“I’m afraid I lost my temper, Mason. I shouted at him. I told him to get the hell out of there, and he merely scraped a match on the under side of my desk, lit a cigarette, looked at me patronizingly and said, ‘Okay, Fatso, we’ll run the story …’ Imagine, Mason, in my own office, this young, insolent whippersnapper referred to me as Fatso!”

  “A certain lack of respect,” Mason said, carefully refraining from glancing at Della Street.

  “Lack of respect!” Addison exclaimed. “It was the height of insolence!”

  “So you threw him out?”

  “Well,” Addison said, “the situation became somewhat complicated. If Dundas should publish anything like that …”

  “You’d sue the newspaper for libel,” Mason said.

  “But, Mason, there are certain damnable facts – that is, the facts themselves are innocent enough, but it’s easy to see how they could be distorted. As Hansell pointed out, they could marshal a certain set of facts. I had brought Veronica Dale to town. I had telephoned the manager of a hotel, insisting that the young woman be given a room, stating that I would vouch for her. She had been arrested for vagrancy. I had hired my personal attorney to get her out on bail and see that the case was dismissed. Then I had given her employment in my store. I naturally wouldn’t like to see those things in print. You can understand my position. It’s innocent enough, but – well, there are those who would cock a cynical eyebrow at the whole thing. The sequence is unfortunate.”

  “It is, indeed,” Mason commented.

  “So,” Addison said, “something has to be done, and done right away.”

  “How much does Eric Hansell want?”

  “He didn’t say. He’s smart enough, all right. Money was never mentioned at all. Hansell merely said that he was getting facts for Dundas’ column. That he did the legwork for George Whittley Dundas; that he had this bunch of facts and he wanted to verify them. He wanted an interview with me. He wanted me to state definitely whether or not certain things were true.”

  “And what did you state?”

  “I told him that any insinuation that my interest in Veronica Dale was other than an impersonal, fatherly interest was the height of absurdity. And then when he asked me either to confirm or deny certain facts, I saw that I was getting into rather hot water. I told him that I had no further time to give him, and kicked him out of the office.”

  “Then what?” Mason asked. “You telephoned me immediately?”

  “No, Mason, I didn’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “I didn’t know just what to do,” Addison said. “I paced the floor there in the office for – dammit, I don’t know, it may have been an hour. I hated to come to you with this thing more than I ever hated to do anything in my life. I feel as though you’re sitting back there laughing at me. You have that smug attitude of – dammit, Mason, I tell you you’d have done the same thing under similar circumstances. You know you would.”

  “Your interview with Hansell took place when?”

  “I would say about an hour and a half ago.”

  “He left a card?” Mason asked.

  “No, he gave me a telephone number. Of course, Mason, the damn thing is blackmail, but it’s handled so cleverly you can’t prove it’s blackmail. Here’s the number.”

  Mason took the folded paper Addison fished from his pocket, turned it over and over in his fingers. “Of course,” he said, “since this is plain blackmail, Hansell probably isn’t any pure white lily. He knows his way around and he’s done this stuff before. He probably has a criminal record.”

  “But,” Addison said, “my hands are tied, Mason. There’s nothing I can do. I can’t afford to get into any controversy. The facts could be distorted by my business rivals and – hang it, the thing would be terrible. My partner, for instance, would simply hit the ceiling.”

  “Your partner?”

  “Edgar Z Ferrell.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “Fortunately, he’s on his vacation. Ferrell is the conservative member of the firm. He’s – well, he’s definitely not broad or liberal.”

  “Something of a stick?” Mason asked.

  “I wouldn’t care to be quoted.”

  “No one’s going to quote you. You’re talking to your lawyer.”

  “Something of a stick,” Addison said with feeling. “The damn fool’s a stump! An old-fashioned, deeply rooted, decayed stump, full of worms, with ants crawling all over the bark, and bird droppings on the top. As far as the business is concerned, I’ve been carrying him on my back for five years. The man hasn’t had a constructive idea or a decent suggestion in all that time.

