The Case of the Baited Hook Read online

  Streaks of moisture which seemed fresh indicated that others were there ahead of him. He paused at the elevator, rang the night bell which summoned the janitor, and waited for a full minute before the sleepy-eyed Swede, who had charge of the basement and night elevators, brought a cage up to the lobby floor.

  “Some rain,” the janitor said, and yawned.

  Mason crossed over to look at the register which persons entering the building at night must sign. “Anyone for me, Ole?” he asked.

  “Not yet,” the janitor said. “Maybe she rain so much they don’t come on schedule.”

  “Someone down from Drake’s office a few minutes ago?” Mason asked.

  “Yah.”

  “Still out?” Mason inquired.

  “No. He comes back oop.”

  “No one else been in in the meantime?”

  “No.”

  The janitor missed the floor by six inches with the elevator, and Mason said, “That’s good enough, Ole.”

  The sliding doors rolled smoothly back, and Mason stepped out into the semi-darkness of the long corridor. He walked rapidly to where the corridor made a T, but in place of turning left to his own office, turned right toward the oblong of illumination which marked the frosted glass door of the Drake Detective Agency. He pushed open this door and crossed a small waiting room just large enough to accommodate an open bench and two straight-back chairs.

  Behind an arch-shaped, grilled window marked “Information,” the night switchboard operator looked up, nodded, and pressed the button which released the catch on the swinging door.

  Near a radiator, an undersized man was trying to dry the bottoms of his trousers. A soggy felt hat and a glistening raincoat hung on a rack near the radiator.

  “Hello, Curly,” Mason said. “Did you give up?”

  “Give up,” the operative asked, looking ruefully down at his wet shoes. “What do you mean, give up?”

  “Ole says no one came up.”

  “Yeah,” the operative said. “What Ole doesn’t know would fill a book.”

  “Then someone came in?”

  “Yeah. Two of ’em.”

  “How did they get up?”

  “The man,” Curly said, “pulled out a key ring, unlocked the door of one of the elevators, switched on the lights, and whisked himself and the woman up here just as neat as a pin. By the time I got up, the cage was there with the door locked and the lights out.”

  “Did Ole notice it?” Mason asked, interested.

  “No. He was too sleepy. He’s having a hard time keeping his eyes open.”

  “Then there’s a man and a woman on this floor?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “How long ago?”

  “They’ve been waiting about five minutes. Gosh, I wish you’d pick clear nights for your shadowing jobs. I felt like a guy trapped in a sunken submarine.”

  “Where did you pick them up?”

  “They came in a car. The man was driving. He dropped the woman in front of the lobby. Then he drove on and turned the corner. I figured he was parking the car, so I took it easy, tailed him into the building, and up to this floor.”

  “How about the automobile?”

  “I got the license number and checked on the registration. It’s owned by Robert Peltham of 3212 Oceanic. I checked up on him in the telephone directory. He’s listed as an architect.”

  Mason thoughtfully took a cigarette case from his pocket, scraped a match on the side of the radiator, and began smoking. “How about the girl?”

  “There’s something funny about her,” Curly said. “I call her a girl. I don’t know. She was a jane. That’s all I know. She’s all bundled up in a big black raincoat. She walks like her shoes were two sizes too big for her feet, and she kept a newspaper over her face.”

  “A newspaper?” Mason asked.

  “Uh huh. When she got out of the car, she put a newspaper up over her head as though to protect her hat, but I noticed she had the newspaper held over her face when they went up in the elevator. And that’s the last I’ve seen of them.”

  “They’re on this floor?”

  “The cage is.”

  Mason said, “Find out all you can about Peltham.”

  “I’m working on it,” Curly said. “Got an operative on the job now. Do you want me to report at your office?”

  “No,” Mason said. “I’ll get in touch with you. In about fifteen minutes you’d better come in my office and get a drink of whiskey—unless Paul keeps a bottle in his desk.”

  “Thanks a lot, Mr. Mason. I’ll be in.”

  Mason said, “I’ll do better than that. I’ll put the bottle on a desk in the entrance room, and leave the door unlocked.”

  “Gee, that’ll be swell. Thanks.”

  Mason’s heels pounded echoes from the silent walls as he marched down the corridor toward the end of the passage where he had his office.

  He saw no one, heard no sound save the pound of his own footfalls. He unlocked the door of the reception office, left it unlatched, and walked on into his private office. He opened the drawer of his desk, found a pint of whiskey, and was just placing it on the desk used by the information clerk when the door opened and a thinnish man in the late thirties said, “Mr. Mason, I presume?”

  Mason nodded.

  “I’m Peltham.”

  Mason raised his eyebrows. “I thought the name was Cragmore,” he said.

  “It was,” Peltham observed dryly, “but several things have caused me to change it.”

  “May I ask what those things are?” Mason asked.

