“I agree with you entirely,” Tragg interrupted. “That also depends entirely on the temperature of the frying pan. But what do you think about Faulkner’s murder?”

  “I never think about murders, Lieutenant, unless I’m paid to do so. And in the event I’m paid for my thoughts, I try to give only my client the benefit of them. Now you are in a different position . . .”

  “Quite right,” Tragg interposed calmly, reaching for the sugar as the waiter served his first cup of coffee. “I am paid by the taxpayers to think about murders at all times, and, thinking about murder, I somehow find my thoughts turning to a certain Miss Sally Madison. What can you tell me about her?”

  “A rather attractive young woman,” Mason said. “She seems to be devoted to her present boy friend who works in a pet store. Doubtless she has had other boy friends to whom she has been devoted, but I think that her present affair with Tom Gridley is, perhaps, more apt to result in matrimony.”

  “Something of a golddigger, I understand,” Tragg observed.

  Mason’s face showed surprise. “Who told you that?”

  “Oh, I get around. Is she a client of yours?”

  “Now there again,” Mason said smiling, “you are asking a difficult question. That is, the question is easy; it’s the answer that’s difficult.”

  “You might try answering it either yes or no,” Tragg said.

  “It isn’t that easy. She hasn’t as yet definitely retained me to represent her interests. But on the other hand, I think she desires to do so, and I am investigating the facts.”

  “Think you’ll represent her?”

  “I’m sure I can’t say. The case she presents is far from being an easy one.”

  “So I would gather.”

  “You see,” Mason went on, “ as the agent of her boy friend, Tom Gridley, she may or may not have reached a contract with Harrington Faulkner. A contract involves a meeting of the minds, and a meeting of the minds in turn depends upon . . . ”

  Tragg held up his hand. “Please,” he begged.

  Mason raised his eyebrows in apparent surprise.

  Tragg said, “You’re unusually loquacious this morning, Counselor. And a man who can deliver such an extemporaneous dissertation upon the art of frying eggs could doubtless talk almost indefinitely on the law of contracts. And so, if you’ll pardon me, I think I’ll talk to your charming secretary.”

  Tragg turned to Della Street and asked, “Where did you spend the night last night, Miss Street?”

  Della smiled sweetly. “That question, of course, Lieutenant, involved an assumption that the night is, or was, an indivisible unit. Now, as a matter of fact, a night is really divided into two periods. First, the period before midnight, which I believe was legally yesterday, and the period after midnight, which is today.”

  Tragg grinned, said to Perry Mason, “She’s an apt pupil, Counselor. I doubt if you could have stalled for time any better if you had stepped in and answered the question for her.”

  “I doubt if I could have done as well,” Mason admitted cheerfully.

  “Now,” Tragg said, suddenly losing his smile and becoming grimly official in his manner, “suppose we quit talking about fried eggs and contracts and the legal subdivisions of the period of darkness, and suppose, Miss Street, you tell me exactly where you were from ten o’clock last night until the present time, omitting nothing—and that’s an official question.”

  “Is there any reason why she should have to answer that question?” Mason asked. “Even conceding that it is a legal question.”

  Tragg’s face was as hard as granite. “Yes. In the event I get the run-around it will be an important factor in determining whether any connection Miss Street may have had with what transpired was accidental or deliberate.”

  Della Street said brightly, “Well, of course . . .”

  “Take it easy, Della,” Mason warned.

  She glanced at him and at what she saw in his eyes the expression of animation fled from her features.

  “I’m still waiting for an answer to my question,” Lieutenant Tragg said harshly.

  “Don’t you think you should be fair with Miss Street?” Mason asked.

  Tragg didn’t take his eyes from Della’s face. He said, “Your interruptions all go on the debit side of the ledger as far as I’m concerned, Mason. Miss Street, where did you spend the night?”

