Erle Gardner: The Case of the Moth-Eaten Mink

It was quite obvious that his hand was shaking.

“You say you never forget a face you have once seen,” Mason said, “and therefore you are a valuable asset to the Keymont Hotel. Have you ever seen the face of the man in the photograph?”

“If the Court please,” Hamilton Burger said, “this isn’t proper cross-examination. If Counsel wants to make this man his own witness he...”

“He certainly has a right to test the memory of the witness,” Judge Lennox said. “Any witness who makes the unusual statement that he never forgets a face he has once seen is testifying that he has a memory which is far better than average. Therefore, under the circumstances, Counsel is entitled to test that memory. The witness will answer the question.”

“I can’t...”

“Careful,” Mason cautioned sternly. “Remember you’re under oath.”

The witness once more held up the photograph. This time the trembling of his hand was so obvious that he lowered the hand hastily to his lap.

“Well?” Mason asked. “What’s the answer? Yes or no?”

“Yes,” Hoxie said, in an all but inaudible voice.

“When did you see him?”

“Oh, Your Honor,” Hamilton Burger said, “that is asking too much...”

Lieutenant Tragg whirled to glare angrily at the district attorney.

“I’ll withdraw the objection,” Hamilton Burger said.

“When?” Mason asked.

“If that’s really Claremont’s picture, I guess it was the night I left for Mexico.”

“What time during the night?”

“Early in the evening. There was a little trouble.”

“What sort of trouble?”

“He went up to see a tenant. There was a complaint about a quarrel. I phoned up to the tenant in the room. The noise quieted down.”

“Then what happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Were there telephone calls from that room?”

“I can’t remember.”

“You have said you never forget a face. Who was the occupant of that room?”

“A regular tenant.”

“Who?”

“George Fayette, the man who was murdered on the third of this month.”

Perry Mason got up, pushed back his chair, and said, “Thank you, Mr. Hoxie,” then to the bewildered court, “Those are all the questions I have.”

“You mean you’re quitting now?” Judge Lennox demanded incredulously.

“Now,” Mason said, and then added with a smile, “and I think if Court will take a thirty-minute adjournment the examination can best be completed by Lieutenant Tragg and in private.”

Judge Lennox hesitated, frowned, then reached for his gavel. “I think I get your point, Mr. Mason. Court will take a thirty-minute recess. The defendants are remanded to custody.”

And Judge Lennox, with a significant glance at Lieutenant Tragg, promptly left the courtroom for his chambers.

Mason faced Dixie Dayton and Morris Alburg in a witness room opening off the courtroom.

“All right,” he said, “I want some facts. Where can I find Thomas E. Sedgwick?”

Alburg glanced at Dixie Dayton.

She shook her head. “I wouldn’t tell anybody—”

“You’re going to tell me,” Mason said. “We’re going to be able to produce him as soon as Lieutenant Tragg finishes with Frank Hoxie.”

“Mr. Mason, do you know what you’re saying?” Dixie Dayton demanded angrily. “This is a cop murder. The police wouldn’t give him a leg to stand on. He wouldn’t have a ghost of a chance. They’d railroad him to the death house so fast that he wouldn’t know what had happened.”

“Why?” Mason asked.

“Why?” Morris Alburg demanded. “What are you talking about? Are you dumb?”

“I’m not dumb and I’m not deaf,” Mason said. “Why would they railroad him to the death house?”

“Because that’s the way the police are. When you kill a cop the police are all on your neck.”

“Why?”

“Because they want revenge, of course, and because I suppose they want to let people know that you can’t kill cops and get away with it. That’s for their own protection.”

“Against whom do they want this revenge?”

“Against anybody that they think is guilty.”

“Exactly,” Mason said. “They used to think Tom Sedgwick was guilty. I don’t think they’ll feel that he’s guilty now.”

Dixie Dayton said, “He has tuberculosis. He can’t do ordinary work. He needs rest. He is having a long, slow fight trying to get better. That’s why he did the things he did. That’s why he got mixed up in bookmaking. He felt that if he could get funds enough, he could take it easy for a while. He’s not bad, Mr. Mason, he — he’s human. He did the things that lots of other people were doing, and then — then they framed this cop killing on him just because that rookie cop was concentrating on him, giving him the works.”

“You’ve been protecting him?” Mason said to Dixie Dayton.

She nodded.

“You’ve been living with him, washing for him, cooking for him, sewing for him, trying to give him a chance?”

She nodded, then said, “I’d give him my life.”

“All right,” Mason told her. “Give me his address, the place where he can be found right now, and you may save his life and yours, too.”

Morris Alburg suddenly turned to face Dixie. “Give it to him, Dixie.”

Mason, Della Street and Paul Drake were in Mason’s office when Gertie, the switchboard operator, rang three frantic signals on the telephone.

“That,” Mason said, “will be Lieutenant Tragg.”

He had no sooner spoken the words than Tragg unceremoniously jerked open the office door, nodded briefly, said, “Hello, folks,” and walked over to sit down opposite Mason’s desk.

“Well?” Mason asked.

“It’s okay,” Tragg said.

“Going to tell us about it?”

“I’d rather not.”

“We’re entitled to it.”

“I know. That’s why I came here. Give me a little time.”

Tragg fished a cigar from his pocket, clipped off the end, lit the cigar, looked at Mason searchingly through the first blue wisps of cigar smoke and said, “What gave you your hunch on this thing, Mason?”

Mason said, “I was faced with clients who had an impossible story. No jury would ever have believed that story. Yet I began to think that it might be the truth.”

“I don’t see how that gives you anything,” Tragg said.

“Anyone who can force an attorney to put on evidence that is going to convict his client, yet which he feels is the truth, must be someone who knows something about evidence. The story that each defendant had to tell was so completely phony that if those stories had been told on the witness stand the defendants would have been convicted.

“In one case that might have been an accident. In two cases it showed design. And then I suddenly realized that I was dealing with a pattern. Thomas E. Sedgwick had been placed in such a position. Any story that he could have told would have eternally damned him before a jury. Therefore his only alternative was to take refuge in flight.

“Well, Lieutenant, I simply used an ordinary police method. You catch many of your criminals because of a file you have entitled Modus Operandi. It is predicated upon the assumption that a criminal, having once committed a successful crime, will thereafter follow a pattern in everything he does.

“In Sedgwick’s case he had an utterly implausible story to tell, and he had possession of a murder weapon. Morris Alburg had an utterly impossible story and a murder weapon.

“It occurred to me that since it was quite apparent Claremont was gunning for the people higher up, he might have made contact.