Mason unlocked the door of his private office, and then suddenly stood motionless, staring in surprise at Della Street.
“You!” he exclaimed.
“None other,” she told him, blinking back tears. “I guess you’ll have to get a new secretary, Chief.”
“What’s the matter, Della?” he asked, coming toward her solicitously.
She started to cry then, and he slid his arm around her shoulders, patting her reassuringly. “What happened?” he asked.
“That t-t-t-two-timing little d-d-d-devil,” she said.
“Who?” Mason asked.
“That librarian, Helen Monteith.”
“What about her, Della?”
“She slipped one over on me.”
“Come on over here; sit down and tell me about it,” Mason said.
“Oh, Chief, I’m so d-d-darned sorry I let you down!”
“How do you figure you let me down, Della? Perhaps you didn’t let me down as much as you think.”
“Yes, I did too. You told me to keep her where no one could find her, and...”
“What happened?” Mason asked. “Did they find her, or did she take a run-out powder?”
“She took a p-p-p-powder.”
“All right, how did it happen?”
Della Street dabbed at her eyes with a lace-bordered handkerchief. “Gosh, Chief, I hate to be a b-b-bawl-baby,” she said. “... Believe it or not, this is the first tear I’ve shed... I could have wrung her neck with my bare hands... She started in and told me a story that tore my heart inside out.”
“What was the story?” Mason asked, his face without expression.
“It was the story of her romance,” Della said. “She told it... Oh, Chief, you’d have to be a woman to understand... It was all about her life. She’d been romantically inclined when she was young. There’d been a high school, puppy-love affair, which had been pretty serious with her... But it hadn’t been so serious with the boy... that is, it had at the time, Chief. I don’t know if you can get the sketch, I can’t tell it to you the way she told it to me.
“This boy was just an awfully nice boy. She made me see him just the way she saw him — a nice, clean, decent chap, with something of the mystic, or spiritual, in him... something that a woman really wants in every man she loves, and this was a real love affair.
“Then the boy went away to get a job, so he could make enough money to marry her, and she was all thrilled with pride. And then, after a few months, he came back, and...”
“... And he was in love with someone else?” Mason asked as she hesitated.
“No, it wasn’t that,” Della said. “He was still in love with her, but he’d become sort of smart-alecky. He looked on her as something of a conquest. He wasn’t in such a hurry to get married, and he’d been running around with a crowd of boys that thought it wasn’t smart to have ideals. They had a sophisticated attitude, and... well, I’ll never forget the way she described it. She said the acid of their pseudo-realism had eaten the gold off his character and left just the base metal beneath.”
“So then what happened?” Mason asked.
“Then she naturally became bitter — toward men and toward love. At a time when most girls were seeing the world through rose-tinted spectacles, she was embittered and disillusioned. She didn’t care too much for dances, and parties, and things, and gradually became more and more interested in books. She said she formed her friendships among books; that books didn’t tease you along until they’d won your friendship, and then suddenly reverse themselves and slap you in the face.
“Along about that time, she acquired the reputation of being narrow-minded and strait-laced, and a poor sport. It started in with a few fellows whose vanity was insulted because she wouldn’t drink bathtub gin, and neck. They advertised her as an awful pill, and gradually that reputation stuck to her. Remember, Chief, she was in a small town. It’s pretty hard for people to really see each other in a small town. They only see the reputation which has been built up by a lot of word-of-mouth advertising.”
“Was that the way she described it?” Mason asked.
Della Street nodded.
“All right, go ahead. Then what happened?”
“Then, when she’d just about given up any idea of romance, along came Fremont Sabin. He was kindly and gentle, he wasn’t greedy. He had a philosophy of life which saw the beautiful side of everything. In other words, Chief, as nearly as I can explain it, there was Something of the idealism in this man that she had worshiped in this boy with whom she’d been in love. But, whereas the boy had the ideals of youth, and they weren’t strongly enough entrenched in him to withstand the cynicism and cheap worldly wisdom of his associates, this man had battled his way through every disillusionment life had to offer, and won his idealism as an achievement, as an ultimate goal. His ideals stood for something — they were carefully thought out. They’d stood the test of time.”
