Mason shook hands with him, escorted him to the exit door and said, “Well, Oscar, perhaps some day I’ll be able to do something for you.”
“Yes, sir, thank you, sir. I hope you sail with me again, sir.”
Mason closed the door, came back, looked at Della Street and asked, “Well?”
She shook her head. “I can’t place it, Chief. And yet I remember having seen it. Some woman wore that dress, but for the life of me, I can’t tell right now who she was. After all, there were a couple of hundred passengers in first class.”
Mason took a small pair of scissors from his toilet case. He was cutting the cloth into three pieces as Paul Drake opened the door from his room and said, “Going into the dressmaking business, Perry?”
Mason said, “Paul, here’s something — a piece of cloth torn from a woman’s dress. I want you to make a few quiet inquiries among the passengers and see if you can find out who had a dress of that description.”
“Wouldn’t you know?” Drake asked. “You were on the ship.”
“Good Lord, no!” Mason said. “I see that they have clothes on and that’s about all.”
“I’ve seen it somewhere,” Della Street said, “but I can’t place it. It may come to me later.”
Drake said, “I have a bunch of news, Perry.”
“Good or bad?”
“Mostly bad,” Drake said.
“Go ahead,” Mason told him. “Spill it.”
“There’s another witness against your client, Perry.”
“Who is it?”
“I don’t know yet. The D.A. doesn’t know, either, but he’s hot on the trail. You see, the alarm of ‘Man Overboard’ wasn’t given by the Fell woman. She screamed and let it go at that, but some woman telephoned the operator from the social hall and told her to notify the bridge. That woman must have seen the man go overboard because she said to tell the bridge a man had been pushed overboard. The telephone operator says she’ll recognize the voice if she hears it again, and thinks she can place it. She’s going over the passenger list.”
Mason grinned and said, “I’m not particularly worried about that witness, Paul.”
“Why not?”
Mason said, “I think it was Mrs. Moar who put in that call. That’s just between you and me, Paul.”
Drake said, “Well, the operator reported she said a man had been pushed overboard. Suppose she recognizes Mrs. Moar’s voice when she gets on the witness stand, and swears Mrs. Moar said a man had been pushed overboard?”
Mason frowned. “That isn’t so hot,” he admitted.
“They’ve identified the gun they found on the boat deck as being Carl Moar’s gun. They’ve also found Mrs. Moar’s fingerprints on the barrel.”
“On the barrel?” Mason asked.
“Yes.”
“None on the butt of the gun?”
“No.”
“Anything else?” Mason asked.
“That’s all the news. Evelyn Whiting’s sister is in her apartment if you want to go up there. So far, my men haven’t been able to locate either the nurse or the man with the broken neck. An ambulance was waiting for them at the dock and drove them away. We’ll locate that ambulance within an hour or two. In the meantime, do you want to talk with the sister?”
“Might as well,” Mason said.
Chapter 11
The drizzle had developed into a cold drenching rain when Mason and the detective emerged from a cab in front of the Wavecrest Apartments.
“Do you do the talking,” Drake asked, “or do I?”
“I do,” Mason said.
“Going to throw a scare into her or take it easy?” Drake inquired.
“Take it easy if she’ll let me,” Mason told him, his eyes exploring the index of tenants on the front of the building. He found the name: MARIAN WHITING opposite Apartment 1329 and pressed the button. A moment later an electric buzzer released the catch on the door, and Drake said, “Well, there’s a good index to her character. She’s on the up-and-up. If she’d been two-timing anybody, she’d have made whistles up and down the speaking tube.”
Mason nodded. They took the elevator to the thirteenth floor, found the apartment they wanted, and tapped on the door. The woman who opened it had alert brown eyes, dark chestnut hair, a slightly upturned nose and delicate lips. She was wearing black and orange lounging pajamas. Sandals on her feet showed red painted nails.
“Yes?” she asked. “What is it?”
“I want to talk with you,” Mason said.
She eyed the two men a moment in silent appraisal, then stood to one side and said, “Come in.”
When they were seated, Mason said, “It’s about your sister.”
“Oh, you mean Evelyn?”
“Yes.”
“Are you newspapermen?”
“No,” Mason said, “we’re just gathering facts. I wanted to find out about your sister’s friendship with Carl Moar.”
“Why?” Marian Whiting asked, her eyes suddenly defiant.
Mason returned her stare, smiled and said, “You win. I’m Perry Mason. I’m a lawyer representing Mrs. Moar. I’m collecting facts.”
“What does my sister have to do with it?”
“I don’t know,” Mason said. “Probably nothing. I’m simply investigating.”
“What did you want to know?”
“How long ago did she first become acquainted with Carl Moar?”
“Oh, heavens, I don’t know. It’s been... Let’s see... it must have been five or six years.”
“How long did the friendship continue?”
“Up until two or three months before Carl was married.”
“You’re certain it didn’t continue up until the time of marriage?”
“Of course I am,” she said. “Sis saw him on the street in Los Angeles two or three months ago, but it was just a casual meeting.”
“Was there any particular reason why your sister terminated her friendship with Carl Moar shortly before his marriage?” Mason asked. “In other words, did any other woman come between them?”
“Good heavens, no. If you want the truth, I think Carl gave Sis some bad financial advice. Of course Carl meant all right, but you know how those things are. Sis had about a thousand dollars she’d saved up and Carl told her he thought he could make her a hundred percent profit. She gave him the money and received interest on it for a while, and then lost everything.”
“What was the nature of the investment?” Mason asked.
“I’m sure I couldn’t tell you. It was something Carl was promoting. He lost all his own savings along with Evelyn’s, but that didn’t help Evelyn any. You know, when a man tells a girl he has a wonderful investment for her he can’t be expected to guarantee she’s going to make money on it, but when her savings are wiped out she naturally doesn’t feel so cordial toward him. She’s lost her respect for his judgment.”
“Where is she now, by the way?” Mason asked.
“Why, in Honolulu.”
Drake flashed a significant look at the lawyer, but Mason, taking a cigarette case from his pocket, said, “Mind if I smoke?”
“Not in the least,” she said. “I’ll have one with you.”
She took a cigarette. Drake also took one. “Three on one match?” Mason asked.
She laughed heartily. “Good Lord, yes! Six on one match if you want to.”
She leaned forward and accepted his light. Drake held back, looked sheepish for a moment and said, “Go ahead, Perry. I’ll light my own.”
Mason said to Marian Whiting, “He’s a confirmed pessimist. No use trying to reform him. How long’s your sister been in Honolulu, Miss Whiting?”
“Just two weeks.”