Erle Gardner - The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe

“What were they going to testify to?” Drake asked.

Mason said, “Paul, I think they’re mixed up in that murder. They’re trying to push it over on Mrs. Breel’s shoulders.”

Drake looked at Mason’s face, apparently waiting for some sign or signal. Mason, in pantomime, indicated that Drake was to speak, but the detective seemed slightly uncertain as to what it was Mason wanted him to say.

Della Street, reading Mason’s signals, interposed to ask, “What are you going to do about it, Chief?”

Mason flashed her a grateful grin, and by his manner indicated she had interpreted his pantomime correctly. “There’s only one thing for me to do,” he said. “If they’re going to try and convict Sarah Breel on perjured evidence, I’ll have to resort to every technicality I can to free her... or else I’ll have to...”

Again Mason made signals. Drake asked tentatively, “Just where will that leave your client, Mason?”

“I don’t know,” Mason admitted. “It might be better for her to plead guilty, or put in a plea of self-defense. I don’t know. All in all, it’s a hell of a responsibility, representing a client who can’t tell you anything about what happened and whether she’s guilty or innocent. Good Lord, for all I know, she may be guilty. I think I’ll go talk with her and sound her out about how she feels about pleading guilty. I may be able to get the charge reduced to second-degree murder under the circumstances.”

Della Street interposed quickly, “I take it you don’t want the officers to have any idea of what you are planning.”

“Good Lord, no!” Mason said. “I’d let them think I was getting ready to fight the case, then I’d start trading with them at the last minute. I’d walk right up to trial just as though I intended to fight all the way through. I don’t dare to make any overtures now. They’d construe it as a sign of weakness and refuse to give me any sort of a break... The more I think of it, the more I think I’ll go down and see Mrs. Breel right now. You folks hold the fort, Della,” and Mason, clapping on his hat, shot out of the office, banging the door violently behind him.

When he had left, Della Street said to Paul Drake, “Well, I guess that’s all, Mr. Drake. I think if Mr. Mason had wanted you to do anything else, he’d have told you so.”

Drake said, “You take it then, Della, that we’re to do nothing?”

“Nothing except what the Chief has specifically instructed.”

“O.K.,” Drake said, “we’ll let it go at that.” And, with a last apprehensive glance at the dictaphone, he eased himself out into the corridor.

Perry Mason entered the hospital room to find Sarah Breel propped up in bed. “Hello,” Mason said cheerfully. “How’s everything coming?”

“As well as can be expected, I guess,” she said with a cheerful smile.

Mason’s voice was sympathetic. “I’m minded of the old adage,” he said, “that it never rains but it pours. You find yourself with concussion of the brain, a broken leg, a charge of murder hanging over your head, and, on top of that, comes the news of your brother’s death.”

She said philosophically, “Well, I can either grin and bear it, or bear it without grinning. As far as the murder case is concerned, it’s up to you to do the best you can to get me out of it. As far as George is concerned, there’s nothing anyone can do. I hope they bring his murderer to justice. Naturally, it’s a shock to me. I was fond of him. I’m going to miss him a lot as time goes on, but a person doesn’t live to be as old as I am without having had plenty of experience with death, Mr. Mason.”

“I try to look at life and death from a broad-minded viewpoint. If you’re going to have births, you must have deaths. Life is a stream death is a part of the scheme of things and it’s a necessary part. If babies kept being born, and no one died, the world would become completely overcrowded. If babies weren’t born and no one died, it would be a pretty sorry, disillusioned world with no youth and gaiety, no romance, no honeymoons, and no children’s laughter. I’m sorry George had to die, but as far as he’s concerned, he’s dead. As far as I’m concerned, I miss him but when I grieve about missing him, it isn’t being sorry for him , it’s being sorry for me . It’s hard to explain, Mr. Mason. It may seem cold-blooded to you. It really isn’t. I have a great deal of love and a great deal of affection for George. He’s dead. We all have to go sometime.”

Mason drew up a chair by the side of the bed and said, “All right, let’s talk about you for a while.”

“What about me?” she asked.

“About the case against you.”

“And what about the case?”

Mason said, “In some ways it doesn’t look so good.”

Sarah Breel said, “I’m sorry, Mr. Mason, but I can’t help you. I haven’t the faintest recollection of what happened after noon on the day Austin Cullens was murdered... Don’t you want a cigarette, Mr. Mason? I know you smoke, and I don’t mind... No, thank you, I won’t have one with you. Just light up and smoke. Go ahead, tell me what you have to say. Don’t try to break the news gently.”

Mason said, “The unfortunate part about not remembering what happened is that you’re not in a position to deny anything which anyone says happened.”

“Just what do you mean by that, Mr. Mason?”

Mason said, “So far, the evidence against you has been circumstantial. Now just suppose, for the sake of argument, that someone showed up who claimed he actually saw you in Cullens’ house and saw you fire the fatal shot. There’s nothing you could do about it. You couldn’t deny it.”

Her eyelids leveled as she stared steadily at him. “Who says that?” she asked.

“No one,” Mason said, and then, after a significant pause, added, “yet.”

“What do they say?”

Mason said, “A man by the name of Golding and a woman, who is living with him as his wife, had their car parked out in front of Cullens’ house the night of the murder. They heard two shots. They saw someone come running out of the front door, pushing something down into a handbag. That something may have been a gun.”

“Then what did they do?” she asked.

“They drove away,” Mason said, and then added, “as soon as they recognized the person who was coming toward their car.”

“Who was that person?”

Mason, looking her squarely in the eyes, said, “You.”

She was silent for several thoughtful seconds. Then when she spoke, her voice indicated only an impersonal interest as though they had been discussing some academic problem. “How soon was it after the shots were fired, before they saw this figure come out on the porch?”

“Almost immediately.”

“And they’re certain it was me?”

“That’s what they say.”

“Do you think you can shake their story on cross-examination, Mr. Mason?”

“I don’t know,” Mason said. “I can’t tell whether they’re making it up out of whole cloth. There’s some possibility that they want to put me in a spot. They know, of course, that you have told the officers you can’t remember anything which happened, that your mind is a blank as to the things which took place after noon on the day of the murder. Those two are plenty smart. They’re shrewd opportunists who have gone through life taking advantage of every break which had been offered. Naturally, they’re smart enough to realize that if you can’t remember anything about what happened on that day, you can’t deny anything.”

She thought for a moment and then said, “That makes it rather tough, doesn’t it?” Mason nodded.