Mason skirted the red pool to look into the bathroom.
The air was still steamy and moist. Paths of water-trickles were still evident on the mirror where moisture had condensed and run down the glass.
The bathroom itself contained a medicine chest, clothes hamper, mirror, tooth-brush rack and the conventional bathroom fixtures. There was not so much as a drop of blood in the bathroom.
Mason turned back to inspect the bedroom once more. A pair of tennis shoes, a tennis racket still in a press, and a can containing three tennis balls were near the closet door. The tennis racket was propped against the wall. The can of tennis balls lay crosswise on the tennis shoes.
Flecks of white caught Mason’s eye and he leaned over to inspect those flecks more closely.
They seemed to be ashes which had been dropped from a cigar and had spread out in a little cluster of light ash. Just inside the bedroom door was a place where a cigarette, about one-third smoked, had been dropped to the floor and had gradually burnt itself out, leaving a long streak of ash and a charred place on the floor.
Mason tiptoed back from the bedroom, looked out into the kitchen and into a dining room. Through that an open door led into a bedroom and another bathroom. This bedroom evidently had not been occupied. There was a disused air to the place, and the white counterpane on the bed was lightly dust-covered.
Mason returned to the living room.
Della Street glanced up quickly, then swung her eyes significantly toward Marilyn Marlow.
Marilyn Marlow was sitting with her gloved hands folded on her lap. Her white face emphasized the patches of orange rouge which were plainly visible against the pallor of her skin.
Mason said quietly, “Marilyn, are you telling me the truth?”
“Yes.”
“The whole truth?”
“Yes.”
“Rose Keeling told you she wanted to play tennis?”
“Yes.”
“She’s quite a tennis player?”
“Yes.”
“This is rather a big place for one woman.”
“She had a friend staying with her up until about two weeks ago. They shared the expense.”
“Even so, it’s a pretty big place.”
“Rose had a lease on it She’s had it for some time. It’s a long-term lease. She got it at a low rental. She can take some woman in with her and charge her almost enough to pay for the whole flat. I know that.”
“She rents it furnished?”
“Yes.”
“She gave you a key to get in with?”
“Yes.”
“You used it?”
“No. I found the door open.”
“Where’s the key?”
Marilyn said, “Heavens, I don’t know. I... I guess I laid it on a table here somewhere.”
Della Street pointed to a little table which held a few magazines, some volumes of phonograph records, and a radio.
The key glinted near the radio.
Mason carefully picked up the key, then blew on the table in order to eliminate any possible outline in case a thin, hardly visible layer of dust might have been covering the table. He dropped the key in his vest pocket.
Marilyn watched him with fascinated eyes.
Mason said, “Marilyn, if I stick my neck out to help you, can you ride along with me and play ball?”
“What do you mean?”
“Can you protect Della and me in case we help you?”
“Yes. I’ll do anything. Why?”
Mason said in a low, kindly voice, “You have too much at stake here, Marilyn. That letter you received this morning would absolutely crucify you. It’s unreasonable to believe that Rose Keeling would have written you a letter like that and then acted the way you said she did.”
“I can’t help it, Mr. Mason. I’m telling you the truth.”
“I think you are. The point is that no one else would believe it. No jury on this earth would ever believe it. To the police, it would look very much as though you had received that letter, as though you had gone up to see Rose Keeling and had found her packing, found her obdurate, refusing to retract the statements she had made. You knew that if Rose could be kept from changing her testimony, you could use the old testimony she had given when the will was first offered for probate. You knew that if she changed her testimony, your entire inheritance would go out the window. You were in a tough spot. You came to see Rose and found her putting the finishing touches on her packing. She was getting ready to go away. You couldn’t afford to let her go. You killed her, but as an afterthought you put out the tennis things. You knew where she kept them.”
“Mr. Mason, that’s utterly, absolutely absurd. I would never have done anything like that!”
“I’m not talking about what you did,” Mason said. “I’m telling you what the police will think you did. Furthermore, the minute that letter is made public, your chance of inheriting property under Endicott’s will is almost nil.”
“I realize that.”
“Even if Rose Keeling can’t change her testimony, the contents of that letter spread out in the public press will have the effect of antagonizing everyone against you.”
“Yes, I know.”
“And your fingerprints are on the telephone receiver. Evidently the prints of the murderer are on there too, because the murderer must have been the one who picked up the telephone receiver and moved it so the phone would quit ringing.”
She nodded.
Mason said, “There are times when a lawyer throws the rule book away, when he has to go by hunches. There’s some evidence that makes me believe some other person came here in the forty minutes between your talk with Rose Keeling on the telephone and the time when you returned. But that evidence is nothing I can bring into court.”
“Can you tell me what it is?”
“It’s better that you don’t know.”
Mason said to Della Street, “Do you think you can take a jolt, Della?”
She nodded.
“I want you to look here a minute.”
She followed Mason down the corridor, paused in recoil at the door of the bedroom.
Mason said, “Don’t touch anything. Stand here. Take a look. Get it all straight. I think those are cigar ashes in there by the bed. You can see where a cigarette burned a two-inch groove in the hardwood floor there. Notice the clothes that are packed in the suitcase and the folded clothes on the dresser.”
Della Street said, “She was packing up to leave.”
“And taking a bath,” Mason said. “Notice the lingerie laid out on the bed.”
Della Street nodded.
“She wouldn’t have taken a bath before she went to play tennis,” Mason said. “She was evidently killed just as she emerged from the bathroom.”
Della Street looked around at the bedroom, said, “That’s a traveling outfit that was laid out on the bed. She wasn’t intending to play tennis. She was going somewhere. Either she lied to Marilyn about the tennis, or Marilyn was lying to us.”
Mason said, “I think Marilyn is telling the truth — but I can’t see why Rose Keeling would have taken a hot bath just before going out to play tennis.”
“Can we look around any? Open drawers?” Della asked.
He shook his head. “We’ve gone too far as it is. We don’t dare touch a thing, not even a drawer handle. Come on, let’s go back and see what Marilyn’s doing.”
Mason held his finger to his lips for silence, tiptoed down the corridor. Della Street, puzzled, followed behind him.
Marilyn Marlow was seated at the little table which held the telephone. Her lips were a thin line of grim determination, and she was busily engaged in polishing the telephone receiver with a pocket handkerchief.
“What are you doing, Marilyn?” Mason asked.
She gave a sudden guilty start, dropped the receiver, then, realizing she was caught, defiantly picked it up again and continued polishing.