Erle Gardner - The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe

“And you did do what is generally known as shoplifting?”

“Yes. You see, my brother had gone on one of his periodical toots. I was worried about him. Sunday I went to the office to check on the contents of the vault. I couldn’t find the diamonds which had been given to my brother Saturday morning by Austin Cullens. It occurred to me that my brother must have taken them with him. Cullens knows all about George’s periodical sprees. He’s absolutely the only one who does — aside from my niece and myself. I was afraid Mr. Cullens might want his stones before George sobered up. I was afraid it might make something of a scandal, so I decided to cover up for George. I thought I could pretend I’d developed a kleptomania. Looking back on it, it seems very foolish now, but at the time it seemed the only thing to do, the only way I could stall things along until I could find George and sober him up.”

“So you deliberately planned to get caught stealing...?”

“Not exactly,” she said. “Somewhere, I’d read that a person couldn’t be charged with shoplifting until they’d removed the things from the store. However, if it hadn’t been for Mr. Mason...”

Sergeant Holcomb interrupted. “All right, now I’m going to tell you something else. Your brother was found...”

Dr. Gifford came charging forward. “No, you don’t!” he shouted. “I warned you my patient was to be spared that nerve shock. You agreed to this interview on that understanding. You can’t...”

“I can do anything I damn please,” Holcomb said. “You aren’t in charge here. I’m in charge here.”

“You may not think I’m in charge here,” Dr. Gifford said, “but this woman is under my care. I stretched a point in letting you question her at this time. You’re not going to inflict any shock on her. That was definitely understood before the interview commenced.”

“Well, as it happens,” Holcomb said, “I’ve changed my mind. I may not know a lot about medicine, but I think this woman is in full possession of her faculties right now and...”

Dr. Gifford nodded to the red-headed nurse. She produced a package from under her arm. Dr. Gifford said. “Just a moment,” and stepped forward. “Let me see your left arm, please, Mrs. Breel,” he said.

She extended her left arm. Dr. Gifford made a quick jabbing motion with his right hand. Sergeant Holcomb pushed forward and said suspiciously, “Say, what are you doing?”

Dr. Gifford stood so that his body shielded his hand and Mrs. Breel’s arm from Sergeant Holcomb’s eyes. Then he stepped away and motioned to the nurse. She handed him a piece of cotton. Dr. Gifford placed the piece of cotton to the neck of an alcohol bottle and swabbed off a place on Mrs. Breel’s arm. He turned to the court reporter and said, “You might make a note at this time that I have just given Mrs. Breel a powerful narcotic and sedative, administered hypodermically. While I don’t ordinarily consider such treatment indicated in a case of this nature, I consider that it is infinitely preferable for the patient than being subjected to further nerve shock.”

Sergeant Holcomb said, “I don’t give a damn what you’ve given her. I’m going to go ahead with this thing...”

“Go right ahead,” Dr. Gifford advised. “The patient is now beginning to feel the influence of the narcotic. As a physician, I would say that any answer to any question she might make from now on will be completely unreliable.”

Mrs. Breel sighed, settled back on the bed, and closed her eyes. There was the faint trace of a smile visible at the corners of her mouth. Sergeant Holcomb yelled, “She’s shamming. That’s a damn fake. That hypodermic couldn’t have taken effect this soon.”

“I take it,” Dr. Gifford said, “that you consider your knowledge of medicine superior to mine.”

Sergeant Holcomb lost his temper. His face darkened as he shouted, “Well, I know what I think. I think she’s shamming. I think this whole thing is a stall. Now then, I’m going to tell her about her brother. Mrs. Breel, you can play possum all you want to, but your brother was found ...”

Sampson lunged for Holcomb, clapped his hand over Holcomb’s lips. “Shut up, you fool. I’m in charge of this.”

Holcomb jumped back with his fist doubled, then squared away to face Sampson belligerently. “All right,” he said, “you asked for it. You...”

“Shut up!” Sampson said. “Can’t you see that you’d be playing right into their hands?”

Sergeant Holcomb said, “I’ll show you,” and swung.

Sampson jumped back. Gifford said, “Gentlemen, I’m going to order hospital attendants to clear this room. This is a disgraceful scene, and it’s having a most harmful effect on my patient.”

Sampson said, “Don’t be a damn fool, Holcomb. Can’t you see that if you...”

Holcomb, still facing Sampson with his fists doubled, said, “Stand up and fight, you little rat! You can be taken in by all this flim-flam, but I’m not being taken in by it.” Still holding his fists doubled, and keeping Sampson away from him, he turned around to face the bed. “All right, Mrs. Breel,” he said, “let’s see how you take this... Your brother’s body was found in his office. He’d been shot by a thirty-eight caliber revolver and the body jammed in a packing case.”

Mrs. Breel might not have heard him. With her eyes closed, her face utterly without expression, she breathed steadily and deeply, as though sleeping. Sampson said sarcastically, “All right, flat-foot, now you’ve done it! You’ve played the one trump card we had at a time when she was under the influence of a narcotic.”

“She’s no more under the influence of a narcotic than I am,” Sergeant Holcomb said, but his voice somehow lacked conviction.

“No?” Sampson said. “Well, you’ll never be able to surprise her with that bit of information now. You’ve put your cards on the table. She’ll sleep that hypodermic off and decide how she wants to play her cards after she wakes up.”

Mason said, “Now that there’s a lull in the furious recriminations, I want the court reporter to be quite certain that he has noted the time at which Dr. Gifford gave the patient the hypodermic. I want him to note that, notwithstanding the nervous condition of the patient, the deputy district attorney and the sergeant of the homicide squad engaged in a fist fight, across the foot of the bed...”

“There wasn’t any fist fight,” Sampson said. “Don’t be a fool, Mason.”

“I considered it a fist fight,” Mason observed.

“Well, I didn’t,” Sampson said. “I didn’t even make a pass at Holcomb. I kept out of his way.”

“Holcomb certainly made a swing at you ,” Mason said.

“Well, that’s neither here nor there,” Sampson remarked.

Mason grinned his fighting grin. “It may not be here, but it’s either in that shorthand record or I’m going to find out why it isn’t.”

The court reporter nodded wearily and said, “It’s in.”

“Thank you,” Mason said.

There was a moment of silence. Mrs. Breel, on the bed, gave a peculiar gurgling sound which might have been a snore. Sergeant Holcomb asserted once more, “No hypodermic in the world ever took effect that quick.”

“Did you,” Mason asked, “note the exact time when Dr. Gifford administered the hypodermic?”

“No,” Holcomb said, “but it was less than two minutes ago.”

Mason said, “Time passes very rapidly, Sergeant, when you’re engaged in fisticuffs with a deputy district attorney in the room of a patient whose physicial condition is so grave that the doctor has warned you not to subject her to any undue shock.”