods, that’s all.”
“Well,” Mason told him, “please don’t misunderstand me. It’s of absolutely vital importance that I talk with Jason Braun. I want to talk with him before the police do.”
“The police?”
“Yes. He may be a witness either for or against Mrs. Prescott.”
“Well, he won’t be a witness against her,” Wray said. “You can depend on that, because Jason Braun will tell the truth, and the truth won’t hurt Rosalind Prescott. I don’t know who killed Walter, but you can gamble she didn’t. If Jason Braun knows anything, he’ll tell the truth. No one can influence him one way or the other.”
“And you think you can arrange for me to interview him before anyone else does?”
“I’m absolutely certain of it,” Wray said.
Mason got to his feet, took out a card and said, “My telephone number’s on the card. When you ring up, ask for Miss Street. That’s my secretary. Tell her who you are and she’ll put you on my line if I’m there, or if I’m out she’ll see that your message gets to me and I’ll call you back within a very few minutes.”
Wray came around the desk to shake Mason’s hand. “Tickled to death to do anything I can, Mr. Mason,” he said. “And, incidentally, if Mrs. Prescott is in need of any cash to cover — well frankly, to cover her retainer to you, I can arrange to advance that cash. You see, the money will come in on that insurance policy within a few days and she’ll be entitled to that. So I’d be only too glad to make an advance against it.”
“I don’t think that’ll be necessary,” Mason told him, “but it is particularly important that I locate Braun. If you can arrange for a confidential interview with him, both Mrs. Prescott and myself will keenly appreciate it.”
Frederick Carpenter, first vice-president of the Second Fidelity Savings & Loan, turned watery blue eyes on Perry Mason, listened to the lawyer’s statement of his errand with an expressionless countenance, cautiously rubbed the palm of his hand over his bald head and said, “I see no reason, Mr. Mason, why the bank should anticipate the legal procedure incident to probate. When Mrs. Prescott is appointed executrix or administratrix, she can file a certified copy of the letters of administration with us and we will then be very glad to turn over any money in Mr. Prescott’s account.”
“Will you tell me the amount of that money?”
“I see no reason for doing so.”
“The court will have to take into consideration the amount of the estate in fixing bonds in the probate proceedings,” Mason pointed out.
Carpenter nodded, stroked his bald spot with a cautious palm for two or three seconds and then said, “Of course, Mr. Mason, the circumstances in the present case are somewhat unusual.”
“In what way?”
“Mrs. Prescott will probably be charged with the murder of her husband.”
“That doesn’t need to affect you in the least.”
“I’d want an opinion from our attorney on that.”
“How long would it take to get such an opinion?”
“I couldn’t say.”
“Look here,” Mason said savagely, “I don’t know how much money is here, but it may be rather a large amount. Sooner or later, Mrs. Prescott is going to have complete charge of that money. Your attitude isn’t one to inspire her with any desire to co-operate with you after she gets in the saddle.”
“I’m sorry,” Carpenter said.
“That doesn’t mean anything,” Mason told him.
“I regret the circumstances,” Carpenter amplified.
“And that doesn’t mean a damn thing,” Mason remarked.
“It’s the best I can do.”
“Well,” Mason said angrily, “as attorney for Mrs. Prescott, I can tell you right now that your attitude isn’t appreciated in the least. When Mrs. Prescott is appointed executrix or administratrix, as the case may be, you’ll lose the account just as fast as she can check it out.”
Carpenter observed blandly, “It’s unfortunate.”
Mason strode from the bank, his angry heels pounding the flagged floor. Behind him, Frederick Carpenter continued to stroke his bald spot with an even tempo of conservative caution. Then, as Mason passed through the swinging doors, Carpenter reached for the telephone on his desk.
Mason paused on his way to his office to telephone Paul Drake. “Listen,” he told the detective, “I think you’ve uncovered something on that Jason Braun angle. I’m working on it from one angle, but that’s no reason you shouldn’t work on it from another. Confidentially, the man’s an investigator for the Board of Fire Underwriters. He’s working on a case right at present and his disappearance may have been deliberate, in which event that amnesia business may have been a stall. Now, the Board of Underwriters probably won’t be anxious to give out any information, if they know why you want it. But if you can rig up a plant who will claim to have certain information about some incendiary fires which have been set within the last two or three months, the chances are the Board of Underwriters will send Jason Braun to call on him. Now, I want to get this angle covered before the police get wise to it, so get busy on it.”
“Okay,” Drake said.
“And one more thing,” Mason told him, “get busy on a Rosa Hendrix who works at the office of Prescott & Wray. She’s a readhead with a cat-swallowed-the-cream expression. See what makes her tick.”