The Case of the Velvet Claws (7 page)

Wind was tugging at the corners of the apartment house where Perry Mason lived. A window was open only about half an inch at the bottom, but enough wind came through that opening to billow the curtains and keep them flapping.

Mason sat up in bed and groped for the telephone in the dark. He found the instrument, put it to his ear and said, "Hello."

The voice of Eva Belter sounded swift and panic-stricken over the wire.

"Thank God I've got you! Get in your car and come at once! This is Eva Belter."

Perry Mason was still sleepy.

"Come where?" he said. "What's the matter?"

"Something awful has happened," she said. "Don't come to the house. I'm not there."

"Where are you?"

"I'm down at a drug store on Griswold Avenue. Drive out the Avenue and you'll see the lights in the drug store. I'll be standing in front of it."

Perry Mason was getting his faculties together.

"Listen," he said, "I've answered night calls before, where people have been trying to take me for a ride. Let's make sure that there isn't anything phony about this."

She screamed at him over the telephone.

"Oh, don't be so damned cautious! Come out here at once. I tell you I'm in serious trouble. You can recognize my voice all right."

Mason said calmly, "Yes. I know all that. What was the name you gave me the first time you came to the office?"

"Griffin!" she shrieked.

"Okay," said Mason. "Coming out."

He climbed into his clothes, slipped a revolver in his hip pocket, pulled on a raincoat, and a cap which came down low over his forehead, switched out the lights, and left the apartment. His car was in the garage, and he nursed it into action; moved out into the rain before the motor was fully warmed.

The car spat and back-fired as he turned the corner. Mason kept the choke out and stepped on the gas. Rain whipped against the windshield. Little geysers of water mushroomed up from the pavement where the big drops splashed down were turned to brilliance by the illumination of his headlights.

Mason ignored the possibility of any other traffic on the road as he swept past the intersections with increasing speed. He turned to the right on Griswold Avenue, and ran for a mile and a half before he slowed down and commenced to look for lights.

He saw her standing in front of a drug store. She had on a coat and no hat, and was heedless of the rain, which had soaked her hair thoroughly. Her eyes were wide and scared.

Perry Mason swung into the curb and brought the car to a stop.

"I thought you'd never get here," she said, as he opened the door for her.

She climbed in, and Perry saw that she wore an evening gown, satin shoes, and a man's coat. She was soaking wet and water trickled down to the floorboards of the car.

"What's the trouble?" Perry Mason asked.

She stared at him with her white, wet face, and said, "Drive out to the house, quick!"

"What's the trouble?" he repeated.

"My husband's been murdered," she wailed.

Mason snapped on the dome light in the car.

"Don't do that!" she said.

He looked at her face. "Tell me about it," he said, calmly.

"Will you get this car started?"

"Not until I know the facts," he replied, almost casually.

"We've got to get there before the police do."

"Why have we?"

"Because we've got to."

Mason shook his head. "No," he said, "we're not going to talk to the police until I know exactly what happened."

"Oh," she said, "it was terrible!"

"Who killed him?"

"I don't know."

"Well, what do you know?"

"Will you turn off that damned light?" she snapped.

"After you've finished telling me what happened," he persisted.

"What do you want it on for?"

"The better to see you with, my dear," he said, but there was no humor in his voice. His manner was grim.

She sighed wearily. "I don't know what happened. I think it was somebody that he'd been blackmailing. I could hear their voices from the upper floor. They were very angry. I went to the stairs to listen."

"Could you hear what was being said?"

"No," she said, "just words and the tone. I could hear that they were cursing. Every once in a while there would be a word. My husband was using that cold, sarcastic tone that he gets when he's fighting mad. The other man had his voice raised, but he wasn't shouting. He was interrupting my husband every once in a while."

"Then what happened?"

"Then I crept up the stairs because I wanted to hear what was being said." She paused, catching her breath.

"All right," pressed Mason, "go on. What happened then?"

"And then," she said, "I heard the shot and the sound of a falling body."

"Just the one shot?"

"Just the one shot, and the sound of the body falling. Oh, it was terrible! It jarred the house."

"All right," said Mason. "Go on from there. Then what did you do?"

"Then," she said, "I turned and ran. I was afraid."

"Where did you run?"

"To my room."

"Did anybody see you?"

"No, I don't think so."

"Then what did you do?"

"I waited there a minute."

"Did you hear anything?"

"Yes, I heard the man who had fired the shot run down the stairs and out of the house."

"All right," Mason said insistently, "then what happened?"

"Then," she said, "I decided that I must go and see George and see what could be done for him. I went up to his study. He was in there. He'd been taking a bath, and had thrown a bathrobe around himself. He was lying there – dead."

"Lying where?" pressed Mason, remorselessly.

"Oh, don't make me be so specific," she snapped. "I can't tell you. It was some place near the bathroom. He'd just come out of his bath. He must have been standing in the bathroom door when this argument took place."

"How do you know he was dead?"

"I could tell by looking at him. That is, I think he was dead. Oh, I'm not sure. Please come out and help me. If he isn't dead, it's all right. There won't be any trouble. If he is, we're all of us in a hell of a mess."

"Why?"

"Because everything's going to come out. Don't you see? Frank Locke knows all about Harrison Burke, and he'll naturally think that Harrison Burke killed him. That will make Burke mention my name, and then anything may happen. Suspicion may even shift to me."

