The Case of the Daring Divorcee by Erle Stanley Gardner

efficiency. A moment later she said, "Here's Paul Drake, Chief."
    Mason picked up the phone and said, "Paul, this is an emergency matter and I want some fast action."
    "You always do," Drake said.
    "Hold it," Mason said, "there's no time for kidding. I want you to get as many young women as you can, up to six or seven-no more than that-but six or seven, if possible.
    "I want them between twenty-seven to thirty-two. I want them all with good figures, weighing not more than a hundred and seventeen pounds, and not less than a hundred and ten pounds. I want them all to put on heavy dark glasses. You can send one of your operatives down to a drugstore and get a bunch of dark glasses, the biggest and darkest lenses you can find."
    "How soon?" Drake asked.
    "Right now," Mason told him.
    "Have a heart, Perry. I can't-"
    "I don't care what you have to pay," Mason said, "I want them. I'm mixed into something that bothers me personally and professionally and I want those women. Probably your receptionist knows some of the girls who are working here in the building who can get away for half an hour or so. Send an operative down to the restaurant. Pick up some of the girls who are having a coffee break. Send someone over to the parking lot. Pick out young women who have parked their cars. Ask them if they want to get twenty dollars for an hour's work. Then give me a ring as soon as you've got them."
    "Twenty dollars for an hour's work?" Drake asked.
    "Fifty, if you have to," Mason said. "I want results."I'm on the job," Drake said. "I'll start with my receptionist. I have a couple of operatives here that are on the loose, and a young chap who can skip down to the drugstore and get dark glasses. You want them big and dark."
    "That's right. Big lenses and very dark," Mason said. "We'll give you a ring as soon as we're ready. Now, get this straight, Paul. You have these girls in your office all ready to go, with dark glasses on.
    "At the proper time, Della will ring your office and say, 'Paul, this is Della.' That's all she'll say. The minute she says that, you push those girls out into the corridor and have them walk down to the door of my reception room, but tell them not to go in until I come out of my private office with a young woman of that general description, who will a]so be wearing dark glasses. I'll walk down to the group and we'll all go in together. Got that?"
    "Got it," Drake said.
    Mason hung up.
    Della Street looked at Mason and smiled. "That," she said, "is the advantage of having a detective agency on the same floor of the building in which you have a law office."
    Mason nodded thoughtfully.
    "The idea is to have something of a line-up?" Della Street asked.
    "Exactly," Mason said. "You know Gertie. If I bring Adelle Hastings out into the outer office with dark glasses on and say, 'Gertie, have you ever seen this young woman before?' Gertie will pipe up and say, 'Oh, yes. That's the woman who left her purse here yesterday-Mrs. Hastings. Mr. Mason has your purse in the office, Mrs. Hastings.' "Human nature being what it is, Gertie by this time remembers only the fact that a well-shaped woman, around twenty-seven or thirty, wearing heavy dark glasses, was in the office and left a purse.
    "Now, if anything has happened, and Gertie makes that offhand identification, we might be in trouble."
    "What do you think has happened?" Della Street asked.
    "If someone has stolen Adelle Hastings' bag and fired two shots from the revolver that was in that bag, almost anything could have happened. And if, on the other hand, Adelle Hastings fired two shots from that revolver and then went to all this trouble to set the stage so that I'd be drawn into the case, you can be pretty damn certain that something has happened. She-"
    Mason broke off as there was a tapping on the door to his private office.
    Mason nodded to Della Street.
    Della Street opened the door.
    "Good morning, Mrs. Hastings," Mason said. "You must have got up early and had quite