“She’s probably been someone’s old-maid aunt who has perhaps lived with her married sister, helped take care of the children until the children grew up, and then found either that her welcome was wearing thin or that she was being used more and more as a servant. So she starts out for herself and she’s completely lost. While she lived with her married sister she had a vicarious sort of life, a man around the house, children to care for, a feeling she was doing something. When she struck out for herself, she became an isolated piece of flotsam on a sea of cold faces.”
“You certainly talk the way Arthur Ansell Ashland writes,” Mason interpolated, “but go on with your story.”
“Someone tells our hypothetical Miss X about my magazine,” Caddo continued. “She puts an ad in, a very diffident ad, using the same old clichés about an unmarried woman of refinement, in the thirties, wishing to correspond with some gentleman whom she will find congenial.
“Now, the gentleman she has in mind is an ideal that exists only in her own mind. He certainly isn’t going to be one who is answering the ads in my magazine.”
“What about the men who answer the ads?”
“There aren’t as many of the men as there are women. There really aren’t enough to go around. Of course, we get lots of answers, but some of them are from practical jokers. It’s quite the thing for pranksters to buy copies of the magazine, write that they’re lonely widowers with large fortunes and good automobiles and things of that sort, and build up a correspondence with some of these women, simply for the purpose of a practical joke. It is, of course, cruel.”
“But each letter nets you twenty-five cents.”
Caddo nodded and said, without enthusiasm, “However, I would like to have the practice discontinued. It’s cruel and it’s bad for my business, but there’s nothing I can do about it.”
“Tell me something about the men who aren’t practical jokers,” Mason said.
“The men are mostly crusty old bachelors who are in love with the dream of a childhood sweetheart who is dead or married to someone else. There are, of course, a sprinkling of glib-tongued adventurers who are in terested only in the small savings the women may have put by for a rainy day. In short, Mr. Mason, the men who advertise are all too frequently somewhat spurious. There is, however, one class, and that’s the green-as-grass young swains from the country who are awkward, diffident, and shy. They want to get acquainted and don’t know just how to go about it.”
“And they all build circulation.”
“It all helps.”
“So eventually your hypothetical Miss X will come back to put other ads in your pamphlet?”
“That’s right. I hold her as a steady reader by the stories I run, stories that deal with women who have been misunderstood, who finally meet and marry a man who would be able to sweep a movie queen off her feet.”
“And you charge for those ads?”
“Oh, yes.”
“How much?”
“Ten cents a word, and that includes box rental.”
“You seem to have quite a few of these ads.”
“The business is profitable; in fact, lucrative, quite lucrative!”
“Publication is at irregular intervals, you say?”
“Yes, depending on the number of ads that come in, the return on the ads, and our stock.”
“Why can’t you find out who this heiress is, if she’s genuine?”
“Everyone who puts an ad in the magazine is given a number, and that number represents the box in which messages are placed. These are something like the boxes in a post office. Each one is opened with a key. An advertiser is charged for the ad. Then the box is given to that advertiser for a period of thirty days, with a renewal for sixty or ninety days on the payment of an additional fee. Any person who has the key has access to the box during the period for which the rental is paid. After the rental has expired, the box is closed and the person can either make new arrangements with the office or surrender the box. Letters to out-of-town advertisers, of course, go by mail.
“Now, in the case of this mysterious woman who placed the ad in the paper, the situation is somewhat complicated. As soon as I realized that it was necessary for me to communicate with her, I wrote a letter to her stating the facts of the case and asking her to give me some evidence of her identity and the sincerity of her ad.”
Caddo fished in his pocket and said, “I received rather a sharp letter in reply.”
He handed this letter over to Mason.
It read:
Dear Sir:
I placed an ad with you in good faith. I paid for it and I rented a box for thirty days. I am receiving replies. I chose to make my contacts in this way because I preferred to remain anonymous. I see no reason why I should sacrifice my privacy for your convenience. I can assure you that every statement contained in the ad is true and on that score you have nothing to worry about.
The letter was signed simply: “Miss Box 96.”
“But she comes to the box for replies?” Mason asked.
“She does not. She sends a tight-lipped, hatchet-faced woman who certainly knows her way around.”
“You’re certain this isn’t the one who is posing as the heiress?”
“I think not. I tried to follow her on two occasions. I suppose I was rather amateurish. She certainly told me that I was. She stopped both times, until I had no alternative but to saunter up to her immediate vicinity. Then she gave me a veritable tongue-lashing, told me that I was falling all over my feet. She said she had, in times past, been shadowed by experts and that I was hopelessly inept. It was a blistering bawl-outl”
“How about writing mash letters in answer to her ad?” Mason asked.
“I’ve tried that. The woman seems absolutely uncanny in her ability to spot a phony letter. I have written a dozen different letters, telling her how much I wanted to meet a young woman of her type, that the fact she was an heiress meant nothing to me. I was interested only in her charming personality.”
“And what happened?”
“I got no answers.”
“I take it this young woman is getting quite a lot of letters?”