  Mason interposed suavely, “Of course, Lieutenant, you’re not a mind reader. The fact that you came to this restaurant means that you knew we were in the neighborhood. There are logically only two sources from which you could have acquired that information. One of them is that you received over the radio a report from a patrol car stating that it had been called to the Kellinger Hotel, where a complaint had been made that two young women were receiving a male guest as a visitor in violation of the rules of the hotel, and the police had been called to eject the tenants. You thereupon acted upon the assumption that you would, perhaps, find the parties who had been ejected in a near-by all-night restaurant, and by the simple process of cruising around, located us here.”

  Tragg started to say something, but Mason, slightly raising his voice, kept the conversational lead. “The other assumption is that you picked up Sally Madison on the street a few moments ago and questioned her. In which event you learned from her that we were in the vicinity. And if you questioned her, you doubtless made a rather complete job of it.”

  Mason’s warning glance at Della Street conveyed the impression to her that in such event Lieutenant Tragg had doubtless examined the purse and by this time was fully familiar with its contents.

  Tragg was still looking at Della Street. “Now that you’ve been properly coached, Miss Street, where did you spend the night?”

  “I spent part of it at my apartment. The rest of it at the Kellinger Hotel.”

  “How did you happen to go to the Kellinger Hotel?”

  “Sally Madison called me on the telephone and told me Mr. Mason wished me to take her to some hotel.”

  “Did she say why?”

  Della Street said quite innocently, “I can’t remember quite definitely whether she told me why or whether I subsequently learned why from Mr. Mason. He wanted me to get her out of . . . ”

  “Out of circulation,” Tragg prompted as Della Street’s voice suddenly trailed away into silence.

  “Out of the way of newspaper reporters,” Della Street finished, smiling sweetly at Lieutenant Tragg.

  “What time was this?” Tragg asked.

  “That Sally Madison called me?”

  “Yes.”

  Della Street said, “I really couldn’t say. I don’t think I looked at my watch, but doubtless the Kellinger Hotel can tell you approximately what time we arrived.”

  “What I am asking you now,” Tragg said, “is what time you received this call from Sally Madison.”

  “I’m sure I can’t say.”

  “Now then,” Tragg said, “we’re getting to the important part. Watch your answers carefully, because a great deal is going to depend on what you say. Did you notice anything unusual about Sally Madison?”

  “Oh, yes,” Della Street told him quickly.

  Tragg’s voice was grim and harsh. “What?” he asked, and the single word was as harshly explosive as the cracking of a whip.

  Mason’s eyes warned Della Street.

  “Why,” she said, “the girl slept in the nude.” She smiled at Lieutenant Tragg and then went on rapidly, “That’s rather unusual, you know, Lieutenant . . . I mean she simply stripped her clothes off and jumped into bed. Ordinarily a young woman as beautiful as Sally Madison takes much more care of her personal appearance before retiring. She’ll put creams and lotions on her face and usually . . .”

  “That isn’t what I meant,” Tragg said.

  “Of course,” Mason interposed, “you’ve interrupted Della, Lieutenant. If you had let her keep on talking, she might have told you exactly what you had in mind.”

  “If I’d let her keep on talking,” Tragg said, “she’d have been here until noon describing Sally Madison’s bedtime habits. The question is, Miss Street, did you or did you not notice anything unusual about Sally Madison or did she make any confession or admission to you?”

  “Remember, Lieutenant,” Mason said, “that as a potential client, anything Sally Madison may have said was a privileged communication and as Della Street is my secretary, she can’t be questioned concerning that.”

  “I think I understand that rule,” Tragg conceded. “And it applies to anything that was necessarily said in connection with the matter on which Sally Madison was consulting you. Now I take it that matter related exclusively to a claim she had against the estate of Harrington Faulkner. I now want to know definitely, once and for all, whether Della Street noticed anything unusual or significant in connection with Sally Madison. Did you or did you not, Miss Street?”

  Della Street said, “Of course, Lieutenant, I had only met the girl a day or two ago, and so I don’t know what is usual about her. Therefore, when you ask me if I noticed anything unusual, it’s hard to tell . . .”

