Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Sleepwalker's Niece

“Why the devil didn’t you tell Sergeant Holcomb about this before?”

“He wouldn’t let me. He was in examining the body. I tried to go in and he told me to stay out.”

Blaine said to Sergeant Holcomb, “Send a couple of men up to look under that pillow. Don’t let anyone touch that knife until we have a fingerprint man go over the handle… How long have you been here, Sergeant?”

“About ten minutes before I telephoned you,” Holcomb answered.

“And I got here in ten or fifteen minutes,” Blaine said. “That makes less than half an hour… What’s this lawyer’s name… oh, yes, Duncan, I’ll get him and take a look at that coffee table.”

Blaine walked out toward the patio. Sergeant Holcomb called two men and ran up the stairs to Kent’s bedroom. Mason followed Blaine, saw him speak to Duncan. They walked toward the center of the patio. Duncan paused uncertainly, went to one of the coffee tables, shook his head, moved over to the one under which Edna Hammer had placed the coffee cup and saucer. “This the table?” Blaine asked.

“I believe it is.”

“You said the top came up?”

“It seemed to. He raised what looked like the top and then let it drop back with a bang.”

Blaine looked the table over and said, “There seems to be an oblong receptacle under this table top… Wait a minute, here’s a catch.”

He shot the catch and raised the top of the table.

“Nothing in here,” he said, “except a cup and saucer.”

“Nevertheless, this is the place,” Duncan insisted.

Edna Hammer said very casually, “I’ll take the cup and saucer back to the kitchen.”

She reached for it, but Blaine grabbed her wrist. “Wait a minute,” he said, “we’ll find out a little more about that cup and saucer before we take it anywhere. There may be fingerprints on it.”

“But what difference does that make?” she asked.

The voice of the butler from the outskirts of the little group said, “Begging your pardon, sir, but I happen to recognize that cup and saucer… That is, at least I recognize the saucer. You see, it has a peculiar chip out of it. I knocked that chip out this morning.”

“What time this morning?”

“Shortly after five o’clock.”

“What were you doing with a saucer shortly after five o’clock?”

“Serving breakfast to Mr. Kent, Miss Lucille Mays, and Mr. Mason.”

“Then what did you do?”

“Then I brought up the Packard and Mr. Kent, Miss Mays and Mr. Mason drove off. After an hour or so, Mr. Mason returned the car.”

“You don’t know where they went?”

“No, sir, but I think they were going to get married.”

“And what have you to say about this cup and saucer?”

“This saucer, sir, went with the cup out of which Mr. Mason was drinking his coffee. I didn’t have time to replace the chipped saucer. They seemed to be in a bit of a hurry, and Mr. Kent had told me to see that breakfast was ready to serve at twenty minutes past five on the dot. He was most punctual.”

“So you drank out of this saucer, Mason?” Blaine asked.

Mason shook his head and said, “Certainly not.”

“You didn’t?”

“No,” Mason said. “I never drink out of a saucer when I’m visiting.” Blaine flushed and said, “I meant, you had the cup and saucer. If you want to be technical, you drank out of the cup.”

“That’s what the butler says,” Mason said. “Personally I wouldn’t be able to tell one cup from another. I admit that I drank out of a cup this morning.”

“Then what happened?”

“Begging your pardon, sir,” the butler said, “Mr. Mason walked out with the cup and saucer. I couldn’t find it afterwards and asked him what he’d done with it and he said he couldn’t remember; that he thought he’d set it out in the patio some place.”

“At fivetwenty this morning?”

“That would have been approximately fivethirty, or fiveforty.”

“What was he doing out in the patio at fivethirty?”

The butler shrugged his shoulders.

Blaine turned to Mason, and asked, “What were you doing out here at fivethirty?”

“I may have been out here,” Mason said slowly, “but I have no independent recollection of it.”

“Did you put that cup and saucer under the top of the table?”

“I did not.”

“Do you know who did?”

“I think,” Mason said, “you’re making a mountain out of a molehill. Here’s a saucer with a chip out of it, and you’re wasting valuable time inquiring how I happened to drink my coffee and where I was standing when I did it, when the crying need is for a solution of this murder. It isn’t a question of who drank the coffee. The question is who stuck the knife…”

“That’ll do,” Blaine interrupted, “I’m thoroughly capable of carrying on this investigation.” Mason shrugged his shoulders. “It may be well for you to remember,” Blaine said significantly, “that, according to the testimony of this disinterested witness, Mr. Peter Kent, who apparently is your client, deposited something in this receptacle at around midnight. Now then, we find that thing is gone, and in its place a cup and saucer which, concededly, had been in your possession.”

“I haven’t conceded it,” Mason replied. “It may or may not have been the cup and saucer I was using. As I mentioned, cups look alike to me, and Duncan didn’t identify the sleepwalker as Peter Kent, either.”

“It’s the saucer that has the distinctive chip out of it,” Blaine pointed out. Mason shrugged his shoulders, lit a cigarette and smiled. Blaine said, “Very well, Mr. Mason. I think we’ll take your statement in front of the Grand Jury. I know you only too well. We won’t get anywhere by trying to interrogate you when we haven’t any power to make you answer questions. You’re trying to stall things along. You’re just leading us around in a circle.”

“You mean that you’re finished with me?”

“Do you know anything more about the murder?”

“Nothing.”

“Yes, we’re finished with you. When we want you we know where to get you, and,” he added significantly, “we know how to get you with a subpoena.”

Mason bowed and said, “Good morning, everyone.”

He caught Edna Hammer’s eye and saw that she was pleading with him, trying to express some unspoken message. He moved toward her and Blaine interposed. “I said that you could be excused, Mason,” he said. “I think this inquiry will progress a lot faster and a damned sight more efficiently if we examine the witnesses before they have had the benefit of your very valuable suggestions.”

Mason smiled and bowed mockingly. “I wish you luck,” he said.

Mason found Paul Drake seated in a car parked at the curb half a block away from the Kent residence. “I tried to get in,” Drake said, “but they turned me back. I’ve got a couple of men ready to go to work on the witnesses as soon as the cops quit keeping the place sewed up. What happened?”

“Plenty,” Mason told him. “A fellow by the name of Rease was killed. He was stabbed in bed, evidently while he was asleep. The covers were up around his neck. The night was rather warm. There were only two light blankets over him. The knife was shoved down through the blankets.”

“Any motive?”

Mason lowered his voice and said, “There’s damn near a case of circumstantial evidence against Peter Kent. He’s my client.”

“Where’s he now?”

“Gone byebye.”

“You mean he’s running away?”

“No, he’s on a business trip.”

“Are you going to surrender him, Perry?”

“It depends. I want to find out first whether he’s guilty. If he is, I don’t want to handle the case. I think he was walking in his sleep. If he was, I’m going to try to get him.”