“That’s right.”
“And, I take it, have a pretty good local reputation for integrity?”
“I certainly hope so.”
“How much money did you send altogether to Los Angeles?”
“Somewhere around a hundred and eighty-one thousand dollars.”
“You sent in money for social security and...”
“No, I just sent the cash back to Los Angeles.”
“I never got so much as the scratch of a pen from the Corning Affiliated Enterprises, but I’d receive a telephone call after each shipment telling me that the shipment had been received okay.”
“Who made the call?”
“I don’t know who it was. Some woman. She’d simply state this was the Corning Affiliated Enterprises office and that she wanted to report the shipment had been received okay and to keep on as before.”
“Then you’ve heard two voices over the telephone,” Mason said, “the voice of the woman who acknowledged the shipments, and the voice of the woman who told you she was Amelia Corning.”
“Well, I guess so,” Lowry said. “I don’t remember the Corning voice too well.”
“Could it have been the same voice?”
“I don’t know. I... I... I’m beginning to get bothered about all this, Mr. Mason.”
“How about the voice that reported the receipt of shipments to you over the telephone? Do you think you could recognize that voice if you heard it?”
“I have an idea I could. At least I could make a stab at it.”
“Where were those calls received?”
“At my house at the mine, the manager’s house.”
“During office hours?”
“No. Every one of them would come in in the evening.”
“And Endicott Campbell told you not to say anything about this to anyone?”
“He told me not to say anything to you, but the more you come to think of it the more you realize that I’m in a peculiar position here. I’m not buying Endicott Campbell as a partner.”
“That’s right,” Mason told him. “I think you’ll realize that you did the right thing by telling me what happened.”
“Well,” Lowry said, “the thing that got me was what Miss Street said about having Campbell as my partner.”
“That’s right,” Mason told him, “you don’t want him as your partner... Now then, have you heard anything from Amelia Corning lately?”
“Not a word.”
“Did you make any other reports on what you were doing?”
“No, I was told not to — just to cash the check and send the money to Los Angeles.”
“Didn’t that impress you as being a peculiar way of running a business?”
“Sure it did. But I figured that there was a tax angle in it somewhere and, of course, you hate to have a mine close down. It gives it a black eye. Of course, people around here know the mine’s closed but as far as the books of the mining company are concerned, it would send out a big payroll every month and every month it would get back a shipment, which I suppose they’d claim came from ore. Since it was in the form of cash it couldn’t be traced.”
“That’s your supposition,” Mason said.
“That’s right.”
“And, as you so aptly remarked, since it’s in the form of cash it couldn’t be traced.”
“Say, what are you getting at?” Lowry asked.
Mason opened the car door, said, “Just be careful who you pick as a partner, Lowry. Perhaps truth is the best partner you can pick.”
Abruptly Lowry reached out and shook hands. “Say,” he said, “I’m awfully glad I met you, and this secretary of yours. I think you’ve given me some pretty darn good advice. I’m feeling just a lot better right now than I have been feeling all day.”
Della Street gave him a smile and her hand. “It’s been so nice meeting you, Mr. Lowry,” she said. “I could see that you were uncomfortable keeping this stuff bottled up inside of you. You’re not the type of individual to get mixed up in any shady transaction.”
“This thing’s been worrying me for a long while,” Lowry admitted.
“Thanks a lot,” Mason told him. “It was awfully nice meeting you.”
Lowry watched Mason and Della Street as they walked back to the service station.
“Thanks, Della,” Mason said, “you pulled that one out of the fire very nicely. That was good psychology, telling him that he’d bought Endicott Campbell as a partner... How did you think of that approach?”
“I’m darned if I know, Chief,” Della Street said. “It just popped into my head since he was the outdoor mining type.”
“I think I need your head along with me all the time,” Mason told her.
“It’s a good idea,” Della Street said. “It’s available. What do we do now?”
“Now,” Mason said, “we beat it back to Los Angeles. But first we get Paul Drake on the telephone. We concentrate on Endicott Campbell. We also find out all we can about this Corning Affiliated Enterprises. And I’m afraid we’re not going to find out very much.”
Chapter 7
From a telephone booth at Lancaster, Mason called Paul Drake.
“Put a tail on Endicott Campbell,” Mason instructed. “This thing is even bigger than I thought it was, Paul, and somehow I have a feeling it’s deadly dangerous. Get a tail on Campbell and try and find out where that son of his is.”
Drake said, “That’s going to be a pretty difficult assignment. He anticipated you’d be looking for the boy and he planned the cover-up well in advance. When an intelligent man does that, he makes it almost impossible for any private agency to backtrack him. The police might be able to, but it will be a long and expensive job if we do it.”
“See what you can do anyway,” Mason said. “I’m on my way back to the city. Wait in the office for me. I want to see you when I arrive.”
“What did you do up there — any good?”
“I think so,” Mason said.
“Let’s hope so,” Drake told him, “because you’re sure as hell running up a detective bill, Perry.”
“My credit still good?” Mason asked.
“Up to a million,” Drake told him.
“All right. Keep going,” Mason said, and hung up.
He called the number of the Arthenium Hotel so that no one except the exchange operator would know it was a long-distance call and asked to be connected with Amelia Corning’s suite.
When he heard her voice on the line, Mason said, “This is Perry Mason, Miss Corning. I’d like to see you some time in the early part of the evening.”
“Oh, that will be wonderful, Mr. Mason. I enjoyed talking with you and I think you and that client of yours can do me quite a bit of good. For your information, my talk with Endicott Campbell was not in the least satisfactory.”
“I see,” Mason said noncommittally.
“Now, I’ve just received a wire that my sister and my Brazilian agent have left Miami and are due to arrive here on the ten twenty-five plane. I’d like to see you before they arrive... could you run up now?... Where are you?”
“It would be inconvenient for me to come up right now,” Mason said, without divulging his location, “but how would seven-thirty do?”
“I’d like to see you before that but I realize, of course, that you’re a very busy man. I’m going to do something rather nice for that Susan Fisher. I have come to the conclusion that... well, I’d better tell you that personally when I see you. And you’ll bring your secretary with you?”
“Yes, indeed,” Mason said.
“Well, just come right up. Don’t bother to be announced. I’ll be expecting you at seven-thirty.”
“At seven-thirty,” Mason said.
“There’s one thing perhaps I should tell you, Mr. Mason. I’m a demon for being prompt. If you can be here at seven-thirty we’ll fix that time. If there’s any question about it, we’ll make it seven forty-five.”