It was after midnight when Perry Mason and Della Street, flushed and laughing, entered Paul Drake’s office. The man who was on duty at the switchboard knew Perry Mason.
“The boss in?” Mason asked.
“Yes. Just go in. I’ll tell him you’re coming.”
They walked along the reception hallway, pushed open a swinging door at the end, entered a filing room, and beyond that, pushed open the door to an eight-by-ten office where Drake had contrived to place a small desk, a swivel chair, three telephones, a filing case, and a steel safe.
Mason said, “I know now why you like to sprawl all over our office, Paul. There isn’t room for you to relax here. You have to sit straight as a ramrod to keep your feet from slipping out of the office during the middle of a conference.”
Drake, violently chewing gum, consulted the three memo pads, one in front of each telephone, and said, “Give Della the chair over there, Perry. You can sit on the corner of the desk. What sort of a run-around were you giving me with this Barkler guy?”
Mason laughed. “Guess I was a little crude there, Paul. I tipped my hand.”
One of the telephones rang. Drake, chewing his gum violently, scooped the receiver to his ear, said, “Hello. Yes — okay, give it to me,” and started making notes. In the midst of the note-taking, the other telephone rang. Drake picked it up, said into the transmitter, “Hold the line for just a minute,” finished making notes, said, “Okay, Frank. Hang on for a minute. Something’s coming in over the other telephone.” He said, “All right,” into the second transmitter and translated the metallic sounds which came through the receiver into notes on the pad in front of him, said, “Report again in an hour,” and hung up. He said into the first telephone, “Okay, keep the place sewed up. Don’t let him get away. Make a report as soon as he does anything.”
“I take it,” Mason said, “you’ve struck pay dirt.”
Drake spat his chew of gum into a wastebasket, opened a drawer, took out two fresh sticks, fed them rapidly into his mouth.
“He gets this way when things get hot,” Mason explained to Della Street.
Della, watching the detective’s jaw with fascination said, “If there were only some way of harnessing that motion to a dynamo, we could run the elevator in the building.”
Drake grinned at her, and said, “Go ahead, folks, have your fun. I can see you’ve been painting the town red while I’ve been holding my nose to a grindstone.”
“My God!” Mason exclaimed. “Don’t tell me there’s a grindstone in here, too!”
Drake pulled the nearest memo pad over toward him. “Want the report?” he asked.
“I suppose we’ve got to have it,” Mason said.
Drake said, “I have an idea we let the biggest game slip through our fingers, Perry. It couldn’t have been helped, but I’m kicking myself just the same.”
“How so?” Mason asked.
Drake said, “Emily Milicant left your office, but didn’t go to her apartment. She kept calling a number from public phones and getting no answer. The fourth time she tried, one of my men got close enough to watch the number she was dialing. It was Westhaven one-two-eight-nine. I looked it up, and found that it was an unlisted number, in the name of L. C. Conway at apartment 625 in an apartment house at 513 Haldemore Avenue.
“I immediately sent a man down to cover that apartment, and we continued camping on Emily Milicant’s trail.”
“Good work, Paul,” the lawyer said.
Drake paused long enough to shift his gum from one side to the other and work it into place with half a dozen nervously rapid chews.
“Okay,” he said, “here’s what happens. Around six o‘clock Emily Milicant goes down to that apartment house. She went up in the elevator around six o’clock and was out about six-five. She’d led us to Conway, so we dropped her, and I put operatives in the lobby to check everyone who took the elevators to the sixth floor. There’s a floor register over the elevator.
“At six-twenty-nine, John Milicant comes in. He’s accompanied by a tall, thin chap around forty that my operative identifies as Guy T. Serle. You remember he’s the one who took over the Conway Appliance Company. They’re smoking cigars. Serle seems sore as hell about something. After we got the dope later on, we found out how he could be sore.”
“What was the dope?” Mason asked.
“Police raided the Conway Appliance Company about five o’clock this afternoon. They confiscated a lot of equipment, picked up a couple of underlings, and there’s a felony warrant out for Serle.”
“Think he knew it when he was with Milicant?” Mason asked.
“He acted like it.”
“Okay,” Mason said, “go on.”
