“Go on,” Mason said.

  “The letter told him that they didn’t like welchers. They said that if he didn’t get the money, their collector would call.”

  “Twenty thousand dollars is a lot of money,” Mason said.

  “He never would have got in that deep if they hadn’t played him for a sucker. They let him get in deeper than he could pay and then saw that he was dealt the second-best hands,”

  “And then when they had him hooked, they lowered the boom? Is that right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Did you come through with the twenty thousand?”

  “No, I didn’t. I wish I had now. I thought Ted had to be taught a lesson. I felt that if he got the money from me, it wouldn’t be any time at all until he’d start trying to get the money to pay me back by betting sure things. I felt it was time for Ted to grow up. Oh, Mr. Mason, if you only knew how I’ve regretted that decision!

  “Ted was sick over the whole thing. He told me he had a. 22 automatic in the glove compartment of his car and he intended to use it. He said that he wasn’t going to be way laid and beaten up and then simply tell the police he didn’t have any idea who did it. He said that he was good for the money but that it would take him a while to get it together. There was a trust which had been left him by his parents and he thought he could explain the situation to the trustee, but the trustee was on vacation and he had to have a little more time.”

  “All right,” Mason said, “what happened?”

  “The dead man must have been the collector,” she said. “Don’t you see? Ted killed him and then tried to make it look as though the man had been killed in a hit-and-run accident.”

  Mason studied her thoughtfully for a moment, then said, “You told that readily enough.”

  “It’s the truth.”

  “I’m sure it is. I merely said, you told it to me readily enough.”

  “I had to. You’ve trapped me. I don’t know how you found me here, but since you found me, I had to tell you what I know, no matter whom it hurts.”

  “All right,” Mason said. “So far, so good. Now tell me the real reason you went to such pains to keep from being questioned.”

  “I’ve told you everything I know.”

  “What about the tape recorder?”

  “What tape recorder?”

  “The one you bought—the wall snooper.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Come on,” Mason said. “Come clean!”

  “Mr. Mason, you can’t talk to me like that! You must think I’m someone whom you can push around. Your very manner is insulting. I am a truthful woman, and I am not a woman who is accustomed to being pushed around by—”

  Mason reached in the inside pocket of his light-weight business suit, pulled out a folded paper, and dropped it in her lap.

  “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Your copy of a subpoena in the case of People versus Balfour. Here’s the original, with the signature of the clerk and the seal of the Court, Be there at the time of trial; otherwise be subject to proceedings in contempt of court.”

  Mason arose, said, “I’m sorry I had to do that, but you brought it on yourself, Mrs. Ingle. Good-by now.”

  Mason had taken two steps before her voice caught up with him. “Wait, wait, for heaven’s sake, Mr. Mason, wait!”

  Mason paused, looked back over his shoulder.

  “I’ll… I’ll tell you the truth. You can’t do this to me, Mr. Mason. You can’t! You mustn’t!”

  “Mustn’t do what?”

  “Mustn’t subpoena me in that case.”

  “Why?”

  “Because if you put me on the stand I … it will… it will be terrible.”

  “Go ahead,” Mason said. “Keep talking.”

  She stood looking at his stern features, her own face white and frightened. “I don’t dare to,” she said. “I simply don’t dare tell anyone.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s … it won’t help you, Mr. Mason. It will… it will be terrible!”

  “All right,” Mason said, “you have your subpoena. Be there in court.”

  “But you can’t put me on the stand. If I told about what Ted Balfour had asked me to do, if I told about his needing the money, and the collector—”

  “No one would believe you,” Mason interrupted. “I’ve served a subpoena on you. You’re trying to get out of circulation. That subpoena is going to smoke you out in the open. The only reason for it is that I want the true story. If you know something that’s causing you to take all these precautions, I want to find out what it is.”

  She looked at him as though she might be about to faint, then, with difficulty composing herself, she said, “Come into the bar where we can talk without my making a spectacle of myself.”

