The Case of the Queenly Contestant

“The big hotels are troubled with ‘cat’ burglars who put through an early-morning call to some person and then say it’s a mistake. The roomer is wide awake and a little angry — too angry to go back to sleep. He gets up, goes to the bathroom, and starts the water running.

“The ‘cat’ burglar, who has been waiting outside the room, sneaks in, helps himself quickly to what he wants, and gets out. The roomer doesn’t have any idea anything is wrong until he has occasion to pay for something. Then he opens his wallet and finds the money is all gone. It’s a problem the big hotels have to wrestle with.

“That’s what happened in this case. Agnes was ready to take a bath. She had turned the water on in the bathroom. This person who had been carefully planning the burglary was probably waiting behind the back door, which he had opened with a skeleton key.

“But Agnes heard a noise and wasn’t too modest, so she threw the door open and caught the intruder right in the act. Agnes had a gun. She didn’t think she was going to have to use it, but she had it and was holding her visitor at arm’s length with that gun.

“A thunderstorm came up. A sudden gust of wind blew the drapes into the room so that Agnes in her near nudity was exposed to view from the street. Feminine-like, and almost instinctively, she reached for the window to slam it shut. Her visitor saw an opportunity and fired, then took possession of the evidence which could have cost one side of the case a couple of million dollars.”

“You got any ideas about that visitor?” Tragg said.

“Let’s use a little logic there,” Mason said. “The visitor was someone who carried a gun. That visitor went to the interview not intending to shoot, not anticipating that Agnes Burlington would pull a thirty-two-caliber revolver — perhaps not anticipating that the evidence that Agnes Burlington had was quite as devastating as turned out to be the case.

“The visitor was someone who would normally have carried a gun, who was vitally interested in the two million dollars, probably working on a contingency basis with the half brothers.”

“You mean the attorney representing them?” Tragg asked skeptically.

“Attorneys don’t carry guns,” Mason said. “Who carries guns?”

“Police officers,” Tragg said, “but that doesn’t mean anything.”

“And private detectives,” Mason said. “We have a Jarmen Dayton in the case who is a private detective, who is—”

Tragg snapped his fingers.

“An ordinary murderer,” Mason went on, “could get rid of the murder weapon, but a private detective who is licensed to carry a gun might have a little more difficulty disposing of a gun. He couldn’t explain not having his gun.

“While your men are searching for that fatal bullet, Tragg, why don’t you pay an official call on Jarmen Dayton, ask to see the gun he is carrying, check his credentials, fire a couple of test bullets from that gun, and then, in case you do uncover a fatal bullet, see if they match?”

Lieutenant Tragg thought the matter over. “I’m sticking my neck way, way, way out,” he said.

“What do you have to lose?” Mason asked.

“Well, Dayton could make a complaint that I’d been unduly suspicious.”

“And what do you have to win if you’re right?” Mason asked.

Tragg thought that over.

“A spectacular solution of a murder case which has attracted a lot of attention,” Mason pointed out; “a two million-dollar estate...”

Tragg held up his hand. “Forget it,” he said; “you win.”

The telephone jangled sharply.

Della Street picked up the instrument, said, “Just a minute.” Then she said to Mason, “The operator says she has an important message sent at double urgent rates.”

“Who’s it from?” Mason asked.

“Just a minute,” Della Street said, her pencil flying over her notebook as the message was read over the telephone.

“Yes, I have it,” Della Street said.

Della Street looked up at Mason and said, “Answering your question as to whom the message is from, it seems to be from Harmon Haslett. The message is from the Azores. It states that he was shipwrecked; that after swimming for hours in a life jacket he was picked up by the crew of a small fishing boat which had no wireless; that he has just been landed at the Azores; that he has heard news that you are involved in a suit concerning the contents of his will; that he is taking the first jet available and will be here sometime tomorrow.”

Lieutenant Tragg said, “Well, I’ll... be... damned!”

Mason said to Della Street, “Don’t tell Gertie anything about this.”

“Why?”

“You know how romantic Gertie is. Fancy how she will start anticipating what’s going to happen when Harmon Haslett meets his sweetheart of twenty years ago, the mother of his illegitimate child — a woman, incidentally, whom he had never forgotten — a son that he didn’t know he had, whose existence he only suspected.”

“And the queenly Ellen Adair,” Della Street said. “What will happen to her composure?”