Mason dropped the telephone receiver into place, pushed back his chair, got to his feet, and started slowly pacing the office.
Chapter 3
Perry Mason was lying in bed reading when the telephone rang. He had been about to turn off the light, and there was a frown on his face as he picked up the receiver.
Della Street’s voice greeted him. “Hello, Chief. How about the evening paper?”
“What about it?”
“Did you read it?”
“I glanced through it. Why?”
“I notice,” she said, “that auditors have been called in to examine the books of the Elmer Hastings Memorial Hospital. Charges of mismanagement of funds have been made by a member of the Hastings family. A firm of certified public accountants were called on to make a preliminary audit of the books. The endowment funds are held in a trust administered by a board of three trustees. The members of that board of trustees are Albert Tidings, Robert Peltham, and a Parker C. Stell.”
For several thoughtful seconds Mason was silent, then he said, “I guess that’s what Peltham meant when he said I’d learn about him in the papers.”
“Get this,” Della Street went on, speaking hurriedly. “I didn’t intend to disturb you over that newspaper business. I clipped the item out of the paper and figured it would keep until morning, but I was getting ready for bed and turned the radio on to get the evening broadcast. A news item came through that early this evening police investigated a parked automobile which had been found in a vacant lot, discovered that there were bloodstains on the seat cushion. A man’s bloodstained topcoat was found pushed down on the floor boards near the gearshift lever. There was a bullet hole in the left side of the coat. The car was registered in the name of Albert Tidings, and a handkerchief in the right-hand pocket of the raincoat had Albert Tidings’ laundry mark and some lipstick on it. A check-up shows that Tidings hasn’t been seen since shortly before noon, when his secretary said he went out without saying where he was going.”