The Case of the Caretaker's Cat (11 page)

After a few minutes, fingertips tapped gently on the panels of the corridor door. Perry Mason opened it, and Drake grinned a greeting.

Mason carefully closed the door behind the detective, offered a cigarette, and took one himself. "Get the dope, Paul?" he asked.

"Pretty much of it."

"What happened after I left?"

"Lots of detail stuff. They quizzed Shuster. He wouldn't tell who tipped him off the body had been exhumed, so I rang up Shuster's secretary, and told her I was in a jam on a murder charge and had to see Shuster right away."

"How did you locate her?"

"That's a cinch. Shuster is one of those criminal attorneys who gets calls at all hours of the day and night. The telephone directory carries his office number and says in the event there is no answer at that number to call another one. The other number is the number of his secretary's apartment."

"I see. Did you learn anything from her?"

"Just this – she was expecting Shuster to telephone any minute. She said that someone had given him a hurry-up call about an hour before I telephoned. She didn't know the exact nature of the case he'd gone out on, but understood it was a murder case."

"Then it wasn't a tip on this body digging."

"Apparently not."

"But he knew about it by the time he arrived at the house."

"Exactly," Drake said.

Mason, holding his thumbs in the armholes of his vest, drummed silently on his chest with the tips of his fingers. "In other words, Paul, you mean that after Shuster had received that mysterious telephone call he went out and contacted someone who wanted him to rush to Laxter's house."

Drake said, "Why not? Stranger things have happened. You don't think that Shuster just put in an appearance because he thought his clients should know the body had been exhumed, do you?"

"Probably not," Mason said thoughtfully.

"Shuster is cunning," Drake cautioned. "Don't underestimate him."

"I won't," Mason said slowly. "What else do you know, Paul?"

"Lots."

"Spill it."

"Did you know that Frank Oafley and Edith DeVoe were married?"

Perry Mason paused in his pacing back and forth across the office. His eyes were thoughtfully attentive.

"Four days ago," Drake said, "they took out an application for a marriage license. Then they got a marriage license today. One of my men happened to pick it up. We make it a point to file the vital statistics of marriages, births, deaths and divorces, alphabetically. Then we check through them whenever we start an investigation."

Mason said slowly, "You did a good job that time, Paul. How did they keep it quiet?"

"They gave phony residences. Oafley went to an apartment house, rented a bachelor apartment for a few days, and gave that as his address when he took out a marriage license as F. M. Oafley."

"Sure it's the same one?"

"Yes, one of my operatives checked up with a photograph."

"How do you know they're married?"

"I'm not absolutely certain, but I think they got married tonight."

"What makes you think so?"

"Oafley was calling a minister and arranging to meet him at a certain place. The housekeeper kicked through with that information – to me, not to the officers."

"Has Oafley admitted it yet?"

"No, he didn't let out a peep. He said he went out to 'see a friend,' and Burger let it go at that."

"Did you find out the name of the minister?"

"Milton's the name. I got his telephone number, but I don't know the initials. We can get the address from the directory."

Mason resumed his pacing of the room, his head thrust thoughtfully forward.

"The trouble with Shuster, Paul," he said, "is that he always wants to help the police find the 'guilty' party. If they leave Shuster alone, that guilty party is always someone other than Shuster's client.

"Both of Shuster's clients have good alibis in this case, Paul."

"Meaning what?"

"Sam Laxter wasn't near the house all the evening. He showed up after the police had arrived. Frank Oafley was away until about eleven, and then he came in. Ashton was killed right around ten thirty."

"How do they fix the time?"

"A lot of ghoulish stuff that autopsy surgeons specialize in. They know what time he ate dinner, and they can tell the extent to which digestion had progressed."

Mason reached for his hat.

"Come on, Paul, we're going places."

"Where?"

"Just places."

Drake pulled his hat down lower on his forehead, tossed his half-smoked cigarette into a cuspidor. Together the men rode down in the elevator.

"One thing about your cases," Drake said, "a person never gets too much sleep."

Mason led the way to the sidewalk. "Got a car here, Paul?"

"Yes."

"We're going to 3961 Melrose Avenue. I've put my car away."

The detective repeated the address musingly, then said, "That's where Douglas Keene lives."

"Correct. Are the police investigating him?"

"Not particularly. They're just rounding up names and addresses, and I made notes. Boy friend of Winnie's, isn't he? There was another one named… Let me see…" He thumbed through the pages of his notebook and said, "Inman – Harry Inman."

"Check," Mason said. "Let's go. We'll take your car."

"Okay," the detective said, "my car's carefully picked so it won't attract attention. It isn't distinctive, if you know what I mean."

"I take it," Mason said, grinning, "there are a million cars in this state. One hundred thousand of them are new – two hundred thousand of them are almost new – and this is…"

"One of the seven hundred thousand," the detective finished, opening the door of a dilapidated, nondescript car.

Mason climbed in. Drake wormed under the steering wheel, and started the motor.

"The police going to be interested in this chap?" Drake inquired.

"That's a chance we've got to take."

"Under those circumstances," the detective announced, "we park the car a block or two away and walk the rest of the distance."

Mason nodded moodily. "And pray that we're not interrupted while we're searching the room."

