"You were standing almost amidships and on this side of the ship?" Mason asked.
"Yes."
"Then it's possible you saw the gun as it fell across the path of light which was thrown from this porthole, isn't it?"
"Well… perhaps. This probably is the porthole. There's a bright light here, and the illumination sort of fans out into a cone. You could see the path of light in the fog."
"What sort of gun was it?" Mason asked. "Could you see?"
Custer beat her to the answer. "It was an automatic. I guess I should know. I worked in a hardware store and I've sold lots of guns. It was a blued-steel automatic with a wooden handle. Just judging from the size of it, I'd say it was a.38, but you can't tell. Some companies make a pretty heavy.32. And then there's one.45 that's not so much different in size from a.38. You know, just looking at it for a second or two that way, it's hard to tell."
"So," Mason said gravely, "you think it was a.38, if it wasn't a.45 or a.32. Is that right?"
"Yes."
"But it may have been a.45?"
"It might have been."
"Or it might have been a.32?"
"Yes."
"Don't they make a.22 caliber automatic with a heavy frame and a long barrel?"
"Well, yes, they do."
"Could it have been a.22?"
Custer frowned thoughtfully. Marilyn Smith laughed and said, "Just because you sold guns, Bert, you try to know too much about them. You couldn't tell what caliber that gun was. Why, we just saw it for a fraction of a second, as it went down through that shaft of light that was coming from the porthole."
Mason said, "Thank you, Miss Smith."
He stepped to the door of the inner office, and the plainclothesman said, "Don't go in there."
"I'm just looking through the door," Mason said.
The body had been removed. The glass top which had been on the desk was standing on edge, propped against the wall. Powder had been dusted on it to bring out hundreds of latent fingerprints, and near the center of the glass was the print of a whole hand, where apparently someone had leaned over on the glass. The imprint seemed to have been made by a woman's hand.
Mason casually moved over toward Arthur Manning. "Is this going to make quite a change for you?" he asked.
The uniformed special watchman nodded and said gloomily, "I'll say it is."
"Won't you get along okay with Duncan?"
"Well, you know how it is," Manning said. "They were both of them fighting. Duncan gave me my job, but Grieb handled most of the inside business and all the cash, and I naturally saw more of Sam Grieb than I did of Duncan. Grieb gave me orders and I tried to please him. So, the first thing I knew, I was in the position of sort of taking sides with Grieb. Not that I did, at all, but I know Duncan felt that way about me. Now that he's in charge, he'll let me out. He didn't like what I told the officers about the chairs."
Mason said, "I might be able to get you a job. At least a temporary job, with a detective agency."
Manning's eyes brightened.
"Think you'd like that?" Mason asked.
"I'd like any job that pays wages," Manning said, "and I've always wanted to get in a detective agency. I think I could make good in that business and perhaps work up."
"Well," the lawyer went on in a low voice, "suppose you drop into my office first thing tomorrow. Don't tell anyone about it, though. Just drop in on your own. Do you think you could do that?"
"Sure, unless they tie me up here so I can't get ashore. I don't know how long this investigation's going to last."
"Well, just drop in any time," Mason said. "Ask for Miss Street. She's my secretary. I'll speak to her, so you won't be delayed. It'll only take a few minutes. Just run in and I'll introduce you to the head of the detective agency that handles my business."
"Okay, Mr. Mason. Thanks a lot," Manning said.
The men who had been in the vault came back into the room. Duncan pulled the door shut, slammed the bolts into place, and spun the combination savagely. There was no trace of a smile on his face. The sergeant took a roll of gummed paper from his pocket, tore off two pieces, wrote his name across them, moistened them on his tongue, and stuck them across the edges of the vault door.
"Now, I don't want anyone opening that vault until after the Marshal gets here," he said. "You understand that, Duncan?"
"I understand it," Duncan blazed, "but it's a hell of a note when you seal up a man's place of business and say he can't get into it! Now, there's something wrong here. We're ninety-five hundred dollars short that I know of. You said you were going to take a complete inventory. Why don't you go ahead with it?"
"Because there's too much junk in there. It'd keep us busy until morning if we did that. I've sealed the vault door. That will hold things intact until…"
"Intact, hell!" Duncan blazed. "A man could steam off that paper, and…"
"Well, I'll put a guard on duty. How will that be?"
Duncan was mollified. "That might be okay," he conceded.
"Now, how about this ninety-five hundred? You said that was to have been paid in tonight. That might have been a motive for the killing."
Duncan stared at Perry Mason in somber appraisal and said, "I'm not making any statements just yet. Let's take a look through the desk."
"Now, I'll be the one who does that," the sergeant said. "You fellows keep away."
He opened the top left-hand drawer in the desk and exclaimed, "Here's your nine thousand five hundred, Duncan."
Duncan pushed eagerly forward. The sergeant's right hand pressed against the gambler's chest. "Keep away, Duncan, I don't want you touching things here."
He scooped the money from the drawer, slowly counting it. As the bills fell to the desk and the count mounted up, Duncan's lips twisted back in a smile so that his gold teeth were once more visible. Then, after the six-thousand-dollar mark was reached, Duncan's smile slowly vanished as his appraising eyes took stock of the bills remaining in the sergeant's hand. By the time the count was completed, Duncan's lips were once more pressed tightly together.
"Seventy-five hundred," the sergeant announced. "Now, that's two thousand dollars short of the amount you mentioned, Duncan."
Duncan said, "You haven't gone through the desk yet. There may be some more in one of the other drawers."
"That's not the point," the officer remarked. "Grieb was sitting at this desk when he was killed. Now, someone paid him a big sum of money. He evidently hadn't had time to put the money in the coin safe. He certainly wouldn't have planned on letting it stay here in his desk. Therefore, the man who paid this money may have been the last man to see Grieb alive. I want to know who he was."
"I don't know who paid it," Duncan said, his eyes carefully avoiding Mason's.
"You have an idea who might have paid it, haven't you?"
"I haven't any ideas that I'm spilling right now," Duncan said obstinately. "After all, this is our business, and it's confidential."
"I order you to tell me."
"Order and be damned!" Duncan blazed. "I don't know who you think you are. We're still out on the high seas. I'm in charge of this ship."
Perkins coughed, hesitated, then blurted, "There was some talk between Mason and Duncan about some IOU's. It was when we first came aboard, before Mason knew about the murder. I think they said something about seventy-five hundred dollars. Those IOU's may have been what…"
The sergeant whirled to Perry Mason. "Did you pay that money?" he asked.
Mason said casually, "I don't think I have anything to add to Mr. Duncan's statement. It seems to cover the point admirably, Sergeant. I might add that there's quite a difference between seventy-five hundred dollars in obligations and a ninety-five hundred dollar shortage."