“Letters!” Caddo exclaimed, moving his hand in a sweeping gesture. “The box is simply jammed with letters! Replies are pouring in.”
“And as far as you know, she treats them all the same?”
“Yes. If my own experience is any criterion, she isn’t answering any letters.”
“Then why did she put the ad in the magazine?”
“That is something I simply can’t explain. But she definitely isn’t answering letters. I’ve sent her over a dozen.”
“What do you want me to do?” Mason asked.
“Get me off the spot with these authorities who are demanding that I either produce the woman or recall the magazine.”
Mason thought for a minute and said, “It would probably be cheaper for you to recall the magazine.”
“I don’t want to do it unless I have to. It’s expensive and …”
“It would be less expensive than coming to me.”
“It would also be an admission of guilt,” Caddo said, “and there’s another angle. Suppose this woman is a real heiress? I’ve made an agreement to publish her ad. I recall the magazine. She sues me. Then what?”
Mason said, “Bring me up a dozen copies of your magazine and a check for five hundred dollars. I’ll see what I can do. It will take a little detective work.”
“I’d want some sort of a guarantee,” Caddo said, his eyes narrowing.
“What do you mean?”
“I’d want you to guarantee me something in return for the five hundred dollars.”
“That’s right,” Mason grinned. “I’ll guarantee to give you a receipt for the money and I’ll guarantee to give you an itemized account of the money that is spent for detective services. And if, as I rather suspect, you’re trying to use me as a cat’s-paw to front for you on a come-on scheme you’ve adopted to increase you
r circulation, I’ll send you a bill for five thousand dollars and see that you pay it!”
Caddo stroked his chin. “That’s putting it rather crudely.”
“I tried to put it that way.”
“Please believe me, Mr. Mason! I’m in good faith…. Why did you want the magazines?”
“I just want to look them over,” Mason said.
Caddo smiled. “You have one magazine,” he said, “and, in case your idea was to bait this heiress by writing letters, I have here a large number of back pages, torn from the magazine, which you can use at your convenience.”
And Caddo opened his brief case and took out some two dozen back covers which had been cut from the magazines.
“Give Miss Street your check for five hundred dollars,” Mason said, “and I’ll see what can be done.”
Caddo sighed and took out his checkbook. “You’re right,” he said, “it’s going to prove expensive.”
When he had gone, Mason picked up the magazine, thumbed through it. “Listen to this,” he said to Della Street, and read aloud from the story by Arthur Ansell Ashland:
“Once more Dorothy stood before the mirror where she had so frequently surveyed herself. Now there had been a magic transformation. The face that looked back at her was no longer wan, drab, lined with care. Love had waved its wand and the reflected features were those of a transformed woman, mature, to be sure, but radiant, feminine, in every way desirable.
“Another reflection formed behind the face in the mirror, the face of George Crisholm who had quietly entered the room and was now standing behind her.
“‘My darling’ he exclaimed. ‘Don’t waste your sweet beauty on that cold glass. Turn and look at me.’
“She turned, and strong arms crushed her in an embrace. Hot, eager lips were searching the pent-up recesses of her soul, releasing floods of desire that were all the more potent for having been so long denied.”
Della Street whistled.
Mason said, “In a way, the thing is a crime. In another way, it probably brings solace to lonely hearts. If our friend Mr. Caddo is on the square we’ll play ball. If he isn’t—God help him.”
Chapter 2
Perry Mason continued to thumb through the magazine, pausing occasionally to read other bits aloud to Della Street. Abruptly he closed the magazine and dropped it on his desk. “Della,” he said, “we are now about to compose a love letter.”
Della Street, nodding, held her pencil poised over a shorthand book.
“We’ll block it out in rough form on the typewriter,” Mason said. “Then I’ll copy it in pen and ink on the back page of the magazine and send it to the magazine office to be put in the box.”
Della smiled. “One would say that the surroundings were hardly conducive to a letter of passion.”
Mason said thoughtfully, “I’m not at all satisfied that she wants a letter of passion.”
“What does she want?”
“Let’s consider that question, Della. It’s highly pertinent. She has advertised in a lonely-hearts magazine. She announces that she is an heiress. She says she is fed up with the class of people she has been meeting. Observe, Della, that quite obviously the woman is not lonely. She only wants a change.”
“Don’t you suppose she has it by this time?”
“That’s a chance we have to take,” Mason said. “But after all, she’s only human and she’s going to read the letters that come in. If we can work out something that catches her fancy, we’ll get a reply.”
“Robert Caddo’s letters didn’t rate a reply.”
Mason said, “We’re going to profit by his mistakes. Caddo must have gone about it in the wrong way.”
“His reply sounded all right to me.”
Mason shook his head. “Observe that in every one of his replies he stressed the fact that he wasn’t after her for her money.”
“What’s wrong with that?” Della asked. “Surely a girl would hardly be flattered by a man who wrote and said, ‘Dear Miss Box 96: I am interested in you because you are an heiress.’”
