“Heavens no! I wasn’t aiming. The first shot I fired completely wild, and the second shot I pulled the gun down, trying to shoot at—well, at nothing in particular, but I guess just above the headlights. It hit something that gave a plinking sound, a rock or something.”

  Ferron shook his head. “We’ve had quite a few instances of a vicious criminal annoying women on these lonely roads and—”

  “With their faces covered by sacks’?” Mason asked.

  “No,” Ferron said. “That’s a new angle. Most of the time this fellow’s not even masked. This one man in particular that we’d love to get is a desperate, cruel thug. You’ve probably read something about it in the paper, but a lot of it doesn’t get in the paper. Girls who have been attacked don’t like publicity and notoriety, and we keep a lot of that stuff confidential.”

  Mason took the gun from Evelyn Bagby’s purse. “Want to look at the gun?” he asked.

  “No,” Ferron said, “that doesn’t make any—why, hello, that’s one of those new short-barreled aluminum alloy guns.”

  “That’s right,” Mason said.

  “A swell little gun.” Ferron reached over and balanced it in his hand.

  “The gun,” Mason said, “had been picked up by Evelyn Bagby in accordance with my instructions.”

  “Well, it’s a darned good thing she had it with her,” Ferron said, returning the gun to Evelyn Bagby. “I suggest you keep it with you. Where did all this happen?”

  Evelyn Bagby said, “Just about—well, there’s a private driveway with a white arch over the—”

  “Yes, yes, I know that place. An artist lives up there. She’s rather elderly. Lives there all alone. That’s rather isolated but it’s out of the county. It’s in the city limits. Was it near there?”

  “Just about a hundred yards or so below that.”

  “Well, we’d better take a run up that road,” Ferron said. “There isn’t one chance in a hundred that your man will be still prowling around there. In fact you’ve probably thrown such a scare into him that he’ll lay low for a week. What happened after you shot, Miss Bagby?”

  “He slammed on his brakes. He must have put them on awfully hard because I could see the headlights weaving as though the car might be skidding.”

  “And then what?”

  “Then I swept around a curve in the road, and—well, believe me, I went just as fast as I dared, but the headlights never came around that curve behind me.”

  “That’s fine. You really threw a scare into him. He’s accustomed to picking on defenseless women who get paralyzed with fright the minute they realize what they’re up against. Then they’re like putty in his hands. If this is the guy that I think it is I’d sure like to get an opportunity to get him lined up in my sights.”

  “I hope,” Mason said, “that we can handle this so there won’t be any publicity?”

  “Oh sure,” Ferron told him. “In fact, things of this sort the papers don’t pay much attention to. Except, of course, in this case Miss Bagby being a client of yours might make good copy. But you don’t need to worry, we’ll put this on a confidential report.”

  “I wish you would.”

  “You are going to take a run up there?” Mason said.”Oh sure, we’ll run on up. We’d like to have Miss Bagby come along and show us exactly where it happened and, of course, since it’s in the city limits we’ll have to report to the city and let the city police handle it. However, we have an understanding on this lonely road bandit and we work hand-in-glove with the city.

  “You see, this prowler is my special detail. My partner and I have been working nights, patrolling these roads a lot, and hoping we’d run on to one of these fellows while he’s at work.”

  Mason beckoned for the waiter, added a twenty per cent tip to the check and signed it. “Come on,” he said, “let’s go. You have a partner, Ferron?”

  “Yes. Outside.”

  “Well,” Mason said, “Miss Bagby has her car. I have my car. You and I can ride with Miss Bagby. Your partner can drive your car and Della Street can drive mine. In that way you can have Miss Bagby available for any further questions while we’re on our way up the mountain.”

  Mason took the gun, swung open the cylinder displaying the two empty shells and the four loaded cartridges.

  Ferron seemed to have but little interest in the gun. “You’ve certainly kept your head nicely, Miss Bagby. I only wish there were a few more women like you who had enough presence of mind to pull the trigger under proper circumstances, and who had a gun with them.”

  Mason took the gun, casually slipped it in his coat pocket.

