Выбрать главу

Mason grinned. “Thanks for die lifesaver, Della. That’s what we’ll do.”

Della Street took her hand from the mouthpiece, said, “Well, I’m not in a position to speak for Mr. Mason, Mrs. Brawley, but I'll tell you what well do. Well have Mr. Jackson, Mr. Mason’s clerk, come down and interview Miss Fenner. You say she’s in for a jewel robbery … Yes … Oh, within half an hour or so. He should be on his way within thirty minutes … Yes … All right, thank you. Good-by.”

Della Street hung up and cocked a quizzical eyebrow at her employer.

Mason said glumly, “George S. Alder is now beginning to turn the screw in the vise. So this girl was really bait for a trap after all”

“Is she really beautiful, Chief?”

Mason nodded.

“Well,” Della Street said, “that’s one consolation. Her beauty will be utterly wasted on Carl Jackson. Jackson will see only the legal principles involved, and for the rest of it will regard her owlishly through those thick-lensed spectacles of his, blinking his eyes as though trying to chop the situation up into small pieces so he can more readily feed them into his mental digestive apparatus.”

Mason laughed. “Good description, Della. I’ve never noticed it before but he does seem to be afraid to trust himself to look at a girl all at once.”

“A great believer in precedent,” Della Street said. “I think if he were ever confronted with a really novel situation he’d faint. He runs to his law books, digs around like a mole and finally comes up with some case that’s what he calls ‘on all fours’ and was decided seventy-five or a hundred years ago.”

“At that you have to hand it to him,” Mason said. “He always finds the case. He’s an absolute terror to all of these young lawyers who take such things seriously. Turn Jackson loose in a law library and he’ll come up with a whole handful of precedents. And the nice part of it is he finds the precedents that are in your favor. So many briefing clerks seem to have a knack of finding precedents that are dead against what your client wants to do.”

Della said mischievously, “I always remember what you said about him when he got married.”

“What was that?” Mason asked, looking slightly alarmed.

“A conversation that I overheard you and Paul Drake having.”

“Tut, tut, you shouldn’t listen in on such conversations, particularly at-a time like that”

“I know,” she admitted. “That’s why I was particularly careful to listen. I remember you told Paul Drake that he was marrying a widow because he was afraid of any situation for which he couldn’t find a precedent.”

Mason laughed. “I shouldn’t have said it, but it’s probably true. Get him in here, Della, and we’ll start him working on Dorothy Fenner.”

“Will you tell him to use his judgment about . .

Mason shook his head and said, “I’ll tell him that we’re going to represent her. I just want him to find out how she happened to get in touch with us. That’s all.”

“But suppose it wasn’t a trap? Suppose she doesn’t know, and…”

“And would get some other attorney,” Perry Mason said. “And then, midway through the trial, she’d happen to see my picture or catch a glimpse of me in court and blab out to this lawyer that I was the one they’d been referring to as the male accomplice. The lawyer would rush to the newspapers… You can imagine what a situation that would makel No, Della, we’re in this and we’re going all the way. If it’s not a trap we’ll give Alder a going over, and if it is a trap, we’ll smash our way out Get Jackson in here.”

Della Street arose from her desk, walked rapidly through, the door to the law library and on to Jackson’s office beyond. A few moments later she came back with the blinking, beetle-browed Jackson a few steps behind her, peering owlishly through his thick-lensed glasses.

Mason said, “Sit down, Jackson. There’s a very interesting case down at the Las Alisas jail, a young woman whom we’re going to represent. Her name’s Dorothy Fenner. She’s accused of having broken into the house of George S. Alder and stolen some fifty thousand dollars’ worth of jewels.

“Now, we’re going to represent her. I want that definitely understood. The question of a fee won’t be particularly important, but I do want to find out just how it happened that she asked me to represent her.”

Jackson blinked.

“Then,” Mason said, “I want bail fixed for her, and when you get a judge to fix bail, I want you to make the claim that the fifty thousand dollars’ worth of jewels is merely so much newspaper talk that it’s easy to say fifty thousand dollars in round figures, but that for the purposes of fixing bail we want to know exactly what jewelry was taken otherwise well consider that the jewelry had only a nominal value and that bail should be fixed at a very nominal amount.”

Jackson nodded.

“Think you can do that?” Mason asked. “I—I mean, get a judge to inquire somewhat into the nature and extent of the property that was taken before fixing the amount of bail?”

“Well, of course I can try,” Jackson said, “but as I remember the doctrine which was held in a case in the eighty-second California Reports .,. Now, wait a minute, and I'll have it … Don’t prompt me, please.”

Jackson held up his right hand, started snapping the fingers. At the third snap, he said, “Oh, yes, I have it. In re Williams, in the eighty-second California Reports, I think it’s page one eighty-three, it was stated that the amount of bail should not depend upon the amount of money which may have been lost to one party or secured by another party by reason of the offense charged. But it was held that bail should depend rather upon the moral turpitude of the crime and the danger resulting to the public from the commission of the offense.”

Mason grinned. “Just after I’d finished telling Della Street what a whiz you were at digging up precedents that were in favor of our clients rather than against them.”

“Well, of course,” Jackson went on judiciously, “a great deal, a very great deal, would depend upon the character of the young woman and, of course, the circumstances under which the property was alleged to have been taken. For the purpose of setting bail, it will be necessary to assume that the charge is well-founded.”

Mason said, “Just walk in there with your fighting clothes on and get in touch with whatever deputy district attorney is handling the thing and demand that he get hold of the complaining witness. Insist that we want to get a specific allegation as to what was taken and exactly when it was taken and the value of it. And, above all, find out whether this young woman got in touch with me because of my reputation, because someone told her to give me a ring, or because she thinks she knows me.”

“Do you know her?” Jackson asked, blinking inquiringly at Mason.

“How the hell do I know? Jackson, in my position would you know everyone who had served on a jury, everyone who had been a witness in a case?”

“No, sir, I don’t think I would.”

“I don’t think you would either,” Mason said, picking up some papers. “Skip down to the Las Alisas jail and get hold of this Dorothy Fenner. Tell her not to worry. Get started as fast as you can. We want some action. File a habeas corpus if you have to.”

When Jackson had gone, Mason turned to Della Street “He does ask the damnedest questions.”

“Doesn’t he? And at the most unexpected times. Then you look at that impassive countenance of his and those eyes blinking away at you as though you were some sort of bug he was looking at through a microscope and you’re darned if you know whether the guy is really smart, or just intelligent.”

Mason threw back his head and laughed.

“Get hold of Paul Drake for me, Della. Let’s start some detectives working.”

Della Street dialed Paul Drake’s unlisted number on the confidential line which Mason kept in his private office, detouring the outside switchboard, and in a moment said, “Hello, Paul? This is Della … How busy are you? … Do you suppose you could run down to the office? … That’s fine. Right away, eh?”