“I guess,” Mason said thoughtfully, “Fremont C. Sabin was really a wonderful character.”
“Apparently he was, Chief. Of course, he played an awful trick on her, but...”
“I’m not so certain he did,” Mason said. “We can look at the thing from Sabin’s viewpoint, and see just what he was trying to do. When you get the whole picture in its proper perspective, and in the light of some new evidence we’ve uncovered, it’s quite consistent with his character.”
“Can you tell me about this new evidence, Chief?”
“No, you tell me about Helen Monteith first.”
“Well, this man started coming to the library. She knew him only as Wallman, a man who was out of work, a man who had no particular trade, and no particular cause to feel friendly toward the world; yet he did. He was interested in books on philosophy and social reform, and he was particularly interested in his fellowmen. He’d sit in the library, sometimes at night, apparently reading a book, but in reality studying the men who were seated around him. And then, whenever he had an opportunity, he’d get acquainted, in an unostentatious manner, and listen. He was always listening.
“Naturally, Helen Monteith, as a librarian, watched him and became interested in him. He started talking to her. Apparently, he had quite a knack of drawing people out, and he got her to tell him a great deal about herself before she realized how much she actually was telling him. And then she fell in love. Because the man was older than she, and because she hadn’t been anticipating anything of the sort, romance sneaked up on her and caught her unaware. She was madly in love with him before she even realized she was in love. And then when she found out that he loved her... Well, Chief, as she told me about it, she said it felt as though her soul was singing all the time.”
“She must have something of a gift for expression,” Mason said, his eyes narrowing slightly.
“No, Chief, it wasn’t an act she was putting on. She was absolutely sincere. She loves to talk about it, because it was such a beautiful thing with her. Despite the shock of the tragedy, and all the disillusionment which has come with finding out he was married, she’s still happy and philosophical about it all. She feels that she finally found happiness in her life. The happiness didn’t last, but she doesn’t seem to feel bitter about that, but, instead, is grateful for the measure of happiness she did have. Of course, when she read the morning paper about the murder, about how Sabin would go around using an assumed name, studying people, browsing in libraries... Well, of course, that made her suspicious. Then she saw the photograph of this mountain cabin and recognized it. But she fought against her fears, trying to convince herself against her better judgment... And then the afternoon paper carried the picture of Sabin, and her worst fears were confirmed.”
“Then you don’t think she killed him?” Mason asked.
“Absolutely not,” she said. “She couldn’t... Well...”
“Why the doubt?” Mason asked, as her voice trailed off into silence.
“Well,” Della said, “there is this side to her character. If she had thought that he had been going to do something to hurt her... If she had thought that his ideals were going to... well, not exactly his ideals, either, Chief, but if she had thought that there was something about him which was counterfeit, I think she’d have killed him, in order to keep from discovering it, if you know what I mean.”
“I think I do,” Mason told her. “Go on, what happened?”
“Well, I took her to a little hotel. I went to some precautions to make certain we couldn’t be traced by the police. I gathered that was what you wanted. I got some baggage out of my apartment, and we registered as two sisters from Topeka, Kansas. I asked the clerk a lot of questions that tourists would ordinarily ask, and I think I completely sold him on the idea.
“We had a corner room, in the back, with twin beds and a bath, and quietly, in such a manner that she wouldn’t notice what I was doing, I locked the door from the inside and put the key in my purse.
“Well, we sat down and talked, and she told me all about her romance, and about everything which had happened. I guess we talked for three or four hours. I know it was long after midnight when we went to bed; and I guess it was about five o’clock this morning when she woke me up, shaking me and telling me she couldn’t get the door open. She was fully dressed, and seemed very much upset.
