"And you think this stuttering bishop is trying to slip something over on you?" she asked.
Mason twisted the stem of his empty cocktail glass in his fingers. "Darned if I know, Della," he told her. "The bishop's playing a deep game. I sensed it the minute he came into the office, and somehow, I have the feeling that he wanted to keep me in the dark as to his real purpose. That's why I'm going to get such a kick out of outguessing him, figuring what he wants before he's willing to let me know just what he wants. Come on, let's dance." He swept her out on the dance floor, where they moved with the perfect rhythm of long practice together. The dance over, they returned to find the first course of the dinner set before them.
"Tell me about it," she invited him, "if you want to."
"I want to," Mason said. "I want to run over all of the facts, just to see if I can't fit them together. Some of them you know, some of them you don't know.
"Let's begin at the beginning. A man who claims to be an Australian bishop comes to call on me. He's excited and he stutters. Every time he stutters, he gets mad at himself. Now why?"
"Because," she said. "he knows that a bishop shouldn't stutter. Perhaps it's some habit he's developed recently, due to an emotional shock, and he's wondering what will happen if he returns to Australia and stutters."
"Swell," he told her. "That's a good logical explanation. That's the one which occurred to me right at the start. But suppose the man isn't a bishop but is some crook masquerading, for one reason or another, as Bishop Mallory of Sydney, Australia. He's inclined to stutter when he becomes excited. Therefore, he tries his darnedest not to stutter, the result being that he stutters just that much more. He's afraid that stuttering is going to give him away." She nodded slowly.
"Now then," Mason said, "this bishop wants to see me about a manslaughter case. He doesn't mention names, but it's virtually certain the manslaughter case is one involving the Julia Branner who became Mrs. Oscar Brownley, Oscar Brownley being the older of Renwold C. Brownley's two sons.
"I don't need to tell you about Brownley. The younger son died six or seven years ago. Oscar went away with his wife, no one knows just where. Then he came back. The woman didn't. Manslaughter charges were pending against her in Orange County. But those charges weren't filed until some time after the automobile accident."
"Well?" she asked.
"Well," Mason said, "suppose I should tell you that Renwold Brownley knew that his son Oscar was coming back to him and was afraid the woman was going to try to come back. Wouldn't it be a smart move for Renwold Brownley to pull some political wires and get a warrant of arrest issued for her? Then the minute she returned to California he could have her thrown into jail on a manslaughter charge."
Della Street nodded absently, pushed back her soup dish and said, "Aren't there two grandchildren living with Brownley?"
"That's right," he said. "Philip Brownley, whose father was the younger son, and a girl whose first name I've forgotten, who's the daughter of Oscar. Now Bishop Mallory comes over on the Monterey, stays four or five days in San Francisco, puts some ads in the local papers and..."
"Wait a minute," she interrupted. "I've just remembered something. You say the bishop came over on the Monterey?"
"Yes, why?"
She laughed nervously and said, "Chief, you know a lot about human nature. Why do stenographers, secretaries and shop girls read the society news?"
"I'll bite. Why do they?"
She shrugged her shoulders. For a moment her eyes were wistful. "I'm darned if I know, Chief. I wouldn't want to live unless I could work for a living, and yet I like to read about who's at Palm Springs, who's doing what in Hollywood and all the rest of it, and every secretary I know does the same thing."
Watching her narrowly, Mason said, "Skip the preliminaries, Della, and tell me what this's all about."
She said slowly, "I happen to remember that Janice Alma Brownley, the granddaughter of Renwold C. Brownley, was a passenger on the Monterey from Sydney to San Francisco, and the newspapers said that the attractive young heiress was the center of social life aboard the ship, or words to that effect, if you get what I mean. You see, Chief, you don't know the granddaughter's first name, but I can tell you lots about her."
Mason stared across the table at her and said, "Twelve."
"What?" she asked.
"Twelve," he repeated, a twinkle in his eyes.
"Chief, what on earth are you talking about?"
"I told you a minute ago that when I added two and two in this case I didn't get four, but six, and it bothered me," he said. "Now I add two and two and make twelve."
"Twelve what?"
He shook his head and said, "Let's not even think of it for a while. It's not often that we have a chance to relax, Della. Let's eat, drink and be merry, have a few dances, go back to the office and get Paul Drake in for a conference. By that time the thing I'm chasing will probably turn out to be just a mirage. But in the meantime," he said, somewhat wistfully, "just in case it shouldn't be a mirage, what a gosh-awful case it would be. A regular humdinger of a case. A gee whillikins of a case!"
"Tell me, Chief."
He shook his head and said, "It can't be true, Della. It's just a mirage. Lets not talk about it and then we won't be disappointed if Paul Drake unearths information which shows we're all wet."
She regarded him thoughtfully and said, "Do you mean that this girl..."
"Tut, tut," he told her warningly, "don't argue with the boss. Come on, Della, this is a fox-trot. Remember now, we're giving our minds a recess."
Mason refused to be hurried through the dinner, or to discuss any business. Della Street matched his mood. For more than an hour they enjoyed one of those rare periods of intimacy which comes to people who have worked together, sharing disappointments and triumphs, who understand each other so perfectly that there is no need for any of the little hypocrisies which are so frequently the rule rather than the exception in human contacts.
Not until after the dessert had been taken away and the lawyer had sipped the very last drop of his liqueur did he sigh and say, "Well, Della, let's go back to our mirage-chasing and prove that it really is a mirage after all."
"You think it is?" she asked.
"I don't know," he told her, "but I'm afraid to think it isn't. In any event, let's telephone Drake to meet us at the office."
"Listen, Chief," she said, "I've been thinking. Suppose this woman, knowing there was a felony warrant out for her arrest in California, fled to Australia and suppose..."
"Not a word," he said, gripping her shoulder. "Let's not go jumping around in the clouds. We'll keep our feet on the ground. You telephone Paul Drake to meet us at the office, and I'll get a cab."
She nodded, but her eyes were preoccupied. "Of course," she said, "if he shouldn't be the real bishop but should be an impostor..."
Mason pointed a rigid forefinger at her, crooked his thumb as though it had been the trigger of a revolver, and said, "Halt, or I fire."