“I would say it was shortly before noon.”
“Tuesday morning?”
“Yes.”
“Did he say where he was calling from?” Mason asked.
“No, sir. He didn’t.”
Mason said, “Then the last we know of . . .”
“Hold it,” Sergeant Holcomb said to Mason, and then into the telephone transmitter, “Yes. Hello. This is Sergeant Holcomb, Doctor. I want the dope on Albert Tidings. I want to know exactly when he died. . . . Yes, of course, I understand you haven’t completed your examination, but you’ve certainly gone far enough to give me a pretty good guess . . . Well, what’s the temperature of the room got to do with it? . . . I see . . . What? . . . What’s that? . . . Now, wait a minute. That doesn’t check with the evidence. . . . No, it couldn’t have been that early . . . Ten o’clock at the latest? . . . You’ll have to up that by three hours . . . Well, get busy on it . . . Of course, I want the exact facts, but I don’t want you to make a monkey out of yourself and the department, too. . . . You get the chief autopsy surgeon on that.”
Sergeant Holcomb banged up the receiver.
Mason grinned at Byrl Gailord, then turned to Sergeant Holcomb and inquired courteously, “What did he say, Sergeant?”
Sergeant Holcomb said, “He doesn’t know. He hasn’t completed his examination. . . . Those doctors are a pain in the neck. I left word they were to go to work on that the minute the body was received at the coroner’s office.”
Mason smiled at Mrs. Tump. “Well, Mrs. Tump,” he said. “I guess you won’t have to produce any alibi to show that you didn’t drag Tidings out of his club, shoot him, and drive him up to Mrs. Tidings’ house. The autopsy surgeon has just advised Sergeant Holcomb that the man has been dead since ten o’clock Tuesday morning.”
Sergeant Holcomb frowned at Mason. “You’re using a lot of imagination,” he said.
Mason picked up the telephone, and when he heard Gertie’s voice on the line, asked, “Did you listen in on that telephone conversation, Gertie?”
“Uh huh,” she said.
Mason said, “Thanks. That’s all.”
He dropped the receiver back into its cradle, and smiled at Sergeant Holcomb’s discomfiture.
“Those doctors,” Sergeant Holcomb said, “are a bunch of boobs. How the devil can a man work up a case with a lot of nitwits tying his hands?”
Mattern said, “Why, I know he was alive shortly before noon. I talked with him over the telephone.”
Mason said, “You talked with someone who said he was Tidings.”
“I talked with Tidings.”
“You recognized his voice?”
“Well . . . well, I thought so at the time.”
Mason said, “Voices can be imitated, you know.”
“Exactly when did he leave the office?” Sergeant Holcomb asked.
Mattern said, “Well, to tell you the truth, Sergeant, I don’t know the exact time. It was right after his conversation with Mr. Mason—just a few minutes after that.”
“Can you,” Sergeant Holcomb asked Mason, “fix the exact time of that conversation?”
Mason said cautiously, “I might reconstruct it from data which I could assemble, Sergeant, but I can’t give you the exact time right now.”
Sergeant Holcomb said irritably, “What are you so damned cagey about, Mason? Your clients are in the clear—if their alibis hold up. Why not tell me exactly when that conversation was?”
Mason glanced significantly at Byrl Gailord. “I think,” he said, “that there’s one matter I’ll have to investigate first.”
“What’s that?”
“The stock of the Western Prospecting Company.”
Carl Mattern said, “I can tell you all about that, Mr. Mason.”
“You haven’t done so, so far,” Mason said.
“It’s a good investment.”
“I prefer to make my own investigations and draw my own conclusions.”
“Well, you’ll find it’s a good investment.”
Sergeant Holcomb nodded to Mattern. “All right,” he said, “that’s all. Let’s go.” He turned to Mason and said, “The next time I’m investigating a murder and want to talk with clients of yours, and they’re in your office, don’t try to hold out on me.”
“I didn’t,” Mason said. “I simply wanted my clients to make their own appointments.”
Sergeant Holcomb stared at Mason, “You,” he said, “don’t co-operate very much with the authorities. Some day, it’s going to get you into trouble. . . . Come on, Mattern.”
They left the office.