“Well, Serle went in at six-twenty-nine and out at six-thirty-eight. At six-fifty-seven, a blonde baby, who impressed the operative on duty as being a million dollars’ worth of pulchritude, went in, and five minutes later came out. From the description, I figure she’s Marcia Whittaker, although the operative didn’t know Marcia Whittaker.
“At seven-forty-one, Serle comes in again. At eight-ten, a restaurant a couple of doors down the street sent up two dinners. The operative checked back and found that the order had been telephoned in to the restaurant right around five minutes to eight. Evidently, Serle and Conway had a little more stuff to talk over, and grabbed a quick dinner while they were doing it.”
“Why quick?” Mason asked.
“Because Serle was out again at eight-twenty-three. A waiter called for the dishes at ten-forty. Well, now, here’s where we pulled our boner. At ten-five a man went in who was a stranger to all the operatives. He was an oldish man, thin, white haired, and straight as a ramrod. He was dressed in blue serge, didn’t wear an overcoat, had black patent leather shoes, and was smoking a cigar.”
“How long did he stay?” Mason asked.
“Eleven minutes. He was out at ten-sixteen.”
“How did you pull a boner, Paul?”
Drake said, “Because I figure this guy was Alden Leeds.”
“You didn’t tell Phyllis Leeds that, did you?” Mason asked apprehensively.
“Hell, no,” Drake said. “It’s bad enough to pull a boner, without telling a client about it.”
Mason nodded thoughtfully.
Della Street said, “I don’t see how you could have done things any differently, Paul.”
“I couldn’t,” Drake admitted, “unless I’d been up on my toes and played a hunch. You see reports were relayed to me. By the time I got this guy’s description, he’d left. But good detective work consists of a lot of luck and a lot of hunch playing. I might have anticipated Leeds would drop in, and been ready for him. I muffed that play.
“Well, that’s practically all. At ten-twenty-one, the blonde girl came back again. This time she was carrying an overnight bag. It looked as though she’d dropped in, fixed things up with Milicant, and was back for a longer visit after Milicant had got rid of all the business.”
“How long did she stay?” Mason asked.
“That’s just it,” Drake said. “She went in, and then came right back out at ten-thirty-two.”
“Did she leave the bag?”
“No, she evidently hadn’t even taken her hat off, just popped in and popped out again. I have a hunch something had happened, and Milicant wasn’t as glad to see her as she thought he was going to be.”
“Meaning what?” Mason asked.
“Meaning the sister,” Drake said. “The girl was in first at six-fifty-seven and was out by two minutes past seven. She came out looking happy. The next time the blonde shows up, the situation is radically different, and she comes out with her shoulders squared, her chin up in the air, and walks to the corner where she grabs a taxi.”
“Anything happen after that?” Mason asked.
“Not a thing,” Drake said.
Mason said, “Hell, Paul, I don’t see how you do any business in this office. You can’t pace the floor.”
Drake started to say something when one of the telephones rang. He answered it, received evidently a routine report because he looked at his watch, made a note, said, “Okay, stay on the job and keep reporting,” and hung up.
Before he could turn to say anything to the lawyer, another phone rang, and Drake picked up the receiver, said, “Okay, this is Drake talking. Put them on.” He turned to Mason, and said, “Seattle calling.” A few moments later he said, “Yes, this is Paul Drake. Go ahead and tell me what you’ve found.” Then for five minutes, beyond an occasional “Yes... Okay... Go on from there,” he said nothing, but scribbled notes on a sheet of paper. He said, “Make a complete report by way of confirmation and send it on by airmail,” hung up, and turned to Mason again.
“That was my Seattle correspondent,” he said. “They dug up old passenger lists of the steamship lines. Records show that Alden Leeds sailed for Dawson City via Skagway in 1906. In the latter part of 1906, he was reported in partnership with a man named Bill Hogarty in the Tanana country. Next winter it was reported Leeds was killed in a snowslide.”
“Killed!” Mason exclaimed.
“That’s the way the report runs. Shortly after that, Bill Hogarty came out. He’d struck it rich. Hogarty got as far as Seattle and vanished. Our correspondent wants to know if he’s to try and pick up the Hogarty trail.”
“Go to it, Paul,” Mason said. “Start from there.”
“Where do I stop?” Drake asked.
“Don’t stop,” Mason said. “Keep going,” then, turning to Della Street, “Come on, Della. Let’s go to an office where we can pace the floor.”