“I asked her why she wanted to get the door open, and she said she had to go back to San Molinas, that she simply had to. There was something she’d forgotten.
“I told her she couldn’t go back. She said she must, and we had quite an argument. Finally, she said she was going to telephone the hotel and have someone come up to open the door. Then I got hard with her.”
“What did you tell her?” Mason asked.
“I told her that you were sacrificing a great deal to help her, and that she was giving you a double-cross; that she was in danger, and that the police would catch her and charge her with murder; that her romance would be written up by every sob sister in the tabloid newspaper game; that she’d be dragged through courts, and the pitiless white light of searching and unfavorable publicity would beat upon her... I told her everything I could think of. I talked like a lawyer working on a jury.”
“What happened?”
“She still wanted to go,” Della Street said; “so then I told her that the minute she walked out of that door, you were finished with her, you wouldn’t protect her in any way; that she was going to have to obey your orders, and stay there, until I could get in touch with you. She wanted to know when I could get in touch with you, and I told her I didn’t know, not until after you got to the office at around nine-thirty; that I could get Paul Drake to give you a message. She wanted me to call your apartment directly, and I told her absolutely nothing doing, because I was afraid the police would be plugged in on your line, and because I thought you didn’t want to know where she was, or have anything to do with her disappearance.
“Well, she thought that over for a while and decided it was reasonable. She said that was all right, she’d wait until nine-thirty, but made me promise, solemnly, that I’d try and get in touch with you then. She undressed and went back to bed, and said she was sorry she’d made such a scene. It took me about half an hour to get composed enough to drop off to sleep again... And I woke up, and she was gone... She’d deliberately planned that business about giving in just so she could double-cross me.”
“She’d taken the key out of your purse?” Mason asked.
“Of course not,” Della Street said. “I had that purse tucked under my pillow slip. She couldn’t have possibly got that key without waking me up. She went down the fire escape. The window was open.”
“You don’t know what time she went?” Mason asked.
“No.”
“What time did you wake up?”
“Not until after eight o’clock,” she said. “I was pretty tired, and I figured we wouldn’t have anything to do except be waiting, so I sort of set my mental alarm clock for around eight o’clock. I woke up and lay there for a while, thinking she was over on the other bed, and being grateful that she’d calmed down. I slipped out quietly from between the covers, so as not to awaken her, and started to tiptoe to the bathroom, and then looked over my shoulder, and saw that her bed looked rather strange. I went over for another look. She’d pulled the old stunt of wadding up some blankets and a pillow, and putting them under the covers, to make it look as though someone was asleep in the bed... Well, Chief, that’s all there is to it.”
Mason held her close to him. “Don’t worry, Della,” he said. “You certainly did all anyone could have done... Where did she go, do you know?”
“I think she was headed back for San Molinas.”
“If she goes there,” Mason said, “she’ll put her neck in a noose.”
“Well, I think she’s done it. She’s probably there by this time.”
“What did you do,” Mason asked, “when you found she was gone?”
“I telephoned Paul Drake’s office right away and told them to get in touch with you. I tried to locate you myself, but couldn’t find you anywhere.”
“I went uptown for breakfast, and then stopped in at a barber shop,” Mason told her.
“Well,” she said, “I think Paul Drake’s on the job. I finally got him personally, and explained to him what had happened, and told him to have his men in San Molinas try and pick her up and keep her out of sight.”
“What did Drake say?” Mason asked.
“Drake,” she said with a wan smile, “didn’t seem overly enthusiastic. I guess I caught him before he’d had his morning coffee. He seemed to think that he’d be dragged up before the Grand Jury in San Molinas if he tried anything like that.”
“Did you sell him on the idea?” Mason asked.
“I sold him,” she said grimly, “but I had to get pretty tough with him, in order to do it. He...” She broke off, as Drake’s code knock sounded on the door, and said, “There he is now.”
Mason nodded to her, and she crossed the office toward the door, then turned and said, “My eyes are a sight; let him in, will you, and let me go splash some cold water on my face?”