  “All this stalling around,” Tragg said, “causes me to reach a very definite conclusion in my own mind. Miss Street, how did it happen Perry Mason came up to call on you at the hour of five o’clock in the morning?”

  “Was it five o’clock?” Della Street asked, with some show of surprise. “I’m certain that I didn’t look at my watch, Lieutenant. I merely . . .”

  Mason said, “There again, of course, the records of the Hotel Kellinger will be of some assistance to you, Lieutenant.”

  Tragg said, “Despite your repeated warnings to Della Street that she isn’t to conceal any information which I can subsequently ascertain by interviewing the clerk at the Kellinger Hotel, I want to know whether you noticed anything unusual in connection with Sally Madison, anything in connection with her wearing apparel, what she had on, what she had with her, what she did, or what she said.”

  Mason said, “I’m quite certain, Lieutenant, that if Miss Street had noticed anything such as you have mentioned that was sufficiently unusual to be of any importance, she would have told me, so you can ask your question of me.”

  “I don’t have to. I’m asking Miss Street. Miss Street, why did you call Perry Mason and ask him to come to the hotel?”

  Della Street’s eyes were suddenly hard and defiant. “That is none of your business.”

  “Do you mean that?”

  “Yes.”

  “You know my business is rather inclusive,” Tragg said, “particularly insofar as murders are concerned.”

  Della Street clamped her lips together in a tight line.

  Abruptly, Tragg said, “All right, you two have sparred around here trying to find out how much I know. The very fact that you’ve been sparring for time convinces me that you do know the thing I wanted to find out. As Perry Mason so aptly pointed out, you could gamble with either one of two alternatives. One was that I’d received a report from the officers who answered the call to the Kellinger Hotel, and had cruised the neighborhood simply on the off chance of picking you up. The other was that I had first picked up Sally Madison and questioned her. You stalled for time, hoping that the first alternative was the correct one. You’re wrong. I’d picked up the report from the officers when it came in as a routine radio report. I’d been up all night, waiting for a break in the case. That radio report looked like the break I’d been waiting for. I dashed out and picked up Sally Madison on the street. In her purse she had two thousand dollars in cash, the possession of which she couldn’t explain. She also had a thirty-eight caliber, double-action revolver which had recently been fired, and which bears every evidence of having been the weapon with which Harrington Faulkner was murdered. Now then, Perry Mason and Della Street, if I can prove that either one of you knew of the contents of that purse, I’m going to stick you as being accessories after the fact. I gave you every opportunity to report to me and to communicate any significant information connected with the murder of Harrington Faulkner. You chose not to do so. And, so help me, Mason, if I can prove that you knew that gun was in Sally Madison’s purse, I’m going to nail you to the cross.”

  Abruptly, Lieutenant Tragg pushed back his chair, said to the puzzled waiter, “Never mind the ham and eggs. I’ll pay the check now.”

  And Tragg slammed money down on the counter and walked out.

  Della Street’s eyes, sick with dismay, caught those of Perry Mason. “Oh, Chief,” she said, “I should have told him! I’m sick all over.”

  The lines of Mason’s face could have been carved from stone. He said, “It’s okay, kid. There were two possible alternatives. We took a chance and we lost. Now we’ll carry on from there. It seems to be our unlucky day. We’re in it together, and it’s a sweet mess.”

  Chapter 11

  Perry Mason, Della Street and Paul Drake sat in Mason’s office, grouped around Mason’s big desk.

  Mason finished his account of the events of the past few hours, and said, “So you see, Paul, we’re in a jam.”

  Drake whistled softly. “I’ll say you’re in a jam. Why didn’t you toss the jane overboard as soon as you saw that rod and call the cops?”

  “Because I was afraid they wouldn’t have believed us in the first place, and, in the second place I hated to throw her to the wolves without knowing what it was all about. I wanted to hear her side of the story first. And, if you want to know, I thought we could sneak out of it and get away with it.”

  Drake nodded, said, “Yes, it was a good gamble all right, only you seem to have lost with every throw of the dice.”