“Going to be there for a while?” Drake asked.
“Probably not,” Mason said. “With you on the job, I don’t see why we should lose a lot of sleep.”
Back in his office, Mason paced the floor, puffing away at his cigarette, his thumbs hooked in the armholes of his vest, his chin lowered, eyes fixed moodily on the carpet. All of the playboy spontaneity which had characterized him throughout the evening with Della Street had vanished.
Della Street sat in the big leather chair, her heels pulled up, her arms clasping her knees and holding her skirts tightly against her legs. Her eyes followed Perry Mason with solicitous concern.
The telephone sounded startlingly loud against the midnight silence of the office building.
“It must be Paul Drake,” Della Street said.
“No, Paul Drake would come in here — unless something important has happened, and he doesn’t dare to leave his own telephone.”
He scooped up the receiver and said, “Hello.”
A feminine voice said, “Mr. Perry Mason, the attorney?”
“Yes speaking. Who is this talking?”
“Long distance. San Francisco is calling you.”
Mason frowned at the telephone and said, “And how did you know that my office hours were from six P.M. until two A.M.?”
The long distance operator ignored the sally. Her voice was crisp and businesslike. “I tried your apartment, Mr. Mason, and then called the office. Just a moment, please... Go ahead. We’re ready with your call to Mr. Mason.”
A woman’s voice, sounding thin and frightened, said, “Mr. Mason, this is Miss Whittaker. Do you remember me, Marcia Whittaker?”
“Certainly,” Mason said. “Where are you now?”
“San Francisco.”
“How did you get there? You were here around ten o’clock, weren’t you?”
“Yes. I came up on a late plane. I’m calling from the airport now.”
“All right,” Mason said, “what is it?”
Her voice showed traces of hysteria. “I can’t do it,” she sobbed. “I can’t run away from it. I thought I could, but I can’t.”
“Run away from what?” Mason asked.
“From what happened.”
Her voice became almost a whisper. “I can’t tell you — over the phone,” she said.
Mason said, “Now listen carefully, Marcia, watch your answers. Does anyone know you’re in San Francisco?”
“No.”
“Have you quarreled with your boy friend?”
“No... not a quarrel... I can’t...”
“Is he angry?”
“No, no! Can’t you understand? He isn’t...”
“And he won’t be angry?” Mason interrupted. “Never be angry again?”
“That’s — that’s right.”
“We’re representing Alden Leeds, you know,” Mason said.
“Yes, I know. That’s why I’m calling you. I have... have something for you... and you can help me.”
“But only if it helps Leeds.”
“I understand.”
“This thing you have — is it important?”
“Very.”
Mason thought rapidly. “You went to his apartment around ten-thirty tonight?”
“Yes. How did you know?”
Mason said, “Never mind that. Can you get a plane back?”
“Yes.”
“Is there any way I can get a key to your apartment?”
“Yes, I keep my mailbox unlocked and there’s an extra key in the bottom of the mailbox.”
Mason said, “Get back here just as quickly as you can. Is there a telephone in your flat?”
“Yes.”
“What’s the number?”
“Graymore six-nine-four-seven.”
“All right,” Mason said. “Don’t tell anyone about this conversation with me, do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Be seeing you,” Mason said, and hung up.
He turned to Della Street. “You probably got most of it,” he said, “from what I said at this end. Marcia Whittaker. It’s an even money bet that John Milicant has either committed suicide or been murdered. I’m inclined right now to the suicide angle.”
Della Street, with calm competence, took a notebook from her purse.
“I took down the schedule as Paul Drake read it off,” she said. “Do you want to know the people who came in during the evening?”
“No,” Mason said, “they’re not important. Serle had dinner with him. A man who answers the description of Alden Leeds was in at ten-five. The girl was there at ten-twenty-one. The man left just before the girl came. That’s the picture. Whatever happened, happened late.
“These people stayed too long to have been standing in front of the door, knocking and waiting for an answer. It’s hardly likely that both Leeds and Marcia would have stumbled on a dead body and said nothing about it... Come on, Della, we’re going to see Paul Drake.”
They trooped back to Drake’s office. Drake was just struggling into his overcoat.
“You again!” he said. “Why don’t you go on out and make whoopee? — In other words, why don’t you get the hell out of here and let working men get a decent night’s sleep?”
