"What do you think this is thatyou're doing?" Mason asked.
"I'm simply putting my cards onthe table."
"You're asking for money inreturn for silence."
"No, I'm not. I'm suggestingthat perhaps you might care to communicate with people who would like to seethat I had money for my rehabilitation."
"And in the event you don't getthe money, you're making threats."
"No, no! No threats,"Gideon said. "After all, Mr Mason, I haven't threatened you."
"You've said that you wouldkeep coming back here."
"I'm rather persistent,"Gideon said. "After all, there's no law which says I can't come to youroffice as often as I like. It's a public place. I am acting on the assumptionthat you will either advise some of your clients or, let us say, some of yourfriends, to pay me some money to see that I don't keep hanging around or thatyou will be instructed by those people to see that I get enough money so I canget out.
"Well, I mustn't detain you, MrMason. You're a busy man, a very busy man."
Gideon got to his feet.
Mason said, "Don't ever try toput pressure on me, Gideon. We deal with lots of blackmailers in this business.If I thought you were resorting to blackmail, I'd deal with youaccordingly."
"And how is that?" Gideonasked, smiling ominously as he stood in the exit doorway
"We have various methods ofdealing with blackmailers," Mason said.
"I dare say you do,"Gideon said. "And I certainly wouldn't want you to put me in thatcategory. However, I would like to know, just as a matter of curiosity, how youdo deal with blackmailers."
"There are three methods,"Mason said.
"Indeed?"
"One," Mason said, holdingup his right index finger, "you pay off."
"Very sensible," Gideonsaid.
"Two," Mason went onholding up a second finger, "you confide in the police. They protect yoursecret. You catch the blackmailer red-handed and he goes to prison."
"Very nice if it works,"Gideon said. "Now, what's the third method?"
Mason met his eyes, held up a thirdfinger. "The third method," he said, "is that you kill the sonof a bitch."
For a moment Gideon recoiled."You can't go to the police, and I can hardly fancy you as a murderer, MrMason."
"Guess again," Mason said."You, yourself, said that the utterly ruthless person had all theadvantage in this world."
"Well," Gideon said,"since I am not a blackmailer, the discussion is simply academic. I will,however, be in touch with you from time to time, Mr Mason, and I feel certainthat you will become interested in, shall we say, my rehabilitation?"
He bowed from the waist.
"Thank you for seeing me, MrMason." He turned, again bowed from the waist. "Miss Street," he said, his eyes and voiceappreciative. Then he opened the exit door and walked out into the corridorwithout once looking back.
Della Street looked at Perry Mason in dismay. "Whydid you say that about killing him?"
"I'll give him something tothink about," Mason said.
"Shall I try to get hold of MrWarren?" she asked.
"Heavens, no," Mason said."Remember that Warren told me calls had to go through his switchboard, that it would be verydifficult to get hold of him, and that our conversations would berestricted."
"You mean you aren't going tolet him know anything about this conversation?"
"Exactly," Mason said."He paid me to handle the situation and I'll handle it."
Chapter 7
It was shortly before five o'clock that the telephone rang and Della Street, picking up the instrument, said,"Yes, Gertie," then suddenly puckered her face in a frown. "Youknow I don't take personal calls here, Gertie -Just a minute."
Della Street put her palm over the transmitter, turnedto Mason and said, "Some woman who refuses to give her name states thatshe wants to talk with me about Judson Olney What do I do?"
Mason picked up his own telephone,said, "Gertie, put me in on Della Street's call but don't say anything about mybeing on the line."
"Okay, Gertie," Della Street said, "I'll take the call."
Mason, listening in, heard afeminine voice, harsh with emotion. "Look here, Miss Della Street, I want to know what you think you'retrying to get away with. For your information, I looked up the passenger liston the Queen of Jamaica at the time Judson Olney made the trip, and you weren'tlisted as a passenger. I thought the whole thing was phoney when I first heardthe story.
"Now, I want to know just whatyou you're trying to pull.
"Don't think you can get awaywith any fast one as far as my man is concerned. I'm the kind to light, andwhen I fight I fight dirty. Now, will you kindly tell me just what this is allabout?"
Mason motioned to Della Street to hang up the phone, and then hung upsimultaneously with her.
"Well," Della Street said, "that's another complication.Good heavens, Chief, she was certainly boiling mad."
Mason said, "That's the troublewith letting an amateur write a script and then trying to act it out. Who doyou suppose that was, Della?"
"I would say it was eitherRosalie Harvey or Adelle Chester. I couldn't recognize the voice."
Mason said, "Well, the fat's inthe fire. Someone went to the trouble to check on the passenger list when Olneymade that cruise. Amateur liars are always amateurish, Della. We let them writethe script. We shouldn't have done it."
"Now we're in a spot where…"
Gertie, the receptionist, appearedin the doorway to the inner office. "A Mr George P Barrington is waitingto see you, Mr Mason. He says he has to see you on a matter of the greatestimportance and I think he's all worked up about something.
"He said to tell you that hemet you at Mr Warren's."
Mason exchanged glances with Della Street.
"I came in personally,"she said, "because he's trying to pump me."
"In what way?" Masonasked.
"He's asking me about Della Street, about where she goes on her vacations, andif I remember the time she went to the Caribbean."
Mason said to Della Street, "Go in the law library, Della. Go outthrough the door from the law library and go home. I'll talk with Barrington alone. I think perhaps he said he wascalling to see me but he actually wants to talk with you. If he wants to talkwith you it'll be about that confounded Caribbean cruise … Why in hell can't clients bebetter liars?"
"He's nice," Della Street said.
"He may be nice," Masonpointed out, "but he fell for you like a ton of bricks and he had a youngwoman with him who seemed to be bored with it all but who was seething inside.She's probably told him you never were on that cruise with Judson Olney."
Mason said to Gertie, "Keep himwaiting about thirty seconds, Gertie. Don't let him inveigle you intoconversation about anything or anybody. As soon as Della gets out through thelaw library, I'll give the phone a jiggle and you can send him in."
"Yes, Mr Mason," Gertiesaid, her eyes big and round, looking from one to the other. Then, ratherreluctantly, she left for the outer office.
"Now you've done it," Della Street said. "Gertie loves mysteries. Shelikes to take a button and sew a vest on it. She'll work out some deep, darkintrigue that – "
Mason motioned toward the lawlibrary. "On your way," he said. "I'm going to tell MrBarrington you've gone home for the evening, and when I tell a lie i like tohave it the truth."
"On my way," Della Street said, grabbing her purse, pausing for aswift look in the mirror, then vanishing through the door to the law library.
Mason waited a few seconds, thenpicked up the telephone and said, "Okay, Gertie."
A moment later George P Barringtoncame hurrying into the office.
"Hello, Mr Mason," hesaid. "Nice of you to see me without an appointment. I am a littleconcerned about something that happened this afternoon."
"Yes?" Mason asked.
"Your secretary, is shehere?"
"She's left for the day,"Mason said.
"I received an anonymoustelephone call that bothered me a lot."