Mason said, "Oh, forget it. Locke knows about Burke all right. But Locke is nothing but a lightweight and a figurehead. As soon as he loses your husband as a prop, he won't be able to stand up. Don't think for a minute that Harrison Burke was the only man who had it in for your husband."

"No," she insisted, "but Harrison Burke had the motive, more so than any of the others. The others didn't know who ran the paper. Harrison Burke knew. You told him."

"So he told you that, eh?" said Mason.

"Yes, he told me that. What did you have to go to him for?"

"Because," said Mason, grimly, "I wasn't going to take him for a free ride. He was getting a lot of service, and I intended to make him pay for it. I wasn't going to have you put up all the money."

"Don't you think," she said, "that that was something for me to decide?"

"No."

She bit her lip, started to say something, then changed her mind.

"All right," he said. "Now listen and get this straight. If he's dead there's going to be a lot of investigation. You've got to keep your nerve. Have you any idea who it was that was in that house?"

"No," she said, "not to be sure; just what I could gather from the tone of the man's voice."

"All right," he told her. "That's something. You said you couldn't hear what was being said?"

"I couldn't," she said, slowly, "but I could hear the sound of their voices. I could recognize the tones. I heard my husband's voice, and then this other man's voice."

"Had you ever heard that other voice before?"

"Yes."

"Do you know who it was?"

"Yes."

"Well, don't be so damned mysterious," he said. "Who was it? I'm your lawyer. You've got to tell me."

She turned and faced him. "You know who it was," she said.

"I know?"

"Yes."

"Look here, one of us is crazy. How would I know who it was?"

"Because," she said, slowly, "it was you!"

His eyes became cold, hard and steady.

"Me?"

"Yes, you! Oh, I didn't want to tell! I wasn't going to let you think I knew. I was going to protect your secret! But you wormed it out of me. But I won't tell any one else, never, never, never! It's just a secret that you and I share."

He stared at her with his lips tightening. "So that's the kind of a playmate you are, eh?"

She met his eyes and nodded, slowly.

"Yes, Mr. Mason, I'm the sort you can trust. I'm never going to betray you."

He sucked in a deep breath, then sighed.

"Oh, hell," he said, "what's the use!"

There was a moment of silence. Then Perry Mason asked, in a voice that was entirely without expression: "Did you hear a car drive away – afterwards?"

She hesitated a moment, and then said: "Yes, I think I did, but the storm was making a lot of racket up there with the trees rubbing against the house and everything. But I think I heard a motor."

"Now listen," he told her. "You're nervous and you're unstrung. But if you're going to face a bunch of detectives and start talking that way, you're just going to get yourself into trouble. You'd either better have a complete breakdown and get a physician who will refuse to let any one talk with you, or else you'd better get your story licked into shape. Now you either heard a motor or you didn't hear one. Did you, or didn't you?"

"Yes," she said, defiantly, "I heard one."

"Okay," he said. "That's better. Now, how many people are in the house?"

"What do you mean?"

"Servants and everybody," he said. "Just who's there. I want to know everybody that's in that house."

"Well," she said, "there's Digley, the butler."

"Yes," said Mason, "I met him. I know all about him. Who else? Who is the housekeeper?"

"A Mrs. Veitch," she said, "and she has her daughter staying with her now. The daughter is there for a few days."

"All right, how about the men? Let's check up on the men. Just Digley, the butler?"

"No," she said, "there's Carl Griffin."

"Griffin, eh?"

She flushed. "Yes."

"That accounts for the fact that you used the name 'Griffin' when you came to call on me the first time?"

"No, it doesn't. I just used the first name that came into my mind. Don't say anything like that."

He grinned. "I didn't say anything like that. You're the one that said it."

She rushed into rapid conversation.

"Carl Griffin is my husband's nephew. He's very seldom home at night. He's pretty wild, I guess. He leads a pretty gay life. They say he comes in drunk a good deal of the time. I don't know about that. But I know that he's very close to my husband. George comes as near having affection for Carl as he does for any living mortal. You must know that my husband is a queer man. He doesn't really love any one. He wants to own and possess, to dominate and crush, but he can't love. He hasn't any close friends and he's completely self-sufficient."

"Yes," said Mason, "I know all that stuff. It isn't your husband's character that I'm interested in. Tell me some more about this Carl Griffin. Was he there tonight?"

"No," she said, "he went out early in the evening. In fact, I don't think he was there for dinner. It seems to me that he went out to the golf club and played golf this afternoon. When did it start to rain?"

"Around six o'clock, I think," said Mason. "Why?"

"Yes," she said, "that's the way I remember it. It was pleasant this afternoon, and Carl was playing golf. Then I think George said that he had telephoned he was going to stay out at the golf club for dinner and wouldn't be in until late."

"You're sure he hadn't come in?" asked Mason.

"Certain."

"You're sure that it wasn't his voice that you heard up there in the room?"

She hesitated for a moment.

"No," she said, "it was yours."

Mason muttered an exclamation of annoyance.

"That is," she said hastily, "it sounded like yours. It was a man who talked just like you. He had that same quiet way of dominating a conversation. He could raise his voice, and yet make it seem quiet and controlled, just like you, but I'll never mention that to any one, never in the world! They could torture me, but I wouldn't mention your name."