“Somewhere around fifteen minutes. Then he left and a woman came in, a woman about forty, and boy, was she worked up! She went in the minute the kid went out. She was just as stately as you please, and she was in there nearly ten minutes. Then she came out, and that’s when the man went in. Now, this man had been waiting. He’d seen the woman’s car and recognized it, or had seen the woman or something; anyway, he’d parked his car down at the far end of the parking place here, then he’d seen the woman’s car and he’d driven out, parked his car in the street someplace and walked in and hung around in the shadows down at the far end waiting for the woman to leave. He was a dignified guy wearing dark glasses. The minute the woman left he hotfooted it across to Unit 10, banged on the door and went in and was there about five minutes. He came out and things simmered down for about ten minutes and then this blonde came in and boy, was she a knockout.… I got the license number on her car.”

  “Did you get a good look at her?” Mason asked.

  “I’ll say I got a good look at her. She parked the car and opened the door on the left-hand side and slid out from behind the steering wheel. Believe me she was in a hurry and she didn’t care how she looked when she got out—she was just getting out.

  “Unit 10 was on the other side of the car from her and when she opened the door and slid out she was coming right toward me. Her skirt just rolled up under her and—Boy, oh, boy, talk about legs!”

  “Let’s go a little higher than the legs,” Mason said. “What about her face?”

  “Around twenty-four or so; blonde, tall, and my God, what a figure! She really filled out her clothes.”

  “All right,” Mason said, “this is important. Now, what time did she go in and how long was she in there?”

  “She went in about ten minutes after the man left and she was in there, I guess, ten or fifteen minutes. And when she came out she was all excited. Boy, was she running! She made a dive for her car. This time she went in the door that was on the right-hand side and slid across the seat. She threw the car into reverse and whipped out of here in such a hurry that she forgot to turn her headlights on. I’ve got the time written down in my notebook.”

  “And after that?” Mason asked.

  “After that, everything was quiet for a couple of minutes. Then the manager came down and pounded on the door and after a while opened the door and went in. Then she came out on the run and a few minutes after that the police came.”

  “All right,” Mason said. “Now, let’s get this straight. You have been watching this place ever since—what time?”

  “Ever since the guy got in here, or right after he got in.”

  “You know every person who went into that motel. You saw everyone.”

  “Sure, I saw them.”

  “There’s no back entrance?”

  “Just the one door. That is, we may have to check it, but I’m sure there’s just the one door because that’s the way the places are laid out … and Sid was going to send someone in with some eats for me… Boy, I’m famished!”

  “Never mind that,” Mason said. “This blonde was in there for how long?”

  “About fifteen minutes.”

  “And she was the last one in?”

  “That’s right. This guy was hurt. If it was a fist fight, it was the man. If it was a shot or a stab, it could have been the girl-probably was, because she was the last one in.”

  Mason took Nye to one side, said in a low voice, “We’ll peg the first man definitely as Montrose Foster. We’ll peg the next man tentatively as Marvin Harvey Palmer, and the third visitor could have been Mrs. Winlock. Then the man with the dark glasses we can be pretty certain was George Winlock.… What time did we leave the Winlock residence, Sid?”

  “Right around eight-twenty-five,” Nye said.

  “And it’s how far from the Winlock residence here?”

  “Not over five minutes if you’re driving in a hurry. Both the motel here and the Winlock residence are on the same side of town.”

  “All right,” Mason said. “As soon as we left the place, George Winlock jumped in his automobile and drove here. He found his wife’s car parked out in front.

  “Now, if that second visitor was Marvin Harvey Palmer, he must have left the house to come out here a short time before we left the house. You told me a sports car left the place.”

  Nye said, “Would it be in order to ask if your interview with George Winlock exploded a bombshell?”

  “It exploded a bombshell,” Mason said.

  “All night,” Nye said, “the answer is simple. The room was bugged. The kid found out what was going on and wanted to beat everybody to the punch, so he came tearing out here.”

  “Then what happened?” Mason asked.

  “Then the wife followed. She was ready to start at about the same time but she wanted to put on her face and take the shine off her nose.

  “Her husband left immediately after we did. He drove out here and—well, that’s it.”

  They moved over to join Dillard.

  “Whatever happened,” Dillard repeated, “is the result of what the blonde did.”

  “Now, wait a minute,” Mason told him. “You’re getting out of orbit, Dillard. The blonde in all probability is my client.”

  “Oh-oh,” Dillard said.

  “It’s one thing for you to say what time she came and what time she left,” Mason went on, “but it’s quite another thing to have you making any big fat surmises as to what happened while she was in that cabin.”

  “I’m sorry,” Dillard apologized, “I guess I spoke out of turn, but—well, the way I looked at it, there was no other way of figuring it.”

  “There may be another way of looking at it,” Mason said. “Let’s suppose that this young man tried to get something from Boring and got a little rough. He left Boring lying unconscious on the floor. The woman could have been the boy’s mother. She went in and found the man lying on the floor, dying. She also found some weapon that tied the crime in with her son. She paused long enough to straighten certain things up, remove certain bits of evidence, including the weapon, then she took off.