  Peltham smiled, a frosty gesture of the lips. “To begin with,” he said, “I was followed from the time I parked my car. It was cleverly done—but I was followed just the same. I notice that the office of the Drake Detective Agency is on this floor. After you came up in the elevator, you went down to that office and were there for some five minutes. I notice that you are now placing a bottle of whiskey on your desk where it can be picked up. Under the circumstances, Mr. Mason, we’ll abandon our little subterfuge. The name is Peltham, and we won’t bother beating around the bush. You’ve won the first trick rather neatly—but don’t overbid your hand.”

  Mason said, “Come in,” and indicated the door to his private office. “You’re alone?” he asked.

  “You know I’m not.”

  “Who’s the woman,” Mason asked; “—that is, does she enter into the case?”

  “We’ll talk about that.”

  Mason indicated a chair, slipped out of his raincoat, shook drops from the brim of his hat, and settled back in the big swivel chair behind the desk.

  His visitor gravely took out a wallet. “I suppose, Mr. Mason,” he said, extracting two one-thousand-dollar bills, “that when I said I’d pay you two thousand dollars for taking this case, you hardly expected to see the color of my money so soon.”

  He didn’t hand Mason the two one-thousand-dollar bills, but held them in his hand as though just ready to place them on the edge of Mason’s desk.

  “What,” Mason asked, “is the case?”

  “There isn’t any.”

  Mason raised his eyebrows.

  “I,” Peltham said, “am in trouble.”

  “You are?”

  “Yes.”

  “Exactly what is it?”

  Peltham said, “I don’t want you to bother about that. I have my own ways of handling those things. What I want you to do is to protect her.”

  “From what?” Mason asked.

  “From everything.”

  “And who is she?”

  Peltham said, “First I want to know whether you’ll accept the employment.”

  “I’d have to know more about it,” Mason told him.

  “What, for instance?”

  “Exactly what you think is going to happen—what you want her protected against.”

  Peltham lowered his eyes to study the carpet for several thoughtful seconds.

  “She’s here,” Mason said. “
Why not bring her in?”

  Peltham raised his eyes to Mason. “Understand this, Mr. Mason,” he said. “No one must ever know the identity of this woman.”

  “Why?”

  “It’s dynamite.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Simply that if it was known this woman had any connection with me, it would raise the very devil all around. It would bring about the very situation I’m trying to avoid.”

  “What,” Mason asked, “is she to you?”

  Peltham said steadily, “She’s everything to me.”

  “Do I understand you want me to represent some woman, but I’m not to know who she is?”

  “Exactly.”

  Mason laughed. “Good Lord, man! You seem entirely sober and in possession of your senses.”

  “I am.”

  “But you’re asking the impossible. I can’t represent a client unless I know who she is.”

  Peltham got up from the chair. He walked gravely across to the exit door which led from Mason’s private office to the corridor. He said, “Pardon me, Mr. Mason, if I seem to take a liberty.” He clicked back the spring lock on the door and stepped out into the corridor. Mason could hear low-voiced conversation, and a few moments later the door opened and Peltham ushered a woman into the room.

  She was garbed in a dark raincoat, buttoned up around the throat, which stretched almost to the ground and concealed all of her figure. It was a voluminous coat either cut for a person several sizes larger or else it had originally been a part of a man’s wardrobe. She wore a small, close-fitting hat which nestled well down on her head. The upper part of her face was concealed by a mask, through which sparkling dark eyes held a twinkle that was almost a glitter.

  “Come in, dear, and sit down,” Peltham said.

  The woman walked calmly across the office to seat herself in the chair opposite the lawyer. Her chin, the tip of her nose, and the full-bodied crimson lips indicated youth, but there was nothing else about her to give a clue to her age or appearance. She sat motionless in the chair, her hands concealed in black gloves. She did not cross her knees, but sat with her feet flat on the floor. Those feet were encased in galoshes which were evidently a size too large.

  “Good evening,” Mason said.

  She might not have heard him. Her eyes—dark, glittering, and restless—stared through the eyeholes in the mask.

  Mason quite evidently began to enjoy the bizarre situation. Outside the dark windows of the office, wind-driven rain pelted against the glass, lending a semblance of fitting background to the situation.

  Peltham was the one person in the office who seemed to see nothing unusual in the conference. He once more took from his pocket a pin-seal wallet. From it he took a bank note. “This, Mr. Mason,” he said, “is a ten-thousand-dollar bill. Perhaps you would care to examine it to see that it is genuine.”

  He passed the bill across to the lawyer who looked it over and silently handed it back.

  “Have you a pair of scissors, dear?” Peltham asked.

  The woman wordlessly opened a black purse and took out a pair of curved manicure scissors. She handed these to Peltham who took them and walked over to Mason’s desk. He held the bill in his left hand, the scissors in his right.

  With the careful touch of a man whose hands are trained to do exactly what he wants them to do, he cut the bill in two pieces by a series of curved segments.

  With the last snip of the small scissors, a piece of the bill representing about one-third of its area fluttered to Mason’s desk.

  Peltham returned the scissors to the masked woman. He held the two sections of the ten-thousand-dollar bill so that Mason could see they fitted perfectly, then he presented the larger portion of the bill to the woman, and dropped the smaller portion on top of the two one-thousand-dollar bills, which he shoved across the desk to Mason.

