“Well, in the meantime,” Ganten said, “it’s to the interest of all of us to see that the situation doesn’t become any more complicated.”
“What are you driving at?”
“Well, you should co-operate with us.”
“In what way?”
“In making the investigation.”
“Anything else?”
“Well, of course if the transaction should be declared invalid, we’d all of us want to be in such a position that we could protect ourselves.”
Bolus said, “As far as I’m concerned, I made a deal. I’m going to stand back of it. . . . That stock’s a good investment, a mighty good investment. There are things the general public doesn’t know anything about. I’m not at liberty to say what they are, but within sixty days that stock is going to be worth—Well, it will be worth plenty.”
Loftus nodded.
Mason said casually, “Then why did you unload all of your holdings, Bolus?”
Bolus whirled on him angrily. “I didn’t unload all of my holdings.”
“How much stock do you have at the present time in your own name in the company of which you’re president?”
“That’s none of your damn business.”
“Did any substantial part of that fifty thousand dollars go into the corporation’s treasury?”
“That also is none of your business. I don’t have to answer your questions.”
“That’s right,” Mason agreed affably, “you don’t,” and once more devoted his attention to the cigarette smoke which eddied upward from the tip of his cigarette. “As I understand what happened, you’d be foolish if you did.”
Ganten and Loftus exchanged glances.
“Well,” Bolus asked, “are you standing with me in this thing, or are you against me?”
“We’re not against you,” Loftus said hastily.
“What my client means,” Ganten corrected, “is that in many respects our interests are in common. That is, it’s to the interest of both of us to show that Tidings was alive when the deal was completed.”
“Do you mean to say that if he was dead when the stock was actually turned over and the cash was passed, you can come back on me?”
“Of course,” Ganten said, “if the transaction was void for any reason, then we’d want to see that you had the stock back and that the money was returned to the proper person.”
“Why?”
“Well, because we acted as brokers, and in the highest good faith. . . . I think you should answer Mr. Mason’s question about what happened to that money and assure him that the sale was of treasury stock.”
“I don’t have to assure anyone of anything,” Bolus said. “You wanted fifty thousand dollars’ worth of stock. You got it. I got the money.”
“You individually?” Mason asked. “Or as president of the corporation?”
“I don’t like your damned insinuations,” Bolus said.
“There’s one way of preventing a repetition of them,” Mason pointed out. “Simply answer the question.”
“I think it would be perfectly in order for you to answer Mr. Mason’s question,” Ganten said.
“Well, I don’t,” Bolus snapped.
Loftus stroked the angle of his chin. His eyes shifted from his attorney to the president of the Western Prospecting Company, then over to Mason, and were hastily averted.
Mason said, “Well, I’ll be going. I simply wanted you gentlemen to know where I stood.”
“I don’t think your client is adopting a fair attitude,” Loftus said.
Mason said, “Don’t let my departure interfere with your discussion, gentlemen.”
Loftus arose from his chair, started around his desk, and stopped. “Just what are you trying to do, Mr. Mason?” he asked.
“Protect the interests of my client,” Mason said, “and educate your legal department.” With an inclusive bow, he left the office.
Mason returned to his office in rare good humor.
“Do any good?” Della Street asked.
“I think so,” Mason said. “I’ve got those brokers plenty worried, and their legal department’s running around in circles. By the time they get done stirring things up, we’ll know when Tidings died. The way things are shaping up now, Sergeant Holcomb won’t be able to dig up additional clues and keep them from me.”
“You mean they’ll do the investigating for you?”
“That’s right. They can bring pressure to bear on Holcomb, and make him talk. I can’t.”
She said, “Paul Drake wants you to call. Shall I get him?”
“Uh huh.”
She got Drake on the line. As Mason picked up the receiver, he heard Drake’s voice over the wire, saying hurriedly, “Listen, Perry. A girl went into the Contractor’s Journal with an answer to that ad you placed. From there she went to a beauty parlor and is getting herself all slicked up: shampoo, wave, manicure, massage. I’ve got a man staked out in front of the beauty parlor. . . . Now, if you’d like to get a look at this baby first hand, we’ve got time to run down there and give her the once-over when she comes out.”
“Got your car downstairs, Paul?”
“Sure.”
“Okay,” Mason said. “I’ll meet you down in the parking lot. You do the driving. I’ll do the looking.”
He hung up the telephone, said to Della Street, “We’ve got a customer on that Contractor’s Journal ad. . . . Probably the same girl who turned in the last ad. I’m going to go take a look at her.”
“Think she’s got the other half of that ten-thousand-dollar bill?” Della Street asked.
Mason grinned. “I’m getting so I think everyone has it. I’m on my way. If this girl turns out to be Byrl Gailord, we’ll know a lot more in an hour.”
Mason walked rapidly down the corridor, took the elevator, and found Paul Drake seated in his automobile, waiting in front of the entrance. Mason climbed in.
“Think you’ll know this girl when you see her, Perry?” Drake asked.
“Uh huh,” Mason said. “—I hope so, and I’m afraid so.”
“Who is she, Perry?”
“My client,” Mason said.
