“Then why did you give the Products Refining Company a chance to trap Moar that way?” Della Street asked.
“Because,” Mason said, “after they once make promises in this case, I’m going to see these promises are kept.”
“How?” she asked.
“You’d be surprised. I have a few tricks up my sleeve I can always use on chiselers.”
“Is that why you didn’t want to represent Moar?”
“That’s partially it,” he told her. “The other reason is that I don’t like to represent persons who are guilty. Of course, every person is entitled to a fair trial. That means he’s entitled to a lawyer. But I’d prefer that chaps like Moar would get some other lawyer. Of course, I can’t always pick innocent ones. For one thing, I have to reach snap judgments. I’m like a baseball umpire who has to call the plays as he sees them.”
“So what are you going to do now?” she asked.
“Right now,” he said, “you can encode another wire to Jackson, reading as follows:
“‘HAVE DRAKE DETECTIVE AGENCY PUT OPERATIVE ON ROONEY. DIG UP SOME DIRT WHICH WILL ENABLE ME TO BRING PRESSURE TO BEAR. QUIT PULLING YOUR PUNCHES AND GET RESULTS.’”
Mason grinned and said, “That’ll make Jackson hopping mad.”