The Case of the Dangerous Dowager (Perry Mason #10)

by Erle Stanley Gardner

Perry Mason studied the white-haired woman with that interest which new clients always aroused. She returned the lawyer’s gaze with bright gray eyes in which a hard glitter gradually softened to a twinkle. “No,” she said, “I haven’t killed anyone—not yet, I haven’t. But don’t think I’m a peaceful old lady who sits by the fire and knits, because I’m not. I’m a hard-bitten old hellion.”

“Why can’t you let Paul Drake handle those gamblers?” “Because my client doesn’t want Paul, she wants me. I collected the fee and I take the responsibility.” “Most generals,” she pointed out, “don’t go into the front-line trenches.” “And thereby miss all the fun,” he told her. She nodded slowly. “Yes,” she agreed, “life in this office never lacks for excitement.” “Like it, Della?” “Of course I like it.” “Then why adopt that hang-your-clothes-on-a-hickory-limb-but-don’t -go-near-the-water attitude?” “Just my maternal instinct, Chief.” “You’re too young to have maternal instincts.” “You’d be surprised. There’s Paul Drake at the door, now.” Della Street crossed the office, opened a door and nodded to the tall man who grinned down at her.

The detective crossed his fingers. “I suppose you’ve hatched out some scheme by which we’ll just scrape past the walls of State’s Prison, if we’re lucky, and be corpses or convicts if we’re not. Well, Perry, count me out. I’ve had enough.”

“You’re sure we won’t get in trouble over this?” Drake asked. “Nothing we can’t get out of,” Mason said. “After all, we sometimes have to fight the devil with fire.” Drake said, without enthusiasm, “You fight him with an acetylene torch. Someday, Perry, you’re going to get your fingers burnt.”

The lawyer settled back against the cushions, turned to look back at the diminishing lights of the amusement pier, at the frosty glitter of the city lights, then peered ahead into the darkness. His nostrils dilated; he breathed deeply of the night air as his lips parted in a smile of sheer enjoyment. The detective sat huddled in his overcoat, his face wearing the lugubrious expression of one who is submitting to a disagreeable experience which he has been unable to avoid.

“Okay,” Duncan said, “you’ve told me—not only once, but twice. If I put my head in a noose it’s my own funeral. Is that it?” “That’s it,” Mason said.

“I,” she proclaimed, “am two paragraphs ahead of you.”

“Paul,” Della Street interrupted in a tone of finality, “when the chief tells me to do something, I do it. I’ve learned by experience that it doesn’t do any good to argue with him.”

Now, you tell Perry I want to talk with him. He’s sitting on a volcano.” “Okay,” Della said wearily, “I’ll tell him, but it probably won’t do any good. He’s the champion volcano-sitter.”

“Confusion to our enemies,” she toasted. Drake gulped down three big swallows of the light amber drink. “You don’t need to wish any confusion on them. The whole case is worse than a jigsaw puzzle.” He slipped his arm around her waist and said, “Gee, Della, you’re a good kid! I wish I could get someone who had just one percent as much loyalty for me as you have for Perry. How does he work it?” Della laughed. “Take your arm away, Paul. Experience has taught me that when a man sticks around my apartment about daylight, drinking Scotch and soda and talking about my wonderful loyalty, he’s getting ready to go out of control.” Drake sighed. “I see you’re a good judge of character as well as a darned efficient secretary. Going to kiss me good-by when I leave, Della?” “No. If I did you wouldn’t leave.” “Well,” Drake said, “there’s no harm in asking. I’ll drop in at the office later on and give you all the dirt I can dig up. So long, Della, and thanks for the drink.” “Don’t forget that bottle of Scotch,” she told him as she closed the door behind him.

“Forget it,” Mason interrupted. “He sold us out, and that’s that. You can’t apologize it away, and you can’t explain it away. It’s happened, and that’s all there is to it. It’s one of those things that are bound to happen when you have to work through operatives. You can’t expect a man who draws eight dollars a day and expenses to pass up a juicy chunk of coin when a newspaper offers it to him.”

“They could make trouble for me,” he admitted, “over lots of things I do. That doesn’t keep me from doing what I think is right. And when I’m doing something which furthers the ultimate ends of justice, I think it’s right. Take another look at those I O U’s, Sylvia.”

“I know what you mean,” Mason told him. “The last time I saw an expression like that was on the face of a nineteen-year-old blackmailer.” He chuckled and added, “While she was waiting in the outer office, I asked Della Street what she looked like, and Della said she looked like a synthetic virgin.”