Эрл Гарднер - Case of the Cautious Coquette

“Probably another key,” Mason said.

Della Street’s voice showed surprise. “The paper that’s in here, the stationery — chief, it’s the same pink colored stationery, and it is another key.”

She shook the envelope and a key fell out on the blotter. The key had an ornamental design at the end, was about two and a half inches long, hollow at the end of the shaft, with an intricate design of square-faced grooves on the part which was intended to actuate the lock.

“Looks like the key to a piece of furniture,” Della Street said.

Mason, grinning, unfolded the letter. Della Street came to look over his shoulder.

Dear Mr. Mason: I’m sorry that the desk was locked, so that you couldn’t get the information you wanted this morning. I’m enclosing the key to that desk. The information you want is in a little leather notebook in the upper right-hand pigeonhole. You will find it on the next to the last page of the notebook — the license number of the car which collided with the Finchley automobile.When it has been established quite to your satisfaction that this is the license number of the car you want, I will do something about collecting the hundred-dollar reward.

Very truly yours,

Mason opened the drawer of his desk, reached for the magnifying glass, said, “Well, I suppose we may as well make a routine check of the typing.”

Della Street’s quick eyes caught the letters which were out of alignment.

“It’s the same typewriter, chief,” she said, “and the same stationery.”

Mason nodded.

Della Street regarded Mason with brows that were knit together, causing two furrows in the otherwise smooth contours of her forehead. “Will you tell me what’s the answer?”

Mason said, “I’m darned if I know. I have an uneasy feeling that I’m being played for a sucker.”

“But surely, chief, she’s smart enough, realizing you know it’s a trap, not to expect you to walk into it a second time. And you simply can’t expect her to be so dumb as to write this second letter on a typewriter that she knows by this time you have seen.”

“Of course,” Mason pointed out dubiously, “there are many people who don’t realize that typing is as individual as handwriting, Not only does the type face tell the make and model of the typewriter on which a message is written, but the alignment gives a definite answer as to whether a document was or was not written upon a certain machine. However, it is surprising how many people fail to realize that.”

“But, even so,” Della Street pointed out, “that pink stationery. She must have known that you used some of it this morning.”

“The thing gets me,” Mason admitted, studying the letter.

Gertie, after a perfunctory knock on the door, pushed her head in and said, “A Lucille Barton is here, Mr. Mason. She said it would only take a minute and that she knew you’d want to see her.”

Della Street smiled. “I’ll have to have that thesaurus, chief. What were the words? Virginal, maidenly, sweet, attractive, charming, naive...”

Mason grabbed up the letter and envelope, pushed them down into a drawer in his desk. He hastily dropped the ornamental key into the side pocket of his vest where it rubbed against the key to the apartment, said, “I’ll see her, Gertie.”

“There’s a man with her.”

“What’s his name?”

“Mr. Arthur Colson.”

Mason said, “Show them in, Gertie.”

As Gertie nodded and closed the door, Mason turned to Della Street and said with swift decision, “Della, if I give you something to be typed for these people to sign before they leave the office, I want you to hold them here under one pretext or another. Be sure they don’t get away.”

“I don’t get it,” Della said.

“It will be a stall, Della. I want you to hold them so I can get down to her apartment and look in that desk.”

“But, chief, isn’t that just what...”

“I can’t help it,” Mason said. “My curiosity is aroused now. I’m going to find out what this is all about.”

“But suppose she has...”

The door opened. Gertie, with an air of formality, said, “Miss Lucille Barton and Mr. Arthur Colson.”

Lucille Barton came gliding across the office. Her tight dress emphasized her voluptuous figure, but the laughing candor of her eyes, the freshness of her face, and the spontaneous smile gave her an appearance of wholesome frankness.

“Mr. Mason, I couldn’t understand the insinuations you made this morning. You thought I was lying about where I was on the afternoon of the third, trying to hold you up or something. And you mentioned an ad in the paper, so I read die ads, and found the one you must have been referring to. So I decided to come and prove to you how wrong you were. Mr. Mason, I want you to meet Mr. Colson.”

Arthur Colson, a slender individual, slightly stooped, with eyes that peered out studiously from under straight eyebrows, extended a thin, muscular hand with an air of preoccupation. “How do you do, Mr. Mason?” he said, in a voice cultured almost to the point of affectation. “I suppose you wonder what I’m doing here. I do myself, but Lucille insisted. Impetuous as ever. Something about being a witness, I believe.”

“Miss Street, my secretary,” Mason introduced them.

They both bowed.

“How do you do?” Della Street said.

“Will you be seated?” Mason asked.

Della Street picked up a pencil, held it poised over her notebook as she seated herself at her secretarial desk.

Lucille Barton went on hurriedly, “I feel that I owe this to you and to myself. You know, Mr. Mason, when I told you that I was no good at remembering what takes place from one day to another, I was fibbing a little. I was with Arthur on the third, but I wasn’t certain he’d want to be — well — have his name mentioned. So I waited until I could get in touch with him and get his permission to tell you.

“You see I am working with Arthur. It’s just a part time job, two to five. But the third was his day off, so we went to see The Gay Prince.”

“A play?” Mason asked.

“A movie. It’s a swell picture, Mr. Mason. One of those things that makes you feel sort of chinned up inside.”

Arthur Colson contented himself with a nod.

“Where was it showing?” Mason asked.

“At the Alhambra. It’s a second-rim picture, but we both missed it when it first came out and I’ve been wanting to see it. Arthur is terribly, terribly busy, but I’ve persuaded him to take one day a week off, even if he is working for himself. As I told him, ‘All work and no play...’”

“Did you,” Mason interrupted, “after leaving the theater, go to the vicinity of Hickman Avenue and Vermesillo Drive?”

Colson shook his head in positive negation.

“Heavens, no,” Lucille said, laughing. “The Alhambra theater is way out at the other end of town, Mr. Mason. The show lasted until almost five o’clock and when we got out we...”

“Went to a cocktail lounge at a hotel near the theater,” Colson observed.

The man had an almost dreamy air of abstraction, as though his mind, immersed in books, had somehow become imprisoned between the printed covers of some text book and had failed to emerge. With him, life might well be a series of dim experiences lived in a state of half consciousness similar to that of a waking dream.

Lucille evidently noticed Mason’s appraisal.

“Arthur’s a chemist,” she interpolated hastily and enthusiastically. “He’s working on an invention of a new type of film that will react to infra-red rays of light so that...”

Colson suddenly came to life. The absent-minded air of studious preoccupation dropped from him abruptly. He said sharply, “We won’t discuss it now, Lucille.”