Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Counterfeit Eye

Drake shrugged his shoulders. "I'm a detective," he said, "not a mind reader. Your guess is as good as mine. Apparently Sylvia Basset figured she'd made her bed and was going to lie in it. Brunold wanted her to leave, that's a cinch. The fact that she didn't walk out right then and there shows that something was holding her. From the slant I can get on Hartley Basset's character, it may have been his threat to set aside the adoption proceedings on the ground of fraud, brand Dick as illegitimate, make a big stink generally. Or it may have been that he wouldn't give her a divorce and she wouldn't join Brunold unless she could marry him, on account of the kid."

Mason, still pacing the floor, said, "Where's Mrs. Basset now?"

"She ducked out and went to a hotel somewhere."

"See if you can find her," Mason said. "You shouldn't have any great difficulty. She's the type who would go to one of the better class hotels. There weren't a great number of unescorted women who registered at the better class hotels after midnight last night. You've got pictures of her, I presume."

"Oh, sure."

"All right, run her down."

"This other stuff going to help you?" Drake asked.

"Very much, I think," Mason told him.

A buzzer gave the signal that Della Street was wanted in the outer office. She glanced at Mason, who nodded.

"Were the eyes okay?" Paul Drake asked.

"I think they'll do the work all right, although I'm afraid we got them a little late."

"I was wondering about that when I heard about the bloodshot eye that was clutched in Hartley Basset's right hand."

Mason said cheerfully, "Oh, well, it'll all come out in the wash."

Drake uncoiled himself from the chair and moved toward the exit door.

"You don't want anything else except putting a finger on Sylvia Basset, is that right?"

"That's all for the present. And that was good work, Paul, tracing that stuff down with the limited time you had."

"There wasn't so much of it," the detective said, "except a lot of detail work. The newspaper men had pumped the servants dry. Brunold had left a wide open trail. It was a cinch to chase him down, and, in the adoption proceedings, Sylvia Basset had given the true date and location of the boy's birth. By that time, I guess, she figured it didn't matter much. It happened that I was able to locate the doctor, and the doctor put me in touch with the nurse. The nurse remembered that there had been a pile of love letters, tied with the conventional ribbon, in the girl's suitcase. They'd been addressed to Sylvia Berkley, and she'd read of the disappearance of Sylvia Berkley in the newspapers."

"And kept her mouth shut?" Mason inquired.

The detective nodded. "Nurses," he said, "see quite a few of those cases. They don't see as many of them now as they did twenty years ago."

"Has she ever got in touch with her folks?" Mason asked.

"I don't know. I haven't been able to find that out."

"Are her folks living?"

"I'll have the dope on that this afternoon. I didn't know just how much attention you wanted to attract, so I'm making my inquiries about them in rather a roundabout manner."

"Good work, Paul," the lawyer said.

The door from the outer office opened and Della Street walked through, closing the door carefully behind her. She went to Perry Mason's desk and stood waiting.

The detective said, "Okay, Perry, I'll get that stuff for you early this afternoon. If I get the party located in one of the hotels, I'll give you a ring. I should be able to cover the principal ones within the next half hour."

He opened the door and took the precaution of thrusting out his head and looking up and down the corridor before he stepped out into the hallway, letting the door click shut behind him.

Perry Mason turned to Della Street.

"Well?" he asked.

"You've got to help them," she said.

"You mean Brunold and Mrs. Basset?"

"Yes."

"We don't know the facts yet."

"You mean about the murder?"

"Yes."

"Apparently," Della Street said slowly, "she's never had the breaks. The cards in life have been stacked against her. Why not give her a break now?"

"Perhaps I will," Mason said slowly, and then added. "if she'll let me."

Della Street motioned toward the outer office.

"The McLanes are out there," she said.

"Harry and his sister?"

"Yes."

Mason nodded his head. "Show them in, Della."

Bertha McLane started talking before Perry Mason had said more than a courteous "Good morning."

"We read about it in the papers. Is it going to make any difference?"

"It will make this much difference," Mason said slowly; "the estate will be handled by an administrator or an executor. If Sylvia Basset handles the estate, she'll be friendly. If some other person handles it, the probabilities are there will be trouble. We can't square it now. If there should be a will contest, or something, and a temporary executor should discover the shortage…"

Her eyes had grown wider as he talked. Now she interrupted him, saying, "Good heavens, don't you know what happened?"

Perry Mason stopped talking and stared steadily at her.

"What happened?" he asked, his voice and manner wary.

She turned to the boy.

"Tell him, Harry."

Harry McLane said, "I paid him off."

Mason stared thoughtfully at the boy.

"Did what?"

"Paid him off."

"Paid who off?"

"Hartley Basset."

"How much?"

"Every damned cent—three thousand nine hundred and fortytwo dollars and sixtythree cents."

"Did you," asked Perry Mason, "get a receipt?"

"I didn't need a receipt. I got back the forged notes. That was all the receipt I needed."

"When did you pay him off?"

"Last night."

"At exactly what time?"

"I don't know. It was around eleven o'clock, I guess, or perhaps a little later."

Mason tried to hold the boy's eyes, but McLane looked toward his sister, then out of the window.

"It's all okay now," he said. "We just thought we'd let you know. Come on, Sis, I guess there's nothing else we can do here."

"Wait a minute," Mason said. "Look at me."

Young McLane turned his eyes to the lawyer.

"Now keep looking at me," Mason said. "Don't move your eyes from mine. Now tell me. You read the newspapers this morning."

"Yes, that's why we came here—to find out if it would make any difference."

"Just how long," the lawyer asked slowly, "before Hartley Basset was murdered did you pay that money to him?"

"I don't know, because I don't know when he was murdered."

"Suppose that he was murdered at around midnight?"

"I must have paid it to him a little while before he was murdered, then… Maybe someone stole the money from him."

"You paid him in cash?"

"Cold, hard cash."

"Where did you get the money?"

"That's my business."

"Did you win it gambling?"

"What do you care where I got it? It isn't important."

"It may," Mason told him, "be very important. Do you realize that… But never mind. Let me ask you a few questions first. Hartley Basset gave you back the forged notes?"

"Yes."

"These forged notes were the only things that he held against you in the line of evidence, is that right?"

"Yes."

"Now, where did he get those forged notes from? In other words, where were they?… No, young man, don't look away. Keep your eyes right on mine… Where did Hartley Basset get those forged notes?"

"From a locked note file that he had on his desk."

"Where was the key to that file?"

"On his key ring, of course."

"Do you realize," Mason asked, "that when Basset's body was found and searched there wasn't more than twentyfive dollars in actual currency in his pockets and that the police haven't discovered any large sum of money either in the safe or in the room where he was murdered?"