Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Curious Bride

"Crying?" Mason asked.

Della Street nodded. "Her eyes are red and tears are streaming down her face. She can't stop them. She's crying so badly she can hardly see."

Mason frowned, jerked his head toward the corridor door.

Drake slid over the arm of the chair, got to his feet and said, "Be seeing you later, Perry."

When the door closed on the detective, Mason nodded to Della Street. "Show her in," he said.

Della Street opened the door, said, "Come in, Miss Strickland," then stood to one side so the lawyer could see the sobbing woman grope toward the doorway. Della Street piloted her into the office, guided her to a chair.

"What is it?" asked Perry Mason. The nurse tried to speak, but failed, holding a handkerchief to her nose. Perry Mason glanced at Della Street, who slipped unobtrusively from the office. "What's happened?" Mason inquired. "You can talk frankly to me. We're alone."

"You put Doctor Millsap on the spot," she sobbed.

"What happened to him?" Mason asked.

"He was kidnapped."

"Kidnapped?"

"Yes."

"Tell me about it," the lawyer said, his eyes wary and watchful.

"We had been working late at the office last night," she said, "almost until midnight. He was going to drive me home. We were driving along in the car when another car crowded us in to the curb. There were two men in it. I'd never seen either one of them before. They had guns. They told Doctor Millsap to get in the car with them and then they drove off."

"What kind of a car?" Mason asked.

"A Buick sedan."

"Did you get the license number?"

"No."

"What color was it?"

"Black."

"Did the men say anything to you?"

"No."

"Had they made any demands on you?"

"No."

"Did you report the affair to the police?"

"Yes."

"What happened?"

"The police came out and talked with me and went out to the place where our car had been stopped. They looked around but couldn't find anything. Then they made a report to headquarters, and then, apparently, the district attorney thought you had done it."

"Thought I had done what?" Mason asked.

"Grabbed Doctor Millsap so that he couldn't testify against your client at the trial."

"Was he going to testify against her?"

"I don't know anything about it. All I know is what the district attorney thought."

"How do you know what he thought?"

"Because of the questions he asked me."

"You were frightened?" asked Perry Mason.

"Yes, of course."

"What kind of a gun did the men have?"

"Automatics. Big black automatics."

Perry Mason got up from the desk, walked to the doors, made certain that they were closed, started pacing the office. "Look here," he said slowly, "Doctor Millsap didn't want to testify."

"Didn't he?"

"You know he didn't."

"Do I?"

"I think you do."

"Well, that's got nothing to do with his being kidnapped, has it?"

"I don't know," Perry Mason said thoughtfully. "I told him to take a sea trip for his health."

"But he couldn't. The district attorney served some papers on him."

Mason nodded. He strode up and down the office, watching the girl's quivering shoulders. Abruptly, he reached forward and snatched the handkerchief out of her hand. He raised it to his nostrils, took a deep inhalation.

She jumped to her feet, grabbed at his hand, missed it, clutched his arm, groped along the arm until she found his hand and tugged at the handkerchief. Mason held to the tearsodden bit of linen. She got one corner of it and tugged frantically. There was the sound of tearing cloth, and then a corner of the handkerchief ripped loose in her hands. Mason retained the biggest portion of the handkerchief.

The lawyer brushed the back of his hand across his eyes and laughed grimly. There were tears in his own eyes, tears that commenced to trickle down his cheeks. "So that's it, is it?" he said. "You dropped a little teargas into your handkerchief before you came into my office."

She said nothing. "Did you," Mason asked, staring at her with tearstreaked eyes, "drop some teargas in your handkerchief when you talked with the police?"

"I didn't have to then," she said, her voice catching in a sob, "they fffrightened me so that I didn't have to."

"Did the police fall for this story?" Mason inquired.

"I think so, because they thought the men might have been detectives you'd employed. They're tracing all of the Buick cars in the city to see if any of them are owned by detectives who might be working for Paul Drake."

Mason stood staring at her. "Damn this teargas," he said; "it blurs my eyes."

"I got an awful dose of it," she confided.

"Was there any automobile?" he asked.

"What do you mean?"

"Did any two men crowd you in to the curb in an automobile the way you said?"

"No. Doctor Millsap just went away. He wanted you to know that he wouldn't be a witness at the trial."

"If anything important develops," said Perry Mason, slowly, "could you reach him?"

"If anything important develops, you could telephone me," she said, "but be sure you talk plainly so I can recognize your voice, because otherwise I wouldn't believe it was you."

Perry Mason laughed, groped for a button on his desk and pressed it. Della slipped through the doorway from the outer office. "Della," said Perry Mason, "guide Mabel Strickland down to a taxicab."

Della Street gave a gasp. "My heavens, chief," she said, "you're crying!!!"

Perry Mason laughed. "It's contagious," he told her.

Judge Markham, veteran of a thousand major criminal trials, sat in austere dignity behind the elaborately carved mahogany "bench." He stared down at the crowded courtroom, surveyed the patient, masklike countenance of Perry Mason, looked over the alert, quivering eagerness of John C. Lucas, the trial deputy who had been selected to represent the rights of the people.

"The case of the People versus Rhoda Montaine," he said.

"Ready for the prosecution," Lucas snapped.

"And for the defendant."

Rhoda Montaine sat by a deputy sheriff. She was clad entirely in dark brown, relieved only by a white trimming at her throat and sleeves. The strain had told upon her, and her manner was nervous, her eyes were swift and darting as they shifted rapidly about the courtroom, but there was something in the tilt of her head, something in the set of her lips that proclaimed to even the most casual observer that, regardless of the strain, she would retain her poise and selfpossession, even should the verdict of the jury be "murder in the first degree."

John Lucas glanced at the defendant and frowned. This was a dangerous attitude for any attorney to encourage in a woman who was accused of murder, far better to coach her to take advantage of all the prerogatives of her sex—to be feminine and weak; to apparently be on the verge of hysteria. A stern, capable woman might well commit murder; a feminine, delicate woman whose nerves were quivering from contact with a courtroom would be less likely to kill in cold blood.

The droning voice of the clerk called men to the jury box.

Lucas arose, made a brief statement of the nature of the case, looked up to Judge Markham.

"Under the law," said Judge Markham, "the Court is required to ask a few preliminary questions of the prospective jurors, touching their qualifications to act as jurors. Those questions may be supplemented by other questions from counsel." He turned to the jury and went through a ritual which was, so far as the selection of the jury was concerned, virtually without meaning.

He asked the jurors, in a tone of voice which indicated he was merely performing a meaningless chore, whether they had formed or expressed any opinion concerning the merits of the case; whether, if so, such an opinion would require evidence to remove, or whether, if they were selected as jurors, such opinion could be set aside and they could embark upon the trial of the case with a fair and open mind. As was to be expected, such questions brought out no disqualifications. The jurors, listening to the droning monotone of the judicial monologue, nodded their heads in silent acquiescence from time to time.