“That’s fine,” Warren said easily. “Tell him to go ahead and get things ready to serve. We should be about ready to start the buffet in twenty minutes.”

  “They’ve already brought in the canapés,” she said.

  “Fine, fine,” Warren said. “It’s a nice job of catering. Now, right this way, Mr Mason, and I’ll show you the rest of this wing. The guest bedrooms are in the other wing.”

  Out in the corridor Warren turned to Mason. “Gosh,” he said under his breath, “that was close! Think what would have happened if we’d been carrying that suitcase.”

  “What would have happened?” Mason asked.

  “I shudder to think of it,” Warren told him. “It would put me in the position of having to make explanations.”

  “It would also have put your wife in the position of having to make explanations,” Mason said. “If you’re going to protect a person it helps a lot to know the source of danger and–”

  “No, no, Mason,” Warren interrupted, “that would have defeated the entire object of calling you in. I want this handled in such a way that Lorna doesn’t have any idea on earth that you’re here other than as a casual guest, and I don’t want her to know that I suspect a thing about her financial problem.”

  “All right,” Mason said, “you’re calling the shots, but quite obviously if she’s being blackmailed she’s made one payment of approximately forty-seven thousand dollars. It’s too late to protect her from that.”

  “I know, I know, but the money is a minor matter,” Warren said. “I want you to protect her from the blackmailer or whatever it is she’s facing, and this is probably the last time we’ll have an opportunity to chat together. As I told you, my business structure is very complex and calls go through a switchboard.”

  “How much does Judson Olney know?” Mason asked.

  “Not a thing, not a thing, and I don’t want him to know anything.”

  “But he knows that this whole plant with Della Street is a fake.”

  “Certainly. He thinks I wanted to introduce Della Street to a certain individual who is here tonight.”

  “Who?” Mason asked.

  “Barrington,” Warren said. “You’ll find his name on the guest list. Now, this is my bedroom and–”

  Mason stepped inside and closed the door. “All right, Warren,” he said, “tell me about Barrington.”

  “Actually there’s nothing to tell,” Warren said. “George P Barrington is the son of Wendell Barrington, the great oil tycoon. George is playing around with some oil properties and I have some properties which can be leased. He’s interested in a lease on those properties.

  “Confidentially, Mason, I don’t give a hang whether he closes the lease or not but I invited him here tonight because he’s been going with a trashy young woman who is no good at all. They’ve split up now. I told Judson Olney that I wanted him to meet Della Street.”

  “And how does Olney figure that you knew Della Street?”

  “A couple of weeks ago,” Warren said, “I addressed a meeting of the Legal Secretaries Association. I told Olney that Della Street was there, that I hadn’t met her but that I had been impressed by her beauty, had found out who she was, and that I would like to have him invite her to come this evening and, of course, bring an escort. I said that I wanted him to be particularly certain she met George Barrington. Now, that’s all Olney knows.

  “Now I’ve simply got to get back to my guests, Mason. A casual tour of the place is one thing but being away long enough to have a conference with you would be quite another. That would defeat the very purpose of all my planning.”

  Horace Warren firmly opened the door and stood waiting for Mason to go through.

  “What are you afraid of?” Mason asked.

  “Me? Nothing. Why?”

  “You’re afraid to call your soul your own. You’re frightened to death of having anyone think you’ve consulted me. Instead of running your office staff, you’re letting the staff run you. Now, what’s the answer?”

  “Just what I’ve told you,” Warren said hastily. “We have no time for detailed explanations now, Mason.”

  “When will we have?”

  “I don’t know. Moreover, it’s not important. You know what you have to do. You have a free hand – a blank cheque. Just protect Lorna.”

  Mason said, “You’re a very remarkable actor, Warren. Tell me about your training.”

  Warren seemed to relax and expand. “At one time in my life I was stage-struck. I even acted as angel for a couple of shows – but don’t let anyone know about that, particularly Lorna. She would think that – Well, you know the general type of thinking that is associated with … with things of that sort.”

  “No, I don’t,” Mason said. “Shows have to be financed and it’s a business proposition.”

  “I know, I know, but – You’re a bachelor, aren’t you, Mason?”

  “Yes.”

  “That tells the whole story,” Warren said, marching firmly down the corridor and into the big living area where the cocktail party had now been in progress long enough so that the masculine voices were a little louder, the feminine laughter a little more shrill.

  “Now, if you don’t mind,” Warren went on firmly, “I’m going to keep away from you for the rest of the evening.”

  “Where’s Barrington?” Mason asked.

  “The man over there who is so busily engaged in talking to your secretary,” Warren said.

  Mason sized up the tall, slender individual in his early thirties who looked very much like a model of a shirt and collar advertisement; broad-shouldered, slim-waisted, bronzed, high cheekbones, and an air of complete poise.

  “I knew he’d fall for Della Street,” Warren said. “Look at him, he’s fallen hard.”

  Mason turned to Warren. “Now look here, Warren, I’m not certain I like this. I don’t know just what sort of a game you’re playing but quite apparently you’re trying to use Della Street as bait of some sort for a deal with Barrington.”

