Mason casually extended his hand, and she unhesitatingly passed over the envelopes. Mason looked at the stamps, studied the postmarks and said, “This one left Honolulu day before yesterday.”
“Yes,” she said, “I got it yesterday. It’s the last letter I’ve received from Sis.”
“Interesting handwriting,” Mason said. “It shows a lot of character.”
“Oh, do you read character from handwriting, Mr. Mason? I’m very much interested in it.”
“Yes,” Mason said, “it’s a hobby of mine. Of course, you can’t read character from just a few words, such as the address on the envelope, but if I had a page of handwriting, I’d be willing to bet I could tell you quite a good deal about your sister, what she looks like, where she’s been recently, what she’s been doing, and... oh, quite a lot of things about her.”
“Can you really? I think that’s wonderful. Mason took a ten-dollar bill from his wallet and said, “I’d even be willing to bet you ten dollars against ten cents.”
Laughing, Marian Whiting took ten cents from her purse, placed it on the lawyer’s ten-dollar bill, and took the letter from the envelope. “There you are,” she told him.
Mason opened the letter.
“Now, wait a minute,” Marian Whiting said. “You can’t read it, because she says lots of things in there about what she’s been doing, things you were going to tell me from her writing.”
“Oh, certainly,” Mason conceded, “I merely want to glance at the handwriting. Here, I’ll let Mr. Drake hold the letter while I tell you. In the first place, your sister is younger than you are. She’s taller and has blonde hair. Her eyes are blue, with just a shade of green. Her lips are rather thin. She’s...”