“And what will it be tomorrow?”

  “I don’t know. I think he’ll give me the five thousand tonight.”

  Mason studied the expressionless countenance, heavy with make-up. His eyes showed he was taking a keen interest in the entire affair. “Faulkner says you’re a golddigger.”

  “Yes, he would think so.”

  “Are you?”

  “Perhaps. I really don’t know. Probably I am. But if Mr. Faulkner wants to throw brickbats around, let him tell you about himself. He’s a tight-fisted, miserly, overbearing— Oh, what’s the use! You wouldn’t understand.”

  Mason laughed outright. “ I’m trying,” he said, “ to make heads or tails out of this case. So far I don’t seem to be having very much success. Now will you please tell me what it's all about?”

  She said, “My connection with it is very simple. I want money out of Harrington Faulkner.”

  “And just why do you think Faulkner should give you money?”

  “He wants his goldfish to get well, doesn’t he?”

  “Apparently, but I’m afraid I don’t see the connection.”

  For the first time since Mason had seated himself, some expression struggled through the glazed make-up of her face. “Mr. Mason, did you ever see someone whom you loved sick with tuberculosis?”

  Mason’s eyes were puzzled. He shook his head. “Go on,” he said.

  “Harrington Faulkner has money. So much money that he’d never miss five thousand dollars. He’s spent thousands of dollars on his hobby. Heaven knows how much he’s spent on these black goldfish alone. Not only is he rich but he’s stinking rich, and he hasn’t the faintest idea of how to enjoy his money or how to spend it so it Would do him or anyone else any good. He’ll just keep on piling it up until some day he’ll die and that granite-hearted wife of his will fall heir to it. He’s a miser except on his goldfish. And in the meantime Tom Gridley has T.B. The doctor says he needs absolute rest, freedom from worry, complete relaxation. How much chance does Tom stand of getting any of that while he’s working at twenty-seven dollars a week, nine hours a day, in a pet store which is damp and smelly. . . . He hasn’t had a chance to get out in the sunlight except a few brief snatches he can get on Sundays. That, of course, isn’t enough even to help.

  “Mr. Faulkner goes into spasms because a few black goldfish are dying of gill disease, but he’d watch Tom die of T.B. and simply ignore the whole thing as being none of his concern.”

  “Go on,” Mason said.

  “That’s all there is to it.”

  “But what,” Mason asked, “ does Tom Gridley have to do with Harrington Faulkner?”

  “Didn’t he tell you?”

  “No.”

  She sighed with exasperation. “ That’s what he went over there to tell you about.”

  Mason said, “ Perhaps it’s my fault. I got off on the wrong tangent. I thought you were trying to blackmail him.”

  “I am,” she said with calm candor.

  “But apparently not the way I thought,” Mason explained.

  She said, “Do you know anything about goldfish, Mr. Mason?”

  “Not a darn thing,” Mason admitted.

  “Neither do I,” she said, “but Tom knows all about them. The goldfish that are Mr. Faulkner’s most prized possession have some sort of a gill disease and Tom has a treatment that will cure it. The only other treatment is a copper sulphate treatment that quite frequently proves fatal to the fish, and is of doubtful value as far as the disease is concerned. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.”

  “Tell me about Tom’s treatment.”

  “It’s a secret, but I can tell you this much. In place of being a harsh treatment that shocks the fish, it’s a gentle treatment that is thoroughly beneficial. Of course, one of the problems of treating fish by putting things in the water is that the remedy has to be thoroughly mixed with the water, and then, the minute you let it settle, it is apt to concentrate in the wrong places. If the remedy is heavier than water it will settle to the bottom, or if it’s lighter it will rise to the top.”

  “And how does Tom get away from that?” Mason asked, interested.

  “I can tell you that much. He paints the remedy he uses on a plastic panel which is inserted into the fish tank and then the panels are changed at certain intervals.”

  “And it works?” Mason asked.

  “I’ll say it works. It worked with Mr. Faulkner’s fish.”

  “But I thought they were still sick.”

