“You can for a fact,” Drake agreed.
“And now, Paul, we’ve got to find Helen Reedley.”
“The police have probably been looking for her,” Drake said. “They seem content with the case they’ve got, but they’ll want to get the Reedley woman just to round it out.”
Frank Holt, chewing on his unlighted cigar, said matter-of-factly, “I was taking a gander around the joint while you fellows were giving the dame the works. The telephone had a clip with a memorandum pad attached to it. I swiped that pad — here it is. One of those numbers may mean something to you.”
Mason looked down the list of numbers gleefully. “Paul,” he said, “it’s almost certain that one of these numbers is that of the hide-out where Helen Reedley was staying and receiving reports from Robert Hines. Get to work on those numbers just as fast as you can. How long will it take?”
“How many numbers are there?”
“About a dozen,” Holt said.
“It’s going to be a job, Perry, but I think I can get the information in — say — well, if I’m lucky, half an hour.”
“I’ll be at my office,” Mason said. “Get the information to me there and keep shadows on Carlotta. I don’t want to lose her.”
Chapter 13
Back in his office Mason had no more than settled himself at his desk when his phone rang.
Drake’s voice had lost its characteristic drawl. “We’ve checked on three of those numbers, Perry.”
“What did you find?”
“One of them’s an apartment hotel — permanent and transient. Helen Reedley’s staying there under an assumed name.”
“Where are you now, Paul?”
“I’m calling from a drugstore down at Tenth and Washington.”
“How far is that from the hotel where Helen Reedley is?”
“Eight or ten blocks.”
“Wait there,” Mason said. “I’ll be right down.” He hung up the telephone and grabbed his hat.
“You wanted me to call Harry Gulling?” Della Street asked.
“Not now,” Mason called over his shoulder. “I’ll call him when I get back.”
Joining Paul Drake, Mason drove with him to the Yucca Arms Hotel.
“How’s she registered?” Mason asked.
“As Genevieve Jordon.”
“You’re sure it’s the same one?”
“Seems to be — she answers the description. We have her number, no use bothering with the desk. Just act important and go on up. We can get by.”
They rode up to Apartment 50-B and Mason knocked.
“Who is it?” a woman’s voice called.
“Mr. Mason.”
“I... I think you have the wrong apartment.”
“I don’t.”
“Who is it?”
“Perry Mason.”
“I... What? I don’t know you.”
“We can talk back and forth through the door, or I can come in. Which would you prefer?”
“Do whatever you please,” she said. “I don’t know you and I’m going to call the police if you don’t go away.”
Raising his voice, Mason called, “When your husband put detectives on your trail, and you decided to—”
There was the sound of a bolt being hastily thrown back. The door was flung open and indignant eyes blazed at Mason. She said bitterly, “I think you have the most obnoxious personality I have ever—” She broke off as she caught sight of Paul Drake.
“Walk right in, Paul,” Mason said.
“Yes, please do,” she said sarcastically. “Any friend of Mr. Mason is always welcome, any time of the day or night! Come right in, do! Won’t you stay for dinner?”
Mason and Drake entered the apartment. As Mason closed the door behind him he said, “If you’d quit playing ring-around-the-rosy with us, Mrs. Reedley, I think we’d all be better off.”
“Do you indeed?”
Mason went on affably, “There’s no reason why we can’t be friends. You have quite a temper, and when it flares up you’re savage: But I’ve noticed that when you realize you’re licked, you dish up a smile and try some other angle. You’d have made a good lawyer.”
“Oh, would I? You can’t imagine how you flatter me! And what do you want now?”
“The time is past for fooling around,” Mason told her. “We want the low-down now.”
“You’ve had everything out of me you’re going to get.”
“Let me present Paul Drake, head of the Drake Detective Agency. He’s in my employ.”
“Why, how do you do, Mr. Drake? I’m so glad to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you. Do make yourself at home. I suppose you want my diary? And a list of all my friends? And how about some photographs?”
Paying no attention to her elaborately sarcastic tone. Mason said, “Of course, we could go about this in another way, if we had to.”
“Is that blackmail?”
“You might consider it such.”
“I hate blackmail.”
“You hate me anyway,” Mason said cheerfully, “so you may as well make a thorough job of it. Now suppose you tell me just what the score is?”
She studied him for a moment with thoughtful eyes, then suddenly smiled. “I like a fighter,” she said.
Mason said nothing.
“I know,” she said, “you think it’s a stall. Another one of those things you were talking about. Trying a new angle when you were blocked off on something you were trying to do. But it isn’t that. I’ve just decided to play ball.”
“Wind up and pitch,” Mason said.
“Well, you’ve met my husband?”
“Yes.”
“You’re a pretty good judge of character?”
“I make a stab at it.”
“All right then, you know him — restless, seething internally, insanely jealous in a possessive way, arrogant, proud, dynamic, forceful, and successful.”
“A rather complex array of adjectives,” Mason commented.
“A complex man, Mr. Mason. He’s successful in business because few men can stand up against the initial impact, or against the steady pressure that follows. Orville has no peace within himself, and therefore people with whom he comes in contact don’t have any peace either.”
“I can well imagine that it might be difficult to be his wife.”
“Not so difficult to be his wife,” she said slowly, “as it is to break away from being that.”
“Go on.”
“The man fascinated me — his drive, his ceaseless desire to dominate. I’d never known anyone before quite like him. That in itself was bad for me, because I thought I had met all the types and could catalogue almost any man within the first fifteen minutes.”
“Orville didn’t catalogue?” Mason asked.
“Not within the first fifteen minutes.”
“You’ve catalogued him now?”
“Yes.”
“And then got tired of him?”
“I don’t think so. I doubt if I was ever in love with him. I was just fascinated by his sheer drive. As every other person must be, I was jarred by that first smashing impact with his personality. He wanted me from the moment he saw me, and when he wants something he starts beating down obstacles.”
“The answer, of course,” Mason said, “is that you married him. All this analysis is just a post-mortem.”
“No, it isn’t — it’s the explanation of what followed.”
“What did follow?”
“Some six months ago, I really and truly fell in love — for the first time in my life, I think.”
“So what did you do?”
“I made the greatest mistake a woman ever made.”