Mason nodded. As she glided through the door into the law library, Mason opened the corridor door. “Hi, Paul,” he said.
Drake’s shoulders were slumped forward, his manner lugubrious. “H’lo, Perry,” he said, walking across to the big leather chair, and sliding into it sideways in his favorite position.
“What’s new?” Mason asked.
“Plenty,” Drake said.
“Good, bad, or indifferent?” Mason asked.
“It depends on what you consider indifferent,” Drake said, mustering a slow grin. “To begin with, Perry, your certified copy of the divorce decree is an absolute forgery, and that was a damned clever stroke of genius, good enough for a cool one hundred thousand bucks.”
“You’re certain?” Mason asked.
“Absolutely certain. Mrs. Sabin probably had some Reno lawyer helping her, but we’ll never find out who it was, of course, because it’s a slick scheme of obtaining money under false pretenses. They had the regular printed blanks all in proper form, the signature of the clerk, and the deputy, and quite apparently they managed to get a genuine imprint of the court seal. That could have been done, the clerk admits, by sneaking around behind the counter sometime when he was occupied, but they don’t let every Tom, Dick and Harry go behind the counter; so, evidently, it was pretty carefully worked out in advance.”
“Then there wasn’t any case of Sabin vs. Sabin ever filed?”
“No.”
“That,” Mason said, “was clever. If it hadn’t been for this murder, no one would ever have detected that forgery. A certified copy of a decree of divorce is accepted at face value everywhere. Unless there’s some question of the pleadings, no one ever thinks of going back to look at the court records. What a sweet job that was. A cool hundred thousand, and still his legal wife! Of course, there’s the forgery angle and obtaining money under false pretenses; but if it hadn’t been for this murder, no one would ever have tumbled to it.”
“Even as it is, she’s doing pretty well for herself,” Drake said. “She’s the legal widow, and, as such, entitled to step in and take charge.”
“All right,” Mason said, “we’ll skip that for a while. What’s this about Helen Monteith?”
Drake made a wry grimace and said, “I wish you’d wash your own dirty linen, Perry.”
“Why?” Mason asked.
“It’s bad enough to hold your coat while you cut the legal corners,” Drake said, “but when I find myself suddenly wished into the position of wearing your coat, it doesn’t go over so big.”
Mason grinned, offered a desk humidor to the detective, and helped himself to a cigarette. “Go on,” he said, lighting up, “give me the works.”
“Della called the agency about quarter past eight this morning, and was in an awful lather,” Drake said. “She wanted to get in touch with me, and wanted to get in touch with you, and wanted operatives to watch for Helen Monteith in San Molinas. My agency got in touch with me, and I telephoned Della at the number she’d left. She was registered under the name of Edith Fontayne. She told me all about Helen Monteith taking a run-out powder, and how you wanted her kept away from the police, and for me to beat it down to San Molinas and pick her up, and keep her hidden out.
“I told her to get in touch with you.
“She said she didn’t know where you were. I told her I’d try and find you, and that was every damn thing I would do. My gosh, here I was remonstrating with you last night about the chances you were taking in holding a fugitive from justice away from the sheriff and the district attorney, and then all of a sudden Della proposes that I stick my neck out on the same proposition. It was so hot that even you had to play it so you didn’t know where she was...”
“What did you finally do?” Mason interrupted.
“Do?” Drake groaned. “What the devil could I do? I did exactly what she wanted. My God, Perry, I’ve always been friendly with Della, and it’s been sort of a give-and-take, informal relationship. I always felt she was my friend, but when I told her I had to draw the line some place, she became a regular little hellcat over the wire. She told me that if I wanted your business, I was to take care of it the way you wanted; that I should know damn well you wouldn’t leave me out on the end of a limb, and that you’d never made a foolish move yet; that you wanted Helen Monteith kept away from the police, and...”
