“And that’s the reason you had me cash the checks?”
“Yes.”
“So that the police would think Lawley had some female accomplice, that he killed his wife and took her travelers’ checks, that the accomplice is going about cashing those checks?”
“Exactly.”
“Well, it worked all right, didn’t it?”
Mason said, “It worked, Della, too damned well. Lieutenant Tragg was watching for it. He’s looking for Carlotta Lawley, and he’s asked department stores... Good Lord!” Mason exclaimed. “What a fool I was not to have realized it!”
“What, Chief?”
Mason said, “Carlotta Lawley must have an account at that department store where you tried to cash the check. The cashier probably didn’t know her personally, but she knew her signature, and Lieutenant Tragg knew she had an account there. He’d told the cashier to notify him at once if any new charges went on the account.”
Della said, “Yes, that would account for it.”
Mason said, “Put your hat back on, Della. You’re going places.”
“Where?”
“Places. I don’t want Lieutenant Tragg to come walking in and say, ‘Miss Street, were you, by any chance, the person who tried to cash a travelers’ check this afternoon by signing the name of Carlotta Lawley?’ ”
“You mean he suspects?” Della Street asked.
“Not yet,” Mason said, “but he’ll get a detailed description of the woman who tried to cash the check, and he’ll come to the office to see me. Then, if he sees you while the description is fresh in his mind — he’s too shrewd a detective not to tumble.”
“So I’m to hide out?” Della Street asked, picking up her hat again and adjusting it in front of the mirror.
“No,” Mason said. “We can’t have that. That looks like flight, and flight looks like guilt. No, Della, we’re going to go out to take some depositions or work on a case. You’re going to stay on the job. I’m going to come back and forth to the office. In that way, you won’t be available, yet your absence will have been explained.”
Her eyes lit up. “That,” she said, “won’t be hard to take. I can think of half a dozen places which would be simply swell for a vacation.”
He nodded and said, “And, by the way, Della, if the mailman delivers an envelope addressed in my handwriting with the return address of the Clearmount Hotel, don’t open it. It might be a lot better if you didn’t know what was inside of it.”
Della Street’s eyes narrowed. “Would it,” she asked, “be a certificate of stock?”
“You and Lieutenant Tragg,” Mason said firmly, “are getting too damn smart.”
Chapter 10
Della Street, moving with the swift rapidity of one who is accustomed to accomplishment, stepped into the outer office to instruct the receptionist. Perry Mason, standing by his desk, hat and coat on, was scooping legal papers into the brief case which he intended to take with him.
Suddenly the door from the outer office was pushed open. Della entered Mason’s office, jerked off her hat, tossed it to the shelf above the washstand in the closet, opened her locker, took out a comb and brush and started changing her hair.
With bobby pins held in her mouth so that her words sounded jumbled, she said, “He’s there... Only seen me with my hat on just for a minute... Gertie looked to me when he asked for you... said he had to see you right away... claims he can’t wait... I’ll change my appearance as much as I can... Wouldn’t do for me to skip out now.”
Mason watched her brush the curls out of her hair, make a part in the middle, slick her hair down on each side. Her fingertips dipped into water from the open tap, smoothing out the curled ends.
“Lieutenant Tragg?”
She nodded, her mouth bristling with bobby pins.
Slowly, Mason took off his coat, hung it up, carefully placed his hat on a hook just behind Della, said, “He won’t wait.”
“I know it,” she muttered... “Told him you had a client but would be free in two or three minutes.”
Mason opened a drawer in his desk, pulled out the papers from his brief case, dropped them into the drawer, closed it, and kicked the brief case back into the foot-well under the desk.
Della swept the last of the bobby pins from her lips, looked at herself appraisingly.
“Let’s go,” Mason said.
Wordlessly, she vanished into the outer office, returning with Lieutenant Tragg in tow.
“Hello, Lieutenant,” Mason said casually.
Tragg wasted no time in preliminaries. “Mason,” he said, “I hand it to you.”
“To me?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“You caught me napping. The thing impressed me at the time. I guess it stuck in my subconscious, but I was too preoccupied to notice it. You drew a red herring across the trail, and I went barking off on a false scent.”
Mason said, “Sit down, Lieutenant. Have a cigarette. My secretary, Miss Street.”
“How do you do, Miss Street.” Tragg took a cigarette, sat down in the big armchair, accepted Mason’s match, and seemed somewhat embarrassed.
“I don’t get you,” Mason said.
“Last night while I was all hot and bothered about that gun Mildreth Faulkner had, and about the way she’d managed to pull the trigger so that a paraffin test wouldn’t give me any results which couldn’t be explained, you went out to your car. You’re a damn good driver, Mason, but when you turned around, you clashed gears, raced the motor, backed and twisted.”
“I must have been excited.”
“Yes. Crazy like a fox. Any time Perry Mason gets so excited he fumbles the ball, it’s a long, cold day. You know why the chief took Holcomb off Homicide and put me on?”
“No. Why?”
“He got tired of having you walk into court and pull rabbits out of the hat. It was up to me to make a better showing than Holcomb.”
“That shouldn’t be exceptionally difficult.”
“Not if I’m going to let my attention get distracted while you set the stage for your little sleight of hand tricks,” Tragg said ruefully.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Tragg didn’t even bother to look up from his cigarette. “Carlotta Lawley,” he said.
“What about her?”
“She drove up to her sister’s house. You heard the car and knew who it was. I was too occupied trying to get some damaging admissions out of Mildreth Faulkner. You walked out and stole the whole bag of tricks right from under my nose.”
“What,” Mason asked, “are you intimating I did?”
“Told Carlotta Lawley that I was in there, that things didn’t look so good for her, that you had managed to coach Mildreth Faulkner so she’d draw our fire for a while. That idea of having the ‘accidental’ discharge of the gun was a masterpiece.”
“Was it the murder gun?” Mason asked.
“It was the murder gun.”
“Do you know where she got it or how she got it?”
“Of course. She got it from Carlotta.”
“Is that what Miss Faulkner says?”
“Naturally not. Miss Faulkner acts more guilty than she would if she were guilty. She’s doing her job too well. She’s overacting. She’s helping her sister by playing red herring.”
Mason said, “You seem to have rather a high opinion of her intelligence.”
Tragg met his eyes. “Damned high. She has what it takes, that woman.”
“But you don’t think she’s guilty?”
“No. Not now.”
“What’s brought about the sudden change?”
“Sindler Coll.”
“Don’t let him fool you,” Mason warned. “He sent for Magard last night. He said that if Magard would give him an alibi, he’d give Magard one. Suggested that they...”