Mason turned to the two women. He said, “I told you that I couldn’t be of any particular assistance. . . . I think now that I can.”
“What do you mean, Mr. Mason?” Mrs. Tump asked.
Mason said, “I want to know more about that deal covering the Western Prospecting Company stock. We may be able to set that sale aside—if we want to.”
“But I don’t see how,” Mrs. Tump said.
Mason said, “Neither do I as yet, but Sergeant Holcomb is in a fix. The autopsy surgeon is going to say Tidings was killed within ten or fifteen minutes of the time he left his office Tuesday morning.”
“Well?” Mrs. Tump asked.
Mason said, “A dead man can’t buy stock.”
Mrs. Tump and Byrl Gailord exchanged glances. Then Mrs. Tump said, “But suppose it should turn out the stock really is a good buy?”
“Then,” Mason said, “we’ll simply sit tight. . . . Now then, you run along and let me get busy.”
The women arose. Byrl Gailord gave him her hand, and said, “I have implicit confidence in you, Mr. Mason. Thanks very much.”
Mrs. Tump said nervously, “Mr. Mason, I didn’t want you to think that I was trying to double-cross you. I . . . Well, I wanted to see Mr. Tidings and let him know that I wasn’t bluffing; that I said I’d go to you and that I’d gone to you.”
Mason said, “Forget it. Even if you had been trying to effect a last minute settlement with him, it would have been all right with me.”
“Thank you, Mr. Mason. You’re so kind. You make me feel like a . . . like a . . .”
“Like a heel,” Byrl Gailord interrupted, laughing. “But really, Mr. Mason, Mrs. Tump was working for my best interests, and she wants to save every dime of my money she can. Come on now, Abigail. ’Fess up.”
Mrs. Tump laughed. “I don’t need to ’fess up, Byrl. I’ve been caught with the goods. . . . Good-by, Mr. Mason.”
Mason and Della Street watched them out of the office.
“The chiseler,” Della Street said.
Mason nodded. “They’ll all do that,” he said, “if they’re smart enough. . . . Get my broker on the line, Della. Tell him to find out everything about Western Prospecting, what the stock can be sold for, and who unloaded a block of fifty thousand dollars’ worth on Tuesday morning.”
“Do you want to talk with Loftus & Cale?” he asked.
“Not yet,” Mason said. “I want to be loaded for bear when I talk with them.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know,” Mason said. “Call it a hunch if you want. I think there’s something fishy about that stock deal. Tidings was being crowded. He must have known that Adelle Hastings was going to put the screws on him. . . .”
“His Monday night appointment was with her?” Della Street asked.
“Looks like it,” Mason said. “Sergeant Holcomb didn’t mention any names, so I didn’t. . . . Ring Paul Drake. Tell him to find Robert Peltham, and ring up the Contractor’s Journal and put in a classified ad. Simply say, ‘P: Must talk with you, personally if possible. Otherwise over the telephone. Will mention no names over the telephone but must have additional accurate information at once. M.’ ”
Della Street’s pencil flew over the lines of her shorthand notebook. “Okay, Chief,” she said. “Anything else?”
“No,” Mason said, “but get busy on that stock deal, and tell Drake to k
eep his ear to the ground on that murder case.”
Della Street said, “If your clients are in the clear, Chief, why worry about the murder?”
Mason said, “Because, Della, I’m caught in a trap. I’m afraid some woman is going to come into this office at such time as suits her convenience, and hand me the other part of that ten-thousand-dollar bill, and say, ‘Go ahead and represent me, Mr. Mason.’ And it’s an even money bet that the hand holding that part of the ten-thousand-dollar bill will be the one that held the gun when Tidings was killed.”
“Within fifteen minutes after he left his office Tuesday morning?” Della Street asked skeptically.
“Somebody killed him,” Mason said.
“Then you don’t believe that it was Tidings who called the secretary at noon Tuesday to find out whether the deal had been completed?”
“The autopsy surgeon doesn’t,” Mason said significantly.
6.
MASON ENTERED his office on Thursday morning to find Paul Drake waiting for him. He nodded to Gertie, took Drake’s arm, and escorted him into the private office where Della Street was busy sorting the morning mail.
