The Case of the Troubled Trustee pm-78

by Erle Stanley Gardner

"For just being," Mason said. "For being so much a part of things, so completely efficient and… and all the rest of it."

  "Thank you," she said, her eyes suddenly soft.

  "Any progress?"

  "On what?" she asked.

  "Come, come," Mason said, smiling. "Don't try to pull the wool over my eyes. On the romance, of course."

  "The Dutton case?"

  "Exactly."

  "Nothing so far," she said. "Give the man a little time."

  "He may not have as much time as he thinks," Mason said, seating himself in the client's overstuffed chair and watching Della Street's smoothly graceful figure as she stood at the desk opening letters, putting them in three pilesthe urgent on the left-hand corner of the desk, the personal-answer-required in the middle, and the general run-of-the-mill for secretarial attention on the right.

  "Want some advice?" she asked.

  Mason grinned. "That's why I brought the subject up."

  She said, "You can't play Dan Cupid."

  "Why not?"

  "You don't have the build. You wear too many clothes, and you lack a bow and arrow."

  Mason grinned. "Keep talking."

  "Sometimes," Della Street said, choosing her words carefully as though she had rehearsed them, "a woman will be close to a man for a long time, seeing him in the part in which he has cast himself and, unless he makes some direct approach, not regarding him as a romantic possibility."

  "And under those circumstances?" Mason asked.

  "Under those circumstances," Della Street said, "nature gave the male the prerogative of taking the initiative; and if he isn't man enough to take it, it is quite possible the girl will never see him as a romantic possibility."

  "Go on," Mason told her.

  "But the one thing that would definitely wreck everything would be for someone else to try and take the intiative on behalf of this individual."

  "Longfellow, I believe, commented on that in the poem dealing with John Alden and Priscilla," Mason said.

  Della Street nodded.

  "All right," Mason told her, "I've been forewarned. You want me to keep my bungling masculine touch under cover, is that it?"

  The phone on Della Street 's desk rang.

  She flashed him a quick smile, picked up the receiver and said, "Yes, Gertie," to the receptionist.

  She said, "Wait a moment. Hold on, Gertie, I'll see." Della Street turned to Perry Mason. "Desere Ellis is in the office," she said.

  Mason grinned. "Let's take a look, Della."

  "Just a moment," Della Street said. "She is accompanied by a Mr. and Mrs. Heclley, apparently a mother and son."

  "They are all three of them together?" Mason asked.

  Della Street nodded. "As Gertie whispered confidentially, the mother is a determined creature with a rattrap mouth and monkey eyes; and the son is pure beatnik with a beard and a cool-cat manner which makes her flesh crawl. You know how Gertie is and how she loves to make snap appraisals of clients."

  "And generally she's right," Mason said. "Have Gertie send the three of them in."

  Della Street relayed the message, then went to the door communicating with the outer office and held it open.

  Hedley came in first-a broad-shouldered young man with a spade beard, calmly contemptuous eyes, a sport shirt open at the neck disclosing a hairy chest, a pair of rather wrinkled slacks, and sandals over bare feet. He was carrying a coat over his arm.

  Behind him was his mother, a woman of around fifty, not as tall as her son. She was rather dumpy and had a sharp pointed nose on each side of which alert brown eyes glittered as she made a quick appraisal of Mason; the eyes darted to Della Street, then around the office.

  Behind Mrs. Hedley, Desere Ellis-slightly taller than average, her skin deeply tanned, honey-blonde hair, steady blue eyes and a figure a little on the spare side-seemed paled into insignificance.

  "How do you do?" Mason said. "I'm Perry Mason."

  The man, stalking forward and pushing out a hand, said, "I'm Fred Hedley. This is my mother, Rosanna, and my fiancee, Miss Ellis."

  Mason nodded. "Won't you be seated?"

  They found chairs. Desere looked at Della Street.

  "My confidential secretary," Mason explained. "She takes notes on interviews, keeps things straight, and is my right hand."

  Fred Hedley cleared his throat, but it was his mother who hurriedly interposed to assume the conversational initiative.

