Dorcas turned to Dr. Cooper and raised his eyebrows.
Dr. Cooper nodded.
Dorcas pushed a button with his forefinger.
"Very well," he said, "I'll dictate it and sign it."
"I want to talk with the deputy who's going to take it out," said Mason. "I can perhaps expedite matters a little by seeing that he has ample transportation provided, and…"
Dorcas grinned.
"You mean giving him a few cigars," he said.
"Perhaps," Perry Mason said, "I might give him a bottle, but I wouldn't want to commit myself in front of a deputy district attorney."
"Go on down to the sheriff's office," said Dorcas, "and get a deputy assigned to deliver the notice. I'll have it ready by the time you get back. You can go out with the deputy if you want to."
"Not me," Mason said, grinning. "I know the proper place for a lawyer and the proper place for a deputy sheriff. One's in the office and the other's on the ground, delivering notices. I'll be in my office when the notice is delivered."
He opened the door of the office and turned to Dr. Cooper. "Don't think I'm argumentative, Doctor. I appreciate the position you're in, but I hope you appreciate the position I'm in. This man came into the office, and I could see that he was in a nervous condition. I didn't know whether he was insane or not. I wanted to find out."
"Of course," Dr. Cooper said, "I can't make a complete diagnosis…"
"I understand that," Mason told him.
"Did he say anything else?" asked Dorcas. "Did he want to consult you about anything other than the howling dog?"
Perry Mason smiled, a slow, patient smile.
"Now," he said, "you are asking questions. I can tell you, however, that the man paid me a retainer, if that will be of any help?"
"In cash?" asked Dorcas.
"In cash."
"That settles it," said Dr. Cooper, laughing, "a certain sign of insanity — a departure from the normal."
"I'll say it's a departure from the normal," Perry Mason remarked, and closed the door behind him.
Chapter 3
Della Street had Perry Mason's morning mail opened when he pushed open the door of the outer office with a cheery "Good morning. What's new, Della?"
"A lot of the usual stuff," she said, "and one that isn't usual."
"We'll save the cake until last," he told her, grinning. "What's the usual stuff?"
"One of the jurors on that last case," she said, "wants to talk over a corporation matter with you. A couple more rang up to congratulate you on the way you handled the case. There's a man who's been trying to get an appointment and won't tell me the details of what it's about. It's got something to do with some mining stock be bought. There are letters asking about minor matters…"
He made a wry face and a sweeping gesture of dismissal with his hand, then grinned at her.
"Kick 'em all out, Della," he said. "I don't like routine. I want excitement. I want to work on matters of life and death, where minutes count. I want the bizarre and the unusual."
She looked at him with eyes that held a tender solicitude. "You take too many chances, Chief," she protested. "Your love of excitement is going to get you into trouble some day. Why don't you simply handle trial work instead of going out and mixing into the cases the way you do?"
His grin was boyish.
"In the first place," he said, "I like the excitement. In the second place, because I win my cases by knowing the facts. I beat the prosecution to the punch. It's lots of fun… What's the unusual thing, Della?"
"That's plenty unusual, Chief," she said. "It's a letter from this man who was in here yesterday."
"What man?"
"The man who wanted to see you about the howling dog."
"Oh," said Mason, grinning, "Cartright, eh? Wonder if he slept last night."
"This letter," she reported, "came special delivery. It must have been mailed some time during the night."
"Something more about the dog?" he asked.
"He enclosed a will," she said, lowering her voice and looking furtively about the outer office as though afraid that some one might overhear her, "and ten one thousand dollar bills."
Perry Mason stood staring down at her with his forehead washboarded, his eyes squinted.
"You mean ten thousand dollars in currency?" he asked.
"Yes," she said.
"Sent through the mail?"
"Through the mail."
"Registered?"
"No, just special delivery."
"I," said Perry Mason, "will be damned."
She got up from behind the desk, walked over to the safe, opened the safe, unlocked the inner compartment, and took out the envelope and handed it to him.
"And you say there's a will?"
"A will."
"A letter with it?"
"Yes, a short letter."
Perry Mason fished out the ten one thousand dollar bills, looked them over carefully, whistled under his breath, folded them and put them in his pocket. Then he read the letter aloud.
Dear Mr. Mason:
I saw you during that last murder trial. I'm convinced you're honest and I'm convinced you're a fighter. I want you to fight on this case. I'm enclosing ten thousand dollars and I'm enclosing a will. The ten thousand dollars is a retainer. You get your fee under the will. I want you to represent the beneficiary named in that will and fight for her interests all the way through. I know now why the dog howled.
I'm drawing up this will, the way you told me a will like this could be made. Perhaps you won't have any occasion to probate the will or fight for the beneficiary. If you don't, you've got the ten thousand dollars, plus the retainer I gave you yesterday.
Thanks for the interest you've taken in my case.
Sincerely yours,
Arthur Cartright
Perry Mason shook his head dubiously and took the folded bills from his pocket.
"I'd sure like to keep that money," he said.
"Keep it!" exclaimed Della Street. "Why, of course you'll keep it. The letter shows what it's for. It's a legitimate retainer, isn't it?"
Perry Mason sighed and dropped the money onto her desk.
"Crazy," he said. "The man's crazy as a loon."
"What makes you think he's crazy?" she asked.
"Everything," he told her.
"You didn't think so last night."
"I thought he was nervous and perhaps sick."
"But you didn't think he was crazy."
"Well, not exactly."
"You mean the reason you think he's crazy, then, is because he sent you this letter."
Perry Mason grinned at her.
"Well," he said, "Dr. Charles Cooper, the alienist who handles the commitments on the insanity board, remarked that the payment of a cash retainer was certainly a departure from the normal these days. This man has paid two of them within twentyfour hours, and he sent ten thousand dollars through the mail in an unregistered letter."
"Perhaps he didn't have any other way to send it," suggested Della Street.
"Perhaps," he told her. "Did you read the will?"
"No, I didn't. The letter came in, and when I saw what it was, I put it in the safe right away."
"Well," Mason told her, "let's take a look at the will."
He unfolded the sheet of paper which was marked on the outside: LAST WILL OF ARTHUR CARTRIGHT.
His eye ran along the writing, and he slowly nodded.
"Well," he said, "he's made a good holographic will. It's all in his handwriting — signature, date and everything."
"Does he leave you something in the will?" asked Della Street curiously.
Perry Mason looked up from the paper and chuckled.
"My, but you're getting mercenary this morning," he said.
"If you could see the way bills keep coming in, you'd be mercenary too. Honestly, I don't see how there can be any depression, the way you spend money."