  “You’ll tell me the truth?” Mason asked.

  She nodded.

  “Let’s go,” Mason told her, leading the way to the bar.

  “Well?” Mason said after the waiter had gone.

  “Mr. Mason, I’m protecting someone,”

  “I was satisfied you were,” Mason said.

  “Someone whom I love.”

  “Guthrie Balfour?” Mason asked.

  For a moment it appeared she would deny it. Then she tearfully nodded.

  “All right,” Mason said. “Let’s have the truth this time.”

  “I’m not a good liar, Mr. Mason, she said. I never had occasion to do much lying.”

  “I know,” Mason said sympathetically.

  She had taken off the dark glasses. The eyes that looked at the lawyer were circled with the weariness of sleepless nights and filled with dismay.

  “Go on,” Mason said. “What happened?”

  She said, “Mr. Mason, that Dorla Balfour is a scheming, wicked woman who has almost a hypnotic influence over Guthrie Balfour. She’s not his type at all. He’s wasting himself on her, and yet somehow … well, somehow I wonder if she doesn’t have some terrific hold on him, something that he can’t escape.”

  “What makes you think so?” Mason asked.

  “She’s twisting him around her thumb.”

  “Go on.”

  “I’ll tell you the real story, Mr. Mason, the whole story. Please listen and don’t interrupt. It’s a thoroughly incredible story and I’m not proud of my part in it, but… well, it will explain a lot of things.”

  “Go ahead,” Mason said.

  “Dorla Balfour was and is a little tramp. She was taking Guthrie for everything she could take him for, and, believe me, the minute Guthrie Balfour got out of town, she was getting herself in circulation without missing a minute.”

  Mason nodded.

  “Guthrie had begun to wake up,” she said. “He wanted a divorce, but he didn’t want to get stuck for a lot of alimony. Dorla wouldn’t mind a bit if he’d divorce her, but she has her grasping little hand out for a big slice of alimony. She’d go to the best lawyers in the country and she’d make herself just as much of a legal nuisance as is possible. She’d tie up Guthrie’s property. She’d get restraining orders. She’d drag him into court on orders to show cause, and she’d … well, she’d raise the devil.”

  “Meaning that she’d drag your name into it?” Mason asked.

  Mrs. Ingle lowered her eyes.

  “Yes or no?” Mason asked.

  “Yes,” she said in a low voice. “Only there was nothing … nothing except sympathy.”

  “But you couldn’t prove that?” Mason asked.

  “She could make nasty insinuations and get notoriety for both of us.”

  “Okay,” Mason said, “now we’re doing better. Let’s have the story.”

  “Well, Guthrie was leaving for Chihuahua City; that is, that’s what he told her. Actually, he got on the train at Los Angeles and then left it at the Alhambra-Pasadena station.”

  “He left it?” Mason asked.

  She nodded.

  “Why, that’s what Dorla was supposed to have done,” Mason said.

  “I know,” she said. “That was all part of the plan he had worked out. When the train stopped at the Pasadena station, he kissed her good-by and got back aboard the train. The vestibule doors slammed and the train started out. Guthrie sent the porter back on an errand, opened the car door on the other side of the car, and swung to the ground as the train was gathering speed. By the time the train had gone on past, Dorla was in a taxicab.”

  “And Guthrie?” Mason asked.

  “Guthrie jumped in a car he’d rented earlier in the day from a drive-yourself rental agency. He’d parked the car at the station. He followed Dorla.”

  “Then, when the train pulled out, neither Guthrie nor Dorla was aboard?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Go ahead. What happened then?”

  “Guthrie followed Dorla. Oh, Mr. Mason, I’d pleaded with him not to do it. I asked him a dozen times to get some private detective agency on the job. That’s their business. But Guthrie had to do this himself. I think he was so utterly fascinated by Dorla that he wouldn’t believe anything against her unless he saw it with his own eyes.