Drake looked at him in surprise. “Don’t you know your own clients?”
Mason grinned. “I have a wide practice.”
Drake said, “Perry, this case keeps getting goofier and goofier. Why should you want to shadow your own client?”
“Just to give you boys a job, Paul. You’ve had a lot of hard cases, so I thought I’d give you an easy one.”
Mason remained thoughtfully silent while Drake piloted the car through traffic. A signal turned against them, and Drake, stopping the car, said, “It’s a couple of blocks farther on. We may not be able to find a parking space.”
“We can roost in front of a fire plug,” Mason said. “I want to get a good look at this girl, but I don’t want her to see me. . . . Got a pair of dark glasses, Paul?”
“Yeah. In the glove compartment. . . . Dark glasses are as near as we come to using disguises—and usually they’re all that’s necessary.”
The signal changed, and Drake eased the car into gear. “Got a description of her?” Mason asked.
“Not too much to go on,” Drake said, “just what I picked up over the telephone. The operative was calling from a cigar stand across the street from the beauty parlor. She has a swell figure, is around twenty-eight, a brunette with large, dark eyes.”
Mason frowned thoughtfully.
“Doesn’t it fit?” Drake asked.
“It depends on the eyes,” Mason said. “The girl I have in mind has dark eyes, but I wouldn’t pick them as being a particularly noticeable feature.”
“This operative is young and impressionable,” Drake said. “He made her sound like a follies’ beauty on the loose.”
He turned the car to the left, and said, “There’s the stake-out—this car right ahead. Have to hand it to that boy. He’s managed to take up two parking spaces so we can squeeze in b
ehind.”
“That’s swell,” Mason said.
Drake pressed lightly on the horn button, and the operative looked behind, nodded, started his motor, and pulled his car forward until its bumper was touching that of the car ahead. Drake managed to work his own car into the space behind. “Want to talk with him?” he asked.
Mason nodded.
They got out and walked across to the agency car.
“Think she’ll be out pretty quick now,” the operative said.
“You tailed her here from the Contractor’s Journal office?” Mason asked.
“Yeah. It’s only three or four blocks. She evidently had an appointment at the beauty parlor. I think the girl in the beauty parlor knows her. But I haven’t tried as yet to get the address or any information in there.”
“You can do that after she leaves,” Mason said. “—No, wait a minute. I don’t want her to think anyone’s trailing her. We’ll wait and keep that beauty parlor as an ace up our sleeve.”
“Okay. You want me to stay here?”
“Yes. You can follow along in the car. I’ll get out and try to follow her on foot. If she gives me the slip, you carry on from there, and find out where she goes.”
“That’ll be swell. She may duck into a department store or something. A man’s lost trying to follow a pedestrian in an automobile when they pull a stunt like that.”
Mason said, “Okay. Stay on the job. How’s she dressed?”
“Dark woolen dress with a red fox jacket and one of those good-looking little hats.”
“Easy on the eyes?” Mason asked.
“Gosh, I’ll say. She’s a beauty. I could go for that number in a big way.”
Drake winked at Mason.
“Okay. We’ll go back and wait in our car,” Mason said. “You tag along and see what you can do.”
Mason and Drake walked back to sit in Drake’s car while they waited.
“You got some ideas on the time of Tidings’ death, Perry?” Drake asked.
“I think I have.”
“What are they?”
Mason said, “I don’t know. The thing doesn’t make sense. . . . Not the way Homicide has it figured out.”
“How do they have it figured out?”
“Holcomb figured it two ways. Once he figured that Tidings was shot in the bungalow, and once he figured he was shot in the automobile and the body dragged into the bungalow.”
“How do you figure it?”
“I figure he was shot in the automobile and came into the apartment under his own power—probably with quite a bit of assistance. He died practically as soon as he was stretched out on the bed. . . . Funny thing, Paul, about his shoes.”
“What’s funny about them?”
“They weren’t on.”
“Well, a man wouldn’t get into bed with his shoes on.”
“A dying man wouldn’t stop to take his shoes off. If someone was helping him in, that someone would hardly think to take the shoes off—unless it happened to be a woman.”
“Something to that,” Drake agreed.
“The boys from the Homicide Squad couldn’t find those shoes,” Mason said. “I looked around for ’em myself when I was in there. I didn’t see them in the closet, and didn’t see them under the bed.”
“Why would anyone take his shoes?”
“I don’t know, but I have an idea.”
“What’s the idea?”
Mason said, “Let’s look at it this way, Paul. The autopsy surgeon says he’s been dead some time. He figures ten o’clock Tuesday morning as the very latest. I have an idea he’d like to put it quite a bit before that, but in view of the other evidence, he’s stretching things to the limit.”
“That gas being on and the room being closed up didn’t help things any,” Drake pointed out.
“I know, but that’s a significant thing in itself.”
“How do you mean, Perry?”
Mason said, “Let’s look at it this way, Paul. Tidings might have gone into the house under his own power. It might have been during the daytime. . . . But there are quite a few things which make me think otherwise. One of them is the gas.
