Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Long-Legged Models

“Well,” Mason said, “let’s start checking, Marie, but don’t get stampeded into doing anything until we know a little more about it. What does it look like to you?”

She said, “It looks very much to me as though someone found out that Eva Elliott was green on the job and simply had billheads printed and sent in a bill to see what she would do. The first one was only three hundred and twenty-six dollars and eighty-five cents.”

“What did she do?”

“She made a check.”

“Then the check must have been mailed,” Mason said.

“The check was mailed all right, and cashed.”

“Go on,” Mason said, his voice showing his interest. “What happened after that?”

“After that, nothing happened for a month, and then there was a bill for seven hundred and eighty-five dollars and fourteen cents. It was paid, and the next month bills came in for three jobs. They were in various amounts, but the total was twenty-nine hundred dollars and some odd cents.”

“Found anything else?” Mason asked.

“The next month there were three more bills. That’s all so far for the Acme Electric and Plumbing Repair Company, but if someone had found out it was that easy to get Eva Elliott to send out checks, I have a hunch it didn’t stop there.”

“How were the checks signed?” Mason asked.

“By Garvin. You know the way Mr. Garvin does. He’ll have his secretary type out checks for bills that come in, and on the 8th of the month he’ll sign all of the checks so as to get his cash discounts. Now that’s another crazy thing. Eva Elliott made out checks for the bills and didn’t take off the two per cent cash discount even when the billheads said right out in printing at the top: ‘Two per cent cash discount if paid by the tenth.’ ”

“All right, Marie, I’ll check into it. Thanks a lot for calling. What was that address again?”

“I have it, Chief,” Della Street said. “1397 Chatham Street.”

“We’ll take a look,” Mason said. “How’s everything coming, Marie?”

“Oh, it’s a mess,” she said, “but I’m getting it straightened out a little at a time.”

“Don’t overwork,” Mason told her. “You’ll be there tomorrow?”

“I’ll be on the job tomorrow.”

“I’ll try to run in. I’d like to have a look at some of those statements.”

“Okay, I’ll be here.”

“Bye now,” Mason said, and hung up.

He looked at Della Street and frowned. “Now that’s something,” he said. “We’d better ask Paul Drake to take a look at this address on Chatham Street and see if he can find anything about the Acme Electric and Plumbing Repair Company.”

“Well,” Della Street said, “that’s something for even a motion picture secretary. Just open the letters, take out the bills, type out checks and send them in for the boss’s signature, then mail out the disbursements.”

Mason grinned. “Some system of bookkeeping, but it seems to have paid off all right.”

“At least for one person,” Della Street said.

Gertie opened the office door, said excitedly, “Here’s the afternoon paper, Mr. Mason, with a photograph in it showing a bloody footprint in Casselman’s apartment and there’s someone from Las Vegas calling, a woman who says the only name you know her by is Lucille.”

“Put Lucille on,” Mason said, as Della Street took the newspaper from Gertie’s hand and relayed it across the desk to him.

Gertie hurried back to the switchboard.

Mason picked up the telephone, waited until he heard the connection being made, then said, “Yes, hello. This is Mr. Mason talking.”

The woman’s voice was urgent with excitement. “Mr. Mason, I guess you know who I am. This is Lucille at the Double-O Motel.”

“Go on, Lucille,” Mason said.

“Mr. Garvin simply had to talk with his son about an urgent matter.”

“Telephone?” Mason asked.

“No, personally. He chartered a plane.”

“Go on.”

“He took elaborate precautions to see that he wasn’t followed to the airport.”

“Go on.”

“He told me that he would telephone me at three o’clock on the dot, at six o’clock on the dot, at eight o’clock on the dot, and at ten o’clock on the dot, that he’d be back by ten. He said if I didn’t get any one of those calls, I was to call you and tell you. Otherwise, I wasn’t to let you or anyone else know where he was.”

“Okay,” Mason said. “I gather that the three o’clock call didn’t come through.”

“That’s right. I haven’t heard from him at all. I wanted you to know.”

Mason said, “Thanks. That means he’s been picked up. There’s nothing we can do until they book him. We’ll stay on the job. Thanks for calling.”

Mason hung up the phone, started studying the picture on the second page of the afternoon newspaper.

“Interesting?” Della Street asked.

“Very,” Mason said. “You can see there’s a man’s footprint here, a footprint which has been made with a bloody shoe and there’s a heel mark, the stamp of a fairly new rubber heel. Police have been able to make out the name: ‘The Spring-Eze.’ ”

Mason pushed back the paper and started pacing the floor.

At length he paused and regarded Della Street quizzically.

“It’s my contention, Della, that an attorney doesn’t have to sit back and wait until a witness gets on the stand and then test his recollection simply by asking him questions. If facts can be shuffled in such a way that it will confuse a witness who isn’t absolutely certain of his story, and if the attorney doesn’t suppress, conceal, or distort any of the actual evidence , I claim the attorney is within his rights.”

Della Street nodded.

“In this case,” Mason went on, “the facts keep shuffling themselves. Usually the police get the main suspect, but have difficulty finding the murder weapon. Here they have the murder weapon and have so many main suspects, they don’t know what to do.”

Della Street said, “In this case you’re one up on them. Knowing that you didn’t switch weapons you know the murder weapon was in Junior’s desk.”

Mason nodded. “The only trouble, Della, is that I don’t know who put it there, and I won’t know until I can talk with Garvin Senior.”

“And if he didn’t put it there?”

“Then the murderer did.

“We’re going to have to work late tonight. Police are holding Stephanie Falkner. Now they’ve also picked up Garvin Senior. He made the mistake of underestimating the police.

“We’ll get Paul’s men to check various job printing establishments and see if we can find where these billheads of the phony repair company were printed. How’s your headache?”

She looked at him, then slowly closed one eye. “ Much better,” she said.

Mason and Della Street entered the dimly lit interior of the cocktail lounge.

“Well,” Della Street said with a sigh, “this is a welcome and relaxing atmosphere after the tense strain of working on a case.”

Mason nodded. “We’ll sit and relax, have a couple of cocktails, then get a nice steak dinner with baked potato and all the fixings. We can have a bottle of stout with the steak, and... However, Della, let’s just check before we sit down. I’ll give Paul Drake a ring to let him know where we are.”

Mason stepped into the telephone booth, dialed Paul Drake’s number, said, “Perry Mason talking. Put Paul on, will you?”

Paul Drake said hello, and Mason said, “we’re just letting you know where we are, Paul. We’re going to take time out for a couple of cocktails, a good dinner...”

“Hold it!” Paul Drake interrupted.