The Case of the Velvet Claws (9 page)

He sat in the living room on the downstairs floor of the Belter house and stared through his cigarette smoke at Perry Mason.

"The papers that we've found," he said, "indicate that he was the real owner of Spicy Bits, the blackmailing sheet that's been shaking them down during the last five or six years."

Perry Mason spoke, slowly and cautiously, "I knew that, Sergeant."

"How long have you known it?" asked Hoffman.

"Not very long."

"How did you find out?"

"That's something I can't tell."

"How did you happen to be here tonight before the police came?"

"You heard what Mrs. Belter said. That's true. She called me. She was inclined to think that her husband might have lost his head, and shot the man who was calling on him. She didn't know what had happened, and was afraid to go and find out."

"Why was she afraid?" asked Hoffman.

Perry Mason shrugged his shoulders.

"You've seen the man," he said, "and you know the type of a man it would take to run Spicy Bits. I would say, offhand, that he was rather hard-boiled. He might not be a perfect gentleman or very chivalrous in dealing with women-folk's."

Bill Hoffman turned the matter over in his mind.

"Well," he said, "we can tell a lot more when we've traced that gun."

"Can you trace it?" asked Mason.

"I think so. The numbers are on it."

"Yes," Mason said, "I saw them when they took down the numbers. A 32-caliber Colt automatic, eh?"

"That's the gun," said Hoffman.

There was a period of silence. Hoffman smoked meditatively. Perry Mason sat perfectly still without so much as moving a muscle, the pose of a man who is either absolutely relaxed, or else is afraid to give way to the slightest motion for fear that it will betray him.

Once or twice Bill Hoffman raised his placid eyes and looked at Perry Mason. Finally Hoffman said, "There's something funny about this whole thing, Mason. I don't know just how to explain it."

"Well," said Mason, "it's your business. I usually get in on the murder cases long after the police have finished. This is a new experience for me."

Hoffman flashed him a glance.

"Yes," he said, "it is rather unusual for an attorney to be on the ground before the police get there, isn't it?"

"Yes," said Mason, noncommittally, "I think I can agree with you upon that word 'unusual.'"

Hoffman smoked awhile in silence.

"Located the nephew yet?" asked Mason.

"No," said Hoffman. "We've covered most of the places where he usually hangs out. We crossed his trail earlier in the evening. He'd been out with some jane at a night club. We've located her all right. She said that he left her before midnight. About eleven-fifteen she thinks it was."

Suddenly there sounded the noise of a motor pounding up the drive. The rain had ceased, and the moon was breaking through the clouds.

Above the noise of the motor could be heard a steady thump… thump… thump… thump.

The car came to a stop, and a horn blared.

"Now what the devil?" said Bill Hoffman, and got slowly to his feet.

Perry Mason had his head cocked on one side, listening.

"Sounds like a flat," he said.

Bill Hoffman moved toward the door, and Perry Mason followed along behind him.

Sergeant Hoffman opened the front door.

There were four or five police cars parked in the driveway. The car that had just driven up was on the outside of the circle of parked cars. It was a roadster with side curtains up. A vague form at the wheel was staring at the house. The white blur of his face could be seen through the side curtains of the car. He was holding one hand on the horn which kept up a steady, incessant racket.

Sergeant Hoffman stepped out into the light on the porch, and the noise of the horn ceased.

The door of the roadster opened, and a voice called in thick accents:

"Digley. I got… flat tire… can't change… don't dare bend over… don't feel well. You come fixsh car… fixsh tire."

Perry Mason remarked casually, "That probably will be the nephew, Carl Griffin. We'll see what he has to say."

Bill Hoffman grunted. "If I'm any judge at this distance, he won't be able to say much."

Together they moved toward the car.

The young man crawled out from behind the steering wheel, felt vaguely with a groping foot for the step of the roadster, and lurched forward. He would have fallen, had it not been for his hand which caught and held one of the supports of the top. He stood there, weaving uncertainly back and forth.

"Got flat tire," he said. "Want Digley… you're not Digley. There's two of you… not either one of you Digley. Who the hell are you? What you want shish time of night? 'Snot a nicesh time night for men to come pay call."

Bill Hoffman moved forward.

"You're drunk," he said.

The man leered at him with owlish scrutiny.

"Course I'm drunk… wash schpose I shtayed out for? Course I'm drunk."

Hoffman said patiently: "Are you Carl Griffin?"

"Coursh I'm Carl Griffin."

"All right," said Bill Hoffman. "You'd better snap out of it. Your uncle has been murdered."

There was a moment of silence. The man who held to the top of the roadster shook his head two or three times, as though trying to shake away some mental fog which gripped him.

When he spoke, his voice was more crisp.

"What are you talking about?" he asked.

"Your uncle," said the Sergeant. "That is, I presume he's your uncle, George C. Belter. He was murdered an hour or an hour and a half ago."

The reek of whiskey enveloped the man. He was struggling to get his self-possession. He took two or three deep breaths, and then said, "You're drunk."

Sergeant Hoffman smiled. "No, Griffin, we're not drunk," he said, patiently. "You're the one that's drunk. You've been out going places and doing things. You'd better come in the house and see if you can pull yourself together."

"Did you say 'murdered'?" asked the young man.

"That's what I said – murdered," repeated Sergeant Hoffman.

The young man started walking toward the house. He was holding his head very erect with his shoulders back.

"If he was murdered," he said, "it was that damned woman that did it."

"Who do you mean?" asked Sergeant Hoffman.

