"Well, we can get it," the clerk said grimly. "It doesn't stand much chance of getting out of the county without being caught. What's the license number?"
Della Street shook her head helplessly. Then seized with a sudden inspiration, said, "Oh, I know. Call up the International Automotive Indemnity Exchange. Call them at my expense. We had the car insured a few days ago. They can look up the insurance records. My husband has the policy and I don't know where it is. But you can explain to them the car has been stolen, and they'll give you the license number and the engine number and all of that data you require."
The clerk was already in motion. He said to the telephone operator, "Get me the International Automotive Indemnity Exchange on long distance, and get me the sheriff's office at the court house. Better get the insurance company first."
Her fingers flew over the switchboard with swift skill.
"I'm afraid I'm making a lot of trouble," Della Street said.
"Not at all, Mrs. Clammert. I'm only sorry something like this should happen to mar the pleasure of your stay."
Then the clerk, suddenly realizing that the pleasure of her stay had been marred by much more than the loss of an automobile, became silent and embarrassed.
The girl at the switchboard said, "Do you want your call in a booth, Mr. Maxwell?"
"Perhaps I'd better."
"Booth one," she said.
The clerk stepped into the booth, and a few moments later emerged holding a slip of paper upon which he had penciled numbers.
"Now then," he said to the operator, "the sheriff's office."
"They're already waiting on the line," she told him. The clerk stepped into the booth once more, then came out, smiling.
"You may rest assured that the car will be recovered, Mrs. Clammert. The sheriff's office is notifying the state motorcycle officers and the sheriff's office in Ventura, in Los Angeles, in San Luis Obispo, Bakersfield, and Salinas. They'll have the roads completely sewed up. What's more, they'll have a radio broadcast giving the numbers, and wires are going out to the Division of Motor Vehicles and to the border patrol stations on the highways into Arizona, Mexico and Oregon."
"Thank you so much," she said. "Oh, I'm so completely desolated. I think I'll pack up and go to Los Angeles, and then return after my husband comes back. I don't want to stay here without him."
"We should be very sorry to lose you," the clerk said, "but I understand how you feel, Mrs. Clammert."
Della Street nodded her head with quick determination.
"Yes," she said, "I'm going to Los Angeles."
"Where can I notify you about the automobile?"
She frowned for a moment, and then said, "Oh, just notify the insurance company and my husband's lawyers will keep in touch with them. After all, I guess it's not so serious. It's up to them to supply us with a new car, isn't it?"
"Oh, you'll get your car back, Mrs. Clammert. Probably some hitchhiker took it to get over a few miles of road. He'll abandon it by the side of the road somewhere when he runs out of gas, or, if he doesn't, he'll be picked up by some of the officers who'll be patrolling the highway."
"Well," Della Street said, "I guess the insurance company will take care of it. You've been very, very nice here, and I'm sorry I couldn't stay longer, but you understand how it is."
The clerk assured her that he understood, prepared her bill and saw that her baggage was safely started for the depot.
Perry Mason was seated in his office, reading mail, when the door opened and Della Street appeared in the doorway, carrying a hatbox.
"Well," he said, "how's the disappointed bride?"
She was all crisp efficiency. "Everything went off okay, Chief. They're notifying the motor patrols, and the border stations."
"Yes," Mason said, "I heard the reports on the police calls."
"The clerk was most solicitous," she said. "He remembered the new Buick and thought it was such a beauty and hoped I wouldn't be deprived of it more than a day or two… Tell me first: Why did you go to all this trouble simply to get the police to report a car as stolen? Couldn't you have simply used a telephone and…"
He interrupted her with a smiling shake of the head. "You wouldn't deprive me of my honeymoon, Della!"
"You deprived yourself of it," she retorted, "and you still haven't answered my question."
"I wanted Watson Clammert arrested," he said slowly. "I wanted him arrested under such circumstances that he would appear to be a professional car thief. I couldn't have brought about that result by any ordinary means, since I didn't dare to make a formal charge in my own name and didn't dare to sign a complaint in any name. My theory may be wrong, in which event I can't afford to leave any back trail the police or Clammert could follow. We needed someone who would enlist the sympathy and active cooperation of the police without signing a complaint and without leaving a back trail. The Biltmore Hotel is a big factor in Santa Barbara and the sheriff of Santa Barbara County is sufficiently important to get all sorts of political cooperation. But the Biltmore Hotel most certainly wouldn't have acted as a cat's paw to pull our chestnuts out of the fire unless we had established ourselves so firmly with them that it would never have occurred to them to question your identity.
"It took human interest to do that, and the best way to get human interest was to give the clerk an orchestra seat and let him become a sympathetic spectator of your blasted romance."
"And would you tell me just what chestnuts you expect to have pulled from the fire?" she inquired.
Mason shook his head. "Not now," he said… "Did you come down on the train?"
"No, I had the hotel take my stuff to the depot and then I chartered a car to drive me down."
"Leave any back trail?"
"No."
"Good girl. They're rushing things with Douglas Keene. They start the hearing at two o'clock this afternoon."
She stared at him with startled eyes. "You mean they're going to start the preliminary at two o'clock this afternoon? Why, it's twenty minutes to two now."
He nodded. "I was just getting my things together ready to go down there. Want to go?"
"Of course, I want to go."
"Drop your hatbox then, and come on. I'll talk things over in the taxi."
"But why let them rush things? Couldn't you have held them off?"
"I think," he told her with a grin, "things are coming along in good shape. I want to have them rushed."
"Why?"
"Partially to get the suspense of those two kids over with, and partially to get even with Sergeant Holcomb."
"How do you mean?"
"If Sergeant Holcomb solves the mystery," Perry Mason said with a grin, "he gets the credit. If I solve the mystery I get the credit."
"You think Sergeant Holcomb could clear it up?"
"I think it will be cleared up for him. That is, I think the machinery has been set in motion. It won't be long before the situation clarifies itself, and I want to beat everyone to it. You know me. I'm a great grandstander."
Her eyes were more expressive than her voice, and her voice held that peculiar, low, vibrant note which characterized her when emotions mastered her. "You're the squarestshooting man in the world," she said. And then, as he looked up, she added with a grin, "And one of the most unsatisfactory bridegrooms. You've no idea how sympathetic that hotel clerk felt toward me."
Chapter 18
Spectators pushed and jostled, filling judge Pennymaker's courtroom to capacity.
Dick Truslow, one of Hamilton Burger's most trusted trial deputies, grinned across the counsel table at Perry Mason.
Truslow had that attribute of a dangerous fighter—an ability fully to appreciate the strong points of an antagonist—a personal liking which could instantly be laid aside to give place to official combativeness.