  “He’s had training as an accountant and he spends his time puttering around with the books, making graphs, sticking his nose into accounts, auditing first this, then that, making a plain damn nuisance of himself.

  “In a business like ours, a man can’t waste too much time in analysing. It’s fine to know what departments have made the most money, but, after all, that stuff is post-mortem. An executive should be on the firing line, getting ideas, not dissecting the accounting corpses of last year’s mistakes.”

  Mason smiled. “I take it that your partner, from time to time, submits figures, statements and graphs, showing where your ideas have lost money?”

  Addison’s face reddened. “He pounces on every mistake like a hawk on a sitting duck. He never takes any responsibility himself. Oh, hang it, what’s the use? The man’s a sponge, a parasite, a thorn in the flesh, but I’ve had too much from him. I simply couldn’t stand to have him read some juicy item in a scandal column and come into my office holding the clipping in his hand and going ‘tut-tut.’ I’ll pay. I’ll have to pay.”

  “How did he acquire an interest in the business?”

  “He inherited his father’s stock. At the time, I should have bought him out, but I felt that I needed a younger man in the business. Because he was younger in years, I thought naturally he would have more flexibility, more receptivity, more energy, more initiative, more adaptability.”

  “And in place of that?”

  “He had nothing. A hidebound, narrow-minded, bigoted stickin-the-mud!”

  “Why don’t you buy him out now?”

  “Unfortunately,” Addison said, “the business has prospered. It’s continued to prosper. You know what happened during the past few years, Mason. People have gone crazy. They’ll pay any price for any sort of merchandising tripe. I shudder to think of what’s going to happen when the inevitable reaction comes, but right now our shelves are stocked with merchandise that is low on quality and long on price, and people are buying it hand over fist. Price means nothing any more. If people want something they want it, and that’s that. The price perspective has been warped beyond all belief, Mason.”

  “Ferrell is married?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “His wife with him on his vacation?”

  “No, Mr Mason, she isn’t. He had to go to the Northwest on a business trip and he took along his fishing tackle. He decided to take a front fishing trip while he was up there. That’s one thing he likes. He’s enthusiastic about fishing.”

  “Go by auto or train?”

  “By auto. And he certainly was loaded. Took out the back seat so he could pile in more camp stuff, bedrolls, tent and what not. Right now he’s somewhere between Las Vegas and Reno, I believe. He’ll be back in two weeks, the date of the annual stockholders’ meeting. I have just that much time to get this whole thing cleaned up – just two weeks, if he got any inkling of this he’d raise the devil. I’m hoping to work things around in such shape that I can buy him out. Frankly, Mason, I have a fund set aside for that purpose and the moment the industrial reaction sets in, the moment the pendulum swings the other way, so that it looks as though we’re facing a steadily declining sales volume, I’m going to buy Ferrell out. There are indications that make me think I won’t have long to wait. This is March. I think by July I can make the deal.”

  “Well,” Mason said, “I think the thing to do is turn a private detective agency loose on Hansell, see if we can find out something and …”

  “Don’t do it,” Addison said. “The plain, simple facts of the case are absolutely suicidal, Mason. I can’t afford to let these fellows bring any of this stuff out. We’re going to have to pay off.”

  Mason drummed with his fingertips on the edge of his desk. “You’ve told me all the facts?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you do any necking with this Dale girl?”

  “Why, Mr Mason!”

  “Did you?”

  “No.”

  “Now, look,” Mason said, “you’re talking to your lawyer. Did you touch her at all – kiss her goodbye or anything of that sort?”

  “Well,” Addison said, “there was no necking, as you describe the word, a word, incidentally, that is highly offensive to me. She did kiss me goodbye, but it was just a kiss of gratitude, the simple, childlike gesture of an unspoiled, inexperienced young woman.”

  “I know,” Mason said, “and then she contrives to get herself arrested for vagrancy.”

