Erie Gardner - The Case of the Crying Swallow

“All right,” Winnett said, “come with me. Mother, you and Daphne pretend you haven’t heard any of this. I’ll talk with you later.”

Major Winnett led the way to his room, opened a portable bar and took out a bottle of Scotch.

Mason refused with a gesture, then when Winnett had poured out a drink, the lawyer reached over and poured half of that drink back into the bottle. “Just enough to give yourself a bracer,” he warned, “not enough to give you a letdown afterward. You’re going to be talking with the police pretty soon. Start talking with me now.”

Winnett said, “I didn’t know Marcia went to visit the man in the trailer on Monday. I did know that Marcia went to the trailer on Wednesday.”

“How did you know?”

“I was watching her.”

“Why were you watching her?”

“Someone told me she had been to the trailer on Monday.”

“Who?”

“My mother.”

“What did you do?”

“After she left the trailer on Wednesday, I went down there to see who was in the trailer and see why my wife was having a rendezvous.”

“What did you find?”

“I found the man dead. I found Marcia’s jewelry spread out on a table in front of him. I realized what must have happened. I saw that one shot had gone into the man’s heart. One had apparently gone past his head and into the wall of the trailer.”

“All right,” Mason said sarcastically, “it’s your story. Go ahead with it. What did you do then?”

“I took Marcia’s jewelry and locked up the trailer. I came home. I waited until after dark, then I moved the trailer to a trailer camp I knew of, where I parked it. I got out and left the trailer and walked to where I had parked my own car earlier in the day. I had driven home before I realized that I could completely throw the police off the scent by letting it appear the murder had been committed late that night in the trailer camp. So I returned, stood near the trailer, fired two shots into the air, then ran to my car and came back home. I thought Marcia was in bed. But when, after a couple of hours, I went up, I found she wasn’t there, that she had left that note. That’s why I came to you. I wanted your help. That’s the truth, so help me.”

Mason said, “You wrote down the license number of that automobile. Later on you tried to cover it up by adding some words and some figures. Then you added the total—”

“Mr. Mason, I swear I did not.”

“Who did then?”

“I don’t know.”

“Someone wrote down the license number of the car,” Mason said, “4E4705, then tried to camouflage it by working in a number of other figures and writing at the top These numbers called — but a mistake was made in the addition. I... wait a minute...”

Mason stood motionless, his eyes level-lidded with concentration.

“Perhaps,” Major Winnett suggested, “it was...”

Mason motioned him to silence, then, after a moment, picked up the telephone, dialed the hotel where Drake had established an office, and when he had Drake on the line, said, “Hello, Paul. Perry talking. I think I’ve got it. There wasn’t any mistake in the addition.”

“I don’t get it,” Drake said. “The total should be 49″37818. Actually it’s 49″37817.”

“And that figure is right,” Mason said. “The number we want is 4E4704.”

“But the license number was 4E4705.”

Mason said, “What happens when you have two cars? You are given license numbers in chronological order. Look up license number 4E4704. You can start your search in room six-thirteen there at the hotel. Make it snappy.”

Mason slammed up the telephone receiver and nodded to Major Winnett. “We’ve got one more chance. It’s slim. The next time you go to a lawyer, don’t be so damn smart. Tell him the truth. Where’s your mother’s room?”

“In the other wing at the far end of the corridor.”

“And the nurse’s room?” Mason asked. “That must be a communicating room?”

“It is.”

Mason said, “Let’s go.”

Helen Custer, answering their knock, seemed somewhat flustered. “Why, good evening. I, ah... is there something...”

Mason pushed his way into the room. Major Winnett hesitated a moment, then followed. Mason kicked the door shut.

“Police are on their way out here,” Mason said to the nurse.

“The police? What for?”

“To arrest you.”

“For what?”

Mason said, “That’s up to you.”

“What do you mean?”

Mason said, “Playing it one way, it’s blackmail. Playing it the other way, it’s being an accessory after the fact on a murder charge. You’d better take the rap for blackmail.”

“I... I... why, what are you talking about?”

Mason said, “I’ve practiced law long enough to know that a man should never torture clues to make them point in the direction he thinks they should go. When that column of figures added up to 49E37817 and I thought it should have been 49E37818, I assumed a mistake had been made in the addition. It wasn’t a mistake. You marked down the number Cal 4E4704. You wanted to preserve that number but you didn’t want anyone to think that it had any significance, so you added the words at the top, These numbers, and then inserted led after the Cal, so that made it read, These numbers called. Then you added other numbers after that number and then totaled the sum. Now then, you probably have less than five minutes to tell us why you wrote down 4E4704.”

She glanced from Mason to Major Winnett. There was dismay in her eyes. “What makes you think I—”

Mason took out his watch, said, “If the police get here first, you’ll be an accessory after the fact. If you use your head, you may be able to get by with a rap for attempted blackmail.”

“I... I... oh, Mr. Mason. I can’t...”

Mason watched the hand ticking off the seconds.

“All right,” she blurted. “It was yesterday morning. I was looking for Mrs. Victoria Winnett. I thought she was up in the observation tower. I went up there. She wasn’t there. The binoculars were adjusted so they pointed down to that grove of trees. I just happened to look through them and saw the trailer. A light coupé was parked beside the big Buick that was attached to the trailer. A man and a woman were having a struggle of some sort. The man tried to strike her and the woman reached into her blouse. I saw the flash of a gun, then another flash. The man staggered back and the woman calmly closed the door of the trailer, got in her car and drove away.

“Through the binoculars I got a look at the number of her automobile. It was Cal 4E4704. I wrote it down on a piece of paper, intending to tell the police. Then... well, then I... thought... I...”

“What did you do with the piece of paper?” Mason asked.

“After a moment I realized that perhaps I could... well, you know. So I changed the focus on the binoculars back to—”

“So what did you do?” Mason asked.

“I didn’t want that number to seem too conspicuous. I had written Cal 4E4704, so I wrote down other things, just as you said.”

“The first number you wrote on a single sheet of paper that was on the table and not on the pad. When you wrote the rest of it, you had placed the paper on the pad.”

“I... I guess I did.”

Mason pointed to the telephone. “Ring up police headquarters,” he said. “Tell them what you saw. Tell them that it’s been bothering you, that you thought you should have reported it to the police, but that Mrs. Winnett is so opposed to any form of publicity that you didn’t know just what to do; that tonight you asked Mrs. Winnett about it and she told you to telephone the police at once; that the reason you didn’t do so before was because the trailer was gone when you looked again and you supposed that the man hadn’t been hurt and had driven the trailer away.”