Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Counterfeit Eye

Perry Mason turned to Della Street.

"Have you got it all down—the questions and answers, Della?" he asked.

She looked up and nodded.

Brunold rushed toward Della Street.

"For God's sake! Has everything I've said been taken down? You can't do that. I'll…"

Perry Mason's hands clapped down on the man's shoulder.

"You'll do what?" he asked ominously.

Brunold turned to regard him.

"You try any rough stuff with that young lady," Mason said grimly; "and you'll go out of here so fast and so hard you'll skid all the way down the corridor. Now, sit down and cut out all this beating around the bush and tell me the truth."

"Why should I tell you anything?"

"Because before you get done, you're going to want someone to help you. You've got a chance to tell me the truth now. You may not have later on. You may be inside, looking out."

"They've got nothing on me."

"You think they haven't."

"No one except you knows I was out there tonight."

"Mrs. Basset knows it."

"Of course, but she isn't a fool."

"Colemar," Mason said, "saw someone running away from the house. He knows who it was. He won't tell me. Was it you?"

Brunold's jaw sagged. "Recognized him?" he said.

"That's what Colemar claims."

"But he couldn't. He was too far away, and I…"

"Then it was you Colemar saw."

"Yes, but I didn't think Colemar could see me. He was across the street. I'd swear I saw him first. I kept my head turned away so he couldn't recognize me."

"What were you running for?"

"I was in a hurry."

"Why?"

"Because I knew Sylvia—Mrs. Basset—had telephoned for you. I didn't want to be anywhere around when you came."

"Look here," Mason said; "could you stand up to a rigid questioning and crossquestioning by the police?"

"Of course, I could."

"You didn't stand up under my questioning very well."

"The police aren't going to question me."

"Why?"

"Because they don't have any idea I'm connected with the Bassets in any way."

"Someone coming," Della Street said.

Shadows hulked on the frosted glass of the door. The knob twisted, the door pushed open. Sergeant Holcomb and two of his men stood on the threshold. They looked over the occupants of the office with wary, watchful eyes. Sergeant Holcomb stepped forward.

"Peter Brunold?" he asked.

Brunold nodded and said belligerently, "What's it to you?"

Sergeant Holcomb grabbed Brunold's shoulder, at the same time flipping back the lapel of his coat, showing his gold badge.

"Nothing," he said, "except that I'm arresting you for the murder of Hartley Basset, and I'm warning you that anything you say may be used against you."

He turned to Perry Mason with a supercilious smile.

"So sorry to interrupt your conference, Mason," he said, "but people have rather a nasty way of disappearing after they've talked with you, and I wanted to get Mr. Brunold before he decided a change of climate would be good for his health."

Perry Mason ground his cigarette end in the ash tray.

"Don't mention it," he said. "Come back again sometime, Sergeant."

Sergeant Holcomb said ominously, "If the district attorney feels the same way I do about what happened to that witness, I will come back. And when I leave here, I won't leave alone."

Perry Mason's manner was urbane.

"Glad to see you any time, Sergeant."

Brunold turned toward Perry Mason, and said, "Look here, Counselor, you've got to…"

Holcomb nodded to the two men. They jerked Brunold to the door.

"Oh, no, you don't," Holcomb said. "You've had your little chat."

"You can't keep me from talking with a lawyer!" Brunold bellowed.

"Oh, no," Sergeant Holcomb said; "after you've been booked and placed in jail, you've got a right to call for a lawyer—but a lot's going to happen between now and then."

The men pushed Brunold through the door. He hung back and tried to struggle. Handcuffs flashed. Metal clicked. Brunold was jerked forward. "You asked for it," one of the men said.

The door hanged shut.

Sergeant Holcomb, left behind, glowered at Perry Mason.

Mason yawned, and covered the yawn with four polite fingers.

"Pardon me, Sergeant," he said, "if I seem to yawn. I've had rather a strenuous day."

Holcomb turned, jerked open the door, paused in the doorway, and said, "For one whose methods are so damned cunning, you get rotten results."

He slammed the door.

Mason grinned at Della Street cheerfully.

"How about looking in on one of the late night clubs before you go home?"

She glanced down at herself and said, "If I took this fur coat off I'd be arrested. Remember, you told me to dress in a hurry. This coat covers a multitude of sins."

"Then you're going home," Mason said firmly. "At least one of us should keep out of jail."

Her eyes were worried.

"Chief, you don't mean he's going to get you?"

He shrugged his shoulders, bowed, and held the door open for her.

"One never knows," he said, "just what Sergeant Holcomb will do. He's so blunderingly ubiquitous."

Perry Mason, freshly shaved, paused at Della Street 's desk to smile down at her.

"Feeling all right after your late hours?" he asked.

"Like a million," she said. "I see the papers play up Hartley Basset's murder, but say nothing about Brunold."

"The newspaper boys don't know anything about Brunold," he told her.

"Why?"

"Because Holcomb didn't take him down to headquarters. Brunold was taken to some outlying precinct where they could sweat him."

"Wasn't there anything you could do about that?"

"I might have got a habeas corpus, but I didn't want to show my hand—yet. I don't know the facts. Brunold may be better in than out. The police would have all they wanted out of him before I could have had the writ issued."

"How about Mrs. Basset?"

"I telephoned her as soon as I got to my apartment."

"Talk with her?"

"No. She staged hysterics after I left. Holcomb couldn't get anywhere with her. The son called a doctor and then he pulled a fast one. He said he was taking her to a hospital, but she didn't show up at any of the hospitals. The boy won't tell where she is. He says he'll produce her whenever it's necessary."

"He wouldn't even tell you where she was?"

"No."

"How did it happen Holcomb let him get away with that?"

"Holcomb came rushing up to get Brunold. That left young Basset his chance. He took it. But it's a cinch the dicks were watching the place. They know where she is. They may not be letting young Basset know it, but they do."

"Then," she said, "all Dick Basset did was to fix it so you couldn't reach his mother, but the police could. Is that it?"

"That's about the size of it."

"Then Mrs. Basset doesn't know about Brunold's arrest?"

"Probably not."

"When will she find it out?"

"When she comes down to earth and acts human. I told young Basset to have his mother get in touch with me at the earliest moment; that it was a matter of the gravest importance."

"And she hasn't telephoned?"

"No."

"But couldn't you have found her?"

"What's the use? It's a cinch the police have her under surveillance. If I had gone trying to force my way into the case, they'd have had me in a tough spot, and I may not be in any too good a spot as it is."

"Why?"

"My fingerprints may be on that murder gun."

She made little designs on the corner of her shorthand notebook with a sharp pencil.

"This is the most peculiar murder case you ever got mixed up in," she said. "We haven't any clients in this murder case yet—that is, we haven't any retainer except Brunold's."

He nodded slowly and said, "I wish I had known where I could have reached Bertha McLane last night. She didn't leave us any address, did she?"