  “Don’t talk that way,” Addison said. “Hang it, Mason, are you aware of the necessary implication in what you say?”

  “Certainly.”

  “You mean this young woman contrived to get herself arrested?”

  Mason said, “Addison, speaking as your lawyer, let me tell you something of the facts of life. You pick up a young woman, a girl who says she’s eighteen. The girl goes to a hotel. You get a room for her in the hotel. She is arrested for vagrancy. You telephone me to get her out. I do so. Her mother shows up. Her mother says she is just eighteen. She …”

  “Her mother?” Addison interrupted. “That’s impossible. Her mother is two thousand miles away.”

  “Her mother was in the office just a few minutes ago,” Mason said.

  “What did she want?”

  “She wanted to thank me for what I’d done for Veronica, and she wanted to pay my fee. So I charged her a hundred and fifty dollars, she left her cheque and I gave her a receipt showing that the cheque when paid would cover my services. You can pay me with a personal cheque now, and when you get back to your office, you can tear up the bill I sent you for five hundred dollars. Then if anyone ever says anything about my bill, I’ll simply say the mother paid me a hundred and fifty bucks and have the bank records and the carbon copy of my receipt to prove it. When the cheque clears, I’ll pay you the hundred and fifty in cash. In that way no one can ever prove you paid me a penny on Veronica’s case.”

  “Well, that does change things. But it still doesn’t let me out, Mason. I’m going to pay. I’ll have to pay. This damn partner of mine – and there are minority stockholders – and the meeting just two weeks off … No, Mason, I’ve got to pay. Keep it as low as possible, but pay. Get rid of these leeches. Keep it out of the damn column.”

  Mason said wearily, “I don’t suppose there’s any use arguing with you. Forget it. Just leave the matter in my hands.”

  “But look here, Mason, I want to pay. I can’t afford to have my name mentioned and …”

  “What happens when you pay the blackmailer?” Mason asked.

  “How should I know? I never paid one.”

  “So I gather.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The blackmailer takes the money and spends it, and then he comes back for more. The way you make your big mistake with a blackmailer is paying him the first time. Once you’ve done that, he really has you hooked. Sooner or later you have to do something to protect yourself. When you do, and it comes out in evidence that you’ve been paying the blackmailer to keep quiet, you could protest your innocence until the cows come home. It doesn’t do any good. The time to have a showdown with a blackmailer is when he first puts the bite on you.”

  “Mason, I tell you I can’t do it! I …”

  Mason said, “All right. Leave the thing in my hands. I’ll take care of it for you.”

  “But I want to pay.”

  “No,” Mason said, “you don’t want to pay. What you want to be sure of is that your name doesn’t get put in a gossip column in connection with an affair with an eighteen-year-old juvenile delinquent. That’s what you really want.”

  “Juvenile delinquent, my foot!” Addison said.

  “Let it go,” Mason told him. “We won’t argue about it. Where do you do your banking?”

  “At the Farmers and Mechanics Second National.”

  “All right,” Mason said, “you owe me a fee for taking care of that vagrancy matter, five hundred dollars. As I said, I’ve sent you a bill.”

  “Well,” Addison said testily, “add it to your bill in connection with this. That’s only going to be a drop in the bucket to what you’ll charge me on this thing.”

  Mason said, “I want a cheque now. Tear the bill up when you get back to your office.”

  Addison flushed.

  “Hang it,” Mason said irritably, “use your head. I don’t want that bill and that cheque to go through your bookkeeping department. Della, hand me a pad of blank cheques on the Farmers and Mechanics Second National.”

  Della Street opened a drawer in the big table where she kept cheques on all of the banks and handed Mason the oblong yellow pad.

  Mason slid it over to Addison. “Make a cheque,” he said, “for five hundred dollars.”

  Addison made the cheque.

