“What can I do about that ticket, Mr. Mason? They say it’s impounded in court.”

  “You’ll have to get a lawyer,” Mason said.

  “I’m talking to one.”

  Mason smiled and shook his head. “I can’t represent you, Rodney.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I’m representing your sister.”

  “Shucks, it’s all right with Sis. Sis and I are one and the same.”

  “Not in this instance,” Mason said. “You’d better have an attorney of your own.”

  Rodney said to Lorraine, “Well, come on, Lorraine, we’re going out and do a little celebrating . . . . You going to come along for a nightcap, Mason, or are you going to wait for Sis?”

  “I’ll wait a little while,” Mason said, “but I can’t wait very long.”

  “Well, we’d better be going,” Rodney said.

  Mason said, “Just a minute. I have some news for you, both of you. Marvin Fremont is dead.”

  “What?” Rodney exclaimed.

  Lorraine gave a little gasp and involuntarily recoiled.

  Mason said, “You’ll find this out either from the police or from the press and there’s no reason why you shouldn’t know it now. Nancy went to the Foley Motel. She rented a unit there. I don’t know why. She had me meet her there to give her some money. I’d prefer that she herself told you how much and where the money came from.

  “Now, it may be that she went to the motel because she was afraid someone was going to try to attach that money. I don’t know.

  “However, this much I do know. Marvin Fremont was found dead in her unit of the motel. He had been murdered. He had evidently been shot once, perhaps more. His body was lying sprawled in the shower.”

  “Well, what do you know,” Rodney said.

  “But what about the police?” Lorraine asked. “Do the police know?”

  “The police know. They’ve been there. They’ve questioned Nancy and let her go. Nancy was to come directly here.”

  “Where were you?” Rodney asked.

  “I was with her when the police came, and afterwards while they questioned her. I was supposed to be right behind her after they turned her loose. I was following along behind to make sure that the police weren’t following. We rounded a turn in the road and when I got to the turn her lights had disappeared. There’s a sort of S turn there and I thought she was on ahead. I put on speed and found taillights way ahead. At the time I thought they could be hers if she had really put on a burst of speed as soon as she rounded the corner.”

  “That first corner by the Foley Motel?” Lorraine asked.

  Mason nodded.

  “Why, that’s where you turn off to the Osgood Trout Farm. I’ll bet she went to the farm and then you went on ahead and missed her. That would put her behind you . . . . That must be why you didn’t see her any more.”

  “Well, what was Marvin Fremont doing in that motel?” Rodney asked.

  “And what was he doing in Sis’s room?”

  Mason said, “I was hoping you could tell me.”

  Rodney shook his head. “It’s all news to me,” he said. “What did the police say about it?”

  “They seemed to have an idea that Nancy might have done it.”

  “That’s a laugh,” Rodney said. “Nancy wouldn’t even slap a fly on the wrist.”

  Lorraine said, “Nancy seems to have been doing things in a mysterious way lately, Rod . . . . Why did she go to the motel in the first place?”

  “So Mason could bring her some money to bail me out with,” Rodney said. “And how did Marvin Fremont know where she was?”

  “Now, that’s a question,” Rodney said. There was a moment of silence, then suddenly Rodney Banks flared. “By God, if Marvin Fremont was making any passes at Sis—if he had an idea he was going to parlay that situation with me into—Why, the sonofabitch!”

  “Hush, Rod. He’s dead.”

  “I don’t give a damn whether he’s dead or not. He was a sonofabitch alive and he’s a sonofabitch dead.”

  “Rodney, don’t talk like that. Don’t talk about the dead that way.”

  “I’ll talk about the dead any way I damned please,” Rodney said. “Well, what do you know! Somebody finally gave old Fremont what he had coming to him . . . . Just where is Sis? You don’t suppose the police picked her up?”

  “I don’t know,” Mason said. “The police questioned her and turned her loose. Told her not to leave town, and to hold herself available for further questioning if necessary. If she went to the trout farm, she could have been picked up all right.”

  “Where do you fit into the picture?” Rodney asked. “You’re representing her in the murder case?”

  “She hasn’t been charged with murder yet. I was representing her in this other matter.”

  “The bail business?”

  “Yes.”

  “I see,” Rodney said. “Where did she get the money?”

  “I think you’ll have to talk with your sister about that. She should be here any minute.”

  Rodney hesitated, looked at his watch, said, “Well, shucks. Sis can take care of herself. I know how she must feel, but Lorry and I are going out and look the town over and I don’t think Nancy would be too happy tagging along . . . . Look, honey, why don’t you put the spring lock on, let Mr. Mason wait here for Nancy, and we’ll go on out.”

  “I’m worried about her,” Lorraine said.

  “What is there to worry about? She can take care of herself. She’s a good driver. She’s been all over the city times without number. She used to drive to work every morning and make better time than I could. If the police are questioning her some more, Mason, here, can take over . . . .Tell me, Mr. Mason, Marvin Fremont got a court order or an attachment of some sort and picked up the ticket I had on Dough Boy to win. Now he’s dead. What effect’s that going to have on the litigation?”

