Free The Case of the Daring Divorcee by Erle Stanley Gardner

the week, Banner."
    "What do you mean?" Banner asked.
    "Your client," Mason said, "has been dead for more than twenty-four hours."
    During the silence at the other end of the line, Mason hung up.
    Della Street's telephone suddenly exploded into a series of short, sharp rings, Gertie's signal that a police officer had entered the outer office and was on his way in without waiting to be announced.
    Mason said to Adelle Hastings, "Here it comes. Get ready."
    The door of the inner office opened abruptly and Lt. Tragg stood in the doorway surveying the occupants of the office with skeptical eyes.
    "I take it you're Mrs. Garvin S. Hastings," he said, tilt ing his black hat slightly, studying the shaken client.
    "Come in and sit down, Lieutenant," Mason said, "and there's no need leading up to a dramatic period of questioning in which you try to get Mrs. Hastings to betray herself. She knows now that her husband is dead. She received a telephone call from her husband's office manager just a few minutes ago. He advised her that her husband had been shot, and had evidently been dead for some time. He also advised her he was notifying the police. She told him to tell the police she was here."
    "So then you called me with this story about the gun and the lost bag?" Tragg asked, his shrewd eyes suddenly shifting from Adelle Hastings to Perry Mason.
    "This call," Mason said, "was after I had notified you about the bag."
    "How long after?"
    "Several minutes."
    "And I take it you have witnesses to prove it."
    "I certainly do. I hope you kept a record of the time my call came in."
    "Pretty shrewd," Tragg said thoughtfully, as though talking to himself. "Pretty damned shrewd!"
    He suddenly shifted his eyes to Adelle Hastings. "All right, Mrs. Hastings, you now know your husband is dead. You know that he's been shot. Do you know that the shots were fired from the gun that was in your purse?"
    "No."
    "But you weren't too surprised to learn he had been murdered?"
    "I was… I was shocked."
    "Mr. Mason tells me that you lost your handbag or it was stolen."
    "It was stolen."
    "Where?"
    "In Los Angeles. It was stolen from the seat of my automobile. I ran in to a drugstore just long enough to get a package of cigarettes and-Heavens, I didn't have my back turned on the automobile for more than thirty seconds. Someone just grabbed my purse."
    "You're certain it was done then?"
    "That was the only time it could have been taken."
    "When did you miss it?"
    "Not until I arrived at my house here. I wanted my key. The handbag, change purse and keys were gone. I had to ring the bell so my husband could let me in."
    "What else did you have in this bag of yours?"
    "Quite a variety of things, such as a woman usually carries. Keys, identification cards, credit cards, lipstick, cigarettes-"
    "I thought you said you were out of cigarettes," Tragg interrupted harshly.
    "I'm talking about what I usually carry in the bag."
    Tragg whirled abruptly to Perry Mason. "You found the bag in your office?"
    "Yes."
    "Made an inventory of the contents?"
    "Yes."
    "What about cigarettes?"
    Mason kept his eyes steady on Tragg's. "There was a half-filled package of cigarettes in the bag."
    Tragg's eyes swiveled back to Adellle Hastings. "That pretty well disposes of your story about being out of cigarettes," he said.
    "It does nothing of the kind," Mason interposed. "A thief could have put cigarettes in the bag without the slightest difficulty."
    "Then it's your theory that the thief came here?" Tragg asked Mason.
    Mason said, "It's my theory that the thief came here. Mrs. Hastings said she wasn't in the office."
    "When did you first talk with her?"
    "Last night."
    "Where?"
    "Las Vegas, Nevada."
    "You took quite an interest in this handbag, didn't you?"
    "There was a fairly good-sized sum of money in it," Mason said.
    "How much?" Tragg asked.
    "Three thousand, one hundred and seventeen dollars and forty-three cents."
    "What time was it when you came here?" Tragg asked Adelle