Mason said, “Listen, Paul. You’re not going home.”
“That’s what you think,” Drake said. “It’s after one.”
Mason shook his head. “You’re going right back and sit at that desk,” he said. “You’re going to keep on the telephone, in direct communication with your men who are watching Conway’s apartment. If there’s anything unusual, any sign of activity, you’re to telephone me at Graymore six-nine-four-seven. You’re to memorize that number and not leave it hanging around on any slips of paper, and you’re to forget this whole business tomorrow morning at ten o’clock.”
Drake frowned. “What’s the matter, Perry?” he asked.
Mason said, “Those are instructions, Paul. That’s all you need to know. You won’t want to know any more.”
“Do I wait here all night?”
“All night or until we telephone you.”
Drake slipped out of his overcoat, said to the man behind the arch-shaped window, “Go down to the all-night drugstore and get me four bits’ worth of chewing gum.”
Mason nodded to Della Street. “Come on, Della. We go within about three blocks of the place and walk the rest of the way.”
Twenty minutes later, Mason’s groping fingers encountered a key in the bottom of the mailbox marked “Marcia Whittaker.” He latch-keyed the front door, switched on the stair lights, and noiselessly climbed the carpeted treads.
“Just what I was afraid of,” Mason growled as he switched on lights in the flat and entered the bedroom.
Everywhere were evidences of hurried flight. The imprints of a suitcase showed on the white counterpane of the bed. Clothes had been laid out and discarded. Drawers had been opened and ransacked.
Mason glanced at Della Street. “How about it, Della,” he asked, “can you put this place in order?”
“So the police won’t know she packed to skip out?”
“Yes.”
“Isn’t that suppressing evidence, Chief?”
He said, “You’re acting under my instructions. If anything goes wrong. I take the rap.”
“Nothing doing,” she said, slipping out of her coat. “We’re in it together. Go out in the other room and sit down. Let me have a free hand here.”
“Okay,” Mason said. “Remember to keep your gloves on.”
Thirty minutes later she joined him in the outer room. They sat together by the little fireplace talking in low tones and waiting for the phone to ring. Perry Mason’s hand unconsciously sought Della Street’s, gently imprisoned the fingers. “Gosh, Della,” he said, “I’m getting sentimental. It almost seems as though this place had been made for us.”
She moved her other hand to gently stroke the back of his well-shaped, strong fingers. “Nix on it, Chief,” she said softly. “You could no more live a domestic life than you could fly. You’re a free-lance, happy-go-lucky, carefree, two-fisted fighter. You might like a home for about two weeks, and then it would bore you stiff. At the end of four months, you’d feel it was a prison.”
“Well,” Mason said, “this is part of the first two weeks.”
It seemed but a few minutes before they heard the click of a key in the lock. Mason glanced at his wrist watch. It was four-forty-five. Della Street, with a quick intake of breath, said, “I don’t want her to see me until I powder my nose,” and dashed for the bathroom.
The door slowly swung back. Marcia Whittaker, looking as though she’d been seeing a steady procession of ghosts, came wearily into the room, lugging a Gladstone bag. She dropped the bag to the floor, came across the room, and held his arms with quivering fingers. “It’s so darn square of you!” she said.
Mason patted her shoulder. “Nix,” he said. “Get that bag unpacked.”
Della Street came out of the bathroom, smiling a cordial welcome.
“My secretary,” Mason said. “Della Street, Marcia Whittaker. Give her a hand, Della, if you will please.”
Mason returned to sit by the fireplace smoking in thoughtful silence until Marcia and Della returned.
“All right,” Mason said, “let’s have it. I want exact, detailed information. You can’t afford to indulge your emotions. Get right down to bedrock. You’ve cried before. You can cry afterward. Right now, you can’t cry. ”
She said, “I can take it now, Mr. Mason. It was a hell of a wallop. I should have expected it. Life’s done that to me ever since I was a kid.”
“Forget that,” Mason said. “I want facts — all the facts — and I want them fast.”
She said, “I didn’t give you a fair break the first time I saw you. I knew Louie Conway and John Milicant were the same. John’s sister is a hypocrite. She’s knocked around plenty in her time, but now she’s developed complexes and wants the family to amount to something. I’m a little tart, and I mustn’t be in the family— Oh, dear no!”
