Tom Gridley said, “After all, Sally, it doesn’t amount to so much. It’s only...”
Faulkner turned to him. “Not amount to so much, young man! Is that any way to talk about...”
Mrs. Faulkner’s voice showed interest as her husband suddenly became silent. “Go on, dear,” she said. “Let’s hear how much. I’m wondering just how much you paid her.”
Faulkner scowled at her and said savagely. “If it’s any of your business, it was five thousand dollars.”
“Five thousand dollars!” Tom Gridley exclaimed. “Why I told Sally to sell it for...” Abruptly he caught Sally Madison’s eyes and stopped speaking in the middle of the sentence.
Drake hurriedly gulped down his drink as he saw Perry Mason put down his glass, arise from his chair, cross over to Faulkner. “I think,” Drake said in a low voice to Della Street, who was watching Mason with amused eyes, “this is where we came in — and it’s damned good whiskey. I hate to waste it.”
Mason said to Faulkner, “I don’t think we need to trouble you further, Mr. Faulkner. Your case doesn’t interest me in the least, and there’s no charge for the preliminary investigation.”
Mrs. Faulkner said hastily, “Please don’t judge him too harshly, Mr. Mason. He’s just a bundle of nerves.”
Mason bowed. “And I’d also be a bundle of nerves — if I had him for a client. Good night.”
4
Mason, attired in pajamas and lounging robe, stretched out in a reclining chair, a floor lamp shedding soft radiance on the book in his hand. The telephone at his elbow rang sharply.
Only Paul Drake and Della Street had the number of this telephone. So Mason promptly closed his book, scooped the receiver to his ear and said, “Hello.”
Drake’s voice came over the wire. “Remember the golddigger, Perry?”
“The one in the restaurant the other night?”
“That’s right.”
“What about her?”
“She’s having a fit trying to get in touch with you. She’s begging me to give her your number.”
“Where is she?”
“Right now she’s on the other telephone.”
“What does she want?”
“Darned if I know, but she seems to think it’s terribly urgent.”
“It’s after ten o’clock, Paul.”
“I know it, but she’s begging with tears in her voice to be permitted to talk with you.”
Mason said, “Won’t tomorrow morning be all right?”
“She says not. It’s something terribly important. She’s made a sale with me, Perry, otherwise I wouldn’t have called you.”
“Get a number where I can call her,” Mason said.
“I’ve already done that. Got a pencil handy?”
“Okay. What’s the number?”
“Columbia six-nine-eight-four-three.”
“Okay. Tell her to hang up and wait for a call from me. Where are you, at the office?”
“Yes. I looked in on my way to the apartment to see if there was anything important, and this call came in while I was here. She’d called twice before within a period of ten minutes.”
Mason said, “Okay. Better stick around there for a while, Paul, in case it turns out to be something really important. I’ll call you in case I need you. Stick around for an hour anyhow.”
“Okay,” Drake said, and hung up.
Mason waited a full minute, then dialed the number Drake had given him. Almost immediately he heard Sally Madison’s throaty voice saying, “Hello... hello... this is Miss Madison. Oh, it’s Mr. Mason! Thank you so much for calling, Mr. Mason! Something has happened that makes it terribly important I see you at once. I’ll come any place you say. But I must see you, I simply must.”
“What’s it about?”
“We’ve found the goldfish.”
“What goldfish?”
“The Veiltail Moor Telescopes.”
“You mean the ones that were stolen?”
“Well... yes.”
“Where are they?”
“A man has them.”
“Have you notified Faulkner?”
“No.”
“Why not do it?”
“Because... because of the circumstances. I don’t think... I think I’d better talk with you, Mr. Mason.”
“And it won’t keep until tomorrow?”
“No. No. Oh, please, Mr. Mason. Please let me see you.”
“Gridley with you?”
“No. I’m alone.”
“All right. Come up,” Mason said, and gave her the address of his apartment. “How long will it take you to get here?”
“Ten minutes.”
“All right. I’ll be waiting.”
Mason hung up the telephone, dressed leisurely, and had just finished knotting his necktie when a ring sounded at the outer door of his apartment. He let Sally Madison in, said, “What’s all the excitement?”
Her eyes were bright with animation and excitement, but her face still retained its glazed veneer of expressionless beauty. “You remember that Mr. Rawlins wanted a tank built...”
“Who’s Rawlins?” Mason asked.
“The man Tom Gridley is working for. He owns the pet store.”
“Oh yes, I remember the name now.”
“Well, that man who had Tom fix up a tank for him was James L. Staunton. He’s in the insurance business and no one seems to know very much about him. I mean that he hasn’t ever done anything with goldfish as far as anyone knows. He telephoned in to Mr. Rawlins Wednesday night and told him he had some very valuable fish that had gill disease and he understood the Rawlins Pet Shop had a treatment that would cure it, and he was willing to pay any amount if Rawlins would treat these fish. He finally offered a hundred dollars if Mr. Rawlins would promise to give him whatever was necessary for the fish. Well, that was too much money for Rawlins to pass up, so he got hold of Tom and insisted that Tom put a couple of panels in a small tank before we went out to Mr. Faulkner’s that night. That’s what detained us. You remember I didn’t even finish my dinner, but went tearing out to get hold of Tom the minute I got the check, because I didn’t want Faulkner’s fish to die on us.”
Mason nodded silently as she paused in her rapid-fire statement long enough to take a quick breath.
“Well,” she went on, “Mr. Rawlins himself delivered the tank and Staunton told him his wife was ill and he didn’t want to have any noise — and that he’d take care of the fish himself if Mr. Rawlins would just tell him how to do it. So Rawlins told him there wasn’t anything to it, just to fill the tank with water, transfer the fish, and that sometime the next morning Rawlins would send out another panel to be inserted in the tank. You’re getting this straight, Mr. Mason?”
“Go ahead, I think I’m getting it okay.”
“Well, Tom painted up some panels and Mr. Rawlins took the second panel out the next morning. Once more Staunton met him at the door, told him in a whisper that his wife had had a very bad night, and that it would be better if Rawlins didn’t come in. So Rawlins told him that there was nothing complicated about the treatment — to just slip the old panel out of the tank and gently put the new one in. He asked Mr. Staunton about how the fish were, and Staunton said they seemed to be better. He took the panel and paid Mr. Rawlins fifty dollars on account, and Rawlins told him a new panel would have to be put in the tank thirty-six to forty-six hours later.”
Once more she stopped, partially out of breath, partially in preparation for the dramatic climax to her story.
Mason nodded for her to proceed.
“Well, tonight I was down at the store. Tom had been home sick, and I was helping Mr. Rawlins. You see, Mr. Faulkner really did buy out the store and Rawlins was taking inventory, and because Tom was sick today he needed someone to help him. Mr. Faulkner had been there from a little after five o’clock until around seven-thirty, making a lot of trouble. He’d even done something terrible that Mr. Rawlins wouldn’t tell me about. It had upset Mr. Rawlins so that he’d quarreled — Rawlins said he’d tell me tomorrow — he’d taken something of Tom’s. Well, all of this is just to explain why I promised to take out that treatment. You see, Mr. Rawlins was planning to go out to Staunton’s house to put that last panel in the tank when Rawlins’ wife called up and said there was a movie she wanted to see and wanted him to take her. When Mrs. Rawlins wants anything like that she doesn’t want to be put off, and so Mr. Rawlins said he’d have to go and I told him I’d finish up, lock up the store and use my own car to take the panel out.”