“Credit, hell,” Drake said lugubriously. “I deserve cash for it. When you get the bill, it’s going to floor you, Perry. I’ve got men working on overlapping nine-hour shifts, and I’ve got ’em scattered all over the country.”
“That’s fine,” Mason said. “How did you get the telephone bill, Paul?”
“One of the men took a chance,” Drake said, “went down to the telephone office, said he was a ‘detective,’ and, because of the murder, wanted service discontinued on the telephone, and wanted to pay the bill. The girl in the local telephone office fell for it, and handed him the bill. He insisted on checking all the long distance charges.”
“What did you find?” Mason asked.
“A few calls to his residence, here in the city,” Drake said. “Those were evidently calls where he’d talked with his secretary. Several of them had been station-to-station calls, and quite a few of them had been for Richard Waid personally. But the interesting things, Perry, are the person-to-person Reno calls.”
“The Reno calls?” Mason asked.
“Yes. Apparently he was in almost daily telephone communication with his wife in Reno.”
“What about?” Mason asked.
“You’ve got me on that,” Drake said. “Probably trying to make certain that the divorce was going through according to schedule, and that she’d be in New York with a certified copy of the decree.”
Della Street, her face freshly powdered, eyes showing but little trace of tears, bustled busily into the office, and appeared surprised to see Paul Drake. “Hi, Paul,” she said.