  Ferron got to his feet. “Well, if you folks are ready, let’s go.”

  Chapter 8

  The cavalcade of three cars swung off the main road and dropped into low gear as they ground their way up the winding stretch of narrow mountain road. For the most part the occupants were silent.

  Mason said, “Just tell us when we come to the place, Evelyn.”

  “I will. I’m not too certain about—I think it was—wait a minute, it was right around this turn where I was making time and—Slow down a bit as we get around the turn because that’s where—”

  “Hey, wait a minute,” Ferron said. “Did you see that?”

  “What?” Mason asked.

  “That guardrail.”

  “I didn’t notice it.”

  “Well, it’s broken. Stop a minute. Just hold your car here. Keep your foot on the brake. This is a steep grade.”

  Mason signaled the cars behind as Evelyn Bagby braked to a stop.

  Ferron got out and disappeared into the darkness.

  “Did you see it, Mr. Mason?” Evelyn Bagby asked.

  Mason said, “I can look back and see it. It looks like a car has gone through that guardrail.”

  Evelyn Bagby’s hand on Mason’s arm was suddenly trembling with apprehension.

  “Oh Mr. Mason, do you suppose there’s any chance, any chance that someone else took my place? He could have waited until some other woman came along, tried to crowd her into the rail and hit her car too hard. That would mean that—if I hadn’t had that gun, I’d be—down there!”

  Mason said in a low voice, “Sit tight and don’t do any talking. If there’s anything down there you’re going to be completely prostrated. You leave things to me.”

  Ferron came running back up the hill to the car. “You’re going to have to wait here, Mr. Mason,” he said. “A car sure as hell went down that grade. Seems to have gone through the guardrail almost head-on. I’m getting my partner and a searchlight out of the car. We’ll see what we can find down there. You’d better back your car so the rear wheels are up against the bank there. This is too steep a grade to hold your car simply with the brakes.”

  “Can I help you?” Mason asked.

  “Probably not now. We’ll see. It looks very much as if your bandit really was intent on running someone off the grade. He may have mistaken Miss Bagby for someone else, or he may have tried to force some other girl into stopping, and—anyhow, we’ll know the answer pretty soon.”

  Ferron ducked away into the darkness. Mason said, “Now remember, Evelyn, keep a cool head, but if you have to, use all the feminine wiles of tears, hysterics, or anything else.”

  Ferron and his partner moved their car over to the side of the road, took out a powerful searchlight, and, standing by the break in the fence, swung the beam of the searchlight down the steep mountainside.

  Della Street came walking up to join Mason and Evelyn Bagby. “What is it?”

  “Another victim, perhaps,” Mason said.

  Della studied Evelyn Bagby. “You weren’t aiming?”

  “Heavens no! I just pushed the gun out of the window and let it go.”

  Mason caught Della’s eye. “I’ll go over to take a look, Della. You stay here and talk with Evelyn.”

  Mason crossed over to the broken guardrail.

  “See anything?” Mason asked.

  “Yes, there’s a car down there at the foot of the ravine,” Ferron said. “We’re going to get out a coil of rope and tie it to the support for the guardrail so we can get down there without falling all over ourselves. Okay, here we are.”

  Ferron’s partner appeared with a coil of rope. He made a bowline knot around one of the supports for the guardrail, then snaked the coil down the mountainside, where it rolled and twisted down toward the wreck.

  “Let’s go,” Ferron said.

  The two deputies eased themselves down the grade, holding to the rope to keep from slipping.

  Mason could see the beam of the searchlight playing around in the darkness down the deep canyon. From time to time he heard excited voices, but no one reported on what they had found. Apparently the two deputies had completely forgotten the people waiting above.

  Mason glanced toward Evelyn’s car where Della Street was sitting next to Evelyn Bagby. He could hear Della’s voice as she kept up a stream of conversation, keeping Evelyn Bagby’s mind occupied.

  Mason gripped the rope, eased his weight over the edge and started working his way down the steep slope. The night was dark as a pocket. The only illumination was furnished by the intermittent wandering beam of the searchlight and a faint reflection from the lights of Hollywood which stretched out below, blazing colored signs, twinkling lights.

