Erie Gardner - The Case of the Lazy Lover

“What did she do?”

“She kept right on going.”

“Then what?” Mason asked. “Was Allred dead?”

“No, but he was still unconscious. He was breathing, a deep, heavy breathing. You could hear it all over the car as soon as the motor was stopped.”

“You had Allred’s gun?”

“Yes.”

“Why were you so afraid of Allred? If you had the gun, why didn’t you simply leave the car on the pavement, get out and start walking and...”

“And where would I have walked?” Fleetwood asked. “It was a cold, misty night with a nasty drizzle. Everything was wet, and up in the mountains it was cold. I wanted a place to sleep and I didn’t intend to be wandering around on the highway. And I didn’t want to dump Allred out in the rain. I wanted to leave him the car so he could recover consciousness and drive himself home. I just wanted to get clean away from him, but I thought it would be swell under the circumstances if I could keep on with that amnesia gag. I had a girl friend, this Bernice Archer, and — well, I thought amnesia would be a pretty slick thing all the way along the line.”

“Hadn’t you been making a play for Patricia Faxon?” Mason asked.

“It depends on what you mean by a play. She is a pretty swell dish. I looked her over pretty carefully, and tried to find out if she wanted to play.”

“Did she?”

“No.”

“Didn’t it go farther than that?”

Fleetwood said, “I’m no tin angel. I probably would have thrown Bernice Archer overboard and married Patricia if Patricia had given me the green light. I thought for a while she was going to do that, but she didn’t. Patricia has dough of her own, and her mother is lousy with the stuff. The man who marries Pat Faxon doesn’t need to worry about work, and if he knows a little something about mining investments, he can cut himself quite a piece of cake. However, that’s neither here nor there. I’m giving it to you gentlemen straight. Bernice Archer was my girl. She still is. She’s a sweet kid.”

“You’ve seen her since you’ve been here?” Mason asked.

“Of course, I’ve seen her,” Fleetwood said. “She came to me first thing when she knew I was here. She was with me for nearly an hour. She’s a sweet kid.”

“And did you tell her this story?” Mason asked.

“No,” Fleetwood said. “I kept on with the amnesia gag. I thought it was the best way out of a lot of things.”

“Did you fool her?”

“I don’t know. You never can be too certain about Bernice that way. She pretended to be fooled.”

“You didn’t tell her anything at all about what had happened up there?”

“Certainly not. I told her I couldn’t remember a thing that had happened from the time I was struck on the head there at Allred’s house until I recovered consciousness just as I was being taken to the police station.”

“All right,” Tragg said impatiently, “never mind about your love affairs. Tell me the details of what happened. Mrs. Allred jumped out of the baggage compartment. Was the lid of the baggage compartment still up?”

“No. It slammed down when she jumped out. She didn’t push it up far enough for it to remain in an upright position.”

“And that blood in the baggage compartment?”

“The blood must have come from her bloody nose,” Fleetwood said. “That’s the only way I can account for it.”

“So what did you do?”

“I’d got out of the car. I’d left Allred in it. Allred was still unconscious, but he was beginning to stir around a little bit and show signs of regaining consciousness.

“I knew I was within a short distance of Overbrook’s house. I got out and listened. I could hear a dog barking and it sounded pretty close. I walked around the car and when I got in front of the car, I took the gun by the barrel and threw it just as far as I could throw it out into the darkness. I made a pretty good job of it. It seemed quite a while before I heard it hit the ground. Then I started walking toward the sound of the barking dog. I guess it was about three or four hundred yards before I came to the house. I knocked on the door. After a while Overbrook got up and wanted to know what I wanted. I told him that I guessed I’d been in an automobile accident or something because I found myself walking along the road with no idea of where I was or how I’d got there.

“Overbrook was a little suspicious. He looked me over pretty carefully. Finally he said he just had a bachelor’s place there, that there was a spare room that had a cot in it, that it was just a cot and there were blankets on it but there were no sheets. He said that if I wanted to stay there that night, I could. I told him that would be fine, that I thought I’d have my memory back in the morning. I went into the bedroom and waited until he’d gone back to bed again. I had an idea of slipping out and listening to see when Allred regained consciousness and drove the car away. But I reckoned without the dog. Evidently Overbrook had told the dog to watch me, because when I tried to open the door a crack, the dog was standing right in front of it with his lips curled back, and he gave a low growl.

“I went back and sat on the edge of the cot and I must have been there for about half an hour before I could hear the sound of a motor starting, and then the car drove away.”

“What time did Allred get out to the Snug-Rest?” Mason asked.

“You’ve got me,” Fleetwood said. “Allred had previously taken, not only my watch, but everything I owned except my money. When I pretended that I was suffering from amnesia, Allred had been smart enough to see that I didn’t have anything that would prove my identity in case I appealed to some stranger. I didn’t have a watch. He’d even taken my handkerchief because it had a laundry mark on it, cleaned me out slick as a whistle.”

“But he didn’t take your money?”

“Not only did he not take my money, but I think he must have put at least a couple of hundred dollars more in the roll of bills I was carrying in my trouser pocket. He wanted me to have lots of money and nothing else.”

Mason looked at Tragg.

Tragg shrugged his shoulders.

“How about Mrs. Allred’s suitcase?” Mason asked.

“What about it?”

“When she packed up at her husband’s request, she put this suitcase in the car?”

“Yes.”

“And,” the lawyer said sarcastically, “when she jumped out of that luggage compartment she was lugging this suitcase?”

“No, she wasn’t, Mr. Mason. She was carrying a jack handle, or some metal rod; that’s all. I could see that jack handle in her hand. The light from the tail light showed me that.”

The lawyer smiled triumphantly. “When the car was found, her suitcase wasn’t in it.”

Fleetwood’s face showed dismay. “The hell it wasn’t! Of course, I couldn’t see her too clearly.”

Mason said scornfully, “It’s a hell of a story. She’s in danger of her life, yet she comes back for her suitcase.”

“Wait a minute,” Fleetwood said. “I’ll tell you what must have happened. Mrs. Allred was trying to hitchhike back to town. Allred recovered consciousness, knew I’d given him the slip. He started to drive back to town. He met his wife on the road. She may even have tried to thumb a ride, not knowing who was back of the headlights. When he stopped the car and tried to force her to get in, she hit him with the jack handle. It was then she got her suitcase out of the car and drove it over the grade. He must have overtaken her right about at the place where the car went over the grade.”

“Bosh!” Mason said.

“Believe me,” Fleetwood said fervently, “Allred got what was coming to him, and if Mrs. Allred ran that car over a bluff, she certainly was acting in self-defense. I’ll bet if you get her to tell the truth, you’ll find that her husband picked her up, that he tried to manhandle her and she cracked him over the head with a jack handle. She...”