“The house detective?”
“No. Hush... Della, it’s Harry, the big waiter from Palomino.”
They stood tense, without motion, holding their breaths, waiting. Through the narrow opening of the door they could hear steps approaching. Then suddenly the steps stopped. Knuckles tapped gently on a door.
They heard a bolt click back. A door opened. A man’s voice said, “Hello. You made a quick trip, come in.”
The voice of the visitor muttered something that was unintelligible. The room door closed and Mason, waiting a full second, pushed open the door from the staircase and said to Della, “Come on.”
“Was that Harry? Are you certain?”
“Yes, that was Harry. I think he went into a room on the other side of the corridor. Let’s see. Yes, it’s across the corridor from our side. The even numbers are on this side and the odd numbers over there. Wait a minute, Della. That may have been the room, directly across. 511. That’s where Callender is supposed to be located.”
“Think he’s likely to come out?” Della whispered.
“I don’t know. We’ll have to knock gently on Sheldon’s door,” Mason said, tapping very lightly with the tips of his fingers. He waited several seconds as nothing happened, then knocked again more loudly.
“Who is it?” a man’s voice asked.
Mason made no answer. Unshod steps sounded behind the door. The man’s voice was closer to the door this time. There was a trace of fear in the voice which came through the panels. “Who is it? I won’t open until I know who it is.”
Mason took a card from his pocket, slipped it through the crack under the door.
A light switch clicked on in the room. A knife edge of light became visible under the door. Hands on the inside pulled Mason’s card the rest of the way through the crack and into the room. There was an interval of silence during which Mason glanced over his shoulder at the door of room number 511. A ribbon of light also was visible beneath the door of that room.
Abruptly there was the sound of a turning bolt, a clicking night latch. The door of 510 opened. Sheldon, standing in bare feet and pajamas in the doorway, saw Della Street and instinctively ducked back behind the door, trying to close it.
Mason pushed the door open, entered the room, kicked it shut behind him, said, “Sorry, Sheldon, there’s no time for being polite.”
“I didn’t know. Your secretary — you’ll pardon me, I’m...”
Mason said, “Forget it. Keep your voice low. Come over here. Sit down on the bed. Let’s talk things out. You got a robe?”
“Yes.”
“Put it on.”
“Can I comb my hair, or...”
“No.”
Sheldon put on a bathrobe, sat down beside Mason and Della Street on the bed.
Mason said, “I saw a fan-dancer. I want to know something more about her.”
“What about her?”
Mason said, “I think there’s been a ringer.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean a ringer.”
“You mean the one in Palomino isn’t the right one?”
“Yes.”
Sheldon sat motionless for several seconds, then he said, “Yes, I guess so. How did you find out?”
“I went up there.”
“But you don’t know the real Lois.”
“I know the ringer.”
“I didn’t think you’d find out — so soon. What do you want?”
“I want you to come clean. I want you to start talking, and I want you to start talking fast.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Who’s Cherie Chi-Chi? Who’s John Callender? Why is the horse so damn important?”
Sheldon said, “John Callender is... that is, in a sense...”
“Come on,” Mason said, “out with it.”
“He’s her husband,” Sheldon blurted. “The real one. I mean the real Lois.”
“And what about the horse?”
“Callender thinks he could use the horse as evidence — that is, if he can find the horse.”
Mason said, “If you start at the beginning and give me the whole story we won’t waste so much time.”
Sheldon said, “It’s hard to tell you about Lois Fenton so you’ll understand her.”
“Then skip her,” Mason said, “and just tell me about facts.”
Sheldon said, “The facts won’t mean anything to you unless you understand Lois.”
“Well, Lois won’t mean anything to me unless I have the facts.”
Sheldon ran his spread fingers through his tousled hair. “The trouble is, there just aren’t words to describe that sort of thing. Have you ever seen a deer when it didn’t know you were watching it? It’s something about the way it walks... well, wild is the only way you can express it. Well, that’s Lois. She has that same sort of thing about her. She’s wild in the sense that she’s untamed and just the way she wants to be. You couldn’t ever put her into a routine job anywhere.”
“And she married Callender?”
“I’m coming to that. There are lots of these carnival girls who are tough. They let the life coarsen them.”
“And Lois didn’t?” Mason asked. “Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”
“Exactly. Lois never had any advantages. She wanted to express herself in motion. Look here, Mr. Mason, you say you saw a fan-dancer. If you ever saw Lois Fenton, the real Lois Fenton, you wouldn’t call her a fan-dancer. You don’t think of sex when she’s dancing, not in that way. You think of beauty.”
Mason glanced at Della Street.
Della said, “You’re in love with her, perhaps that’s why.”
Sheldon said, “No, it isn’t that. You’ve got the cart before the horse. It’s because she’s so beautiful and all of that that I’m in love with her, not that I just think she’s beautiful and clean and fine because I’m crazy about her.”
Mason said, “All right. Now let’s have the facts.”
“There are two dancers using the name of Lois Fenton, but the real Lois... I can’t explain fully right now, Mr. Mason.”
Mason said, “I can’t do a thing until you’ve given me the facts and I know where to start working and how to start working.”
“Lois Fenton has a brother, Jasper Fenton,” Sheldon said. “He’s made a lot of trouble for Lois. Callender met Lois. He fell for her like a ton of bricks. Because he was rich, he thought that was all there was to it. Then he found Lois wasn’t for lease and wasn’t for sale. He gave Jasper a job, running his office. It was a nice job. It had a good salary.
“That’s Calender’s way. It was easy for Jasper to play the horses. Callender made it easy. He’s a deep one, make no mistake about that, Mr. Mason.
“The boy forged two checks for around three thousand dollars. That gave Callender everything he wanted. Don’t try to tell me those crude methods don’t work any longer. They do. I saw them work. John Callender is a big shot in his home county. When he whistles, the prosecutor jumps through hoops. Callender pretended that he was surprised and shocked to death. He made it stick. Actually, he’d watched the kid like a hawk, putting temptation in his way and waiting for him to fall. He wanted to make certain the kid stole enough to make restitution impossible, not enough to really hurt. When he gave Jasper that job...”
“All right, never mind that,” Mason interrupted. “Regardless of whether it should have worked or not, the fact is it did work. She married him. Is that right?”
“She married him.”
“And broke your heart?” Della Street asked.
“Yes.”
“Can you tell us about the marriage?” Della asked.
“Callender trapped her into marriage and it was like trapping a wild thing. Lois was like a wild animal in a cage. But she played fair with John. She would have continued to stay with him until it killed her if he’d played fair with her.