Erle Gardner: The Case Of The Dangerous Dowager

Duncan, still tilted back in his chair, said, "You see how my partner feels, Mason. Suppose we compromise on five grand."

"I don't give a damn how your partner feels," Mason said. "I've offered you a thousand dollars and that's my limit. If you suckers keep on holding those notes, you'll find yourselves holding the sack. By the time the smoke blows away, Sylvia isn't going to be able to pay even the face of those notes."

"That's a bluff," Grieb said.

"Now, Sammy, keep your shirt on," Duncan told him.

Grieb started toward Duncan. "Listen, Charlie," he shouted. "I'm running the office end of this business. You haven't invested anything here except a lot of conversation. I know what those IOU's are worth, and you ain't going to make a cheapskate out of me."

Duncan turned to look at him then, and his gold teeth vanished. "Sit down, you damn fool," he said, "and shut up. If Frank Oxman doesn't buy these notes, who's going to?"

"Sylvia will take them up."

"When?"

"Pretty soon."

"For how much?"

"Well, if she knew we had a chance to sell them..."

Duncan's coldly contemptuous gaze silenced his partner. He turned to Mason, "Suppose you boys go out in the other room for a little while," he said, "and let me talk to my partner. I want to be reasonable, but I agree with him a thousand dollars is altogether too small a sum to..."

"Then," Mason interrupted, "there's no need of our waiting. I've offered you a thousand dollars, and that's final. Take it or leave it. Don't ever forget I can put you two birds on the witness stand and find out everything I want to know without its costing me a damn cent. Anytime a..."

"Now, take it easy," Duncan interrupted soothingly. "This isn't going to get us anywhere, Mason. It's a business proposition. You two boys go out in the other room and wait a few minutes." He walked over to the heavy door, jerked the lever which pulled the bolts back, twisted the knurled knob of the spring lock and held the door open. "Make yourselves at home, boys. There's some magazines right over there. We won't be over five minutes."

"If you're as long as five minutes," Mason said, "you won't find us here when you come out."

Grieb yelled, "Go ahead and go, you damn piker, and see who cares!"

Duncan, still smiling, closed the door on Mason and the detective. The spring lock clicked into position. A half second later the iron bars shot home.

Drake turned to Mason and said, "Why not boost it to fifteen hundred, Perry? They'd take that. It would give Grieb a chance to save his face."

Mason said, "To hell with Grieb, and his face too. I don't like his damned blackmailing hide."

Drake shrugged his shoulders. "It's your funeral, Perry."

Mason slowly grinned and said, "No, it isn't. Duncan's nobody's fool. That talk I gave him about taking their depositions scared hell out of him. It's just a question of how long it'll take him to whip Grieb into line... Evidently there's friction between them."

"That's going to make it all the harder for us," Drake said.

Mason shook his head. "No, it isn't, Paul, it's going to make it easier."

"Why?"

"Because this partnership isn't going to last very much longer. They're fighting. Duncan is a shrewd thinker. Grieb flies off the handle. Now then, figure it out. If this partnership is going to bust up, it's a lot better to have eighty-five hundred dollars in cash to divide than seventy-five hundred in IOU's to try and collect."

Drake said, "That's so, Perry. I hadn't figured on that."

"Duncan's figuring on it," Mason said.

They were silent for a moment. Quick, nervous steps sounded in the passageway outside of the office. The two men listened while the steps swung around the right-angle turn in the corridor and approached the door of the reception office. Iron bars were jerked back on the other side of the door from the inner office. A knob twisted. The door opened explosively and Duncan, carrying the IOU's, said to Mason, "Okay. Pay over the money. It'll have to be cash."

"How about your partner?" Mason asked.

"Pay over the cash," Duncan said. "I have the IOU's here. That's all you want..."

The door from the hallway opened. A woman in her middle twenties, her trim figure clad in a dark, tailored suit, stared at them with black, disinterested eyes, then turned to Duncan and said, "I want to see Sam."

Duncan crumpled the oblongs of paper in his right hand and pushed them down into his coat pocket. His gold teeth came into evidence. "Sure, sure," he said. "Sam's right inside." But he continued to stand in the doorway, blocking her passage.

Once more she flashed her eyes in quick appraisal of the two men, then stepped forward until she was standing within two feet of Duncan, who kept his left hand on the knob of the partially opened door. "Well?" she asked smiling. "Do I go in?"

Duncan shifted his eyes to study Mason and Drake, and she, following the direction of his gaze, glanced at them for the third time. Duncan's smile expanded into a grin. "Sure," he said, his eyes focused on Drake's face, "go right on in." He shoved the door open, stepped to one side, raised his voice and said, "Don't you two talk any business until I get there."

She swept through the door and Duncan, still grinning pulled it shut behind her.

"Well, boys," he said, "it's too bad your little scheme didn't work. I'll see a lawyer tomorrow, Mason, and see if we can't pin something on you. We may have something to take before the D.A. In the meantime, don't forget the ship, boys. It's a nice place to gamble. We give you a good run for your money."

Mason said, "No, Duncan, we won't forget the ship."

"And," Duncan assured him, "we won't forget you." He escorted them down the corridor until the uniformed guard had opened the outer door. "Well, good night, boys," he said. "Come back any time."

He turned and retraced his steps down the corridor. Mason took the detective's arm and led him toward the gangway where departing patrons caught the speed boat.

"Was that Sylvia Oxman?" Drake asked.

"It must have been," Mason said, "and when she failed to recognize you and you gave her a dead pan, Duncan saw the play. Remember, you're supposed to be the lady's husband."

"Doesn't that leave us in something of a spot," Drake asked anxiously, "having tried to pick up the lady's notes and pulled all this hocus-pocus?"

"That depends on the breaks," Mason said gloomily. "Evidently it isn't our night to gamble."

Drake pushed his fingers down inside his collar, ran them around the neckband of his shirt, and said, "Let's beat it. If we're going to be pinched, I sure as hell don't want to go to jail in this outfit."

CHAPTER 4

MASON LOOKED across his desk at Matilda Benson and said, "I sent for you because I'm going to ask you a lot of questions."

"May I ask you some first?" she inquired.

He nodded.

"You saw Grieb?"

"Yes."

"Get anywhere?"

Mason shook his head and said, "Not yet. The breaks went against me."

She eyed him in shrewd appraisal. "I suppose you don't go in much for alibis and explanations."

Mason shook his head and was silent.

"Do you want to tell me about it?"

"No."

"Well, then, what's the next move?" she asked.

Mason said, "I'm going to try him again - this time from another angle. Before I do, I want to know more of what I'm up against."

She opened her purse, took out her cigar case and selected a cigar. While she was cutting off the end, Mason scratched a match and held it across the desk to her. She regarded him with twinkling eyes through the first white puffs of cigar smoke and said, "All right, go ahead. Ask your questions."

"What do you know about Grieb?"

"Nothing much. Just what my granddaughter tells me. He's hard and ruthless. I warned you he wouldn't be easy."