  “The man could have been her husband. He was waiting for her to come out so he could go in. He’d spotted her car as soon as he drove up.”

  “And the minute he spotted the car,” Nye said, “he knew that the room in his house had been bugged and that his wife had been listening in on whatever conversation it was that you had with him.”

  “Well,” Mason said, “let’s suppose that the boy had hit Boring with the butt of a revolver, and that his mother found Boring unconscious and got out; then the husband, coming in as soon as his wife had left, found the man in a dying condition. He looked around just long enough to make certain his wife hadn’t left any clues that would indicate she had been there—that meant he could have been the one who picked up the revolver—and then he got out.”

  Dillard asked, “Have you fellows got names to put on these tags of son, mother and husband?”

  “We think we have,” Mason said. “I’m talking in terms of tags instead of names because you’re going to be a witness. If you haven’t heard any names, it’ll be that much better for you.”

  Dillard said, “You fellows figure it up any way you want to. All I know is that the blonde was the last one in the room. If she’s your client, I’m not going to start guessing what she was doing in there for fifteen minutes, but you know what the police are going to think. You may sell your idea to a jury, but the police won’t buy it. They’ll feel that if she found the man lying on the floor badly injured or dying, she wouldn’t have stuck around for fifteen minutes.”

  Nye said, “Let me ask you a straight question, Dillard. Do you ever lose pages out of your notebook?”

  “Not in a murder case,” Dillard said. “I’ve been in enough trouble.”

  “You have, for a fact,” Mason told him.

  “But,” Dillard went on, “I don’t have to tell all I know if I haven’t anyone to tell it to.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I could be hard to find.”

  Mason thought things over and said, “I don’t think that’s the answer, Dillard.”

  “Well, what is the answer?” Dillard asked.

  “I’ll be darned if I know,” Mason said, “but I’ve got to talk with my client before the police talk with her and before the police get wise to you.”

  “Well, you’ve got to move plenty fast,” Dillard said, “because the police are going to get wise to me.”

  “How do you figure that out?”

  “I checked in here right after Boring. I got the place across the parking lot where I could have a good view of his unit.”

  “You say you got it?” Mason asked.

  “That’s right.”

  “How did you get it?”

  “I asked for it.”

  “Oh-oh,” Nye said. “That is going to put the fat in the fire.”

  “Why did you ask for it?” Mason inquired.

  “Because I didn’t want to sit out there in my car. That’s too damn conspicuous. I wanted a place where I could look across the parking place. I asked the manager what she had and she told me she had several vacancies and I asked for Number 5. I asked if it was vacant and she said it was and I said I wanted it.”

  “Did she ask you why?”

  “She didn’t ask anything but she looked me over a couple of times and once she begins to put two and two together, she’s going to tell the police about me. They’ll ask her if there was anything unusual and she’ll say no, and then they’ll ask her about other tenants and if anybody checked in about the same time that Boring did, or a little after he did, and then she’ll remember me and then the police will start talking to me if I’m around. Or, if I’m not around, they’ll check the registration card for the license number on the automobile, find it’s in the name of Paul Drake, and then they’ll want to see me.”

  Mason said to Nye, “I’ve got to go talk with my client right away. Dillard, you can sit here in the dark and I’ll give you a ring if I need to.”

  “Remember one thing,” Dillard told him. “If you should give me a ring after the police have asked questions of the manager, somebody will be listening in on the line.”

  Mason said, “I usually act on the assumption someone is listening in on the line.”

  “If I don’t hear from you, then what?” Dillard asked.

  “Get out as best you can,” Mason said. “On second thought, it might be a good plan to get out of here right now.… You haven’t had any supper?”

  “That’s right. They said a dame would bring me some sandwiches.”

  Nye snapped his fingers. “I’ve got to contact the agency and head her off. If she should come walking in here right now, it would cause trouble.”

  “Why not go get something to eat?” Mason asked Dillard. “There’s no use keeping Unit 10 under surveillance now. The police will have it blocked off and probably will have a detective spending the night in there, just to see if any telephone calls come in.”

  “Okay,” Dillard said, “I’ll go to dinner.”

  “We’ll go out together,” Nye said. “I’ll take Mason to the hotel and come back and get you.”

  “I have my car here, you know,” Dillard said.

  “Then we’ll take both cars,” Nye told him: “I’ll take Mason to the hotel and I’ll have to head off that woman operative with the sandwiches and coffee.”

  Mason nodded. “On our way, Sid.”

  Chapter 11

  Della Street said, “We saved it for you, Chief, but it’s all cold. I didn’t dare to keep it in the warming oven for fear it would be too well done.”

  “That’s all right,” Mason said. “I’ll eat it cold.”

  “Oh, no,” Della Street protested. “Let’s have another hot one sent up. I’ll—”

  ‘There may not be time,” Mason said. “You didn’t eat much, Dianne.”

  “I didn’t— Somehow I don’t seem to be hungry.”

  “A little different from the way you were when I first met you,” Mason said.

  “Yes, I—”

  “Something happened to change the picture?” Mason asked conversationally, seating himself and cutting off a piece of the steak. “You don’t crave food as you feared you would?”