  “There you are,” he said. “I don’t want a receipt. Your word’s good. You’ll never know this woman’s identity unless it becomes necessary for you to know it in order to protect her interests. At that time, she’ll give you the rest of this ten-thousand-dollar bill. That will be her introduction. You can paste the two halves together, take it down to your bank, and deposit it. In that way, your fee will be guaranteed, and there’ll be no chance of an impostor imposing on you.”

  “Suppose someone else should get that other half of the bill?”

  “No one will.”

  Mason looked across at the woman. “You understand what Mr. Peltham is asking of me?” he asked.

  She nodded.

  “I take it that you knew what he had in mind when he came here?”

  Again she nodded.

  “And you’re satisfied to have me accept employment under those conditions?”

  Again there was a nod.

  Mason straightened in his chair, turned to Peltham, and said, “All right. Sit down. Let’s get down to brass tacks. . . . You want me to represent this woman. I don’t know who she is. Perhaps tomorrow morning someone will walk in and ask me to take a case. I’ll accept the employment. Later on, this woman will announce that she’s the adverse party in that case, and hand me the rest of this ten-thousand-dollar bill. I’d then find myself retained on both sides of the same case.

  “I think that explains my position. I can’t do it. What you ask is impossible. I’m interested, but I can’t do it.”

  Peltham raised his left hand to his head. The tips of his fingers massaged the left temple. He was silent for an interval. “All right,” he said at length. “Here’s how we’ll get around that. You’re free to take any case except one that involves matters in which I am apparently directly or indirectly interested. If such a case should come to your office, you will get my permission before you accept the employment.”

  “How can I get that permission?” Mason asked. “In other words, how can I get in touch with you? Will you be instantly available?”

  Again Peltham rubbed his temple for several seconds of thoughtful deliberation. Then he said, “No.”

  “All right,” Mason said impatiently. “That leaves us right back where we started.”

  “No, it doesn’t. There’s another way.”

  “What is it?”

  “You can put an ad in the Contractor’s Journal in the personal column. You will address it simply to P, and sign it with the single initial, M. You will ask in that ad if there is any objection to your accepting employment on behalf of the person calling on you.”

  “That,” Mason said, “wouldn’t be fair to my other clients. Clients don’t care to have their names broadcast in the personal columns of a newspaper.”

  “Don’t mention that person by name,” Peltham said. “Take the telephone directory, list the number of the page, the column, and the position of the name in that column. For instance, if it’s a person on page 1000 of the telephone directory, the fourth name down from the top in the third column, you will simply say, ‘If I accept employment for 1000-3-4, would I be in danger of handling a case against you?’ ”

  “And you’ll answer it?”

  “If I don’t answer it within forty-eight hours,” Peltham said, “you may consider yourself free to accept the employment.”

  “And how,” Mason asked, “will I know about your affairs? I take it, you have somewhat diversified business interests. I may not know . . .”

  Peltham interrupted. For the first time, there was in his voice evidence of mental tension. “You’ll know by tomorrow,” he said, “—that is, if you read the newspapers.”

  Mason said, “It’s goofy. It doesn’t make sense.”

  Peltham indicated the two thousand dollars on the desk. “There’s two thousand dollars,” he said. “That money is paid over to you with no questions asked. I don’t want a receipt. I’ll take your word. Ninety-nine chances out of a hundred you won’t have to turn a finger. That money will be velvet. But if you should become active on behalf of this woman, you will then automatically receive the additional ten thou
sand dollars.”

  Mason said, with finality, “I’ll take you up on that proposition on one condition.”

  “What’s the condition?”

  “That I’ll use my best efforts to be fair. I’ll act in the highest good faith. If I make a mistake, and find myself involved, I have the right to return the two thousand dollars and wipe the matter off the books as effectively as though we’d never had this conversation.”

  Peltham glanced inquiringly at the masked woman.

  She shook her head vigorously.

  Mason said, “That’s my proposition. Take it or leave it.”

  Peltham looked about him at the walls of the office. His eyes fastened on the door to the law library. “Could we,” he asked, “go in there for a moment?”

  “Go right ahead,” Mason said, and then added, “Are you afraid to have me hear this woman’s voice?”

  It was Peltham who started to answer the question, but the vigorous nodding of the woman’s head gave Mason his answer.

  The lawyer laughed. “Go ahead,” he said. “After all, it’s your show. I’m just sitting in the wings.”

  “In a twelve-thousand-dollar seat,” Peltham said with some feeling. “It’s bank night as far as you’re concerned, Mr. Mason, and you’ve won the jackpot.”

  Mason indicated the door of the law library with a gesture. “Go ahead,” he said. “I’m going to be back in bed within thirty minutes. You have my proposition. Take it or leave it.”

  Peltham crossed over to her chair. “Come, dear,” he said.

  She arose with some reluctance. He cupped his hand under her elbow, and they walked across the office, her raincoat rustling as she walked.

  The galoshes gave her a somewhat awkward gait. The raincoat, hanging loosely from her shoulders, gave no indication of the contours of her figure, but there was something in her gait which showed that she was young and lithe.