  “I think he knew the truth, but I think he knew himself well enough to feel she’d be able to talk him out of it unless he saw her himself and had the proof. He wanted proof without any outsiders for witnesses. That’s why he asked me to get him that tape recorder. He wanted to record what was happening after she … well, you know, after she met the man.”

  “Go on,” Mason said. “What did Dorla do?”

  “Drove to the Sleepy Hollow Motel.”

  “So then what?”

  “She met her boyfriend there. They had a passionate reunion.”

  “Where was Guthrie?”

  “He’d managed to get into the unit that adjoined the one where Dorla’s boy friend was staying. He’d put the microphone up to the wall and he had a tape recording of the whole business.”

  “You were there with him?”

  “Good heavens, no! That would have ruined everything he was trying to do.”

  “That’s what I thought, but how do you know all this?”

  “He phoned me.”

  “From Chihuahua?”

  “No. Please let me tell it in my own way.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “After a while Dorla went out. She said she had to go home and let Ted know she was seeking her virtuous couch. She said that she’d pick up a suitcase and be back later on in the evening.”

  “Then what?”

  “That’s where Guthrie made the mistake of his life,” she said. “He thought that he might be able to go into the motel next door, face this man who was registered under the name of Jackson Eagan and put it up to him cold turkey. He thought that this man might get frightened and sign a statement. It was a crazy thing to do.”

  “What happened?”

  “This man, Eagan, was in a dimly lit motel bedroom. The minute Guthrie walked in Eagan snapped on a powerful flash-light and the beam hit Guthrie right in the face, completely blinding him. Eagan, on the other hand, could see his visitor. He obviously recognized Guthrie, felt certain the irate husband was about to invoke the unwritten law, and threw a chair. He followed it up by hitting the blinded Guthrie with everything he had.

  “Guthrie tried to frighten this man by bringing out this gun of Ted’s that he’d taken from the glove compartment of the car without Ted’s knowing it.

  “The two men started fighting for the gun. In the struggle the gun went off and Eagan fell to the floor. Guthrie knew from the way he hit the floor he was dead. And all at once Guthrie realized the full implications of the situation. He was afraid someone might have heard the shot and phoned for the police, so he jumped in his car and drove away fast.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then,” she said, “Guthrie had this idea. He realized that nobody, except me, knew that he had left the train. He called me from the telephone in his house. He told me everything that had happened. He said that he was going to take the company plane, fly to Phoenix and pick up the train there. He said he’d wire for Dorla to join him at Tucson, and in that way Dorla would have to give him an alibi. He asked me to take a commercial plane to Phoenix and fly his plane back. He said that he would leave a note with the attendant so that I could get the plane, and if I’d do that, well, no one would ever be the wiser.”

  “And so?” Mason asked.

  “So I did that. I went down to Phoenix the next day. His plane was there and so was the note so that I could get it without any trouble. I flew it back, picked up his rented car where he’d left it at the hangar, and returned it to the rental agency.”

  “And Dorla joined him?”

  “Dorla must have joined him. Only to hear her tell it, she never got off the train. I know that’s a lie because I know from Guthrie what really happened. You can see the whole thing, Mr. Mason. He called on her to give him an alibi. He didn’t tell her what happened. He didn’t need to. When she got her suitcase and returned to the motel, she found her lover boy, Eagan, lying there dead.

  “Now, under those circumstances, I know exactly what she’d have done, and it’s just what she did. She telephoned for Banner Boles, the ace trouble shooter for Balfour Allied Associates. Boles realized at once that it would be better to have a drunk-driving charge against Ted and try to beat that rap than to have a murder charge against Guthrie. He’s unbelievably resourceful and clever.

  “So he fixed the whole deal up and Dorla flew to Tucson and picked up the train. Guthrie asked her to swear she’d been on the train all the time. That was right down her alley. Now she has a murder rap on him and she’ll bleed him white. There won’t be any divorce until she is all ready for it, with a new husband picked out, and she’ll strip Balfour of everything he has left when she’s ready to cut loose from him.”