  "Desere was told to come and see you," she said. "We gathered it was about her trust."

  "I see," Mason said, noncommittally.

  "We'd like to know about it," Mrs. Hedley said.

  "Just what was it you wanted to know?" Mason asked.

  Fred Hedley said, "The reason why Desere should be told to come and see you."

  "Who told her?" Mason asked.

  "The trustee, Kerry Dutton."

  Mason's eyes locked with Hedley's. "Do you know him?" he asked.

  "I've met him," Hedley said in a lukewarm voice. And then added as though disposing of Kerry Dutton for all time, "A square, a moneygrabber. He's an outsider."

  "He's a very dear friend," Desere Ellis interposed, "and my father had the greatest confidence in him."

  "Perhaps too much confidence," Mrs. Hedley snapped.

  "You see," Desere explained, "my father thought I was not to be trusted with money. There was rather a fair sum of money, and Father left it to Kerry as trustee so that I could have enough each year to keep me going for four years, but not enough to go out and splurge and wake up broke. I think Daddy was more afraid of my gambling than anything else."

  "I see," Mason observed noncommittally, and then asked, "Do you have any predilection for gambling, Miss Ellis?"

  She laughed nervously. "I guess Daddy thought so. I guess he thought I had a predilection for just about everything."

  Mrs. Hedley said, "The reason we're here is that we understand the trustee has finally come around to the idea for an endowment."

  "An endowment?" Mason asked.

  "Fred's idea," she said. "He wants to have it so that-"

  Fred Hedley held up his hand. "Never mind telling him the details, Mom."

  "I think Mr. Mason should know them."

  "Then I'll tell him," Hedley said.

  He turned to face the lawyer. "Get one thing straight, Mr. Mason. I'm not a visionary; I'm not a goof. I play around with a bunch of poets and artists but I'm essentially an executive type."

  Warming to his subject, he got up from the chair, leaned forward and placed his hands on Mason's desk.

  "The trouble with our civilization," he said, "is that it can't develop itself. It tends to wash itself out.

  "I think we are beginning to realize that every country needs to develop geniuses; but here in this country we can't do it because the genius can't develop; he starves to death.

  "Look at the artists, the poets, the writers I know who could be developed into geniuses. I don't mean, Mr. Mason, that anybody has to develop them. All they need is to be left alone-just be free to develop their own talents."

  "And they can't do it?" Mason asked.

  "They can't do it," Hedley said, "because they can't make a living while they're doing it. They're starving to death. You can't develop anything on an empty stomach except an appetite."

  "And you have some idea?" Mason asked.

  "I want to endow up-and-coming poets, writers, artists, thinkers-principally, thinkers."

  "What kind of thinkers?"

  "Political thinkers."

  "What kind of politics?" Mason asked.

  "Now, there you go, Mr. Mason. You're trying to pin me down. Probably because of the beard. You think I'm a goof. I'm not. I go with a beat crowd, but I don't just want to drift along with the stream. I stay cool, but I want to do something."

  "Such as what?"

  "I want to think."

  "You called Dutton a square," Mason said. "Why?"

  "Because he is a square."

  "Wh
at's a square?"

  "He doesn't belong; he's narrow-minded; he's all wrapped up in a conventional concept of moneygrubbing.

  "Times are changing. The whole world has changed. You can't get anywhere any more with the conventional type of thinking-not in art, not in writing, not in poetry, not in political thinking."

  Mason glanced at Desere Ellis. "You are planning to finance this idea he has?"

  "I wish I could," she said, "but I don't see how I can. As I told the Hedleys, Dad's money is just about used up. I wish now I hadn't been quite so extravagant. Sometimes I even wish Kerry Dutton had been more firm with me and had done more of what Dad wanted him to."

  "In what way?" Mason asked.

  "Not giving me money to throw away."

  "You threw it away?"

  She made a little gesture. "Oh, I was always taking off for Europe, or someplace, and buying new cars, new clothes, living it up. Once you start in, you can go through money pretty fast, Mr. Mason."