"That baby-faced bitch he married," said the young man.

Hoffman took the young man's arm and turned back to Perry Mason.

"Mason," he said, "would you mind switching off the motor on that car and turning off the lights?"

Carl Griffin paused, and turned unsteadily back.

"Change tire, too," he said, "right front tire – it's been flat for miles and miles… better change it."

Perry Mason switched off the motor and lights, slammed the door on the roadster, and walked rapidly to catch up with the pair ahead of him.

He was in time to open the front door for Bill Hoffman and the man on his arm.

Seen under the light in the hallway, Carl Griffin was a rather good-looking young man with a face which was flushed with drink, marked with dissipation. His eyes were red and bleary, but there was a certain innate dignity about him, a stamp of breeding which made itself manifest in the manner in which he tried to adjust himself to the emergency.

Bill Hoffman faced him, studied him carefully.

"Do you suppose that you could sober up enough to talk with us, Griffin?" he asked.

Griffin nodded. "Just a minute… I'll be all right."

He pushed away from Sergeant Hoffman and staggered toward a lavatory which opened off the reception room on the lower floor.

Hoffman looked at Mason.

"He's pretty drunk," said Mason.

"Sure he's drunk," Hoffman replied, "but it isn't like an amateur getting drunk. He's used to it. He drove the car all the way up here with the roads wet, and with a tire flat."

"Yes," agreed Mason, "he could drive the car all right."

"Apparently no love lost between him and Eva Belter," Sergeant Hoffman pointed out.

"You mean what he said about her?" asked Mason.

"Sure," said Hoffman. "What else would I mean?"

"He was drunk," Mason said. "You wouldn't suspect a woman on account of the thoughtless remark of a drunken man, would you?"

"Sure, he was drunk," said Hoffman, "and he piloted the car up here, all right. Maybe he could think straight even if he was drunk."

Perry Mason shrugged his shoulders.

"Have it your own way," he said, carelessly.

From the bathroom came the sounds of violent retchings.

"I'll bet you he sobers up," remarked Sergeant Hoffman, watching Perry Mason with wary eyes, "and says the same thing about the woman when he's sober."

"I'll bet you he's drunk as a lord, no matter whether he seems to be sober or not," snapped Mason. "Some of these fellows are pretty deceptive when it comes to carrying their booze. They get so they can act as sober as judges, but they haven't very much of an idea what they're doing or saying."

Bill Hoffman looked at him with a suggestion of a twinkle in his eyes.

"Sort of discounting in advance what ever it may be that he's going to say, eh, Mason?"

"I didn't say that."

Hoffman laughed.

"No," he said, "you didn't say it. Not in exactly those words."

"How about getting him some black coffee?" asked Mason. "I think I can find the kitchen and put some coffee on."

"The housekeeper should be out there," Hoffman said. "I don't want to offend you, Mason, but I really want to talk to this man alone, anyway. I don't know exactly what your status in this case is. You seem to be a friend of the family and a lawyer both."

"That's all right," Mason agreed readily enough. "I understand your position, Sergeant. I happen to be out here, and I'm sticking around."

Hoffman nodded. "You'll find the housekeeper in the kitchen, I think. Mrs. Veitch, her name is. We had her and her daughter upstairs questioning them. Go on out there and see if they can scare up some coffee. Get lots of black coffee. I think that the boys upstairs would like it as well as this chap, Griffin."

"Okay," Mason said. He went through the folding doors from the dining room, then pushed through a swinging door into a serving pantry, and from there into the kitchen.

The kitchen was enormous, well lit, and well equipped. Two women were seated at a table. They were in straight-backed chairs, and were sitting close to each other. They had been talking in low tones when Perry Mason stepped into the room, and they ceased their conversation abruptly and looked up.

One of them was a woman in the late forties, with hair that was shot with gray, deep-set, lack-luster, black eyes that seemed to have been pulled into her face by invisible strings that had worked the eyes so far back into the sockets it was hard to tell their expression. They hid from sight back in the shadowed hollows. She had a long face, a thin, firm mouth, and high cheek bones. She was dressed in black.

The other woman was very much younger, not over twenty-two or three. Her hair was jet black and glossy. Her eyes were a snapping black, and their brightness emphasized the dullness of the deep-sunken eyes of the older woman. Her lips were full and very red. Her face had received careful attention with rouge and powder. The eyebrows were thin, black and arched, the eyelashes long.

"You're Mrs. Veitch?" asked Perry Mason, addressing the older woman.

She nodded in tight-lipped silence.

The girl at her side spoke in a rich, throaty voice.

"I'm Norma Veitch, her daughter. What is it you wanted? Mother's all upset."

"Yes, I know," apologized Mason. "I wondered if we could get some coffee. Carl Griffin has just come home, and I think he's going to need it. And there's a bunch of men working on the case upstairs who will want some."

Norma Veitch got to her feet. "Why, I guess so. It's all right isn't it, Mother?" she asked.

She glanced at the older woman, and the older woman nodded her head once more.

"I'll get it, Mother," said Norma Veitch.

"No," said the older woman, speaking in a voice that was as dry as the rustling of corn husks. "I'll get it. You don't know where things are."

She pushed back her chair and walked across the kitchen to a cupboard. She slid back a door and took down a huge coffee percolator and a can of coffee. Her face was absolutely expressionless, but she moved as though she were very tired.

She was flat-chested and flat-hipped and walked with springless steps. Her entire manner was that of dejection.

The girl turned to Mason and flashed him a smile from her full red lips.