“Skip all that,” Mason said. “Let’s get down to brass tacks. What happened to Louie? Tell me...”
She stopped him with a gesture. “You have to know about this other,” she said. “Let me tell it first — then I’ll tell... tell the other.”
“Go on,” Mason said.
“Louie — John, is — was a good scout. He was too weak. I’m no tin angel myself. John liked good clothes, good cars. He hadn’t the training for a job. He couldn’t have held one down anyway. He went in for promoting. He liked horses, cards, dice, and gambling... John wasn’t young any more. Things were getting harder for him.
“I could understand him. His sister was figuring on marrying into a rich family. She wanted to keep the family background on the up and up, and make a nice impression on Alden Leeds. She had some dough, some settlement she got from a former husband. I don’t know how much. She told John he’d have to become respectable — no ponies, gambling, or promoting — until she’d got her hooks into Alden Leeds.
“John wasn’t the kind who could do that. His sister put him on an allowance. He stayed straight for a week or two, and then went back to the old life, keeping his sister in the dark. He took the name of Louie Conway and started the Conway Appliance Company. That was where I met him. I was clerking at a cigar counter. John came in and shook me a couple of games of twenty-six. He was lucky with dice all right, and the game was on the square. I’ve knocked around a bit myself, and I saw to that. A couple of customers came in and pretty quick they were shooting craps.
“John was rolling the dice. I was selling cigars. I saw the dice were crooked, but I didn’t say anything. If the suckers wanted to get trimmed, that was up to them. The way I figure it, a sucker is a sucker. If John hadn’t taken them, someone else would.
“Well, John knew that I’d spotted the dice. He came back later, and said, ‘Sister, you’ve got a nice mouth.” I said, ‘Most men talk about my eyes.“He said, ‘I’m talking about your mouth. It stays closed at the right time. Here’s fifty bucks. Buy yourself some glad rags.’
“I took a shine to him. I knew him as Louie Conway. We played around for a while. I was tired of living in little bedrooms and cheap furnished apartments with the furniture all battered up, and the thin mattresses having a ridge down the center.
“Louie got serious — and told his sister. She blew up, said everything was fixed with Alden Leeds and that it would ruin the play to have John bring a cigar-counter girl into the family.
“John wouldn’t give me up. He pretended to his sister that he had. She was suspicious. John started scheming, and then, one day, he came to me and said he’d used the Conway connection to get a stake out of Alden Leeds, and Leeds would never know that Conway and John Milicant were one and the same person. He told me I’d have to help him put it across, that then we’d get married, and he’d tell his sister to go jump in the lake.”
“Did you know what the shakedown was?”
“No, not then. I still don’t know.”
“Go on,” Mason told her.
“I didn’t want to do it. I’d never had a police record. I knew him well enough to know he was keeping himself in the background and pushing me out in front.”
“You can skip that,” Mason said. “Hell, we don’t need a blueprint. You did it. Then what?”
“Of course, I did it!” she blazed. “And why not? And don’t blame Louie too much either. Leeds is lousy with the dough. He can’t take it with him. It’s all right to talk about respectability if you’ve been educated so you can get by and be respectable, but when you have nothing back of you, you have to take things as they come.
“That’s the way John found life, and that’s the way I found it. I suppose some women think I’m cheap and flashy, but... well, John thought I was swell, and I thought he was swell... Anyhow, I was to go to his apartment at ten-thirty, and in the morning we were to get married, and be on our way. And... and I went up there about ten-twenty. I had a key. I walked on in, calling to John. I didn’t get any answer. I looked around the place. Things had been turned topsy-turvy. I was frightened and I ran into the bathroom. John was in there on the floor with the handle of a carving knife st-st-sticking... sticking...” She broke into tears, shook her head, and dropped down into a chair. “I c-c-can’t do it,” she said. “I c-c-can’t.”
“Take it easy, Marcia,” Mason told her. “I know how you feel, but you’re loaded with dynamite. If you found John had been murdered and didn’t notify the police, you’re in a fix, and, now that you’ve told us, if we don’t notify the police, we’re in a fix. You’re not our client. Alden Leeds is our client. This isn’t a privileged communication. We’re going off the deep end for you.”
Marcia Whittaker took a quivering breath, and said, “I go nuts every time I think of it... I knew what they were searching for. They didn’t find it.”