“ ’Lo, Della. Anything new?” Mason asked.
“Nothing particularly important,” she said. “Hello, Paul.”
“Hello, Della. How’s tricks?”
“Swell.”
Drake jackknifed himself into his favorite pose across the arms of the big, black, leather chair.
“Got something?” Mason asked.
“Odds and ends,” Drake said. “Peltham’s skipped out. The officers want him damn badly. They can’t find him, and I can’t find him.”
“Any charge against him?” Mason asked.
“They figure he’s the one who signed the checks with Tidings. . . . The checks that left the hospital holding the sack.”
“You can’t find out anything about a girl friend?”
“Not a thing. He lived in an apartment, and as far as is known, no woman ever visited him in that apartment. He’s a cold-blooded, mathematical individual with no more emotions than a banker turning down a loan application. Anything that he did would have been done skillfully, thoroughly, and with ample attention to details. If he had a love affair with a married woman, for instance, the thing would be all blueprinted, nothing would be left to chance.”
Mason said, “Okay. Here’s an important job for you, Paul. I put an ad in the Contractor’s Journal. That’s confidential. I don’t want even your operatives to know about it. The point is, sometime during the day a person will send in an ad in answer to mine. Plant a man there at the office, Paul, and when an answer to my ad shows up, arrange for a tip-off from behind the counter, and tail that person.”
“Okay,” Drake said. “Anything else?”
“Yes. Mrs. Tump had a run-in with an orphan asylum, The Hidden Home Welfare Society. It made quite a stink. . . . She’s in touch with a former bookkeeper of that society. I have a hunch this bookkeeper is here in the city. I’m going to make her want to get in touch with him sometime after . . . Oh, say ten-thirty this morning. You watch her hotel, check on the people who inquire for her at the desk, and watch her outgoing telephone calls. . . . Do you think you can fix that up?”
“The telephone calls aren’t easy,” Drake said, “but it can be managed.”
“All right,” Mason said, and then to Della Street, “Promptly at ten-thirty, Della, ring up Mrs. Tump and tell her that Mr. Mason says there’s some question as to the endorsements on the back of the cancelled checks from The Hidden Home Welfare Society. Tell her the claim has been made that they’re forgeries, that The Hidden Home Welfare Society never received any of that money in the first place, and that the person endorsing the checks was never connected with the society. Ask her if she knows anything about it. . . . Get her worried, but be a little vague. You know. You’re only my secretary calling during my absence from the office and repeating my instructions. . . . You can act just a little dumb if you want to. It won’t hurt anything.”
“Be your own sweet self,” Drake supplemented.
Della ran out her tongue at him and made a note. “Ten-thirty,” she said.
“That’s right.”
“You have a man planted on the job by that time, Paul,” Mason said to Drake.
“Okay.”
Mason said, “I want to find out something about Byrl Gailord, Paul. The story Mrs. Tump tells doesn’t hold water.”
Della Street looked up in surprise. “How so, Chief?” she asked. “I thought it was very dramatic.”
“You bet it was dramatic,” Mason said. “Too dramatic. The hands clutching at the steel sides of the vessel, people being swept away on waves and all that. . . . But what she overlooked was certain routine matters of procedure. In the first place, the Russian nobleman and his wife wouldn’t have gone over in the first lifeboat—not with Mrs. Tump standing on the rail looking down into the dark waters. It’s a rule of the sea that women and children go first.
“Mrs. Tump gives a swell picture, but it’s only the way she’s imagined it. She pictures herself standing on the rail, looking down with a detached, impersonal interest. If she’d actually been on that ship, she’d have spoken about how hard it was for her to stand up on the slanting deck, how she struggled to get on her life preserver, and how officers kept blowing whistles and herding passengers around from one boat to another. . . . That shipwreck sounds phony to me. Notice she didn’t give any data about the name of the ship. Whenever she’d come to statistics, she’d wave her hand and say, ‘All this is preliminary, Mr. Mason.’ ”
Della Street said, “When you come to think of it, it does sound fishy. . . . But why?”
Mason said, “On a guess, she’s lying about some things, telling the truth about others. If it weren’t for that correspondence she has, I’d have figured that she was just trying to tell Byrl a fairy story and horn in on the trust fund.”
