Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Spurious Spinster

“But... suppose he asks me if you’re satisfied? If—”

“Tell him,” Miss Corning snapped, “that I said I thought he was a crook. That’s what I said and that’s what I meant. He’s going to have some explaining to do. Good afternoon, Sue.”

“Good afternoon, Miss Corning.”

Sue got out and stood at the curb, watching the cab drive away with Amelia Corning sitting straight as an arrow in the back seat, her face completely without expression, the dark glasses pointed straight ahead.

Then Sue sighed and took out the latchkey which opened the outer door of the apartment house.

It was twenty minutes after six when Susan Fisher’s phone rang and Endicott Campbell’s impatient and irritated voice rasped over the wire.

“What the devil’s all this about you calling the golf club and trying to get hold of me, Sue? You know I like to have my weekends undisturbed and I particularly dislike having women telephoning around trying to find out where I am and what I’m doing. Now, what’s the trouble?”

Angrily, Susan said, “Well, I like to have a weekend too. I’ve been working all day and—”

“There is a slight difference in our relative positions,” Campbell interrupted, “and,” he added pointedly, “in our value to the company. I flatter myself that I am indispensable. You are not. Now start talking.”

“In the first place,” Sue said, “your son came to the office with a shoe box containing a lot of hundred-dollar bills and said that it was his daddy’s treasure, that he and Daddy had traded treasures.”

“A what?” Campbell demanded incredulously.

“A shoe box with a lot of hundred-dollar bills in it. It looked pretty well filled.”

“You didn’t count the money?”

“No.”

“You have no idea how much there was in there?”

“There must have been thousands of dollars.”

“You mean Carleton had that box?”

“Yes.”

“You’re crazy!”

“All right,” Sue said, “then I’m crazy. But your son had the box and he said it was yours. That’s all I know about it.”

“Where’s that box now?”

“I put it in the safe.”

“Susan, I can’t understand this. I can’t... Why, I didn’t have any treasure... I don’t know anything about a shoe box filled with hundred-dollar bills. What’s the matter? What are you trying to do? My son never gave you any box filled with money. It’s impossible! Preposterous!”

“All right. I’m a liar then.”

“I wouldn’t have put it that bluntly, but you’re certainly emotionally disturbed. There’s something wrong. You say you put the box with the money in it in the safe?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then it’ll be there now and we’ll try and find out what it’s all about. I did let my son play with a box containing a pair of dress shoes. It’s preposterous to think there was any money in that box. Now, is that the only reason you had for calling me? This wild tale about my son and a shoe box full of—”

“And Amelia Corning came in on the plane this morning and has been holding me at the office all day, and says she wants you to call on her promptly at eight forty-five and told me to explain that when she said eight forty-five she meant—”

“What!” Campbell shouted into the telephone.

“Amelia Corning,” Susan said. “She’s here.”

“She can’t be here!”

“All right, then I’m lying about that too,” she said. “And if I’m such a little liar I guess there’s nothing more I can do, except to say goodbye.”

She indignantly slammed down the receiver.

She hesitated a moment, then pulled out the telephone directory and looked up the listing of Perry Mason, Attorney at Law.

The directory gave his office address and telephone number with a note in parenthesis, “For night number call Drake Detective Agency.”

The number of the Drake Detective Agency was given and Susan dialed the number.

When the switchboard operator at the Drake Detective Agency said, “This is the Drake Detective Agency,” Susan was sufficiently nervous to start pouring words into the telephone without giving the operator time to answer.

“I must see Mr. Mason,” she said. “I’ve got to see him tonight at once. This is a very important matter. This is Susan Fisher and I got this number from the telephone directory. It listed it as Mr. Mason’s night number and—”

“Just a minute,” the operator cut in finally, “and I’ll let you talk with Mr. Drake himself. He happens to be here in the office at the moment.”

A moment later a man’s voice, calm and collected, said, “This is Paul Drake talking. Now, what seems to be the trouble?”

Again Susan Fisher poured words into the line.

Drake started asking questions and almost before she knew it the calm competency of his voice soothed her nerves and she found herself giving a fairly consistent resume of the events of the day.

“Where are you now?” Drake asked.

She told him.

“All right,” Drake said, “I’ll try and get in touch with Mr. Mason and call you back. Wait there until you hear from me.”

Susan Fisher hung up the telephone, dashed to the bathroom and put fresh powder and rouge on her face, was just touching her mouth with lipstick when again the phone rang.

Susan hurried to the phone, picked it up and said, “Yes?” expectantly.

The voice that came over the wire was that of Endicott Campbell.

“Susan,” he said, “what the devil! I’ve been trying to ring you and your line has been busy. I want to get this straight, Susan. Where is Miss Corning?”

“At her suite in the Arthenium Hotel.”

“That suite was reserved for Monday.”

“I know, but it was unoccupied and so she moved in this morning.”

“You say she went over company records?”

“She had me up there all day.”

“I don’t like that.”

“I didn’t like it either,” Sue Fisher said. “She wants to see you at the hotel at exactly eight forty-five.”

“Very well,” Endicott Campbell said, “and I want to meet you at the office at exactly eight o’clock.”

“I don’t think I can be there.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’ve been working all day and I’m all in and... and I have an appointment.”

“Cancel it.”

“I can’t be there at eight o’clock.”

“Very well,” Campbell said. “I will meet you in the lobby of the Anthenium Hotel at eight-thirty on the dot. I will give you that much time to break your engagement and straighten out your affairs so that you can cope with the situation in the event of an emergency. If you are not there it will be equivalent to your resignation.”

He hung up the phone without saying goodbye.

A few moments later the phone rang. It was the soothing, masculine voice again. “Paul Drake talking,” the detective said in his calm matter-of-fact manner. “Mr. Mason and his confidential secretary, Miss Street, are dining at the Candelabra Café. They expect to be finished by eight o’clock. Mr. Mason said that if it is a matter of very great importance he will arrange to see you there at eight.”

“But that’s right near the Arthenium Hotel!” Susan Fisher exclaimed.

“That’s right.”

“Oh, I’ll be there. I’m so grateful. I... Oh, please tell Mr. Mason I can’t thank him enough.”

Della Street, looking over the rim of her demitasse cup, said in a low voice, “Unless my judgment of facial expression is in error, the young woman who just entered the place unescorted and is now standing by the reservations desk is the one who telephoned Paul Drake and is so concerned about the dishonest management of the company where she works.”