Mason hesitated a moment, then said, “Okay, I’ll see you through. Now, let me ask you some more questions before Carl gets here. Just how much have you told him?”
“I told him that Mr. Dail, the president of the Products Refining Company, was aboard. It seems that wasn’t any news to him. I told him Mr. Dail was willing to make some concessions if Carl made restitution. He told me I was absolutely crazy. He said that if I ever approached Dail with any proposition like that, he’d kill me. He said he hadn’t taken a cent from the Products Refining Company. So then I told him that Celinda Dail was looking for an opportunity to expose Belle... and that made him furious.”
“What else?” Mason asked.
“That’s all,” she said. “That’s all I had time to tell him.”
“Was that after he received this note, or before?”
Afterwards. We had left the others and entered the stateroom. I talked to him for just a minute or two. Then I stepped into the closet to get out another dress and I heard him slam the door.”
“And he told you he had to see a man?”
“Yes. He said he’d be back in five minutes and have it out with me.”
Mason said, “I think we’d better go on deck and find out what’s happened. You’re certain Carl took the gun?”
“Yes. I heard him slam the drawer in the dresser. I didn’t realize what it meant at the time. If... if somebody’s overboard, can they find him — her?”