  By shielding his eyes so he could look down into the darkness, Mason could see where the wheels of an automobile had left tracks, then swung sideways. For another fifty or sixty feet the car had evidently been in the air. Then it had struck and left a gouged out place in the hillside.

  Mason continued to work his way on down, holding to the rope, feeling his way cautiously. The sound of voices at the bottom of the ravine was plainer now and Mason could hear comments.

  “ … darned good job if you ask me.”

  “Must have gone through … right window … open … ”

  “Better get Homicide … It’s in the city limits.”

  Mason moved through sagebrush and greasewood, came at length to the bottom of a ravine where a heavy growth of chaparral had broken the impact of the rolling car.

  “Well, what are you finding?” he asked.

  Ferron’s voice was suddenly harsh. He asked, “Are you alone?”

  “That’s right. The girls are up there in the car.”

  “It looks like she made a bull’s-eye all right,” Ferron said.

  “The devil!” Mason exclaimed.

  He followed a crude path that the man had chopped around the side of the car, which was resting on its top, the wheels up in the air.

  The beam of the searchlight, shining through the splintered glass of the broken windshield, showed a crumpled figure with a pillow slip tied over its head. There were two holes for the eyes and one side of the pillow slip was soaked with red.

  “That right-hand window is open,” Ferron explained, “but it’s on the underside. The car’s upside down, but tilted so the left side is quite a bit higher than the right side. We’ve been chopping a trail so we could get around. We’ve got to get a window open. He’s dead as a mackerel all right, but we’ve got to make sure before we go back and notify the coroner. And, I suppose, technically we’ve got to notify Homicide. How’s that girl going to take it when she knows what happened?”

  Mason said, “You mean that just shooting wildly with her left hand, she made a bull’s-eye like that?”

  “That’s the most dangerous way to shoot,” Ferron said. “Tests show that when a person gets excited and shoots instinctively, it’s something like pointing your finger.”

  Ferron’s partner said, “We can pry this door open, Bill, or we can smash in the glass.”

  “I hate to smash in the glass. Let’s try prying this door.”

  “The front one’s jammed. The rear one we can get open, I think.”

  Using the ax with which they had chopped the trail, the men managed to pry the left rear door open. Ferron squeezed inside, then stretched out a hand to feel the wrist of the body.

  “No pulse,” he reported. “He’s dead all right.”

  “Can you get at that steering post and get the registration certificate while you’re in there?”

  “I’ll try. Keep that door open. I think I can make it.”

  Ferron stretched himself until his fingers were able to encounter the certificate of registration snapped to the steering post of the automobile. He unsnapped the fasteners which held the Celluloid envelope in place, then, inching his way backward like some caterpillar, squeezed out through the door in the car.

  “Gosh,” he said, straightening and brushing himself off, “I’m all out of breath. Getting a little out of condition, I guess. That was quite a stretch.”

  “What have we got?” his partner asked.

  “Car registered in the name of Oscar B. Loomis,” Ferron said, reading the license. ‘We’ve got a local address here. Suppose there’s any chance this guy is Loomis?”

  “Can’t tell. It may be a stolen car—you never can tell. Well, let’s get up that rope and—oh-oh, here it comes!”

  As he spoke, the first drops of rain came rattling down, striking the overturned car, pattering on the leaves of the dry chaparral.

  “Those are big drops,” Ferron said. “When it starts that way, it means there’s a heavy shower right behind. Let’s see if we can get up the hill before this dust turns to mud and gets the rope slippery.

  “If it rains this is going to be one hell of a mess, trying to get the body out of the car and getting the car back up to the road.”

  “We’ll get the body out of the car,” Ferron said, “and let the wrecking company wrestle with the car.”

  “Have you decided what happened?” Mason asked.

  “There’s nothing to it,” Ferron told him. “The window on the right-hand side of this car was down. This guy probably had a rod of his own and was intending to force her off to the side of the road and then make her get out of her car and get into his car. That’s the way he worked. Her bullet hit him right in the side of the head and he probably never knew what struck him. He slumped over against the steering wheel and when she described the car as weaving back and forth and thought it was because he had applied the brakes too suddenly, it was probably because the car slammed into the bank, then caromed off, hit the guardrail, smashed through and plunged on down.”