“How do you know they didn’t find it?” Mason asked.
“Because I have it,” she said.
Mason’s eyes narrowed.
“Louie wasn’t a fool,” she said. “He knew that his apartment might be searched. He had to have this stuff where he could get at it at any time. He left it with me.”
“What?”
“Papers.”
“What kind of papers? What would they buy?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I know that it got Louie twenty grand, and he said it was going to get him another twenty grand, maybe another eighty grand, before he’d let go of them.”
Mason, frowning thoughtfully, said, “Where did John get these papers?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
Mason said, “All right, Marcia. Where is the stuff?”
“I have it.”
“Get it.”
“If I do, what do I get?”
Mason said, “Are you holding an auction?”
She said, “Don’t think I’m going to take the rap on this. Alden Leeds has dough. He can see me through. He’s the only one who can.”
“What’s the proposition?” Mason asked.
“I give Alden Leeds the papers if he agrees to stand by me.”
Mason thought for a moment, then said, “Suppose it should appear that Alden Leeds was in that apartment just before you were?”
She thought that over silently, then shook her head, and said, “No.”
“I think he was,” Mason said. “That puts you both on a spot. The natural way for you to get out is to try to pin the murder on him. The natural way for him to get out is to try to pin it on you.”
“If he does that,” she threatened, “I’ll... I’ll...”
“What?” Mason asked.
“I’m not exactly a fool,” she said, after a moment.
“That trip to San Francisco sounds like it,” Mason said.
“I came back, didn’t I?”
Mason said, “Don’t forget, Marcia, we’re acting as Leeds’ lawyers. We’re cold-blooded about it.”
“I know,” she told him, “but I can trust you.”
“What are these papers?” Mason asked.
“Mostly photographs,” she said.
“Photographs of what?” Mason asked.
“Of old saloons, of a dance hall in Dawson City, of hotel registers, and a photostatic copy of a marriage license.”
“Who got married?” Mason asked.
“Emily Milicant and a Bill Hogarty.”
“Who signed the hotel registers?”
“Bill Hogarty.”
Glancing across at Della Street, Mason said, “They may not be worth much.”
“Louie got twenty grand as a starter, and there was more to follow.”
“All right,” Mason said. “Give me the papers.”
She got up from the chair, and walked into the bedroom. They heard the door close, and a lock click. Della Street exchanged glances with Perry Mason.
Mason said, “There’s something Alden Leeds wanted to cover up. The documents were only the blackmailer’s card of introduction.”
“How do you figure that, Chief?”
“Because Leeds paid twenty thousand, and didn’t get possession of the documents.”
“Where does that put us, Chief?” she asked.
“Right on the end of the limb,” Mason said.
The bedroom door opened. Marcia Whittaker walked directly across to Perry Mason, holding a manila envelope in her hand. When she got within two steps of the lawyer, she slid the manila envelope behind her back, and held it across the curve of her hips.
Mason said sharply, “Don’t be like that!”
“I want to know,” she said, “exactly what I’m going to get.”
“A first-degree murder rap if you don’t watch your step,” he warned.
“You’ll promise me that Alden Leeds will stand back of me, that...”
“I promise you nothing.” Mason said. “I’ve gone too damn far already. Who do you think you are, to stand up there and ask me, will I do this and will I do that? You’re standing on a red-hot spot.” Mason pointed dramatically to the door. “Any minute the law may walk in through that door. If they find those papers on you, it means the gas chamber. And you want to know what I’m going to do for you! For one thing, I’m going to take those papers off your hands. That’s enough — too damn much.”
She whipped the envelope from behind her back, and literally pushed it into his hands.
Without looking at it, Mason dropped it into his inside coat pocket. “I’m not your lawyer,” he said. “I’m Alden Leeds’ lawyer. To the extent that you play ball with him, I’ll play ball with you. Try to slip anything over on him, and I’ll give you the works. Do you understand?”
She nodded. There were tears in her eyes.
“Listen,” Mason went on, “John Milicant was being shadowed. Private detectives kept a record of everyone who went to the sixth floor of that apartment. There’s an elevator indicator over the elevator shaft. There are two other apartments on the sixth floor. At least one of them is vacant. Everyone who took the elevator up to the sixth floor was clocked in and clocked out.”
“Who hired them?” she asked.
