Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Shapely Shadow

Della Street said, “It seems a shame, since Mr. Smith was so nice, that we can’t tell him that all he needs to do is to go to the post office and ask for a letter addressed to A. B. Vidal at General Delivery. He can tell them he’s Mr. Vidal and they’ll give him the letter and then he’ll have his key back.”

“That’s right,” Mason said.

“What’s right?” Paul asked, glancing suspiciously at Perry Mason.

“It’s a shame that we can’t tell him,” Mason said dryly.

Within fifteen minutes of the time Mason returned to his office, Paul Drake was tapping his code knock on the door to the lawyer’s private office.

“Something new?” Mason asked as Della Street opened the door.

“Your friend, A. B. Vidal,” Drake said.

“What about him?”

“The police want to know about him.”

Mason pursed his lips. “Why the police?”

“I’m darned if I know. They don’t confide in me. They want me to confide in them. But in any event, they’re anxious to get information about Vidal. It seems that they think he’s connected with a blackmail setup involving Morley L. Theilman. Now then, do you know Theilman?”

Mason said, “As you have so aptly expressed it, Paul, the police don’t confide in you, they want you to confide in them. And when I hire a private detective I don’t always confide in him, I want him to confide in me.”

“Well,” Drake said, “I managed to excuse myself for a minute, but this detective was waiting for me when I got back. He’s in my office now and he’s asking rather insistent questions.”

“How do the police tie Vidal in with you?” Mason asked.

“They had a tip that Vidal was using the mails to blackmail Morley Theilman. Theilman, it seems, has become for the moment unavailable, and the police in checking with the postal authorities found that I had been interested in Mr. Vidal. They want to know why I was interested.

“Now then, Perry, I presume all this ties in with this locker at the Union Depot, but I can’t tell them so without your permission. On the other hand, I can’t withhold any information that has to do with a crime.”

“You say this detective is in your office now?”

“Yes. He’s waiting. He thinks I’m phoning.”

Mason pushed back his chair. “All right, Paul, I’ll go back to the office with you and we’ll talk with this detective.”

Drake’s face showed his relief. “That’s swell,” he said.

“The detective know I’m mixed in it?” Mason asked.

“I don’t know,” Drake said, “probably he does. The police know I do your work. I told this detective that before I answered his questions I would have to put through a telephone call and wanted to go into another office to put it through. He could have surmised I wanted to come down here and talk with you personally.”

“What’s his name?” Mason asked.

“Orland.”

“Let’s go have a chat with him,” Mason said. He nodded to Della Street. “You tend the store, Della. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Mason walked down the corridor with Paul Drake to the offices of the Drake Detective Agency. Drake led the way down to his little cubbyhole of a private office which contained a desk, a swivel chair, a battery of telephones on the desk, and two smaller chairs at opposite corners.

“Mr. Orland,” Drake said, “I want you to meet Perry Mason.”

The man who rose from the chair was quietly dressed, of average build, and soft-spoken. “How are you, Mr. Mason?” he said. “I’ve seen you around Headquarters and up in court, but I’ve never met you.”

Mason said, “I employed Paul Drake in this matter. Now, what do you want to know?”

“I want to know everything you know about A. B. Vidal.”

Mason said, “I can’t tell you very much about him.”

“You were making inquiries of the postal authorities?”

“That’s right.”

“May I ask why?”

Mason said, “There’s an envelope containing a key to locker FO82 at the Union Depot. As nearly as I know, the envelope contains that key and nothing else. It was addressed to A. B. Vidal at General Delivery. I wanted to get a line on Vidal when he picked it up.”

“How do you know what’s in the envelope?” the detective asked.

“I know because my confidential secretary, Della Street, put the key in the envelope, sealed the envelope, and then put the envelope in the mailbox.”

“And what’s in locker FO82?” Orland asked.

“Nothing.”

Orland’s face showed surprise. “What?” he asked.

“That’s right,” Mason said, “nothing.”

“How do you know?”

“Because I made it a point to find out.”

“May I ask how?”

Mason said, “Paul Drake, again. You’ll run on this anyway so we may just as well cover the ground right now and get it out of our system.”

“I’m afraid I don’t follow you. You mean that you mailed a key to an empty locker?”

Mason said, “We mailed the key to a locker.”

“And what was in the locker at the time you mailed the key?”

Mason said, “To the best of my knowledge, a suitcase was in the locker.”

“What was in the suitcase?”

“That,” Mason said, “is something I can’t tell you.”

“Because you don’t know?”

Mason said, “I will repeat. That is something I can’t tell you.”

“Because it would be violating the confidence of a client if you did?”

Mason said, “I will again repeat. That is something I can’t tell you.”

Orland looked at Paul Drake. “You don’t have the same professional privileges an attorney does, Drake.”

Mason said, “Drake knows nothing about any suitcase, nothing about Della Street having put the key in the envelope and mailed it. He entered the picture only to get a line on A. B. Vidal and after that to find out something about the contents of the locker.”

“And how did you find that out?”

“We got the locker service company to open the locker. They changed the lock, incidentally, so that the key that is in the envelope at the post office, while it is marked FO82, will no longer open that particular locker because there is now a new lock and a new number on that locker.”

Orland said, “Well, that helps. We had been trying to unwind red tape so we could open that envelope and see exactly what was in it. It was evident there was a key in it and apparently it was a key to a locker somewhere. Your statement, as far as it goes, has been a big help but it stops short of what we want.”

“That’s all I can tell you,” Mason said.

“Once more you have used that expression, ‘all you can tell me.’”

“It seems to cover the situation,” Mason said.

“What do you know about Morley L. Theilman?”

“I never met the man in my life.”

Orland said, “His wife thinks he was being blackmailed. She thinks he had given this blackmailer quite a sum of money, that the blackmailer was using the name A. B. Vidal and that Vidal was using the mails. Apparently you thought so too.”

“Where’s Theilman now?” Mason asked.

“That,” Orland said, “is something we’re trying to establish. He doesn’t seem to be in his usual haunts, and when a man disappears at a time when he’s being blackmailed, we always like to get as much information as we can.”

“Do you folks have anything on this A. B. Vidal?” Mason asked. “Does he have a record? Do you know anything about him?”

Orland grinned and said, “I’m sure I can’t tell you, Mr. Mason.”

Mason smiled. “I can appreciate your position,” he said. “Is there anything else?”

“I’d like to know the things you say you can’t tell me,” Orland said.