“His father died ten years ago, and the son inherited the company.”
Mason said, “Has it occurred to you that this letter to The Cloverville Gazette suggesting that you would make a very fine subject for a story in ‘Cloverville’s Yesterdays’ was not just accidental but was part of a well-laid plan to locate you?”
“Has it occurred to you?” she countered.
“In the light of subsequent developments I think it is a logical explanation,” Mason said.
“All right,” she admitted, “it occurred to me. It occurred to me as soon as I saw the column. It occurred to me when I had a blind panic. It occurred to me when I went to your office to enlist your aid.”
“Any idea who it might be?” Mason asked.
The shake of her head was too emphatic and too instantaneous.
Mason smiled. “You are a little too emphatic in your denial, Ellen. How about the man who is the father of your child?”
“I haven’t said anything about a child.”
“You have very carefully avoided saying anything about a child,” Mason said. “But you admit you went in a blind panic. You were opposed to abortion. A logical explanation is that you had a child, that that child must be nineteen years old at the moment.
“You have made your mistakes; you have lived them down; you have established yourself in a new position of responsibility; you have a career.
“Times have changed. The fact that you may have had an illegitimate child nineteen years ago means little today. It would, of course, cause a few uplifted eyebrows, but nothing to get panicky about.
“Therefore,” Mason said, “I conclude that your panic is because of something concerning this child.”
“You are too... too damned logical,” she said.
“And correct?”
She hesitated a moment, then met his eyes. “And correct. I am going to protect him... my child.”
“It was a boy, then,” Mason said.
“Very well; it’s a son, and I am going to protect him.”
“From what?”
“From his father.”
“A boy is entitled to a father,” Mason said.
“During the formative years he’s entitled to a father whom he can look up to and respect — not a heel who runs off to Europe and leaves a pregnant sweetheart behind to face the music by herself.”
“And more than that?” Mason asked.
“I can’t tell him,” she said. “I have to protect him.”
“From the knowledge that he is illegitimate?”
“Partially that.”
“I think,” Mason said, “you’d better tell me the truth.”
The waitress brought the second round of cocktails and the menus. They ordered three steaks. The waitress withdrew.
Ellen Adair picked up her cocktail glass, drained a good half of it. “Don’t try to corner me,” she said.
“I’m simply trying to get the information I’m going to need so that I can help you,” Mason told her.
“All right,” she said; “I’ll tell you this much: I was a young, foolish, unsophisticated, good-looking girl. I was pregnant. I had a thousand dollars. That was every cent I had to my name. I know now what the public-relations man or troubleshooter or whatever you want to call him had in mind. He thought that I would use some of the money to go away from home and then use the rest of it for an abortion, then return to my parents with some story about having been emotionally disturbed and...”
“But you didn’t do that,” Mason said.
“I didn’t do that,” she said. “I came out here and got a job.”
“What kind of a job?”
“Doing housework.”
“And what happened?”
“It wasn’t long before the woman I was working for, who was very shrewd and rather suspicious, found out I was pregnant.
“She and her husband were childless. They had been trying to adopt a baby. They couldn’t adopt one because of personal reasons that had nothing to do with their competency as parents.
“The woman suggested that we move to San Francisco, that when it came time for the baby to arrive I go to the hospital and take her name, that the birth certificate would show the child as hers. They promised to treat him as their own child. They were nice people.”
“That was done?” Mason asked.
“That was done.”
“The boy thinks those people are his parents?”
“Yes.”
“Does he know you?”
She tossed off the last of her cocktail. “That, Mr. Mason, is something that is none of your business. I have told you enough so you can understand my position, so you can realize that I want protection. I am in a position to pay your fee.
“All I can say is that those people must never, never, never find me.”
“You mean never, never, never find your son?”
“It’s the same thing.”
“The boy’s real father,” Mason said, “inherited a rather large company when his father died?”
“I suppose so, yes.”
“And, by the same token, is now rather wealthy?”
“I suppose so.”
“He would be in a position to give your boy a first-class education?”
“He could probably be made to support him and educate him in accordance with his style of life, but my son is now nineteen years old and any advantage he could get would be far outweighed by corresponding disadvantages.”
“But,” Mason said, “suppose the boy’s father should die?”
“All right,” she said; “with that lawyer mind of yours you’ve probably put your finger on the sore spot.”
“Which is?” Mason asked.
“That the boy’s real father is now single and childless, that he has two half brothers who have no interest whatever in the manufacturing plant. If the man in question should die without a will, and without children, they would be in a position to inherit. If there was a child, even an illegitimate child, who could show up, the situation would be different. If the man in the case should leave a will stating that he has reason to believe that somewhere he has a son or a daughter, that the bulk of his property is to go to that son or daughter — well, the half brothers would be out of luck.”
“What kind of people are they?” Mason asked.
“Do you have to ask that question? Can’t you see what is happening?” She pushed aside her cocktail glass. “And that’s all the information you’re going to get, Mr. Mason. It is your job to build a fence around me, to keep me concealed. Get a substitute, do anything you have to. Let the boy’s father feel that his son is dead.”
Mason slowly shook his head.
“Why not?”
“Your boy has rights.”
“I’m his mother.”
“And the man in the case is his father,” Mason said.
“Unworthy to be his father.”
“Unworthy or not,” Mason said, “the father has rights. And the boy has rights too. Now I’ll go this far with you: I’ll try to keep them from finding you, at least for the moment. But I’m not going to do anything of which my conscience wouldn’t approve.”
“I don’t think I want you on that basis,” she said.
“You don’t have to have me,” Mason told her. “You have given me twenty dollars. That pays you up in full of account to date. If you want to get some other attorney, you are at liberty to do so.”
“But you’ve been to a lot of expense. You’ve hired detectives and...”
“That,” Mason said, “will be my contribution to the cause.”
She hesitated a moment, then suddenly pushed back her chair. “As an attorney, Mr. Mason, you have to respect my confidence. You can’t divulge any of the information I have given you. I don’t know how much money you have spent on detectives, but here are two one-hundred-dollar bills. You may consider that you have withdrawn from the case or that the case has been withdrawn from you. The more I see of you, the more I think you will be too damned conscientious, and there are factors involved which you know nothing about.