  "And Dutton gave you the money?"

  "I think his idea was that he'd take the money Dad left and pay it out in installments so that I would have a steady income until the time came when the trust was terminated."

  "And then you'd have nothing?" Mason asked.

  "Then I'd have nothing," she said. "Then I'd have to consider seriously how I was going to make a living."

  "Did you remonstrate at all with Dutton?" Mason asked.

  "Remonstrate with him?" she said, and laughed. "I remonstrated with him all the time."

  "About giving you so much money?"

  "About not giving me enough. I asked him how did he or anyone else know if I would live until the trust terminated. Why not go through life seeing what there was to see, living what there was to live, and then cross the bridge of the trust termination when I came to it."

  Fred Hedley said, "If you ask my opinion, Mr. Mason, it was one hell of a way to handle a trust. Particularly, a spendthrift trust of that sort. Her father recognized that tendency in his daughter and wanted to guard against it. If Dutton had been on the job, we'd have a lot more money now for our foundation."

  Mason smiled affably, the smile taking some of the sting from his words, and said, "But I didn't."

  "Didn't what?" Hedley asked.

  "Ask your opinion," Mason said.

  Hedley flushed.

  "Well," Mrs. Hedley said, "we're here. What do you have to tell us, Mr. Mason?"

  "Nothing," Mason said.

  "Nothing?"

  Mason spread his hands in a gesture.

  "Well, why are we here?" Fred Hedley asked.

  "I thought perhaps you'd tell me," Mason said.

  The trio exchanged glances.

  Desere Ellis said, "Kerry Dutton called me last night. He told me that the time was approaching when 'the trust would be terminated, that he had retained you as his attorney and suggested that it might be a good plan for me to drop in and see you just to get acquainted."

  "He suggested you bring the Hedleys?"

  "No, that was my idea."

  "Why," Mrs. Hedley asked, "would he need an attorney to terminate the trust if the money is all gone and-I suppose, of course, there will be accurate accounts submitted. Then all he has to do is to turn over whatever balance there may be and Desere will give him a receipt."

  "Oh, there are lots of legal gimmicks in a thing of this sort," Fred Hedley said. "I can see why he thought he'd need an attorney, but I don't see why he wanted Desere to come in at this time."

  "Perhaps it didn't occur to him that the three of you were coming," Mason said.

  "Well, you may have a point there," Hedley admitted. "We thought, of course, from the way the message was received that you were going to make some announcement. There is, as I figure it, somewhere around fifteen thousand dollars left, and while that's not enough to carry out the plan we had in mind, it could be a start in the right direction. Desere, of course, would have to make some sacrifices, but she's going to have to anyway. Personally, I think it's a damn shame Desere frittered away all this money on frivolities when it could have served a really useful purpose."

  "You estimate there's fifteen thousand dollars left?" Mason asked.

  "In the trust? Yes."

  "Just how do you figure?"

  "Well, we know the amount of the original trust. We know what Desere has taken out and we can figure just about what the income should have been."

  "How much have you been getting during the last twelve months?" Mason asked Desere. "I take it there's no secret about it."

  "Heavens, no," she said. "I've had just about all of it." And then looking at him sharply, said, "You should know, as Kerry's attorney."

  "I've just had one preliminary talk with him so far," Mason said. "I haven't gone into details."

  "You're preparing an accounting?"

  "Not yet."

  "Well," she said, "I've been getting just about two thousand dollars a month for the past four years. But the last couple of months Kerry has intimated there will be a balance to be distributed on the termination of the trust. So I did a little figuring and believe there should be around fifteen thousand dollars-perhaps a little more-because Kerry has intimated there may be a little surprise for me."

  "You haven't asked him specifically?"

  "I haven't asked him much of anything," she said somewhat wistfully. "He calls me over the telephone and sends me checks and… he doesn't approve."

  "Of what?"

  "Of the Hedleys, for one thing," she snapped. "Of the way I do things, for another."

  "Look here," Mason asked, "have you been spending two thousand dollars a month?"

