Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Curious Bride

"That would tie in with the testimony of the witnesses who lived in the other apartment house, and by the time Rhoda Montaine got on the witness stand and tried to swear that she was the one who was ringing the bell while the murder was being committed, the jury would put her down for a liar. Then the district attorney would start dangling that garage key in front of the jury, and Rhoda Montaine would draw a verdict of firstdegree murder."

Drake nodded thoughtfully. "But," he said, "what's the idea of keeping those people on the run?"

"Sooner or later," Mason said, "the district attorney is going to realize the really vital point in this case. Some one was standing in front of the street door of Moxley's apartment ringing the bell, at the very moment the murder was committed. The testimony of the prosecution's main witnesses will establish that. Now, whoever that person was, he or she must be innocent of the murder, because, obviously, a person can't ring a doorbell on a street door and, at the same time, club a man over the head in an apartment on an upper floor and in the back of the house. On the other hand, the person who was ringing that doorbell isn't going to be anxious to come forward and admit being in the vicinity of the murder at the time it was committed, but when he is once run to earth by the district attorney, he's going to tell his story eagerly enough. Therefore, we have two people who are going to fight over that doorbell. One of them will be the person who actually was standing in front of the door, ringing the doorbell, and the other person will be the one who was murdering Moxley at the time the doorbell was ringing. Both of these people will insist that they were the ones who rang the doorbell.

"Rhoda Montaine has been the first one to advance her claim. It is weakened very materially by the presence of her garage keys in Moxley's apartment, but the jury may believe her, just the same. If, however, the district attorney can find some one who will go on the stand and swear positively that he was the one who was ringing the doorbell, it is going to weaken Rhoda Montaine's case."

Drake nodded. "If," Mason went on, "the district attorney gets hold of Pender, and Pender tells him his story, the district attorney will make him a star witness for the prosecution. I'll have to crossexamine him and try to prove to the jury that he is the murderer instead of the one who was really ringing the doorbell. Obviously, if I'm forced to crossexamine this man along the usual lines of simply trying to prove he's lying, I'm not going to get very far. The district attorney will have coached him and coached him carefully. But, if I can crossexamine him by proving to the jury that he fled over the country, using different aliases, leaving places in the dead of night, slinking about the country from city to city as a common criminal, I can brand his testimony as a lie. Now, that's what I'm doing with Oscar Pender, and, incidentally, with his sister. I'm giving them an opportunity to impeach themselves before a jury. The more places that they go to and leave hurriedly, the more different names they take, the more attempts they make to disguise themselves and to conceal themselves, the more the jury is going to believe that they are the guilty ones. That's more particularly true because Pender will probably forget some of the places he went to and some of the names he used. If I can produce hotel registers to impeach his testimony, I can rip him wide open."

"Then," Drake said, "you intend to let the district attorney discover Oscar Pender eventually."

"At the proper moment," Perry Mason said, "I may let the district attorney get hold of Oscar Pender, but I want to have it in my power to produce him, or not to produce him, just as I see fit."

Drake nodded his head, said slowly, "You say there will be two people who will claim to have been on the scene of the murder, ringing that doorbell. One of them will be the murderer. The other one will be the one who was actually ringing the doorbell. We now have found these two people. One of them is Oscar Pender; the other one is Rhoda Montaine. Therefore, one of these people must be guilty of the murder."

A slow smile twisted Perry Mason's countenance. "Excellent reasoning, Paul," he said, "only it happens that there are three people who claim to have rung that doorbell."

"Three?" the detective asked in surprise. "Who's the other one?"

"I can't tell you, Paul, I can only tell you that he's a person the district attorney knows about. So far, the district attorney hasn't been able to get any admissions from him because this man is trying to protect Rhoda. Sooner or later they'll drag his story from him. That's going to put Rhoda in an awful spot.

"The district attorney will bear down heavy on this doorbell business, and then is when I will produce Oscar Pender. Then is when I will show his guilty conduct. Then is when I will show his motive. Then is when I will mix the whole case up so badly the district attorney won't know what it's all about, and the jury will get so hopelessly confused they'll let the two men fight it out and acquit the woman."

Drake stared thoughtfully at the tip of his cigarette. He half turned and raised his eyes to the lawyer's countenance. "I've stumbled on to something else," he said.

"What?"

"Some one is looking for Pender."

"How do you know?"

"We've had men watching the place where Pender stayed and the apartment that his sister occupied, just in case some other accomplice should show up. Yesterday evening a bunch of detectives came down on the place like flies coming to a syrup jar. They swarmed all over the place and moved heaven and earth, trying to find where Pender and his sister were."

Mason's eyes showed interest. "Police detectives?" he asked.

"No, they were agency detectives, and, for some reason, they seemed anxious to keep their activities from coming to the attention of the police."

"There were lots of them, Paul?"

"I'll say. Some one certainly is spending money on the case."

Perry Mason's eyes narrowed. "C. Phillip Montaine," he said, "is a dangerous antagonist. I think he realizes something of what I have in mind. I don't know how he got on Pender's trail. Perhaps it was the same way you did, Paul."

Drake said slowly, "You think old man Montaine is working up this case independently of the district attorney's office?"

"I'm certain of it."

"Why?"

"Because he wants to keep Rhoda Montaine from being acquitted."

"Why?"

"Because, in the first place," Mason said slowly, "if she is acquitted, she'll be his son's legal wife, and I think we'll find C. Phillip Montaine has some very definite plans for his son's matrimonial future."

The detective stared incredulously at Perry Mason. "That doesn't seem a strong enough motive," he said, "to cause a man to try to get a woman convicted of murder."

Mason's lips twisted in a grin. "That, Paul, is what I thought at the time, when C. Phillip Montaine approached me with a proposition to pay me a handsome fee for representing Rhoda if I would consent to place her in a position where her defense would be materially weakened."

The detective gave a low whistle. After a moment of thoughtful silence, he said, "Perry, where do you suppose Oscar Pender really was at the time Gregory Moxley was being murdered?"

"There's just a chance," Mason said, "that he actually was standing in front of the street door, ringing the bell. That is one of the reasons why I would like to have enough ammunition in my hands when I crossexamine him to rip him wide open."

Drake's stare was steady. "You don't seem to have a great deal of faith in your client's innocence," he said.

Mason grinned, said nothing. Della Street opened the door, slipped into the room, glanced significantly at Paul Drake, and said to Perry Mason, "Mabel Strickland, Doctor Millsap's nurse, is in the outer office. She says she's got to see you at once. She's crying."