Paul Drake said, “Hi, Beautiful,” and ushered a chunky, competent-looking man into the office.
“This is Jerry Nelson, one of my operatives,” he said. “Jerry, this is Della Street, Mr. Mason’s confidential secretary, and Perry Mason. Now I want you to tell these people what happened just as you told it to me.”
Drake turned to Mason and said apologetically, “I got this over the telephone. It sounded so cockeyed I told Jerry to dash in and report personally. Now then, I’m turning him over to you all. Go ahead, Jerry.”
Mason smiled and said, “Sit down, Nelson, and let’s have the story.”
Nelson said, “I know you people are going to think I’m a little screwy but I’m going to tell you exactly what happened.
“Paul Drake told me there was a woman in your office that you wanted shadowed; that I was to pick her up in the elevator; that another operative would be waiting with a car in front of the entrance; that there would be a vacant taxicab waiting just in case anything went wrong. I gathered it was an important job of tailing so I wanted to be on my toes. Drake said we weren’t to let her out of our sight no matter what happened.”
Mason nodded.
“Okay,” Nelson said. “This young woman left the office. She was above five feet three, somewhere in her early twenties, had chestnut hair, hazel eyes. She wore a green and brown plaid suit and a green blouse—”
“Now, wait a minute,” Mason said, “we know all about her appearance.”
“I know, I know,” Drake interrupted, “but get this thing straight, Perry. We want to be sure of our facts.”
“All right, go ahead,” Mason said.
“Well, anyway,” Nelson said, “I got aboard the elevator with this young woman. My partner was waiting out in front.
“She wanted a cab. The cab that we were holding at the curb had its flag down and she tried to get that. The driver pointed to his flag and she started to argue with him but just then another Yellow came along and she flagged it down.
“I was still playing it cautious because we didn’t know what was going to happen. The only orders we had were to see that she didn’t get out of our sight, and to spare no expense — so I jumped in the cab that we had waiting at the curb, and my buddy pulled out in his car and both of us followed the cab which had been taken by the girl.
“What’s more, we had the number on the cab ahead and a twenty-dollar bill got my cab driver to radio in to the dispatcher and ask him where this cab was going as soon as he got a report.
“The report came in in about two minutes. The cab driver said he was headed for the airport.
“So both of us tagged along behind and sure enough she went right to the airport without any attempt to shake off any shadows or even paying the slightest attention to what was happening behind her.
“Those cab drivers get pretty sharp in watching traffic and I felt the cab driver might be keeping an eye out behind, so I had my cab drop back and the other operative moved in close behind. Then after a while the other operative dropped back and my cab moved up. Between us we kept her in sight all the way.”
“All the way where?” Mason asked.
“To the airport.”
“Then what?”
“Then she just stuck around.”
“How long?”
“Over an hour,” the operative said. “She was waiting for something and I guess I was maybe dumb that I didn’t pick up what it was, but because I thought she might be trying something shifty I kept my eye on her and didn’t try to look around too much at the scenery.”
“What are you getting at?” Mason said.
“Well, I’d better tell you just the way it happened. You see, when two operatives are working on a case that way, one of them has to be in charge, and because of seniority I was the one to call the shots on this deal. I probably should have had my colleague keeping a look around the place but, as I say, I thought this babe might be trying something shifty so we were keeping our eyes on her.”
“What happened?” Mason asked.
“All of a sudden she jumped up, ran over to the news stand, shouted, ‘This isn’t a stick-up,’ pulled a revolver out of her handbag and fired three shots.
“It was so darned sudden and so completely, utterly senseless that it caught me flat-footed.”
“Now, wait a minute,” Mason said. “You said that she said, ‘This isn’t a stick-up’?”
“That’s right. I was within ten feet of her and I heard her distinctly.”
“Go on,” Mason said. “What happened? Did you grab her?”
“Not me. I was like everyone else. People stood there just frozen in their tracks. It was one of the darnedest sights I ever saw, just as though you had been watching a motion picture and all of a sudden the thing stopped and the picture froze on the screen.
“One minute everybody was hurrying around, bustling here and there; people sitting waiting for planes, people buying tickets, people moving back and forth; and then wham! Everything stopped and people just stood in their tracks.”
“And what about the young woman?”
“The young woman didn’t stand in her tracks,” Nelson said. “She brandished the gun, whirled, and made for the ladies’ rest room.
“Now, as far as I’m concerned there’s a brand-new crime angle. You have a lot of guards around an airport, and police on duty, but there was no policewoman immediately available.
“So here’s a babe with a gun, barricaded in the women’s rest room, and who’s going after her?”
“You?” Mason asked, his eyes twinkling.
“Not me,” Nelson said. “Facing a crazy woman with a gun is one thing, and facing irate women who have been disturbed in a rest room is another, and when you add the two together you’ve got too many risks for any mere man. I just stood around where I could watch the door of the rest room.”
“And what happened?”
“Well, a couple of cops came running up and held a conference and seemed to be as perplexed about the situation as I was. Then they evidently decided to go through with it and started for the rest room. About that time the door opened and this babe came walking out, just as cool as you please.”
“With a gun?”
“I’m telling you,” Nelson said, “she came out just as cool as a cucumber — just like any normal woman who had been powdering her nose and was emerging to take a look at the bulletin board and see just when her plane was scheduled to depart.”
“What happened?” Mason asked.
“Well, the officers hadn’t seen her when she fired the gun so they didn’t recognize her when she came out. She walked right past them and it wasn’t until one of the bystanders yelled, ‘There she is!’ that one of the officers turned.
“By that time three or four of the bystanders were pointing their fingers and yelling, ‘That’s her! Grab her!’ and then everybody started to run.”
“Then what happened?”
“You’ve never seen anything like it,” Nelson said. “This woman stood there with the most utterly bewildered expression on her face, looking around to see what it was all about.
“One of the officers came up and grabbed her and for a moment she was startled, then she was indignant and demanded to know what it was all about. Then a crowd gathered and a lot of people started talking all at once.”
“What about the gun?” Mason asked.
“The gun had been left in the rest room. A woman came out and handed the officer the gun. It had slid across the floor and scared this woman to death. The officers asked our woman if she’d mind if they looked in her handbag and she told them to go ahead. Naturally they couldn’t search her but they did look in her handbag. Then one of the officers opened the gun and looked at it and seemed more puzzled than ever. He said something to his companion, and the other fellow looked at the gun.