Erle Gardner: The Case of the Haunted Husband

Tragg dropped the receiver into place. “You could have fooled me,” he said to Mason, “if you hadn’t been such a softie. You knew that if I called headquarters and gave them that line on Mrs. Warfield, it would sound like a logical solution. The newspaper boys would make me out a regular Sherlock Holmes and tomorrow morning when they found Mrs. Greeley’s body and her confession, I would be the laughing-stock of the town. I presume you told her to commit suicide.”

Mason sighed. “I only told her to see her doctor, Tragg.”

Della Street came through the door from the outer office. Mason, tilted back in his swivel chair, his feet crossed on the corner of the desk, was staring in frowning concentration at the tips of his shoes.

“What is it, Della?”

She didn’t answer at once but walked around the desk to place a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. “Lieutenant Tragg just telephoned, Chief.”

Mason looked up with a quick glance, then at what he saw in Della Street’s face, turned away once more.

“They have found her.”

“Where?” Mason asked.

“In the place no one would ever have thought of looking.”

“The Gateview Hotel?” Mason asked.

Her eyes were wide. “How did you know?”

Mason said, “My guess would be she never checked out of that room she took. She didn’t want to attract any attention to herself, so it is very possible she paid a week’s rent on the room when she registered.”

“Then she must have intended to kill him at that time.”

Mason nodded.

“Why?”

“To protect the reputation of the man she loved.”

“Homan?”

“Yes.”

“And your idea was to throw Tragg off the scent just long enough to give her an opportunity to... you are a softie.”

Mason said, “She is intensely emotional Della. She is a woman. She loved Homan, madly, passionately. She did what she did in order to save Homan’s reputation. And then Tanner started blackmailing her. And when she knew Tanner knew, she had to silence his lips in the same way she had silenced her husband’s. And the tragic part of it was, if she had only waited, it wouldn’t have been necessary. If she had only talked with Mrs. Warfield before she went down to her husband’s room...

“Oh, well,” Mason said with a sigh, “You can’t reverse the hands of the clock.”

“Chief, what did actually happen?”

“A great deal of it was just the way I outlined it to Tragg,” Mason said, a note of weariness creeping into his voice. “But there were one or two important variations. When Mrs. Greeley learned her husband was corresponding with a detective agency over a Mrs. Warfield, she probably thought Mrs. Warfield was a witness in the case Greeley was planning to file for alienation of affections against Homan.

“She followed her husband to the hotel. Of course, she didn’t go to Mrs. Warfield’s room first. She went to his room — and killed him. We can only surmise what happened next, but under the evidence, it is not taking much of a chance. Greeley probably had some of Mrs. Warfield’s correspondence to Spinney in his pocket when he was murdered, and it wouldn’t have taken Mrs. Greeley long to realize that here was a marvelous opportunity for framing Greeley’s murder on Mrs. Warfield. She goes to Mrs. Warfield’s room, gets Mrs. Warfield down to her room, and worms the whole story out of her. Mrs. Warfield is afraid of the law, believing her husband to be a convict, and she is already suspicious of Drake and me, so it is easy to persuade her to ditch us and disappear so Drake and I can’t find her. Mrs. Greeley has to put her some place where she won’t see the newspapers. The answer is Homan’s yacht.”

“And Mrs. Warfield’s baggage?”

“Mrs. Greeley put it in Greeley’s room, of course — probably telling Mrs. Warfield she was going to spirit it out of the hotel.”

There was a long pause. Then Della frowned. “Greeley wasn’t wearing his dinner jacket when he got home.”

“Sure he was, but he changed his clothes before awakening his wife.”

“How much did Homan know of what Mrs. Greeley had done?”

Mason shook his head. “I don’t know. That is up to Tragg. But my best guess is he didn’t know a thing.”

“Not even if he was keeping Mrs. Warfield on his yacht?”

“No. I don’t think he knows she is on the yacht. Only that Mrs. Greeley said she wanted to borrow it to keep some witness concealed. In any event, that’s Tragg’s headache. I am not going to worry about it. Dammit, Della, I sent a woman to her death. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”

Della picked up an ash tray, emptied it, and replaced it on the lawyer’s desk.

“What about your beautiful blonde, Chief?”

“She is in the clear.”

“Sure. I mean—”

“Oh, that uncle of hers will come around after I have talked with him.”

“Uncle!” Della’s nose wrinkled in disdain. “I mean her love life.”

“Well — there is the Romeo from home — but I am betting on young Homan. He is not a bad kid, and if I know the signs—” The telephone rang. Della Street picked up the receiver, said, “Hello?... Hold the line a minute,” and turned to Mason. “It’s Tragg.”

Mason took the phone.

“Hello, Perry,” Tragg said. “I just wanted to thank you. The newspaper boys think I am some detective.”

“That is fine.”

“When did you first know, Mason?” Tragg asked.

Mason said, “I should have known some time before I did, but when you found that white feather in my hallway, Tragg, I realized at once what had happened. When Mrs. Greeley telephoned about the shirt she wasn’t calling from her house. She was telephoning from the Adirondack Hotel or someplace nearby, but said she was at home so that she would have an alibi.”

“And she had already committed the murder?”

“Yes. She had followed Tanner ever since he left the courtroom. By that time she was desperate. She had tried to protect Homan and herself and she was going to see it through. She realized Tanner held the whip hand. Remember, when she called she said she couldn’t leave right away, so she had time to dash by and pick up the shirt and tuxedo. You should have known as soon as you found that feather, Tragg.”

“You mean she was the one who dropped the feather?”

“Of course,” Mason said.

“How did you know you didn’t?” Tragg asked.

Mason grinned. “I wouldn’t want to make any admissions to you in your official capacity, Tragg, but if I had been in that room in the Adirondack Hotel, I certainly hope you don’t think I could be so confoundedly negligent as not to look over my shoes very carefully while I was returning to the office in the taxicab. A man of ordinary intelligence would know that loose feathers would stick to wet shoes — and take proper precautions.”

And Mason gently slid the receiver onto its hook before Tragg could make any reply — or ask any questions.