The room was empty, but seemed to have been recently occupied since there was a distinct odor of fresh cigarette smoke.
Mason cautiously crossed the threshold.
It was the standardized room of a cheap hotel. The thin carpet was worn through the pattern in a well-defined trail from the door around the bed to the window. There was a washstand and mirror over in the corner, and the carpet in front had been worn through almost to the floor.
Mason’s eyes made swift inventory.
He saw the imitation-leather-bottomed rocking chair, the two straight kitchen chairs with cane bottoms, the square table which looked as though it had been primarily designed to hold a white glass pitcher and bowl before running water had been installed in the room.
Mason left the door open, and took two swift but cautious steps to the door, pulling it toward him to make sure no one was standing behind it. He walked over to another door and disclosed a narrow closet. The next door showed a toilet and a shower jammed together in a room scarcely the size of a good-sized closet.
Having satisfied himself there was no one there, Mason went back and closed the door. This time he gave the room a more careful survey.
It was illuminated with a reddish glow from a glass bowl which hung from the center of the room and was supported by a chain of brass-colored links, through which ran electric wires down to the single bulb.
The bed was an iron bedstead with a thin mattress, carefully covered, however, with a smooth but somewhat threadbare white bedspread. A reading lamp was clamped to the head of the bed.
Mason noticed the indentation near the head of the bed where someone had evidently been sitting. Then he noticed another indentation near the center of the bed.
The lawyer stooped so that he could see this indentation to better advantage.
It looked very much as though someone had thrown a gun onto the bed. The gun had been picked up, but it had left an imprint in the white spread.
Something the color of gold, glittering in the light, caught Mason’s eye. He stooped and picked up a lipstick.
The lipstick was worn flat, and from little ridges at the edges looked as though it might have been drawn across some hard surface.
The lawyer searched the room carefully, studied the lipstick once more, then turned up the small square table.
On the underside had been lettered in lipstick, “Mason Help 262 V 3 L 15 left.”
Mason was standing looking at the lipstick and the message on the bottom of the table when he heard a faint squeaking noise from across the room. The knob of the door was slowly turning.
Hastily thrusting the lipstick into the side pocket of his coat, Mason put the table back into position, and was standing poised thoughtfully, one foot on the chair, in the act of taking a cigarette from a cigarette case as the door slowly, cautiously opened.
The woman who stood in the doorway was about twenty-five years of age, with a good figure, raven-dark hair, large dark eyes, and olive skin, against which the vivid red of her mouth was a splash of crimson.
She drew back with a quick intake of breath, half a scream.
Mason, regarding her with calm, steady eyes, said nothing.
The woman hesitated in the doorway, then slowly entered the room. “You — Who are you?”
“Is this your room?” Mason asked.
“I–I came here to meet someone. Who are you?”
“I came here to meet someone. Who are you?”
“I–I don’t have to give you my name.”
Mason, watching her, said slowly, “My name is Perry Mason. I am an attorney. I came here to meet a client. The client told me he was registered in this room. Now, tell me whom you expected to meet.”
“Oh, thank heaven! You’re Mr. Mason. Where’s Morris? I’m Dixie Dayton. I came here to meet Morris Alburg. He telephoned me that you were coming, but he said he’d be here with us. He said he was going to have you represent me, so I want to tell you frankly...”
Mason seated himself, gestured her to a chair. “Now, wait a minute,” he said, “it may not be that simple.”
“What do you mean?”
“In the first place, you may have had a wrong impression of what Mr. Alburg wanted to say to me.”
“No, I didn’t, Mr. Mason. I know it was that, honestly it was.”
“In the second place,” Mason said, “regardless of what anyone might say, I might not want to represent you.”
“Why? Morris — Mr. Alburg will pay you whatever it’s worth.”
“What makes you think he will?”
“He promised me he would.”
“You might be guilty of something.”
“Mr. Mason, don’t let them pull the wool over your eyes.”
“I’ll try not to,” Mason said, “but, after all, I have to pick and choose my cases. I can’t possibly take all the work that’s offered to me. I have to know a good deal about the facts in any given case before I commit myself. And I frequently turn down cases.”
She dropped down to the floor at his feet. “Mr. Mason, if you only knew what it meant; if you only knew what I’m up against.”
Mason said nothing.
“Mr. Mason, tell me, how much do you know? How much has Mr. Alburg told you?”
“Not very much,” he said.
She said, “All right, I’ll tell you the truth, Mr. Mason. I’ll tell you the facts in the case.”
“I may not be free to listen,” Mason told her. “At the moment I’m not free to receive any confidential communication from you. If you tell me anything I can’t treat it as a professional confidence.”
“Oh, don’t be so cagey,” she said. “After all, why should you and I sit here and spar with each other? Let’s get down to brass tacks.”
She quickly reached up and took his hand in hers. “I suppose I’m being terribly impulsive and you must think I’m a ninny, but I’m in an awful jam, Mr. Mason, and you’re going to have to get me out.”
“I’ve already explained to you,” Mason said, “that I can’t talk with you, and I’d prefer not to listen until after I’ve seen Morris Alburg. I have to know where I stand before I...”
“Oh, Mr. Mason,” she wailed. “Please — I’m going to put my cards on the table for you, Mr. Mason.”
“I can’t even let you do that at the moment,” Mason said.
She sat silent for a few minutes, thinking. She still held onto his hand. Gripping it, she said, “You mean so much to me, Mr. Mason. I can’t begin to tell you what it means to have you working on the case.”
“I’m not working on it.”
She met his eyes with laughing challenge and said, “Yet.”
“Yet,” Mason told her, half-smiling.
“And you certainly are one cautious lawyer.”
“I have to be.”
She lightly kissed the back of his hand. “For the moment that will have to serve as a retainer,” she said. “You stay right there. I’m going to see if I can’t get a line on Morris Alburg. You just wait here and I’ll bring him within fifteen minutes, and then we’ll get started right.”
She walked quickly across the room, opened the door and vanished.
Mason came out of the chair almost at once, hurried to the telephone, and gave Paul Drake’s private, unlisted number.
It seemed minutes before Mason heard Drake’s sleepy voice.
“Wake up, Paul,” Mason said. “This is important. Get it, and get it fast.”
“Oh, Lord, you again,” Drake said thickly. “Every time I try to get a little sleep...”
“Forget the sleep,” Mason barked into the telephone. “Snap out of it. I’m up here in the Keymont Hotel, room 721. There’s a brunette girl, about five feet two, who weighs one hundred and fifteen, age twenty-five or twenty-six, olive skin, large round eyes, a vivid red mouth, up here with me — that is, she will be here inside of a minute or two, and...”