“What are you getting at?” Mason asked.
“Just this,” Drake said. “Suppose that someone gave Moar the works. Suppose the Fell woman is telling the truth, and a woman hoisted him up to the rail and pushed him over. Just as he went, he made a grab at her and ripped a chunk of cloth out of her dress. As he fell, that cloth caught on the cleat and ripped from his fingers.”
“That’s just a theory, Paul.”
“All right,” Drake said, give me some other theory which will hold water, and account for that dress being on the outside of the ship.”
Mason squinted his eyes in thought and stared moodily at the carpet. The telephone rang. He picked it up and learned that his Los Angeles office was on the line. Jackson told him they had had no word from or about Della Street.
As Mason was ready to hang up, the hotel operator cut in on the line and said, “Mr. Mason, a Miss Newberry is down here.”
“Send her up,” Mason said.
He was idly twisting the piece of blue silk in his fingers when Belle Newberry rapped at the door.
Mason let her in, shook hands and said, “How was it, Belle, pretty bad?”
“It was tough,” she told him, “but not too tough. Poor Moms, I’m afraid she’s having a harder time on it.”