“I don’t think that the gas was turned on simply to create conditions which would cause a more rapid decomposition of the body and make it more difficult to fix the time of death with any degree of accuracy.”
“Why was it turned on then?” Drake asked.
Mason said, “It was turned on because it was cold in the room. Whoever turned it on wanted to heat the room. That means it was turned on at night.”
“Tuesday night?” Drake asked.
Mason said, “No, Paul. Monday night.”
Drake stared at him. “Monday night! But that’s impossible!”
Mason said, “Let’s look at it this way, Paul. It was either Monday night or Tuesday night. The man wasn’t dead when he was brought into the house. The bloodstains on the floor indicate that. The nature of the bloodstains on the bed show that there was considerable hemorrhage after he was put to bed.”
“That’s right,” Drake admitted.
“According to the testimony of the autopsy surgeon, it had to be Monday night and not Tuesday night. Remember, he says the man had been dead since at least ten o’clock Tuesday morning.”
“But, Good Lord, Perry, you talked with him over the telephone. His secretary says he was . . .”
“How do I know I talked with him over the telephone?” Mason said. “I talked with someone who said he was Tidings. I talked with the secretary first.”
“But how do you account for the fact that the secretary says he was in the office, and that the secretary said . . . Gosh, Perry, do you mean that the secretary’s lying?”
“Exactly,” Mason said. “I don’t see any other way out of it. The secretary has to be lying.”
“Why?”
Mason said, “Your guess is as good as mine, but let’s look at the thing from a viewpoint of sound common sense. To begin with, we’re pretty safe in assuming that Tidings wasn’t dead when he was taken into the house. He was mortally wounded. Apparently he died very shortly after he was stretched out on the bed. Whoever helped Tidings into the house, and stretched him out on the bed, turned on the gas heat to warm up the room, probably went into the bathroom to get some towels to stop the flow of blood, or perhaps ran to the telephone to get a doctor—and Tidings died.
“Then they got in a panic, surveyed the situation, and decided to skip out; and having made that decision, whoever it was had every reason to believe that it would be a considerable period of time before the body was found—that it would be difficult if not impossible to fix the exact time of death. So off came Tidings’ shoes.”
“Why?”
“Don’t you see?” Mason said. “The shoes furnish a valuable clue.”
“To what?”
“To the time of death.”
“No,” Drake said, “I don’t see.”
Mason said, “I think the shoes were taken off after Tidings died, and that the person who took them off was a woman.”
“Just what do the shoes have to do with it, Perry?”
“There was mud on the shoes,” Mason said. “Not a great deal of mud, but just enough to show that it had been raining outside, a hard, driving rain which had made not for a thick, sticky mud, but for a thin coating which would have adhered to the soles of the shoes.
“There’s no counterpane on the bed. That means the counterpane was pulled out from under the body after death because it contained some telltale clue—probably the marks left by muddy shoes and wet smears made by a wet topcoat.”
“You figure Tidings was wearing a topcoat at the time?”
“That’s right. I figure that Tidings either drove or was driven up to the bungalow. Someone helped him up the walk to the house, across the living room, and into the bedroom. Tidings stretched out on the bed and was dead within a very few minutes. There were bloodstains on the counterpane, mud on his shoes, and wet smea
rs made by the topcoat.
“Someone took off his shoes, managed to get off the topcoat, and then pulled the counterpane out from under the body. . . . That made rather a bulky bundle. The topcoat was disposed of by putting it back in the bottom of Tidings’ car. Then Tidings’ car was planted where the police would find it sometime the next day, but not where they’d find it before the next day.
“That brings us to the most significant clue of all, Paul, the fact that those bloodstains stop an inch or two beyond the threshold of the house. Remember, it was raining cats and dogs Monday night. That’s a cement porch, and a cement walk. Now I’ll tell you why the bloodstains stop near the door. It’s because the driving rain washed them away, except for those two or three drops which were protected from the rain by that little roof over the front door. That again fixes the time of the murder—Monday night.”
Drake said, “Okay, Perry. You win. That last clue clinches things. Standing by itself, it’s almost enough. . . . All right, he was killed Monday night. Where does that leave us?”
Mason said, “I don’t know.”
“How about going to work on that secretary of Tidings’ and seeing if we can get a confession out of him?”
Mason said, “That’s the logical thing to do—if I knew where I stood.”
“What do you mean, Perry?”
Mason said, “Frankly, Paul, I don’t know who my client is.”
“Come on,” Drake said. “Talk sense.”
Mason said, “I’ve been retained by someone to protect a woman. I think I was hired to defend this woman from the charge of murdering Albert Tidings.”
“That wasn’t specifically mentioned?” Drake asked.
“No, Paul. It wasn’t. A man come to my office after midnight Monday. It was raining then—raining hard. There was a woman with him. The woman wouldn’t let me hear her voice, wouldn’t let me see her face. The man made arrangements by which she could be identified. When that identification was complete, I was to receive a very substantial fee.
“Now, I can’t figure anything which would have justified all of that frenzied effort—that business of getting me out of bed to protect someone, unless it had been an emergency and a serious one. I figure a murder would be most apt to fill the bill.
The Case of the Baited Hook Page 11