Erle Gardner - The Case of the Haunted Husband

“Come on,” Mason said, “unload the gossip.”

“Don’t we eat?”

Mason glanced uneasily toward the telephone. “Tragg has had dinner,” he said, “and he is waiting for a report...”

“Oh, not dinner,” Tragg interposed. “It was just a snack. I am about ready for a beefsteak. I can telephone headquarters and let them know where to get in touch with me. After all, I am really supposed to be off duty now. Only on this job, you don’t keep hours.”

“Personally, I am famished,” Della Street admitted. “That is, I mean really famished. I think the idea of a steak would be simply terrific. Oh, definitely.”

Mason picked up a law book, held it poised, and said, “Cut it before I brain you.”

Her eyes were sparkling with mischief. “Don’t be a dope,” she said. “I mean this is the weanie of the evening.”

“Come on,” Drake announced, getting to his feet. “I have been waiting long enough for a chance to eat on Perry and dance with his secretary.”

“In my capacity as official representative of the law,” Tragg interposed sternly, “I am afraid I shall have to preempt your claim.”

“Age before beauty, my lad,” Drake said.

“Don’t I get in on this?” Mason asked.

“Go on,” Drake told him. “You are the host. You are supposed to see that your guests are properly entertained.”

“Socko,” Della Street announced. “Colossal!”

“Come on,” Mason said, getting to his feet.

“It is drizzling outside,” Della Street told him.

“Uh-huh,” Mason said, putting on his hat and coat.

Tragg stood watching him with speculative eyes. “You know, Mason,” he said, apropos of nothing, shaking a cigarette from a package, “you are damn deep.”

Drake said, “You don’t know the half of it.”

Mason switched out the lights, shepherded them out into the corridor, saw that the door was closed and locked. They started trooping down toward the elevator.

“Good place over at the Adirondack,” Della Street said.

“Oh, let’s try some place that has more life,” Mason said. “That’s staid and stodgy.”

“Suits me all right,” Tragg announced. “Do I get the first dance, Miss Street?”

“That will depend,” she said, “on how I feel after I have had the first steak. Right now, I am simply caving in.”

“I had the first claim,” Drake warned.

Mason said, “Remember I am painfully conscious of my duties as host, but I get the last dance, Della. Let them fight over the first.”

She turned and flashed him a quick understanding smile. Drake sighed. “There we go, Lieutenant. Our ship is scuttled before we have even got it away from the pier. As you have remarked before, Mason is a deep one.”

“Well, where are we going to eat?” Della asked.

“Oh, let us try the Tangerine,” Mason said. “It is good and lively, and it has the advantage of being within three blocks of the office.”

“We can walk it,” Tragg said.

“Not in this drizzle,” Della Street announced. “It’s really commencing to rain. I mean definitely, I really do!”

Mason made a grab for her, but she laughingly eluded him, slipped around the corner, and ran the rest of the way down the corridor. As he chased after her, he had a fleeting glimpse of Tragg making silly, futile gasps at thin air. Mason caught up with her at the elevator, and his arm encircled her waist. Struggling a little, she managed to move close to him and said in a low whisper, “What is wrong with your hat, Chief?”

“Huh?” he asked, surprised.

“Tragg was looking at it when you took it out of the closet.”

“Oh,” Mason said, and pressed the button for the elevator. “The lid is going to blow off tonight. Keep sober.”

The others came walking up. Della Street twisted away from Mason’s grasp just as the elevator slid to a stop, and the quartet trooped in with much laughing and joking.

When they reached the street, it was raining hard, and they stood in the shelter of the lobby for nearly five minutes before Mason was able to get a cab. The Tangerine however, because of the rain, had plenty of vacant tables, and a deferential headwaiter escorted them to a choice location near the side of the dance floor.

Mason said, “As a perfect host, Della, I will sit with my back to the floor show, place you between Tragg and... where the devil is she?”

Tragg turned around. “She was here a moment... Oh.”

He stood looking out on the dance floor to where Paul Drake and Della Street were whirling around.

“There you are,” Tragg said, seating himself. “The private detectives beat the regulars to it every time. Guess I shall have to see about getting that guy’s license revoked after all.”

“Steak dinner?” Mason asked.

“Uh-huh. Think I will telephone and see if headquarters has any news.”

“Cocktail?” Mason asked.

Tragg hesitated.

“You are not on duty,” Mason told him.

“Well, all right, make it a martini.”

“Think we will probably have four customers on that,” Mason said as Tragg threaded his way through the dancers toward the telephone booth.

A waiter approached Mason. “Four dry martinis, four de luxe steak dinners. Make the steaks medium rare except for the gentleman sitting over there, who wants his well-done, and I wish you would keep that dinner moving right along. Will you?”

“Yes, sir.”

Mason settled back in his chair, watching the dancers. Tragg returned from the telephone booth, and Mason flashed a quick glance at the officer’s face. Tragg’s smile indicated that as yet he had received no news of the crumpled figure which lay balanced precariously over the edge of the bathtub in the Adirondack Hotel.

“News?” Mason asked.

“I shall say. It was a cinch to pick up our man in the tuxedo at Fresno. He got off the plane, made inquiries about renting a car which he could drive himself. He couldn’t get a car until about eight-thirty in the morning when one of the places opened up. He rented a car, gave the name of L. C. Spinney, drove the car one hundred and sixty-five miles, and brought it back about two o’clock. He walked out, and evaporated into thin air. We lose him from then on. The description is Greeley.”

The dance music stopped. Paul Drake and Della Street came toward the table.

Mason said abruptly, “Cover the garages that rent cars with drivers.”

“What is the angle?” Tragg asked.

“Don’t you see?” Mason asked.

“No, hanged if I do.”

Mason said, “Bet you the dinners that you will find he appeared at a garage which rented cars with drivers before three o’clock in the afternoon and hired a driver to take him exactly eighty-two miles up into the mountains. He got out there.”

Paul Drake and Della Street were now at the table, Drake holding Della Street’s chair.

Tragg said, “I am not going to bet you the price of the dinners because I am a poor working man. I can’t pass expenses on to a rich client the way you can. I can’t make the compensation for my services sufficiently elastic to cover all the traffic will stand. And furthermore, I think you are bluffing.”

“Go ahead and call me,” Mason said.

Tragg said, “Well, I will call headquarters and have them check with the Fresno police on it. If it is right, will you tell me how you reason it out?”

“Uh-huh.”

Tragg threaded his way once more among the tables and belated dancers who were coming off the dance floor. Della Street asked, “What is it, Chief?”

Mason said, “I think we are on the home stretch.”

“Don’t clean the case up too soon,” Drake jokingly remarked. “I am getting paid by the day, and I never do get these delightful dinners and a chance to dance with Della except when you are on a case and have an expense account.”