  “We did indeed,” Mason said.

  “Just where does that leave you now?”

  Mason said, “If they can pin some part in the murder on Sally Madison, it leaves us right out on the end of the limb. If they can’t, we’ll probably squeeze out. What have you found out about the facts of the murder, Paul?”

  Drake said, “They’re putting an official hush-hush on the thing, but I can tell you this much—the medical examiner made a bad slip. The young deputy coroner who went out there was green, and Sergeant Dorset was helping to ball things up. The police have fixed the time of death within a very short time, but, as I understand it, the autopsy surgeon neglected to do the one thing that would have given the cops a perfect case.”

  Mason said, “That’s good.”

  “I can tell you something else, Perry, that doesn’t look so good.”

  “What?”

  “This chap that works in the pet shop, Tom Gridley, seems to have been out there and got a check for one thousand dollars, and that check may have been about the last thing that Faulkner ever wrote.”

  “How do they figure that out, Paul?”

  “There was a checkbook lying on the floor. The last stub in it had been partially filled out. It was a check for one thousand dollars, and Faulkner had been writing on that stub when all of a sudden his pen simply quit writing, but he had written ‘Tom’ and then the letters ‘G-r-i.’ Quite evidently he’d been intending to write ‘Tom Gridley.’ There was a fountain pen found on the floor.”

  Mason thought that over for a moment, said, “What did Tom Gridley say about it, Paul?”

  “No one knows. The police swooped down on him as soon as they found that stub in the checkbook, and Gridley has been out of circulation ever since.”

  “When do the police think the murder was committed?”

  “Right around eight-fifteen. Say between eight-fifteen and eight-thirty. Faulkner was to have attended a meeting of goldfish experts. He was to have been there at eight-thirty. About ten minutes past eight he telephoned and said that he’d been delayed by a business matter which had detained him longer than he’d expected; that he was just shaving and was going to jump in a hot bath, that as soon as he’d finished he’d be right over, but that he would be perhaps a few minutes late. He also said he’d have to leave probably at nine-thirty, as he had a business appointment for that hour. And then, right in the middle of the conversation, he said to someone who had evidently entered the room while he was telephoning, ‘How did you get in here? I don’t want to see you, and if and when I do want to see you, I’ll send for you.’ The person at the other end of the line could hear the mumble of some voices, and then Faulkner said, apparently very irritated, ‘Well, I’m not going to discuss it tonight. Damn it, either get out or I’ll throw you out. All right, if you want it that way, here it is,’ and then abruptly he slammed the telephone receiver into place right in the middle of the conversation.

  “These people who were having the meeting wanted to be sure to have Faulkner there. They wanted to get some money out of him. They called him back at eight-twenty-five and no one answered the telephone, so they concluded Faulkner was on his way. They waited another five or ten minutes, then when he hadn’t shown up, tried to get him again. Then they went ahead with the meeting. Now, obviously, Faulkner had been dressing and getting ready to go to that meeting. There was a razor on the glass shelf in the bathroom with lather and whiskers still adhering to the blade, and Faulkner was freshly shaved when the body was discovered. Putting all that together, the police are absolutely positive that while Faulkner was telephoning, some visitor walked in unexpectedly, some visitor who hadn’t rung a doorbell, but had simply walked in. Faulkner resented his coming, and decided to throw him out physically. That’s when he slammed up the telephone and started toward the intruder. The police think that’s just about when the shot was fired.”

  “And the autopsy surgeon?” Mason asked.

  “Apparently the autopsy surgeon was asleep at the switch. When the cops got there, it didn’t appear to be particularly important to fix the time of death right down to a minute, and there was more work done in connection with photographing the position of the body, getting fingerprints and trying to reconstruct the physical evidence than in getting to work with body temperatures and all that sort of stuff. The detectives think it was a blunder on the part of the medical department and there’s some feeling about it. Taking the body’s temperature right at the time the police first arrived would have given them some fine corroborations. As it is, they have to rely on deductions.”