“I’m not so certain,” Mason said musingly.
“Why, Chief, what do you mean? Certainly she …”
“She took particular pains to mention that she was an heiress,” Mason interrupted. “If she didn’t want people to take that into consideration, why did she set it forth?”
Della Street frowned and said thoughtfully, “Yes, of course, she did mention that she was an heiress, but that was just to arouse interest.”
“Then a man who wrote her that he was not interested in her because she was an heiress branded himself at once as being a damn hypocrite.”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
Mason said, “Let’s try her with two letters. We’ll start with this one:
“‘Dear Miss Box 96:
“‘I am a poor young man, and since you are an heiress I don’t suppose there is any possibility that you would be interested in me. But, nevertheless, I am writing to tell you that I would like to meet you and would do anything to get your friendship. I think we have some things in common.’”
“That’s all of it?” Della Street asked.
“That’s all of it.”
“Why, what a vague letter!”
“Exactly,” Mason said. “I want it vague. I think perhaps Caddo’s letters didn’t get to first base because he was too specific.
“Let’s suppose, Della, that this heiress is playing a pretty shrewd game. Perhaps she isn’t lonely at all. Perhaps she just wants to contact someone whom she can use for some particular purpose.”
“What purpose?”
“I don’t know. We’ll have to find that out.” “Then why not use more regular channels, if that were the case?”
“Because she’s not interested in the sort of person she’d get through regular channels. Remember, Caddo said some of his readers were young men, chaps who came mostly from the country.”
“Young men from the country know plenty these days,” Della Street said.
“Most of them do,” Mason admitted, “but there are some who are young and impressionable and haven’t been around too much. Suppose, for instance, our heiress is really trying to get hold of someone who is green as grass?”
“I would say there wasn’t much chance,” Della Street said.
“I’m not so certain. Let’s try her with this sort of a letter:
“‘Dear Miss Box 96:
“‘An heiress, gee! I’ve always wanted to meet an heiress. I haven’t been in the city very long and I guess I’ve got no business writing you, but, golly, I certainly would like to meet up with a real, honest-to-goodness heiress, just to see what she looks like. I’m good and strong and husky and can handle just about any kind of farm work there is. I know a little something about cattle and am not afraid to pitch right in. Maybe if you’d like to meet a man like me, you could give me a break.’”
Della Street said, “You don’t tell her what you look like, how old you are, or anything about yourself.”
“That’s right,” Mason said.
“A woman who is looking for a boy friend would want to know those things first off,” Della suggested.
Mason nodded. “I’m acting on the assumption she isn’t looking for a boy friend, but is looking for something else.”
“What else?”
“I’m darned if I know.”
“What names do you want to use on the letters?”
Mason said, “The second one is easy. I’ll sign it ‘Irvin B. Green.’ The initials, you’ll notice, make it read I B Green.”
“And the first one?”
Mason grinned. “The first one will have been written by a man named Black. We’ll see what color she wants, black or green. Tell you what to do, Della. We’ll need two different types of handwriting. Go down the hall to Paul Drake’s office and get Paul to write out the one to be signed by Mr. Black and I’ll write the one by Mr. Green. Paul Drake keeps a couple of post-office boxes that he can use for
mail when he doesn’t want to give a business address. Assign one of those box numbers to Black and the other one to Green. Then see that the letters go to Caddo’s office.”
“Do you want Caddo to know that these are your letters?”
Mason shook his head. “Let them be handled in the usual routine manner. From now on the less Caddo knows about what I’m doing, the better I’ll like it. We’ll give him a report on results, not on the means we use to get those results.”
Chapter 3
Paul Drake tapped on the door of Mason’s private office, a loud knock followed by four quick, gentle knocks, then two more loud knocks.
“That’s Drake’s code knock,” Mason said to Della Street. “Let him in, Della.”
Della Street unlocked the corridor door and the tall detective grinned fraternally at her. “Hi, Della, what’s new?”
“Whatever you have in your hand,” Della Street said, smiling at the letter Drake was holding.
Drake moved on in, nodded to the lawyer. “Well, Perry, we got an answer.”
“An answer to what?” Mason asked, looking up from the brief he was studying.
“Remember the letters you had me mail day before yesterday?”
“Oh, those. Who got the answer?”
“Mr. Green got the answer,” Drake said. “Mr. Black seems to have drawn a blank.”
Mason narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. “Now, that’s something!” he said. “She’s looking for someone who’s green as grass, an impressionable, gullible young chap. Let’s see what she says.”
Mason took the letter Paul Drake handed him, slit open the envelope, shook out a sheet of paper that had the crested initials MM. He raised the paper to his nostrils, caught the scent of perfume, grinned, and said, “The heiress speaks.”
“What does she say?” Della Street asked. “I’m burning with curiosity.”
Mason read the letter aloud:
“Dear Mr. Green:
“I was so thrilled to receive your letter. I only i wish I could tell you how much it has meant to me to hear from a man like you.
The Case of the Lazy Lover Page 23