  “That’s all of it?” Mason asked.

  “That’s all of it,” she said. “Now you see why I had to get out of circulation. It was all right for a while. It looked like a hit and run. Of course, Ted was mixed up in it, but everyone knew that Ted could get a suspended sentence if he was found guilty.”

  “And what did you hear from Guthrie after he went to Mexico?” Mason said.

  “Only this,” she said, fighting to keep her lips straight as she opened her handbag and took out a crumpled wire.

  She passed the wire over to Mason. Mason unfolded the yellow paper and read:

  SAY NOTHING OF WHAT HAS HAPPENED. DORLA AND I HAVE REACHED FULL AGREEMENT AND BELIEVE EVERYTHING WILL COME OUT ALL RIGHT IN THE FUTURE.

  GUTHRIE

  “That,” Mason said, “was sent from Chihuahua City?”

  She nodded.

  “And since that time?”

  “Since that time I haven’t heard a word. Dorla has been with him, and heaven knows what she’s done.”

  Mason said, “Would Guthrie Balfour sit back and see Ted convicted of murder?”

  “No, of course not, not of murder. He’ll come forward if he has to. After all, Mr. Mason, it was self-defense.”

  “He’d have a hell of a time proving that now.”

  “Well, now you know the facts. What are you going to do?”

  “There’s only one thing I can do,” Mason said.

  “What?”

  “I’m representing Ted Balfour.”

  “You mean you’ll blow the whole case wide open?”

  “I’ll blow the top clean off,” Mason said, “if I have to.”

  She looked at him with angry eyes. “I played fair with you, Mr. Mason.”

  “I’m playing fair with my client,” Mason told her. “That’s the only fair play I know.”

  “Do you think I’m a complete, utter fool?” she asked. “You couldn’t drag that story out of me on the witness stand no matter what you did. I told you so you’d know, so you’d understand what to do. Can’t you understand? You’re working for the Balfours. They’re wealthy. You can have any amount you need as a fee, only fix this thing up so that…well, work it out on a basis of legal technicalities so the facts never need to come out.”

  Mason got to his feet. “You already have my answer.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “The paper you folded and put in your purse—your subpoena to appear as a witness on behalf of the defendant.”

  CHAPTER 15

  As Perry Mason entered the office, Della Street said, “We have troubles,”

  “What?” Mason asked.

  “I don’t know. But Addison Balfour telephoned.”

  “Personally?”

  “Personally.”

  “And talked with you?”

  “That’s right.”

  “What did he want?”

  “He said that this wasn’t the simple case it seemed, that the whole Balfour empire was threatened, that he was going to leave it up to you to work out the best deal possible. He said his right-hand man, Banner Boles, would be in touch with you within a short time, that Boles knew his way around and knew how to handle things.”

  “And did he say what the trouble was?”

  “No.”

  “Or what Banner Boles wanted to see me about?”

  “No. It was just to tell you that there was trouble and Boles would be seeing you.”

  “Okay,” Mason said, “I’ll see him.”

  “How did you come out with Florence Ingle?”

  “I had a nice talk with her,” Mason said.

  “You don’t seem very happy about it.”

  “I’m not.”

  The phone rang. Della Street answered it, said, “Yes, just a moment, Mr. Boles; I’m quite certain he’ll talk with you.”

  She cupped her hand over the mouthpiece, nodded toward the telephone, and said to Perry Mason, “This is Banner Boles on the line now.”

  Mason picked up the extension phone on his desk, said, “Yes, hello. This is Perry Mason talking.”

  “Banner Boles, Mr. Mason,” a hearty voice at the other end of the line said.

  “How are you, Mr. Boles?”

  “Did Addison Balfour telephone you about me?”

  “I understand he talked with my office,” Mason said. “I’m just getting in myself.”

  “Well, I want to see you.”

  “So I understand. Come on up.”