  The tempo of the falling raindrops increased.

  Mason said, “Well, I’ll lead the way going up unless you fellows want to go first.”

  “No, you set the pace,” Ferron said.

  Mason started up the steep slope, pulling his weight up by the rope, scrambling with his feet, trying to keep some semblance of a foothold in the loose, dry soil.

  The rain suddenly freshened, then abruptly began to pour down in torrents.

  Mason said, “Perhaps you fellows had better go ahead of me and—”

  “No, you’re doing fine,” Ferron said. “Just be careful you don’t slip on the wet rope and lose your footing. This is a steep slope and you could take a nasty fall.”

  Mason worked his way upward carefully. The dust that was on the rope had turned to a thin coating of mud as the rain came down in sheeted torrents.

  “Gosh,” Ferron said, “we should have put on our raincoats. We’re all going to be wet.”

  Mason said, “I don’t think it’s much farther.”

  “Carrying this searchlight is a chore,” Ferron’s partner complained. “I’ve got it on my back and around my shoulder, but it keeps thumping and—”

  ‘We’re right near the top,” Mason said. “I can see the guardrail up above. Here we are, I’m at the top. Can I take that searchlight?”

  “No thanks, it is only a step or two.”

  The men heaved their way up to the top.

  The rain was pelting down, striking the pavement and spattering into mushrooms.

  Mason turned up his coat collar, said, “Well, you know where you can reach me. Evelyn Bagby is at the Crown-crest Tavern. We’re going to make a run for it.”

  “Go ahead,” the officers told him. “We’re going to get on our two-way radio and get our office to notify the coroner and the city police.”

  They diverged, making a run through the rain.

  Mason panted his way up to the car where Della Street and Evelyn Bagby were seated.

  “Chief,” Della Street exclaimed, “you’re all wet!”

  “And out of breath,” Mason said. “That’s a steep slope.”

  He paused for a moment, panting, then said, “Della, you ride up to the Crowncrest Tavern with Evelyn. In that way, you won’t get wet. I’ll sprint back to my car and join you up there.”

  “No, you’re all wet now. You mustn’t—”

  “Go ahead,” Mason told her, and ran back down the grade.

  As Mason passed the officers’ car, he saw them sitting inside with the dome light on, putting through a call on the two-way radio to the sheriff’s office.

  Mason ran down to where Della Street had left his car, opened the door, and slid in behind the steering wheel. Evelyn Bagby’s car was already moving slowly up the grade.

  Mason turned on the motor, switched on the headlights and the brilliant illumination showed the narrow strip of road. The falling rain made a gray curtain above the water-lashed, hard-surfaced road.

  The lawyer pulled on past the county car. The windshield wipers of his car, beating in metronomic monotony, were unable to keep the water from the windshield sufficiently to give good driving visibility even when working at high speed. The rain assumed the proportions of a cloudburst.

  With Evelyn Bagby leading the way, the two cars slowly wound their way up the curves of the mountain grade until it reached the summit and joined Mulholland Drive. Then, after a few yards, the lighted front of the Crowncrest Tavern colored the raindrops with a red and blue aura.

  Mason parked his car near the entrance. Evelyn drove her car around to the side, parked in a space reserved for employees’ cars.

  Mason, making a run for the front door, encountered Joe Padena.

  “Hello, Joe,” Mason said. “Nice weather for ducks.”

  “This rain,” Padena said angrily. “You think it starts raining at one or two o’clock in the morning and clears up by ten or eleven o’clock? Hell no! She starts six, seven, eight, nine o’clock. Whenever she rains, she rains like hell until Joe Padena closes. Then she lets up. Next morning the sun is bright. The sky is blue. The food is ruined. Tonight I plan a big special—roast ribs of beef. You know what is for lunch tomorrow? I’ll tell you. Cold roast beef. Next day roast-beef hash.