“I did,” Mason said.
“Then can’t you... ”
“Not a chance in the world,” Mason told her, “and I don’t even dare to try. There were two men and two women on the job working in relays. You try to hush up anything like that, and you wind up in a lot hotter water than when you started.”
“But what can I do?” she asked.
Mason said, “The apartment door was closed when you went in?”
“Yes, but I had a key to it.”
“There’s a spring lock on the door?”
“Yes.”
Mason said, “Give me your key.”
She crossed to the table where she had tossed her purse, opened it, took out a key and handed it to him. He dropped it in his pocket. “Forget that you ever had this,” he told her. “Now, what did you do when you came out? Did you pull the door shut?”
“No. I left it part way open — just an inch or two.”
“Why?”
“I was afraid that when the blow-off came, they might claim I’d been the last one in — and that I had a key. By leaving the door slightly ajar — someone else might come to see Louie, and push the door open, and find him, and be on a spot that would let me out.”
Mason said, “You’re a cold-blooded little devil, aren’t you?”
“Christ, no!” she said. “I’ve always been too much the other way, but I’ve learned to think for myself in a jam. You would too, if you had them hand you the deals they’ve handed me.”
Mason studied her with hard, watchful eyes. “You were wearing gloves?” he asked.
“Yes.”
Mason nodded toward the telephone. “Call the police. Tell them you had a date with Louie Conway at his apartment, that he was to wait for you there, that you pounded and hammered on the door, and he didn’t answer, that you know it isn’t a stand-up because he was going to marry you, and you were going away together.”
“If I just tell them that,” she said, “they’ll think I’m crazy.”
Mason said, “That’s what you want. Act crazy. Be hysterical over the telephone. Ask them to please send someone out to the apartment to make sure he’s all right. Tell them you’ve been trying to sleep, and couldn’t, that you knew he was afraid of something, that he’d been gambling, and he was afraid men were going to kidnap him. And don’t, under any circumstances, mention the name of Milicant.”
“But that won’t do any good,” she said.
“Don’t you see?” Mason told her. “They’ll make a record of that call and of your name and address. They’ll hand you a line and tell you they’ll have a radio car drop by for an inspection, that if you don’t hear from them, it’ll be all right.”
“And they won’t go?”
“Of course not. They can’t go around hammering on the apartment doors of all the men in the city who have stood up trollops on dates. In the morning when the thing breaks, that call will get you as much in the clear as you can get. With that call, they’ll never think of trying to check up on the airports.”
Her tear-reddened eyes blinked as she digested the lawyer’s advice.
“Then,” Mason went on, “when the law does come, you’ll have plenty of excuse for having had a sleepless night and putting on the weep act. Remember, you were to be married. The man’s sister has been trying to break up the match.”
“Should I bring her in?” she asked.
“Yes,” Mason said. “All the way. Don’t forget, Marcia, the records show you were in the apartment for eleven minutes.
“Get out of those clothes. Get into pajamas and litter this apartment with cigarette stubs. Have a drink of whiskey and leave the whiskey bottle and the glass out where the officers can find ’em. See that there are plenty of half-burnt cigarettes in the bedroom — not stubs, mind you, that would make you seem too calm. You want to register as having had one cigarette after another, with only a puff or two from each. Don’t have any make-up on your face. Let your hair string down. Lie in bed long enough and turn around often enough to get the sheets all rumpled. Go into the kitchen, mix salt into a glassful of water. Sprinkle the salt water on the pillow so it’ll be damp to the touch, but don’t overdo it.
“Can you go through with it?”
“Yes,” she said.
Mason took Della Street’s arm.
Marcia Whittaker stood at the head of the stairs, sobbing silently as she waited for the front door to slam before switching out the light.
On the cold pavement in front of the house, with the first streaks of dawn showing in the east, Della Street turned anxious eyes to Perry Mason. “Chief,” she asked, “aren’t we doing a lot for Alden Leeds?”
Mason grinned down at her. “I’ll say we are. Getting cold feet, Della?”
She snuggled her arm in his. “Be your age, you big oaf.”
They drove a dozen blocks before Mason found an all-night restaurant with a public telephone. He parked the car, went into the restaurant, and called Paul Drake’s office. When he heard the detective’s voice on the line, he said, “Okay, Paul. You can go home now,” and hung up.