  "Not lately," she said; and then after a moment, added, "I'm running scared."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I'm trying to save a little."

  "If you'd give up your apartment and live more simply, that last money that's coming in could go a long way toward getting Fred's foundation started," Mrs. Hedley said.

  Desere Ellis shook her head. "I'm sold on it, but I'm going to use my money to take a business course and fit myself so I can make a living. I've been a playgirl long enough."

  Fred Hedley looked at her in surprise. "You mean you're going to join the herd? You're going to become a key-pounding square?"

  "I mean that I'm going to fit myself to take the responsibilities of life."

  "You would be simply a cog in a business machine," Hedley told her reprovingly. "In no time at all you'd lose track of your friends who are original thinkers. You'd become just another wage slave taking pothooks and slanting lines. You'd be on the outside."

  Mason grinned. "Don't disparage secretaries, Mr. Hedley," he said. "They are pearls of great price and I can assure you that good ones are hard to find. These days you have to get them and train them over a long period of time. Miss Street is my right hand. I'd be lost without her."

  "Wage slaves," Hedley snapped. "Human dignity is entitled to something more than machine routine."

  Mason said, "Dignity means greatness. Look it up sometime."

  He turned to Desere Ellis and said, "I don't know why Mr. Dutton suggested you come and see me. I am going to represent Mr. Dutton. I will be glad to talk with you at any time."

  Mason placed a subtle emphasis upon the "you."

  She nodded.

  "But," Mason said, "I am acting as Dutton's attorney and at the moment I am not in a position to disclose anything about our relationship or about his affairs. I would want to have him present at any conversation with you."

  "Heavens," she said, "you don't need to keep things confidential as far as anything in connection with the trust is concerned. It's dead open and shut. I've kept books on it; I know how much I had and how much I've spent."

  "Were there any new investments?" Mason asked.

  "I don't think so. Dad left the property in stocks and bonds. Kerry has had to sell them a little at a time to keep up my allowance, but there have been some dividends, some increases in value. T
hat's part of the bookkeeping I've been doing-just checking up."

  "We've gone back over the bonds and stocks," Hedley said, "and figured the dividends, interest payments and selling prices."

  "I see," Mason commented noncommittally; and then asked, "When are you going to enroll in this business course, Miss Ellis?"

  "Tomorrow," she said.

  Mason nodded approvingly and then, by his continued silence, indicated that he had nothing more to offer.

  Hedley got to his feet and was promptly joined by Desere. Mrs. Hedley hesitated for a moment and then slowly arose from her chair.

  "Thank you for calling," Mason said.

  Della Street held open the exit door and they marched out.

  When the door had closed, Mason turned to his secretary with a worried look. "I am probably violating all sorts of professional ethics," he said. "I'm afraid I'm getting swept along on the same current which has caused Kerry Dutton to lose his footing."

  "Meaning you're falling in love with the girl?" Della Street asked, smiling.

  Mason said, "I guess there's always the temptation to play God… Here's a woman who has frittered away her life and, as far as she knows, all of the money that her father left her. She's tied up with some radicals who are writing intellectual poetry, espousing theoretical political views predicated upon limited experience and less knowledge; and she's now just at the point of corning to grips with herself."

  "Well," Della Street asked, "what should you do? Tell her the truth?"

  Mason said after a moment's thought, "I am not my client's conscience-only his lawyer."

  Chapter Three

  It was the next morning when Della Street handed Mason the folded newspaper as he entered the office.

  "What's this?" Mason asked. "The financial page?"

  "Right."

  "What's the trouble?"

  "Read it," she said. "Unless I'm mistaken, there's plenty of trouble."

  Mason read the paragraph she indicated.

  It was announced last night that Steer Ridge Oil amp; Refining Company had brought in a gusher proving up an entirely new territory in the Crystal Dome area. Market value of the company stock had been steadily declining and according to Jarvis Reader, president of the company, the news of this strike will reverse the downward trend. The new gusher is reported in an entirely new field which had previously been abandoned by one of the major oil companies as nonproductive.