Erle Gardner - Case of the Silent Partner

Tragg bent over the woman, felt of her pulse, said to the manager of the apartment, “Go downstairs. Call Sergeant Mahoney at headquarters. Tell him Lieutenant Tragg has found the Dilmeyer girl and the candy, that she’s evidently been poisoned. Tell him to rush out fingerprint men and an ambulance.”

Mason dropped to one knee to look down on the unconscious figure. “Should we straighten her out?” he asked.

Tragg felt her pulse again.

The face was slightly congested. Her breathing was slow and seemed labored. The skin was warm to the touch.

Mason said, “Looks more like a drug than an active poison. Perhaps we can bring her out of it.”

“We can try,” Tragg said. “Get her over on her back. Okay. See if you can find some towels, hot and cold. We’ll start with the cold.”

Mason turned cold water into the washbowl, sopped a bath towel, wrung it out, and tossed it to Tragg. Tragg sponged off the woman’s face and neck, and started gently slapping her in the face with the cold towel. After a moment, he raised her blouse, pulled down the top of her skirt, and applied the cold towels directly to the bare skin over the pit of her stomach.

There was no slightest sign of returning consciousness.

“Want a hot one now?” Mason asked.

“Yes, let’s try that.”

Mason turned on the hot water, found a clean bath towel in the lower drawer of a cabinet, and got it steaming hot. He tossed it to Tragg, received in return the cold towel, and held that under the cold tap in the bathtub.

For five minutes Tragg worked alternately with hot and cold towels.

“No use,” he said. “That ambulance should be here.” He looked at the telephone and said, “I don’t want to touch that. Be careful about touching things, Mason, particularly that candy or the wrapping paper.”

Mason nodded, shut off the water in the bathroom. Tragg got to his feet. Mason walked over to peer in the waste-basket. Then he opened the door of the clothes closet, and looked inside.

There were half a dozen expensive-looking evening gowns with shoes to match. By comparison, the clothes for daytime wear seemed somewhat shabby and few in number.

Tragg said impatiently, “I don’t know whether she got the call through to Mahoney or not. I guess we’d better go down and...” He broke off as a siren sounded.

“This,” he said, “will be it. We’ll let them take the responsibility.”

Mason said, “One thing I want, Tragg. I want to get my own doctor working on this.”

“Why?”

“Your emergency surgeons are all right, but she won’t get the complete care, particularly on follow-up treatment in an emergency hospital, that she will under my doctor. I want this woman taken to the Hastings Memorial Hospital, put in a private room, and I want Dr. Willmont to co-operate with whatever doctor is called in.”

“Willmont, eh?”

“Yes.”

“Who’s paying for it?”

“I am.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m interested.”

Lieutenant Tragg indicated the note on the card. “I noticed the initials ‘M.F.’ on that card,” he said.

“Well?”

“Mildreth Faulkner.”

Mason said, “Nuts. A person wouldn’t send another a box of poisoned candy, and then put a card in with the candy for the police to find.”

“You can’t always tell,” Tragg said. “Rules don’t mean anything except on a general basis. And even then, they don’t mean anything when you’re dealing with crimes of women.”

Mason said, “And, therefore, you think I don’t want her to die simply because I’m protecting the poisoner. A person who isn’t even a client, whom I don’t know and haven’t seen; but with whom I have an appointment in...” he glanced at his wrist watch, “exactly fifteen minutes.”

Tragg laughed and said, “Well, when you put it that way, it does sound goofy. I guess there’s no objection to taking her to the Hastings Memorial Hospital — if you can get Dr. Willmont on the job.”

“I can try,” Mason said. “I think there’s a telephone in the manager’s apartment.”

He walked rapidly toward the stairs, met two white-garbed men carrying a stretcher in the corridor.

“Down at the end of the corridor, boys,” Mason said. “Wait for me at the door of the apartment house. I’ll tell you where to take her.”

Perry Mason latchkeyed the door of his private office. Della Street was sitting over by a corner of the desk, Mason’s desk telephone pulled over close to her.

“Hello,” Mason said. “I’m about ten minutes late. Heard anything from our client?”

“No.”

Mason said, “I guess it was a stand-up after all. That cures me of night appointments at the office.”

“How is Esther Dilmeyer?” Della asked.

“She’s at the Hastings Memorial Hospital. I got hold of Dr. Willmont on the telephone. He’s rushing right out to meet her when she’s unloaded from the ambulance. Looks like some drug, but it’s too early to tell. Sometimes a drug which will induce sleep is given to cover the effects of some other poison. However, I’d say we got her in time, and she’ll pull through.”

“Did you,” she asked, “throw a scare into Magard?”

“I’ll say we did — that is, Lieutenant Tragg did.”

“He sounded thoroughly subdued.”

“Did he ring up?”

“Yes. He called, said that he understood you had been at the Golden Horn with an officer looking for information, said he’d given the officer the information he wanted, and inquired if there was anything else he could do for you.”

Mason chuckled. “What did you tell him?”

“I thanked him and told him it would be all right.”

Mason looked at his watch. “Well, I guess we’ll be on our way and charge this to experience... Wait a minute. Here’s someone coming.”

They could hear the rapid click-clack... click-clack... click-clack of heels in the corridor.

Mason opened the door.

Mildreth Faulkner said, “Thank you so much for waiting, Mr. Mason. I’m sorry I was late. I just couldn’t make it any sooner.”

Mason looked her over carefully, said, “Come in. Miss Faulkner, my secretary, Miss Street. This chair please. You’re breathless and excited. How about a cigarette?”

“No, thanks. I have to work fast, Mr. Mason.”

“What’s wrong?”

She said, “It’s a long story. I hardly know where to begin.”

“Well, begin right in the middle,” Mason said, “and keep moving.”

She laughed. “It’s this way: My sister Carlotta and I started the Faulkner Flower Shops. That was before Carla was married. We each had half of the stock except a small block of five shares which we gave to one of our employees to qualify her so there’d be three on the board of directors.

“Harry Peavis is a big competitor. He controls the bulk of the retail flower business here. I’ve always liked him. He’s rather naïve in some respects, but a shrewd businessman, hard-boiled, occasionally somewhat tactless, and with a great deal of native ability.”

“Where does he come into the picture?” Mason asked.

“He managed to pick up the five shares of stock which had been given to our employee.”

Mason frowned. “Why? Does he want to pry into your business?”

“I thought so at the time. When he handed over the stock for transfer, he joked about being a silent partner, but I think there’s something far more sinister back of it.”

“Go ahead.”

“My sister married a little over a year ago — about eighteen months ago.”

“Whom did she marry?”

“Robert C. Lawley.”

“What does he do?” Mason asked.

She made a little gesture which was more expressive than words, and said, “He manages my sister’s money.”