  “They are.”

  “Then it wouldn’t seem that the remedy worked.”

  “Oh, but it does. You see, Tom wanted to go ahead and cure the fish entirely, but I wouldn’t let him. I gave Mr. Faulkner just enough of the remedy to keep them from dying, and then I told him that if he wanted to finance Tom in the invention we’d let him have a half interest in it and he could put it on the market. Tom’s one of these simple souls who trusts everyone. He’s a chemist and is always experimenting with remedies. He worked out one remedy for distemper and simply gave it to David Rawlins, the man who was running the pet shop. Rawlins just said ‘Thank you,’ and didn’t even give Tom a raise. Of course, you can’t blame him very much because I can understand his problem. He doesn’t have a large volume of business and there isn’t a whole lot of money to be made out of pets unless you have a huge place, but he works Tom terribly hard and . . . Well, after all, the man’s making some money out of this invention of Tom’s for distemper.”

  “Those two the only things Tom’s invented?” Mason asked.

  “No, no, he’s done other things but somebody always gyps him out of them . . . Well, this time I decided things would be different. I am going to take charge of the thing myself. Mr. Faulkner could give Tom five thousand outright and then pay him a royalty to boot. I’m willing to let the five thousand be considered as an advance payment against one half of the royalties, but only against one half.”

  “I don’t suppose there are a great number of goldfish fanciers in the country,” Mason said.

  “Oh, but I think there are. I think that lots of people collect them as a hobby.”

  “But do you think there’s enough gill disease to enable Mr. Faulkner to break even on an investment of that size?”

  “I don’t know, and I don’t care. All I’m interested in is seeing that Tom gets a chance to go out into the country, some place where there’s sunshine and fresh air. He’s got to go where he can take life easy for a while. If he does, they tell me he can be cured absolutely. If he doesn’t, things will go from bad to worse until finally it will be too late. I’m giving Mr. Faulkner an opportunity to cure those prize fish of his and to have a remedy that will enable him to build up his strain without danger of future infection, and that’s worth a lot to him. When you consider what he’s spent on them, I’m letting him off cheap.”

  Mason smiled. “ But you’re boosting the ante on him one thousand dollars a day?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s trying to blackmail me. He says Tom worked out his invention while he was working for Rawlins and that, therefore, the invention belongs to Rawlins and unless Tom cures his fish, then Mr. Faulkner will buy an interest in Rawlins’ store and sue Tom for his invention. Mr. Faulkner is a hard man, and I’m dealing with him in the only way he’ll understand—the hard way.”

  “And just what is Tom Gridley to you?” Mason asked.

  She met his eyes steadily. “My boy friend.”

  Mason chuckled. “Well,” he said, “it’s no wonder Faulkner thinks you’re a golddigger. I thought from the way he talked that he’d been making passes at you and that you were holding him up.”

  Her eyes flickered somewhat scornfully over to where Harrington Faulkner was sitting, stiffly uncomfortable, at the table. “Mr. Faulkner,” she announced with cold finality, “never made passes at anyone,” and then, after a moment, qualified by adding, “ except a goldfish.”

  Mason smiled. “ The man’s married?”

  “That’s what I mean. A goldfish.”

  “His wife?”

  “Yes.”

  The waiter appeared with food on a tray. “ Shall I serve you at this table?” he inquired of Mason.

  Mason looked over to where Harrington Faulkner had turned to regard proceedings at the other table, apparently with anxiety. “ If you don’t mind,” he said to Sally Madison, “ I’ll return to my table, and send Mr. Faulkner back to join you. I don’t think I’ll take his case.”

  “You don’t need to send him back,” Sally Madison said. “ Tell him to send over his check for five thousand bucks, and tell him from me that I’m going to wait here until I get it, or until his damn black goldfish turn belly up.”

  “I’ll tell him,” Mason promised, and, excusing himself, returned to his own table.

  Faulkner glanced at him questioningly.

  Mason nodded. “ I don’t know just what you want,” he said, “ but I’ll at least look into the matter—after I’ve had something to eat.”