  “I … I don’t know. I guess I just lost my appetite.”

  “What did you come up here for?” Mason asked.

  “To Riverside?”

  “Yes.”

  “To see Mr. Boring.”

  “See him?”

  “Not yet. Della said to come here. I know now after listening to her, that you should be the one to do the talking.”

  There was silence for a minute.

  Della Street said, “The coffee is hot, Chief. I kept that going over the candle flame but it isn’t fresh-it will only take a few minutes to get more coffee.”

  Mason shook his head, said to Dianne, “Right now Boring is either at the hospital or at the morgue.”

  “Why?” she asked, her eyes wide. “Did something happen to him?”

  “Something happened to him,” Mason said.

  Dianne put her hand to her throat. Her eyes got large and round.

  “Something happened to him,” Mason said, “while you were talking with him.”

  “I … I …” She started blinking back tears.

  Mason said, “Now look, Dianne. You’re playing a dangerous game. It can possibly trap you into a life term in a prison cell. You can’t afford to lie to your lawyer. Now, tell me the truth. What happened?”

  “What do you mean, what happened?”

  Mason said, “You went to the Restawhile Motel. You knew that Boring was in Unit 10. You called on him. Now, did you find him lying on the floor or—”

  “Lying on the floor!” she exclaimed. “What do you mean?”

  “Go on,” Mason said. “Tell me the truth. And don’t ever lie to me—don’t ever try to lie to me again, Dianne. If you do, I’m going to walk out on you.”

  She said, “All right, Mr. Mason, I’ll tell you the truth. I wanted to tell you the truth all along. I did see him. I knew he was up here at the Restawhile.”

  “Who told you?”

  “This man that told me so much about him. He told me where I could find him. He told me that the only thing to do was to make him give me back the other copy of that contract; that he had deliberately tricked me and that he didn’t care a thing in the world about whether I put on one pound or fifty; that all of that stuff about being a model and building up my figure and all that was just so much eyewash, that he would use that contract to get me to go to South America and then suddenly cut me off without any funds and I’d have to… to sell myself. He said that as long as Boring had that contract with my name on it, he could ruin my reputation any time he wanted to.”

  “Did you tell him Boring had terminated that contract?” Mason asked.

  “No, because I felt that so-called repudiation was just a part of the plan to get me in his power.”

  “What time did you see Boring?” Mason asked.

  “Just before I came here.”

  “And did he tear up the contract?”

  “He … gave it back to me.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then I walked out.”

  “How long were you there?”

  “The whole thing couldn’t have been over five minutes.”

  “And when you left, what about it?”

  “Then I came here.”

  “How long were you in there?”

  “It couldn’t have been—not over five minutes.”

  “You couldn’t have been in there fifteen or twenty minutes?”

  “Heavens, no, Mr. Mason. I don’t think I was in there five minutes. Those things happen awfully fast. I don’t think I was in there over two minutes I just told him that I’d found out about him and found out about that contract and it was all a phony and I wanted to call things off and I wanted him to give me that other copy of the contract back.”

  “And then what?”

  “And then he said that he didn’t know who had been talking to me but he had my name on the dotted line and, as he said, he had me sewed up.”

  “And then what?”

  “Mr. Mason, I’ve been over it. It’s just the way I told you. He told me that he had me all sewed up and I told him that I knew he was a big phony, that the whole contract was a phony, that he didn’t have any career as a model for me, that he just wanted to get me in his power, and he laughed and said I was in his power, and I told him I wasn’t, that if he thought he could make me do anything that wasn’t right just because of the money involved, he had two more guesses coming and that I had retained you as my lawyer and then he gave me the contract. That scared him.”

  Mason said, “Look, Dianne, this can be very, very serious. If you picked up a chair and clubbed him over the head while you were defending yourself, or if you used a weapon, or if he tumbled and fell, all you have to do is to say so. You’ve got a good reputation, you can create a good impression and a jury will believe you. But if you try to tell a lie and get caught, it’s going to mean you’re going to be convicted of homicide; perhaps manslaughter, perhaps even second-degree murder.”

  She tried to meet his eyes but failed.

  “Dianne,” Mason said, “you’re lying.”

  Abruptly she said, “I have to lie, Mr. Mason. The truth is simply too utterly devastating.”

  Mason said harshly, “You’ve wasted enough time trying to lie. You can’t get away with it, Dianne. You’re an amateur. You’re not a good enough liar. You haven’t had enough practice. Now, tell me the truth before it’s too late.”

  “What do you mean, too late?”

  “The police,” Mason said. “They may be here any minute. Now, tell me the truth.”

  “I’m afraid you won’t believe me.”

  “Tell me the truth,” Mason said, “and get started—fast!”

  “All right,” she said, “I went to the motel unit and—well, I was all worked up and excited and indignant and—”

  “Never mind all that,” Mason said. “What did you do?”

  “I went to the door and it was open just an inch or two and I could see a light on inside. I knocked and no one answered so I pushed the door open and—well, there he was, lying on the floor. The place reeked with the smell of whiskey and I thought he was dead drunk.”