Drake said, “Well, I’ll get busy,” and started to straighten up from the chair.
Mason said, “Wait a minute, Paul. I’ve got one more thing for you. Carl Mattern, the secretary to Albert Tidings. Get all the dope you can on him. Find out who his sweetheart is, whether he intends to get married, whether he plays the horses, hits the hooch, or what he does for relaxation.”
“Okay. Anything else?”
“That’s all, right now.”
As Drake moved out through the exit door, the telephone rang, and Della Street said, “Here’s your broker on the line with that information about Western Prospecting.”
Mason picked up the telephone, said, “Okay. This is Mason talking. Let me have it.”
His broker gave him the information in concise, dry-as-dust statistics. “Western Prospecting,” he said, “capital stock, three million dollars. Two million five hundred thousand shares issued. Each share has a par value of one dollar. Much of it given in exchange for mining properties. Some sold to the public at a dollar a share, then it went up, and there were several sales at a dollar and a quarter, a dollar and a half, and at two dollars. Then the pressure was removed, and the stock drifted back. Right now, there’s no open market for it at any price. The corporation isn’t making any sales at less than a dollar, but reports are that private stockholders will sell out for anything they can get from two cents up. No one wants it.
“Tuesday, shortly before noon, the sale of a big block of stock went through. The stock was transferred on the books of the corporation to Albert Tidings, trustee. Doesn’t say trustee for whom or for what. . . . I don’t know what broker handled the deal, and I don’t know what the consideration was. It shouldn’t have been over three or four thousand dollars. The company has a bunch of prospects all of which look good, but there’s a big difference between a prospect and a mine. Anything else you want?”
“Yes,” Mason said. “Where did the stock come from that was sold to Tidings?”
“They’re trying to be secretive about that,” the broker told him, “but my best g
uess is the president of the company unloaded his personal holdings.”
“Who’s the president?”
“Man by the name of Bolus—Emery B. Bolus.”
“Western Prospecting Company have offices here?”
“Uh huh. . . . Think they keep them simply to sell stock. Pretty good suite of offices under a lease which hasn’t expired yet. No business activity. One stenographer, a vice-president, a superintendent of operations, a president, and a bookkeeper. . . . You know the type. . . . If you get rough, don’t let anyone know where you got the information.”
“Thanks,” Mason said. “I’m going to get rough—and I won’t let anyone know where I got the info.”
He said to Della Street, “Get me Loftus or Cale on the line. . . . Brokerage firm of Loftus & Cale. I want either one.”
She nodded and put through the call. While Mason was waiting for the connection, he pushed his hands down deep in his pockets and paced the floor of the office thoughtfully.
“On the line,” Della Street called. “Mr. Loftus, senior partner.”
Mason took the line, said, “Hello, Mr. Loftus. This is Perry Mason, the lawyer. I find that I’m interested through one of my clients in a transaction which was concluded through your office on Tuesday morning.”
“Yes?” Loftus asked, his tone reserved and cautious.
“A sale of Western Prospecting Company stock to Tidings as trustee.”
“Oh, yes.”
“What can you tell me about it?” Mason asked.
The answer was prompt. “Nothing.”
“I’m representing Byrl Gailord, the beneficiary of the trust which Tidings was administering,” Mason explained.
“Are you, indeed?” Loftus inquired.
Mason’s face darkened. “Can you come over to my office?” he asked.
“No.”
“Do you,” Mason asked, “have an attorney who handles your business?”
“Yes.”
“Would you mind telling me who he is?”
“I see no occasion for doing so.”
“All right,” Mason said, raising his voice, “if you won’t come to my office, I’ll come to yours. You can have your attorney there if you want. If you take my advice, you’ll have him there. You’ll also have Emery B. Bolus, the president of the Western Prospecting Company there. . . . I was willing to give you guys a break. Now, I’m going to stick you for exactly fifty thousand bucks. And so you’ll have something to worry about, I’m going to tell you in advance exactly how I’m going to do it. . . . I’ll be there in fifteen minutes, and I won’t wait.”
The Case of the Baited Hook Page 9