“Never mind what she told you,” Mason said, grinning, “what did you do?”
“Took my medicine like a little man, got my operatives in San Molinas on the telephone, and told them to get out to Helen Monteith’s house; to grab her as soon as she showed up, and rush her back to the city; to kidnap her, if they had to, or do anything else that was necessary. My operatives started arguing with me, and I had to read the riot act to them, and told them I’d take the responsibility.”
“Well,” Mason said, “where’s Helen Monteith now?”
“In jail,” Drake said gloomily.
“How come?”
“My operatives didn’t get the message in time. She’d got out to the house about half an hour before they did. Evidently, the police had left word with Mrs. Winters to let them know as soon as Helen Monteith showed up. The sheriff and the district attorney went out there on the run. They nabbed Helen. She’d been killing parrots, burning papers, and trying to find some place to hide a box of forty-one caliber cartridges... You can figure where that puts her.”
“How about the parrot-killing?” Mason asked with interest.
“She went home and killed the parrot,” Drake said. “Snickasneed its head off with a butcher knife — made a nice clean job of it, too.”
“As soon as she got home?” Mason asked.
“I reckon so. The sheriff didn’t tumble to it for a little while. They caught her red-handed with the forty-one caliber shells and stuff she’d been burning in the fireplace. The sheriff went to quite a bit of trouble trying to get something out of the ashes, but about all he could tell was she’d been burning paper. They hustled her out to jail and telephoned in for a technical man from the homicide squad here, to see what could be done about reconstructing the papers... Sergeant Holcomb has been working hand and glove with ’em, you know.”
“I know,” Mason said. “What did she say about the forty-one caliber shells? Does she admit buying them?”
“I don’t know,” Drake said. “They hustled her off to jail, and that’s all anyone knows.”
“When did they find out about the parrot?”
“Not so very long ago,” Drake said. “Sergeant Holcomb’s men apparently discovered that when they went through the house...”
“Wait a minute,” Mason interpolated. “Couldn’t the parrot have been killed after Helen Monteith was arrested?”
“Not a chance,” Drake said; “they put the place under guard right after they’d pinched her. That was so no one could get in and remove any evidence. I think your friend, Helen Watkins Sabin, may have been back of that move. I understand they’re going through the house with a magnifying glass, looking for additional evidence. They found out about the parrot, and my man telephoned in a report about fifteen minutes ago... Perry, why the devil do you suppose she killed that parrot?”
“The murder of a parrot,” Mason said, with his eyes twinkling, “is somewhat similar to the murder of a human being; that is, a person must look for a motive. Having found a motive, there must then be opportunity, and...”
“Nix on it, nix on it,” Drake interrupted. “Cut the comedy, Perry. You know damn well why she killed that parrot. Now, I want to know why.”
“What makes you think I know?” Mason asked.
“Phooey!” Drake exclaimed, “don’t take me for such a simp. She wanted the parrot out of the way, and you wanted the parrot preserved as evidence of something or other. You knew she was going to kill that parrot if she had a chance, so you had Della keep Helen Monteith out of the way long enough for us to go down and substitute parrots. I suppose it was because of the cracks the parrot’s making about ‘Drop that gun, Helen’ and ‘My God, you’ve shot me,’ but I still don’t see why she didn’t kill the parrot before, instead of waiting until she had to climb down a fire escape to do the parrot-butchering... I admit that I thought last night you were trying to keep Helen Monteith concealed from the authorities, and I thought so this morning when Della Street rang up. I didn’t realize until just now that what you were really trying to do was to keep her away from that parrot.”
“Well,” Mason said, “now that the parrot’s dead, we might as well...”
“But the parrot isn’t dead,” Drake interrupted. “You have the parrot. I suppose that the parrot is a witness to something or other — probably the murder — but damned if I see how he could have been. Tell me, Perry, could a parrot be used as a witness in a court of justice?”
“I don’t know,” Mason said. “It’s an interesting point, Paul. I’m afraid the oath couldn’t be administered to a parrot. In other words, he might commit perjury.”