  “The cause of action that he had probably did not survive,” Mason said, “but the administrator of his estate will be given an opportunity to be substituted as party plaintiff.”

  “You mean the money will be tied up?”

  “For a while, yes.”

  “The hell with that stuff,” Banks said. “I should be able to make the old buzzard pay for that.”

  “You can try to collect damages from his estate, but there again the cause of action would hardly survive.”

  “You lawyers and your surviving of actions,” Banks said. “Come on, let’s go, Lorry.”

  Lorraine Lawton said, “Would you mind waiting here, Mr. Mason? Or, you could wait across in Nancy’s apartment. I have a key. We could let you wait there. You could leave the door open.”

  Mason looked at his watch, said, “I feel that under the circumstances there’s not very much I can do here. I think I’ll leave now and keep in touch with the Drake Detective Agency. If either of you hear anything about Nancy or want to get in touch with me, please call the Drake Detective Agency and leave a message. They’re open twenty-four hours a day and I can get messages there.”

  “Okay, she’ll get in touch with you,” Rodney said. “Come on, Lorry. We’re going out and trip the light fantastic . . . . Nice to have seen you again, Mason.”

  Chapter Ten

  From a phone booth Perry Mason called the office of Paul Drake. When he had the detective on the line, Mason said, “Just checking in, Paul, to see if there’s anything new. If there isn’t, I’m going home and call it a day. I’ve lost my client. You might put an ear to the ground.”

  “What do you mean you’ve lost her?”

  “She was to show up at the apartment of a friend,” Mason said, “and she didn’t make it.”

  “Police?”

  “The police had turned her loose.”

  “Car accident?”

  “I don’t think so. She may have led with her chin. You’d better put an ear to the ground.”

  “Okay,” Drake promised. “Will do. In the meantime. I have another development waiting here that I think you’d better look into.”

  “What?”

  “His name,” Drake said, “is Larsen E. Halstead. He’s the bookkeeper-manager of Fremont’s business. He has a story.”

  “Will it keep?”

  “It’ll keep,” Drake said, “but we can’t keep it. The police have to know about it. I’m holding the guy here temporarily because I thought you might like to hear the story before the police do and thought it might be good public relations for you to telephone the police that—”

  “Where is he?”

  “My office.”

  “Can you hold him until I get there?”

  “I think so. I’ve held him fifteen minutes already.”

  “I’m on my way,” Mason said. “Do the best you can, and see if you can find out what’s happened to Nancy Banks. Check with any police connections you may have.”

  Mason jumped in his car, drove rapidly to the parking lot adjoining his office building, left the car in the stall he rented by the month, and took the elevator to Paul Drake’s office.

  The telephone operator looked up as Mason opened the door, flashed him a smile, then motioned down the corridor toward Drake’s office. She was at the moment talking on the telephone.

  Mason interpreted the sign language, opened the locked gate, went on down the corridor to Drake’s rather small office.

  A somewhat stooped man in his early fifties was sitting in a chair, his steel-rimmed glasses down on his nose so that he could, by raising his eyes, peer over them.

  The man’s hair was turning gray, his eyebrows were bushy and gray, his eyes were a pale blue, steady and appraising. He was slightly stooped, quiet, but not meek. His face had character.

  Paul Drake performed the introductions. “This is Mr. Mason, Halstead,” he said, and then to Perry Mason, “Larsen Halstead is the manager of Fremont’s business. He has a story.”

  “How did you get in touch with him?” Mason asked.

  Drake answered evasively, “It’s a long story, Perry, but I thought you’d be interested in what Halstead has told me about the nature of Fremont’s business. Suppose you tell Mr. Mason just as you told it to me, Halstead,” Drake said, turning to the figure in the chair. “It might be a good plan to run over it once more.”

  Halstead cleared his throat and said, “I’m not certain of my position in the matter. I don’t like to make charges and—”

  “That’s all right,” Drake said hastily. “Whatever you’re saying is completely confidential.”

  “I’m afraid,” Halstead said, “that Fremont is a crook. And I shouldn’t say that about my employer, but I’m afraid I can’t continue to work for him any longer. The man’s methods are repulsive.

  “You know he had Rodney Banks arrested for embezzlement. I think Rodney may have been a few dollars short, but Fremont really engineered the whole deal. He gave Rodney collections to make in cash over the week ends, knowing Rodney liked to go to the track and bet on the horses every week end.”

  Mason exchanged glances with Paul Drake. “Why would he want to make an embezzler out of an employee?”

  “On account of the sister, Miss Nancy. I’m here because of her. I understand she employed Mr. Drake. I gathered there was a connection . . . . Mr. Drake has refused to comment . . . but, of course, I can see you gentlemen are interested and that she is no stranger to you.

  “Nancy worked for Fremont for a while. He couldn’t keep his hands off of her. She slapped his face and walked out. He’s been trying ever since to get some sort of a hold on her.

  “Rodney kept on working for Fremont after his sister quit. He threatened to punch Fremont’s face in if he ever made another pass at Nancy.

  “Fremont laughed it off.

  “Something should be done to help Rodney now. His arrest was only to enable Fremont to get Nancy where he wanted her.

  “Fremont is a crook.”

