“Not at the moment. The—”
The phone rang. Della Street picked it up, said, “Yes, Gertie,” then after a moment said, “Just a moment. I’ll find out.
“Your on-again-off-again client has called the office, asking Gertie if it would be possible to have an appointment with you this morning.”
“You mean Adelle Hastings?“
“Yes.”
“Let me talk with her,” Mason said.
Della Street said, “Just a minute, Gertie. Put her on Mr. Mason’s line, will you?”
Mason picked up the phone, said, “Hello?”
Adelle Hastings’ voice held a note of urgency.
“Mr. Mason, I simply must see you.”
“You’re here in Los Angeles?”
“Yes.”
“How did you get here?”
“I couldn’t get to sleep last night. The more I thought of it the more I began to think your idea might be the right one, and if it is... I want to see you, if possible before... before...”
“Before what?” Mason asked.
“Before anything happens.”
“What do you mean, happens?”
“Well, if Garvin doesn’t keep that ten o’clock appointment this morning Simley Beason will— Well, it will mean something very serious is wrong.”
“Probably he’s keeping that appointment right now,” Mason said.
“That’s just the point,“ she said. “He hasn’t shown up at the office as of two or three minutes ago.”
“You mean you’ve been on the phone talking with Mr. Beason?”
“Yes.”
“That might not be too good,” Mason said thoughtfully. “Where are you with reference to my office?”
“I’m in the parking lot adjoining the building.”
“All right,” Mason said, “now here’s what I want you to do. Come up here right away but don’t go to the entrance office. Now, understand that definitely. Don’t go to the entrance office. Go to the door marked PERRY MASON — PRIVATE. Knock on that door and Della Street will let you in.”
“I’m not to go through the reception room?”
“No.”
“And I’m to come right up?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll be right up,” she promised.
Mason hung up the phone and turned to Della Street. “This thing bothers me, Della.”
Della, who had been monitoring the telephone conversation, nodded.
“Of course,” Mason said, “Adelle Hastings could be right about her purse having been stolen.”
“And again,” Della Street said, as Mason hesitated.
“And again,” Mason said, grinning, “she could have come to the office, left her purse and walked away, knowing that someone in the office would find the purse and that the contents would arouse a great deal of interest.
“She had left enough money in the purse so that she could be certain we’d take steps to get in touch with her — even without the gun in the purse we’d have done that.”
Della Street waited silently as Mason paused.
“Well?” Mason asked.
She smiled and said, “Go ahead. You’re thinking out loud, just using my ears to bounce words off of so you can clarify your own thinking”
Mason might not have heard her. Abruptly he said, “Get Paul Drake on the phone right away, Della. I want to talk with him before Adelle Hastings gets up here.”
Della Street’s nimble fingers twisted the dial of the telephone with swift efficiency. A moment later she said, “Here’s Paul Drake, Chief.”
Mason picked up the phone and said, “Paul, this is an emergency matter and I want some fast action.”
“You always do,” Drake said.
“Hold it,” Mason said, “there’s no time for kidding. I want you to get as many young women as you can, up to six or seven — no more than that — but six or seven, if possible.
“I want them between twenty-seven to thirty-two. I want them all with good figures, weighing not more than a hundred and seventeen pounds, and not less than a hundred and ten pounds. I want them all to put on heavy dark glasses. You can send one of your operatives down to a drugstore and get a bunch of dark glasses, the biggest and darkest lenses you can find.”
“How soon?” Drake asked.
“Right now,” Mason told him.
“Have a heart, Perry. I can’t—”
“I don’t care what you have to pay,” Mason said, “I want them. I’m mixed into something that bothers me personally and professionally and I want those women. Probably your receptionist knows some of the girls who are working here in the building who can get away for half an hour or so. Send an operative down to the restaurant. Pick up some of the girls who are having a coffee break. Send someone over to the parking lot. Pick out young women who have parked their cars. Ask them if they want to get twenty dollars for an hour’s work. Then give me a ring as soon as you’ve got them.”
“Twenty dollars for an hour’s work?” Drake asked.
“Fifty, if you have to,” Mason said. “I want results.”
“I’m on the job,” Drake said. “I’ll start with my receptionist. I have a couple of operatives here that are on the loose, and a young chap who can skip down to the drugstore and get dark glasses. You want them big and dark.”
“That’s right. Big lenses and very dark,” Mason said. “We’ll give you a ring as soon as we’re ready. Now, get this straight, Paul. You have these girls in your office all ready to go, with dark glasses on.
“At the proper time, Della will ring your office and say, ‘Paul, this is Della.’ That’s all she’ll say. The minute she says that, you push those girls out into the corridor and have them walk down to the door of my reception room, but tell them not to go in until I come out of my private office with a young woman of that general description, who will also be wearing dark glasses. I’ll walk down to the group and we’ll all go in together. Got that?”
“Got it,” Drake said.
Mason hung up.
Della Street looked at Mason and smiled. “That,” she said, “is the advantage of having a detective agency on the same floor of the building in which you have a law office.”
Mason nodded thoughtfully.
“The idea is to have something of a line-up?” Della Street asked.
“Exactly,” Mason said. “You know Gertie. If I bring Adelle Hastings out into the outer office with dark glasses on and say, ‘Gertie, have you ever seen this young woman before?’ Gertie will pipe up and say, ‘Oh, yes. That’s the woman who left her purse here yesterday — Mrs. Hastings. Mr. Mason has your purse in the office, Mrs. Hastings.’
“Human nature being what it is, Gertie by this time remembers only the fact that a well-shaped woman, around twenty-seven or thirty, wearing heavy dark glasses, was in the office and left a purse.
“Now, if anything has happened, and Gertie makes that offhand identification, we might be in trouble.”
“What do you think has happened?” Della Street asked.
“If someone has stolen Adelle Hastings’ bag and fired two shots from the revolver that was in that bag, almost anything could have happened. And if, on the other hand, Adelle Hastings fired two shots from that revolver and then went to all this trouble to set the stage so that I’d be drawn into the case, you can be pretty damn certain that something has happened. She—”
Mason broke off as there was a tapping on the door to his private office.
Mason nodded to Della Street.
Della Street opened the door.
“Good morning, Mrs. Hastings,” Mason said. “You must have got up early and had quite a drive.”