  “No, no,” Warren said hastily, “that’s just the gambit I used with Judson Olney. But I knew Barrington would fall for her – hard. Now if you’ll excuse me, Mason …”

  Warren turned and walked away.

  Mason stood for a moment looking at Barrington, studying the man’s quite obvious attempt to impress Della Street.

  Then a woman holding a cocktail glass in her left hand swooped down on Perry Mason and demanded to know the magic recipe which he used for winning all his cases. Within a moment she was joined by two more people and Mason found himself a centre of attraction.

  Chapter Four

  Promptly at ten o’clock Mason rescued Della Street from a group of men who were at no pains to conceal their admiration, said good night to his host and hostess and watched while Judson Olney made quite a production of saying good night, including a kiss on Della Street’s right cheek.

  “Now that I’ve found you,” he said, “I don’t intend to lose you again.” And then he added with subtle emphasis, “And I mean every word of this, Della.”

  Mrs Warren said, “Having staked out your claim you’d better stay in possession of it, Judson, or someone’s going to jump it.”

  Olney said, “You just watch me.”

  Mason, turning his head, caught a glance of malevolent hatred directed at Della Street. He knew that the young woman with the blazing eyes was named Chester, and he had heard someone call her Adelle. The lawyer made a mental note to interrogate Della about her when they reached the office.

  Horace Warren shook hands with Mason warmly. “We’re very much indebted to Judson Olney,” he said, “and to Miss Street. Believe me, it was a real treat meeting you, Mr Mason, and I certainly hope we see more of you.”

  Mason bowed, thanked him, and with Della Street on his arm left the house. When they came to the place where they had parked the car, he helped Della in and started the motor.

  She laughed merrily. “You look like a man who is just getting out of the dentist’s chair.”

  Mason guided the car out of the driveway, said, “I’m bored by small talk, I’m tired of standing up and walking around from group to group, I detest women who deliberately get themselves boiled and then try to simulate owlish sobriety.”

  “There was only one,” Della Street said. “The others were delightful.”

  “That one was enough,” Mason said. “She’d follow me around with a cocktail glass in her left hand, her right forefinger hooking at the lapel of my coat as though she was afraid I was going to get away … Who is the bottled blonde who regarded you as an insect of some sort?”

  “That,” Della Street said, “was Adelle Chester. George Barrington brought her up and introduced us. She managed to take an instant dislike to me. She wasn’t the only one. There was one other woman there, Rosalie Harvey. I don’t know whether you noticed her. She was dark-haired with green eyes. She was wearing a–”

  “I noticed her,” Mason interrupted. “Isn’t she connected with the business in some way?”

  “Judson Olney’s secretary,” Della said. “She’s been with him for five years. I think she smelled a rat and I also think she was bursting with curiosity, but she didn’t quite dare ask direct questions.”

  “Well,” Mason said, “it’s easy to account for the enmity of these two girls. Barrington was making a great play for you and neglected the girl he was with, so that explains Adelle Chester’s attitude. Then after the build-up Olney gave you and told how he had lost his heart to you in the moonlight, it’s not difficult to understand the attitude of his devoted secretary who has secretly been idolizing him for years but who never gets a tumble.

  “There wasn’t any evidence of hostility on the part of anyone else – Just how does Judson Olney fit into the picture?”

  “As manager of most of the enterprises, he’s Horace Warren’s right hand.”

  “Rather young for such a responsible position, isn’t he?”

  “It depends on how you look at it. He’s smart; believe me, he’s smart, and he was doing a lot of thinking.”

  “About what?”

  “About you being there.”

  “Yes,” Mason said, “I suppose it would take a lot of doing to palm that off as simply being an accidental circumstance, particularly in view of the fact that I keep my social life sharply limited. What was supposed to be the occasion for the gathering, Della?”

  “That,” Della said, “I don’t know. I assume they do a lot of entertaining, with that house and the set-up they have. But this was a conglomerate party. Barrington was invited because of business reasons. Some of the people were from the organization. A couple of them were neighbours. Others, it seems, were members of a bridge club Mrs Warren belongs to, and that was about it … I gather you didn’t have a good time?”

  “I earned my five hundred dollars,” Mason said. “Don’t think I’m an old grouch, Della, but a professional man can seldom enjoy himself at a gathering of that kind. I must have had five different people come to me and start talking in general terms about the law and about my career and then finally get around to bringing up some little legal problem of their own on which they wanted my advice.

  “A doctor can seldom attend a social gathering without having people start reciting symptoms and asking him for his opinion.”

  “Where did you and Horace Warren go after you went out to the swimming pool?” Della asked. “I tried to keep my eye on you but you disappeared somewhere out by the shower.”

  “We went through a door into a bathroom,” Mason said. “Then through the bathroom into Lorna Warren’s bedroom.”

  Della raised her eyebrows.

  “Warren wanted to show me a suitcase which he said had forty-seven thousand dollars in it, which his wife was keeping in her closet.”

  “You saw that suitcase?” she asked.

  “I saw the suitcase,” Mason said, “but all that was in it at the time we looked were some newspapers.”