  “We could talk right here,” Faulkner said.

  Mason’s nod indicated Sally Madison sitting. alone at the other table. “After I’ve had something to eat,” he repeated, “ and I take it you didn’t want me to try and work out any terms with Miss Madison, because, if you did, I’m not interested.”

  Faulkner said, “ Sally Madison’s proposition amounts to blackmail.”

  “I dare say it does,” Mason agreed calmly. “ There’s a lot of blackmail in the world.”

  Faulkner said bitterly, “ I suppose she’s played upon your sympathies. After all, her face and her figure are her biggest asset, and how well she knows it!” And then he added even more bitterly, “ Personally, I don’t see what people can see in that type.”

  Mason merely grinned. “ Personally,” he announced, “ I have never collected goldfish.”

  Chapter 3

  A thick pea-soup fog had settled down upon the streets of the city until it seemed that Mason’s automobile was swimming slowly through a sea of watered milk. The windshield wipers were busily beating a monotonous rhythm of cold protest against the clammy surface of the windshield. Some fifty feet ahead, the red taillight of Harrington Faulkner’s automobile served as a guiding beacon.

  “He’s a slow driver,” Della Street said.

  “An advantage in weather of this kind,” Mason agreed.

  Drake laughed. “Bet the guy never took a chance in his life. He’s a cold-blooded, meticulous bird with an ice-water personality. I almost died when I saw him kick through over there at the table with that golddigger. How much did she nick him for, Perry?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Judging from the expression on his face when he took out his checkbook,” Della said, “ it must have been just about what the girl asked for. She certainly didn’t waste any time once she got her hands on the check. She didn’t even wait to finish her dinner.”

  “No,” Mason said, “ she didn’t make any bones about it. Her interest in Harrington Faulkner was purely financial.”

  “And when we get out to his house, just what are we supposed to do?” Drake wanted to know.

  Mason grinned. “ I’ll bite, Paul, but he feels that he has to show us the location of the goldfish tank before we can understand his problem. It seems that’s an important phase of the case as far as he’s concerned, and when he gets an idea, he gets it all the way. As I gather it, Faulkner and his wife live in a large duplex house. One side is their living quarters and the other is where Faulkner and his partner, Elmer Carson, have their office. Apparently, Faulkner has various goldfish tanks scattered around the place and this particular pair of Veiltail Moors that is the cause of all the excitement is in part of the building that was used as an office. For some reason, Faulkner wants us to see the tank and the fish, and he has to have things done just so or not at all. It’s just the way he’s made.”

  Drake said, “ Faulkner’s a self-contained little cuss. You’d think it would take more than an ordinary jolt to send him running to a lawyer, all steamed up. What I mean is, he’s the sort you’d expect to find making an appointment two days in advance and keeping that appointment to the exact second.”

  Mason said, “He evidently thinks more of that pair of Veiltail Moors than he does of his right eye. However, we’ll get the details when we get out to his house. My own idea is there’s something on his mind other than these fish and the affair with his partner, but I’m not going to stick my neck out until I see what’s in the offing.”

  The taillight of the car ahead veered abruptly to the right. Mason piloted his car around the corner. They drove down a side street, pulled to a stop in front of a house which showed in misty outlines through the fog. Mason, Della Street and Paul Drake jumped out of the automobile, watched Harrington Faulkner carefully lock the ignition of his car, then lock the car door, following which he walked completely around the automobile, trying each of the doors to make sure it was locked. He even tried the trunk to make sure that it too was firmly bolted. Then he moved over to join them.

  Having joined them, he took a leather key container from his pocket, carefully slid the zipper around the edges, took out a key and said in the precise tones of a lecturer explaining something to an audience in which he had only an impersonal interest, “Now, Mr. Mason, you will notice that there are two outer doors to this house, the one on the left bears the sign ‘FAULKNER AND CARSON, INCORPORATED, REALTORS.’ The door on the right is the door to my house.”