Drake glanced sidelong at Mason and said, “Go ahead and joke all you want to, brother. I suppose if you don’t want to tell me, there’s nothing I can do to make you.”
“What else do you know?” Mason asked, abruptly changing the subject.
“Oh, a few things,” Drake said. “I’ve had a bunch of men working all night. I’ve been trying to find out as much as I could about that wire-tapping up there at the cabin. You know, it occurred to me, Perry, that I might find out something about the calls which had been listened in on, by getting a copy of the telephone bill. You see, that cabin line is on a local exchange, but Sabin wouldn’t have been interested in maintaining a telephone to call any of his neighbors. All of his contacts were in the city, and, of course, they’d have to be handled as long distance calls.”
“A good idea,” Mason said. “You deserve credit for that, Paul.”
“Credit, hell,” Drake said lugubriously. “I deserve cash for it. When you get the bill, it’s going to floor you, Perry. I’ve got men working on overlapping nine-hour shifts, and I’ve got ’em scattered all over the country.”
“That’s fine,” Mason said. “How did you get the telephone bill, Paul?”
“One of the men took a chance,” Drake said, “went down to the telephone office, said he was a ‘detective,’ and, because of the murder, wanted service discontinued on the telephone, and wanted to pay the bill. The girl in the local telephone office fell for it, and handed him the bill. He insisted on checking all the long distance charges.”
“What did you find?” Mason asked.
“A few calls to his residence, here in the city,” Drake said. “Those were evidently calls where he’d talked with his secretary. Several of them had been station-to-station calls, and quite a few of them had been for Richard Waid personally. But the interesting things, Perry, are the person-to-person Reno calls.”
“The Reno calls?” Mason asked.
“Yes. Apparently he was in almost daily telephone communication with his wife in Reno.”
“What about?” Mason asked.
“You’ve got me on that,” Drake said. “Probably trying to make certain that the divorce was going through according to schedule, and that she’d be in New York with a certified copy of the decree.”
Della Street, her face freshly powdered, eyes showing but little trace of tears, bustled busily into the office, and appeared surprised to see Paul Drake. “Hi, Paul,” she said.
“Don’t you ‘Hi, Paul’ me, you baggage,” Drake grumbled. “Of all the high-pressure stuff I ever had handed me...”
She came over to where he was sitting on the chair, and put her hand on his arm. “Don’t be such an old grouch-face,” she laughed.
“Grouch-face nothing,” he told her. “You put it up to me cold-turkey that I either had to go in for kidnapping or lose Mason’s business.”
“Well, Paul,” she said, “I was trying to do what the Chief wanted — that is, what I thought he’d want under the circumstances.”
Drake said to Mason, “You’re bad enough. This girl is twice that bad.”
Mason grinned at Della. “Don’t talk with him this morning, Della, he’s suffering from an ingrowing disposition.”
“Did he get Helen Monteith?” she asked.
“No, the officers did,” Mason told her.
“Oh!” she exclaimed in startled dismay.
“It’s all right, Della,” Mason said. “Ring up Sabin’s residence, get Richard Waid or Charles Sabin, whichever one is available; say that I’d like to see both of them at the office at their earliest convenience.”
He turned back to Paul Drake. “Have your men found out anything about where those forty-one caliber shells were bought, Paul?”
“Not where they were bought,” Drake said, “but by this time the police sure have found out who bought ’em.”
Mason dismissed it with a gesture. “Concentrate for a while on the Reno end of things, Paul. Find out as much as you can about what Mrs. Sabin did in Reno, and get me copies of the long distance telephone bill.”
“Okay,” Drake said, sliding from the chair, “and remember this, Perry Mason, the next time you duck out because things are getting too hot for you to handle, I’m going to duck out too. Being a stooge is all right, but being pushed up into the front-line trenches just when the machine guns start rattling, is a gray horse of another color.”