  “Then she’d already paid the blackmail?”

  “That’s what Warren thinks.”

  “You don’t?”

  Mason said, “When a person pays blackmail he turns over the money. If Mrs Warren had been blackmailed she’d have put the suitcase on the bed, opened the suitcase, taken out the forty-seven thousand dollars, given it to the blackmailer and put the empty suitcase back in the closet.

  “When a person takes money out of a suitcase and then stuffs old newspapers into the suitcase to give it approximately the same weight, that looks more like the work of a burglar.”

  “Good heavens, if someone had stolen forty-seven thousand dollars …!” Della Street said, and then let her voice trail off, into silence.

  “Exactly,” Mason said, “but it goes deeper than that. If someone is putting a bite on Mrs Warren for that amount of money, it’s something rather important, and when Mrs Warren goes to pay him off and opens the suitcase and finds that in place of the money she had left in there, there’s nothing but a stack of old newspapers, the fat is apt to be in the fire. You can’t pay a blackmailer with a stack of old newspapers.”

  “I should say not,” Della said, and then became silent as she contemplated the picture of what might happen if Mrs Warren, not knowing the money had disappeared, should open the suitcase.

  After a moment she asked, “But who could have taken the money?”

  Mason said, “The blackmailer, knowing she had the money in cash waiting to pay him, could have sneaked in, stolen the money, and then, denying he knew anything of the theft, demanded payment.”

  “That’s a thought!” she exclaimed.

  “Or,” Mason went on, “someone who didn’t want her to pay the blackmail could have taken the money out of the suitcase and substituted old newspapers.”

  “Someone who didn’t want her to pay blackmail?” she echoed.

  “Exactly,” Mason said.

  “But that could have been the husband!” she exclaimed.

  Mason’s silence was eloquent.

  Della Street, thinking over the various possibilities brought up by this idea, said, “And then, when she went to pay the blackmailer and told him she’d had the money there but had been robbed, he’d call her a liar and … and then there would be complications … and you’d have been retained to protect her, and – Chief, that’s what did happen! Warren must have removed the money himself.”

  “We can’t prove it,” Mason said.

  After that they were silent until they reached Mason’s office.

  “I take it that you had a good time,” Mason said, as he switched on the office lights.

  “I had a wonderful time,” she told him.

  Mason said, “Probably we should have a more active social life. We keep running from one murder case to another like a hummingbird flitting from one–”

  “Now, don’t compare murders with honeysuckle,” she interrupted, “and don’t be so grim. This case is just an ordinary blackmail case.”

  Mason shook his head. “It isn’t ordinary, Della, and I’m not even certain it’s blackmail.”

  “Why?”

  Mason said, “I have never had a case where the client was at such pains to avoid me.”

  “What do you mean? Mr Warren took you around the house, he was talking with you a dozen times during the evening, and–”

  “Oh, that,” Mason interposed. “That’s the preliminary build-up. That’s all right, but you notice that Warren has been at great pains to impress upon me that he isn’t going to be available, that there’s no way I can reach him when I want to without jeopardizing the things he wants to accomplish.”

  Della Street brought out the coffee percolator, filled it, connected it to the electric socket.

  “The Drake Catering Service did quite a job,” she said.

  “A fine job. That was good champagne, too.”

  “Do you suppose we’ll be invited again to another one?” Della said.

  “I doubt it. Warren wanted to get us familiar with the situation and then keep us at arm’s length.”

  She smiled. “You forget I have my old cruising crush, Judson Olney.”

  “Yes,” Mason said, “you have him. He started out acting under orders from Warren, but I had the feeling that he was putting a lot of enthusiasm into his acting along toward the last.”

  “A lot of enthusiasm is right,” she said. “He wants to find out what it’s all about. And speaking of acting, did you know that Horace Warren had always wanted to be an actor, that he still practices in front of a mirror, using a tape recorder?”

  Mason settled himself comfortably in a chair, pulled up another chair for his feet, and lit a cigarette. “The trouble with a man of that sort is that he overdoes it,” he said. “He becomes too much of a ham. He gets to thinking how good he is and adds just a little too much emotion, a little too much expression, a little too much in the way of gestures.”

  Drake’s knuckles tapped his code knock on the door of Mason’s private office.

  Della Street let him in.

  “Hello, caterer,” Mason said. “We didn’t expect you so soon.”

  “I got away early. My share of the work was done,” Drake said, then went on with a grin, “When you become an executive you can leave the dirty dishes for others.”

  “They aren’t washing those dishes are they?” Mason asked.

  “Not in that outfit, no. They take them to the main plant to be processed. Every one of those dishes is dried by hand and then they are polished with a towel so that there isn’t the faintest sign of a fingerprint on them and every bit of the glass is smooth and clean.”

  “The fingerprint crew worked efficiently?”

  “Very.”

  “All right, what did you find out, Paul?”

  “We found out who made the fingerprint you wanted to know about but we didn’t find out until right at the last.”

  “How come?”

  “The fingerprint was made by someone we weren’t particularly interested in. We were lifting fingerprints from the other glasses and dishes and only took this one as a last resort.”