  “Where does Elmer Carson live?” Mason asked.

  “A few blocks down the street.”

  “ I notice,” Mason pointed out, “ that the house is dark.”

  “Yes,” Faulkner said tonelessly, “my wife evidently isn’t home.”

  “Now the particular fish about which you are mainly concerned,” Mason went on, “ are the black Veiltail Moors which are in the tank or aquarium that is in the office?”

  “That’s right, and Elmer Carson claims the tank is an office fixture and that the fish are a part of the office furnishings. He’s secured a restraining order keeping me from moving any fixture or even tampering with them.”

  “The fish were raised entirely by you?”

  “Correct.”

  “Carson made no financial contribution?”

  “None whatever. The fish were raised from a strain which I developed. However, the tank, Mr. Mason, was billed to the corporation as an article of office furniture, and it is so fastened to the building that it probably would be considered a fixture. It is, you understand, an oblong tank some three feet by two feet and four feet deep. There was a recess in the wall of the building, a place which was occupied by a china closet and which certainly added nothing to our office. I suggested that this closet could be removed and an aquarium inserted in the space. This was done with Carson’s approval and co-operation. When the bills came in, without thinking, I okayed them as an office expense, and, unfortunately, they were so carried on our books and in our income tax report. The tank is undoubtedly affixed to the building, and the building is owned by the corporation.”

  “The entire building?” Mason asked.

  “Yes. I have taken a lease on the other side of it where I live.”

  “Then how did it happen that you put such valuable fish in the tank that was a part of the office?”

  “Well, you see, Mr. Mason, it’s rather a long story. Originally, I put in a water garden in the bottom of the tank, a device to aerate the water and an assortment of some two dozen various types of interesting goldfish—the Fringetail, the Chinese Telescope, some Japanese Comets, some Nymphs and some Autumn Brocades. Then I developed these Veiltail Moor Telescopes, and suddenly found that other fish in another tank in which they were kept had developed something which looked suspiciously like gill fever, or rather a gill disease, since the fish really had passed the gill-fever stage. I wanted some place to move these Moors at once where I could have them under observation; and, without thinking of the possible legal complications, I cleaned out the other fish and inserted these Veiltail Moors in the office tank. Almost immediately my troubles commenced. The fish developed disease and Elmer Carson suddenly blew up and demanded that I pay him an exorbitant price for his interest in the business. He went to court and got a restraining order preventing me from moving that fish tank away from the premises, on the ground that it was a fixture. I simply can’t understand what caused his sudden change of attitude, the bitter animosity with which he regards me. It happened almost overnight and followed an attempt on my life.”

  “An attempt on your life!” Mason exclaimed.

  “Exactly.”

  “What happened?”

  “Someone tried to shoot me. But after all, gentlemen, this is hardly the place to discuss these matters. Let’s go on in and— Hello, what’s this?”

  “Seems to be a car stopping in front of the place,” Mason said.

  The automobile which had pulled in to the curb disgorged two passengers, a man and a woman. As the figures materialized through the fog, Faulkner said, “ It’s that Madison girl and her boy friend. This is a great time for them to be getting here! I gave her a key to the place. They should have been here thirty minutes ago. She started out fast enough. Didn’t even wait to finish her dinner. I suppose it’s that boy who held her up.”

  Mason lowered his voice and talked rapidly. “ Look here, Faulkner, that tank may be a fixture and therefore a part of the building which can’t be moved, but the fish certainly aren’t a fixture. They’re swimming around in the tank. Get a bucket or a net and lift those fish out and leave the tank in place—then you can fight out the restraining order with Elmer Carson.”

  “By George, you’ve got something there!” Faulkner exclaimed. “ Those fish are . . .” He broke off abruptly to turn to the couple who were hurrying up the walk. “Well, well,” he said testily. “What was holding you up?”

  The slender, somewhat bony-shouldered young man with Sally Madison said, “ I’m sorry, Mr. Faulkner, but the boss had a case of gill disease to treat and I had to coat a tank so he’d have a place to . . .”