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retained to try and bring Patton to justice. I went out to Patton's apartment, when I found out his address from the detective who had been talking with Thelma Bell. I saw you, Marjorie, leaving the apartment."
    The two young women exchanged swift glances.
    Marjorie Clune took a deep breath, turned to stare steadily at Perry Mason.
    "What," she asked, "did you find in Frank Patton's apartment, Mr. Mason?"
    "What," asked Perry Mason, "did you leave there, Marjorie?"
    "I couldn't get in," she said.
    Perry Mason shook his head wordlessly in chiding negation.
    "I couldn't!" she flared. "I went up to his apartment and pressed the buzzer. There wasn't any answer. I came back down."
    "Did you try the door?" asked Perry Mason.
    "No," she said.
    "When you left the apartment," he said, "there was -"
    "I tell you I wasn't in the apartment!"
    "We'll let it go at that," he told her. "When you left the apartment house there was a woman bringing an officer to the apartment. She'd heard quite a bit of commotion in the apartment. She'd heard a girl screaming something about her legs being lucky, and having hysterics. Then she'd heard the sound of something falling, a heavy fall that had jarred the pictures on the wall."
    Perry Mason stopped and stared steadily at Marjorie Clune.
    "Well?" she asked, and her voice contained just the right amount of polite disinterest.
    "Well," said Perry Mason, "what I want to know is whether you met that cop as you walked along."
    "Why?"
    "Because," he said, "you looked guilty. When you looked at me and saw I was looking at you, you turned your head the other way and acted as though you were afraid I was going to nab you and charge you with the theft of a thousand dollars."
    Perry Mason watched her with his eyes slitted in shrewd contemplation.
    The girl bit her lip.
    "Yes," she said slowly, "I saw the officer."
    "How far from the Holliday Apartments?"
    "Quite a way; perhaps two or three blocks."
    "You were walking?"
    "Yes, I was walking. I wanted to…"
    She broke off.
    "Wanted to what?" asked Perry Mason.
    "Wanted to walk," she said.
    "Go ahead," he told her.
    "That's all there was to it."
    "You saw the officer. What happened?"
    "Nothing."
    "Did he look at you?"
    "Yes."
    "What did you do? Did you walk rapidly?"
    "No," she said.
    "Think again," Perry Mason told her. "You were almost running when I saw you. You were walking as though you were trying to win a walking race. Now, are you sure you didn't do that when the officer saw you?"
    "Yes."
    "What makes you so sure?"
    "I wasn't walking at all."
    "Oh, you stopped then?"
    "Yes."
    Perry Mason stared steadily at her and then said slowly and not unkindly, "You mean that when you suddenly saw the officer you turned faint. You stopped, perhaps put your hand to your throat, or something of that sort. Then you turned to look into a store window. Is that it?"
    She nodded her head.
    Thelma Bell slipped an arm around Marjorie Clune's shoulder.
    "Lay off the kid," she said.
    "What I'm doing," Perry Mason told Thelma Bell, "is for her own good. You understand that, Marjorie. You must understand that. I'm your friend. I'm here to represent you. There's a possibility that the officers may come here even before I've finished talking with you. Therefore, it's important to know just exactly what happened, and to have you tell me the truth."
    "I am telling you the truth."
    "You're telling the truth about not getting into that apartment?"
    "Of course. I went to the apartment and couldn't get in."
    "Did you hear any one moving around in there? Did you hear any one screaming? Any one having hysterics? Any one making reference to lucky legs?"
    "No," she said.
    "Then you came back down the elevator and out to the sidewalk?"
    "Yes."
    "And you're positive you didn't get in that apartment?"
    "Positive."
    Perry Mason sighed and turned to Thelma Bell.
    "How about you, Thelma?" he said.
    She raised her eyebrows.
    "Me?" she asked in a tone of polite surprise.
    "Sure, you," Perry Mason said,