  “In what way?” Mason asked.

  “He’s a fence.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I stumbled on it somewhat accidentally. Fremont buys and sells antiques, dabbles in speculative investments mostly related to real estate and has a rather sketchy sort of business that I never fully understood.

  “One thing is certain. He doesn’t cater generally to the public. He has the most sloppy place you can imagine; things are piled all over the place in confusion. The only thing that is modern about it is the safe in the office and his books. He keeps an elaborate set of books, and I’ve now come to the conclusion they don’t mean anything.”

  “Why not?” Mason asked.

  “His activities, his main activities don’t appear on the books. His other activities are accompanied with elaborate accountings.”

  “What are his main activities?”

  “The man is a fence.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He buys up antique jewelry, the old settings that have, for instance, garnets or perhaps imitation rubies.”

  “Go ahead,” Mason said.

  “He’ll have them around the shop for a while and then the gold setting which had contained a garnet will blossom into something else. The garnet will disappear and in its place will be a huge diamond.”

  “And then?” Mason asked.

  “Then he’ll sell the thing to one of the concerns that would take the good gems out of the antique gold settings, mount them in platinum and sell them and then sell off the antique settings.”

  “How did you get onto this?”

  “I got onto it last week when I happened to recognize a piece that had been gold with several garnets. When I saw it last week two of the garnets had disappeared and in their places were sparkling diamonds, naturally making the whole piece very valuable indeed.”

  “I see,” Mason said thoughtfully.

  “Go on,” Drake said. “Tell him the rest of it, Halstead.”

  “Well, of course, in order to carry on a business of that sort, Mr. Mason, particularly one that doesn’t appear on the books, it’s necessary for a man to have huge sums of cash money.”

  “Fremont has such a sum?” Mason asked.

  “He has it,” Halstead said, “and I didn’t find it until last week. I realized that my own activities in the matter might be subject to question because I am employed as bookkeeper, so I started making a secret inventory.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of the cash.”

  “And it fluctuates?”

  “I’ll say it fluctuates. There was twenty thousand dollars in currency in a secret vault in the floor, and the amount fluctuated from day to day, getting as low as six thousand, two hundred and seventy-five dollars one day, then going back to eighteen thousand dollars; then, early Friday morning, going down to a little over twelve thousand, then after Fremont came in it was up to over eighteen thousand again.”

  “And what happens to this money?”

  “Undoubtedly some of it is used as payment to people who bring in stolen gems, but it could have been taken out by any person.”

  “Just what do you mean by that?” Mason asked.

  “Rodney Banks is a good kid,” Halstead said. “He’s young and he has the arrogant chip-on-his-shoulder attitude that some young people have.

  “Fremont is going to claim that Banks embezzled money from the liquid cash which we keep in the regular safe.

  “Now, here’s where I can help. I happen to know that one of the hundred-dollar bills that was in the liquid cash in the safe Thursday night turned up in the hidden cash in the concealed floor receptacle on Friday morning.”

  “How do you know?” Mason asked.

  “Because I wrote down the number on the bill. I’ve been jotting down numbers on hundred-dollar bills ever since I found that secret hiding place in the floor.”

  Mason regarded the man thoughtfully. “You’re going to have to go to the police with this,” he said.

  “I intend to go to the police. I want to keep my own skirts clean, but the point is that if cash was juggled from the liquid cash in the safe to this hidden hoard of money, then there’s no way on earth of proving any embezzlement and—Well, the case against Rodney Banks blows sky high.”

  Mason looked at his watch, said, “Just a minute. I’ll see if I can get the police.”

  Paul Drake raised his eyebrows. “Lieutenant Tragg?”

  Mason nodded.

  Drake picked up the phone, said to his switchboard operator, “Get Lieutenant Tragg at Homicide, if he hasn’t gone home for the night.”

  “Homicide?” Halstead said, puzzled. “This is in the department which deals with cash shortages and embezzlements.”

  “Not now it isn’t,” Mason said. “It’s in Homicide. Marvin Fremont was killed at the Foley Motel sometime earlier this evening.”

  “What!” Halstead exclaimed.

  “Nancy Banks was there. The body was found in her room.”

  “That explains a lot,” Halstead said thoughtfully.

  “Fremont told me he was satisfied Nancy had some of the embezzled money, and he was going to get it one way or another. He said she wouldn’t dare go to the police no matter what happened.”

  Drake said, “Just a moment, Lieutenant Tragg. Perry Mason wants to talk with you,” and handed the phone to Mason.

  “Hello, Lieutenant,” Mason said. “I didn’t know whether you had left for the night.”

  “Don’t you know we never go home?” Tragg said wryly.

  Mason said, “I’m sending you a witness, if you want to wait there long enough to talk with him.”

  “What sort of a witness?”

  “A man by the name of Larsen Halstead, who was employed by Fremont as bookkeeper-manager.”

  “We’ve been looking for him,” Tragg said. “I located the place where he rooms and we’ve had a man staked out trying to get him. We want to talk with him.”

  “He’s with me now and he’ll be on his way up there by taxicab,” Mason said.

  “He’s with you now?”

  “Yes.”