  “All right,” Mason said. “Now we can forget about that vagrancy matter. I’ll handle this other thing and send you the bill. There’s no reason why that can’t go through regular channels. Don’t talk with Hansell. If anyone asks if you know Hansell, tell him you can’t recall the name. In case Hansell should call again, tell him you’re busy. Don’t let him get you on the phone.”

  “But I can’t afford to adopt that attitude, Mason. After all, the man has too much on me in the line of facts. I …”

  “Tell him you’re busy,” Mason repeated. “I’ll handle everything. Now go on back to your department store, tear up my bill for services on the vagrancy case when you get it and then forget about it.”

  Addison heaved a sigh of relief. “I get you now, Mason. Dammit, you’re clever! Pay them what you have to pay them, but don’t go beyond ten thousand dollars without consulting me – oh, hang it, don’t go any higher than you have to! But pay him whatever he needs. I suppose I’m hooked, and hooked good and proper. After all, a man in my position has to make allowances.”

  Mason said, “You pay him ten thousand dollars now, and you’ll be paying someone else ten thousand dollars within thirty days, and they’ll ten-thousand-dollar-you to death for the rest of your life. You can’t pay a blackmailer. You should know that, Addison.”

  “Dammit, Mason, I’ve got to pay him.”

  “Leave Hansell to me.”

  “You’ll pay him?”

  “I may. If I do I’ll handle it so we don’t have ever to pay him again.”

  Addison heaved himself up out of the big chair. “All right, that’s why I have you as my lawyer. You’re all right. You’ll soak me, damn you, but go ahead. Goodbye.”

  Mason turned to Della Street as soon as Addison had left the office. “Della, put on your gloves, will you?”

  “My gloves?”

  “That’s right.”

  Della Street opened a desk drawer, took out a pair of light leather gloves, put them on her hands.

  Mason walked over to the coat closet, took a pair of gloves from his overcoat pocket, put them on and said, “Now I want that pad of cheques on the Farmers and Mechanics Second National.”

  Della Street handed him the pad of cheques. Mason pulled back the pad so that he could extract one from the centre. “I guess this won’t have any fingerprints on it,” he said.

  Della watched with a puzzled frown while Mason walked over to the window, placed the cheque for five hundred dollars John Racer Addison had given him against the pane of glass, then, superimposing the other cheque over it, with a sharply pointed pencil carefully traced the signature.

  He returned to his desk, opened a desk drawer, took out a bottle of India ink and, with a steel pen, carefully traced a black ink signature over the pencilled lines.

  “How does it look, Della?”

  She examined it carefully and shook her head. “Not too good.”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  She said, “There’s a certain little tremor in the lines. Addison’s signature is a dashing sprawling signature that’s made at high speed. When you traced this you did it very slowly and there’s a stiff, wooden appearance about it, and here and there are little tremors which are apparent – hang it, Chief, I don’t like to be critical, but it’s not a good forgery, if that’s what you’re intending.”

  Mason grinned, and said, “That’s fine. You’ll also notice, Della, that if you look carefully, on the second d I’ve missed the loop a little bit, and even without a magnifying glass you could see the line of the pencil just inside the ink line on the curve.”

  “So you can,” Della Street said.

  “All right,” Mason said, handing her the cheque, “be careful you don’t touch this except with gloves. Go down to one of the stores selling typewriters, ask to try out one of the new model typewriters, keep stalling around until the clerk goes to wait on someone else, then slip this cheque into the machine, make it in favour of Eric Hansell in the sum of two thousand dollars, then bring it back. Be certain there isn’t a fingerprint on it.”

  Della Street’s eyes widened as she looked at Mason’s face, now suddenly granite-hard.

  “You mean …”

  “I mean,” Mason said, “that you do exactly as I tell you without knowing anything whatever about the reasons for doing what I’m telling you.”

  She let that soak in for a moment. “You mean in case anything should happen you don’t want me to …”

  “I mean I want you to do exactly as you’re told and know just that and nothing else.”

  She said, “Isn’t that rather dangerous, Chief?”

  “For whom?”

  “For both of us.”