"We going to break in?" Drake inquired with a sidelong glance.

"We'll try not to break anything," Mason replied.

"Meaning, I take it, that you want me to bring along a house-breaking kit."

"Something of the sort, yes."

"I've got one in the car, but where will we be if the police catch us?"

Mason said, "It's Douglas Keene's place, and he's a client of mine although he may not know it. I'm going to enter his rooms for the purpose of protecting his interests. Burglary, you understand, lies in the unlawful entering of a place with a felonious purpose."

"These fine distinctions are too much for me," Drake admitted. "I'm just leaving it up to you to keep us out of jail. I figure I can take any chances you can take. Come on, let's go."

Paul Drake's car was decidedly inconspicuous in color, model and design. Mason sighed resignedly as it jolted into motion. "Keene figure as a suspect on anything?" Drake asked.

"That's why we're going out there – we want to beat everyone to it."

"You mean that he will enter into the picture later on?"

Mason failed to answer the question, and Drake said, with a grin, "I take it that means that what I don't know won't hurt me," and devoted himself to driving the car.

After some fifteen minutes, he slid the car in close to the deserted curb, looked up and down the street, switched off the lights and locked the car. "Two blocks to walk," he observed. "That's close enough to leave the machine on his sort of a job."

"With a real burglary, I take it, you'd have left it a mile away," Mason said.

Drake nodded his head emphatically. "And then stayed parked behind the steering wheel," he agreed. "You lawyers take too many chances with the law to suit me."

"I'm not a lawyer," Mason grinned, "except as a sideline. I'm an adventurer."

The men walked briskly side by side, saying nothing, but their eyes were restless as they kept a watch for prowl cars of radio officers. They turned the corner, walked three quarters of a block, and Drake nudged the attorney's elbow. "This is the place."

"The outer door should be easy," Mason said casually.

"Nothing to it," Drake agreed optimistically. "They're made to open with a pass-key. Almost anything will work them. Anyone coming?"

"No one in sight."

"Okay, hold your coat so it conceals the beam of this flashlight."

Drake played the beam of a small flashlight on the door, produced keys from his pocket.

A moment later the lock clicked back, and the men entered the apartment house.

"What floor?" Drake asked.

"The third."

"What's the apartment?"

"308."

"Better take the stairs."

They walked up the stairs with silent feet. On the third corridor Drake cast professional eyes over the locks on the doors.

"Spring locks," he observed.

He found 308 paused before it and whispered, "How about a knock?"

Mason shook his head.

Drake whispered. "We can rush things by pushing back the catch."

Mason said laconically, "Rush things, then."

There was a fine crack between the door and the jamb. The detective, taking a cowhide tool kit from his pocket, extracted an instrument which looked very much like the long, thin spatula knife used by artists and druggists. "Hold the flashlight, Perry."

Mason held the flashlight. Drake was inserting the steel, when Mason suddenly gripped his wrist. "What's that?" the lawyer asked in a whisper.

Drake looked at the peculiar markings on the woodwork under the tip of Mason's pointing finger. "Someone's beat us to it," he said. "They may be in there now."

Both men stared at the place where the wood had been slightly crushed under the pressure of a steel instrument. "A bungling job," Drake volunteered.

"Let's go on in," Mason told him.

Drake said, "You're the doctor," and inserted the blade. He manipulated it for a moment. The lock clicked back.

"Turn the knob and open the door, Perry," the detective said, still holding the latch back.

Perry Mason turned the knob, and they entered the room.

"Lights?" Drake inquired.

Mason nodded and clicked on the electric lights.

"A good place not to leave any fingerprints, Paul," he suggested.

Drake looked at him with an expression which intensified the droll humor of his features. "Are you," he asked, "telling me?"

Mason looked about the room.

"Bed hasn't been slept in," he said.

"It's turned down," Drake pointed out, "and the pillow is mussed up."

"Just the same, it hasn't been slept in. There's nothing that's harder to simulate than the type of wrinkle which is produced in a sheet from long contact with a body."

Drake inspected the bed, and nodded.

The apartment was a typical bachelor's apartment. Ash trays were littered with cigarette stubs. There were a whiskey bottle, a dirty glass, a couple of soiled collars, and a tie clasp on the bureau. Half a dozen neckties were hooked over the mirror support. A closet door was half open, showing several suits hanging from a rod. Drawers in a dresser were partially open.

Mason opened the drawers and stared thoughtfully at them.

"Suitcase," he said, "packed in a hurry." He scooped out handkerchiefs, socks, shirts and underwear. "Let's take a look in the bathroom, Paul."

"What are you looking for?" Drake asked.

"I don't know; I'm just looking."

Mason opened the bathroom door, then suddenly recoiled.

Drake, looking over his shoulder, gave a low whistle and said, "If he's your client, you'd better plead him guilty."

Someone, working with the frenzy of panic, had evidently tried to remove traces of blood from clothing in the bathroom, and the job had not been thoroughly done. The washbowl was spattered with red. Water had been turned in the bathtub and had not been drained. It was colored a peculiar reddish brown. A pair of trousers had been washed and hung up to dry over the metal rod which supported the shower curtain. A pair of shoes had been washed, evidently with soap and water, and the washing had been insufficient. Stains still remained in the leather.