Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Stepdaughter’s Secret

“Now show me the oil and gasoline wharf which was recognized last night,” Mason said.

“A little over to the right,” Bancroft told the pilot.

The helicopter hovered over the water.

“Right down here,” Bancroft said.

“No sign of a boat here,” Mason said. “Was there any wind last night?”

“No wind. It was dead calm. That’s the reason a fog came in and stayed so long. There hasn’t been any wind. It’s just beginning to clear off with a slight land breeze.”

Mason said, “The tide was coming in last night. Keep working up to the head of the bay.”

The pilot obediently kept the helicopter moving slowly up the bay.

“Look! Look ahead!” Bancroft said suddenly. “That looks like her.”

“Where?”

“About a mile up ahead.”

Mason nodded to the pilot who sent the helicopter into more rapid forward motion, eventually hovering over a yacht which was anchored out by the edge of the shore line along some mud and sand flats at the head of the bay.

“That your boat?” Mason asked. Bancroft nodded.

“It seems to be anchored,” Mason said.

“That’s right.”

“The tide is now running out?”

“Right.”

“And the anchor is holding it.”

“Yes.”

“Any idea about how deep the water is here?”

“Judging from what I know of the bay and the angle of the anchor chain, I’d say the water was ten or twelve feet deep and there’s about twenty or twenty-five feet of anchor chain out.”

Mason said, “Notice that the dinghy is still attached to the boat.”

“I’ve noticed that,” Bancroft said.

Mason said, “Evidently the boat has been stolen. I think we’d better have a representative of the sheriff’s office with us when we go aboard.”

The helicopter pilot said, “There’s a sheriff’s substation up here a little ways. I can land the helicopter there if you want. Also I have an aerial camera set up in this crate. I can take pictures if you want.”

“We want,” Mason said. “Both the sheriff and the pictures, but don’t say anything about the pictures for a while.”

A few moments later the helicopter settled to a landing by a sheriff’s substation.

Mason quickly explained to the deputy, “We have reason to believe that Mr Bancroft’s yacht was stolen last night. We’ve been looking for it and finally found it. It’s riding at anchor out here and whoever stole it is probably still aboard because the dinghy is still tied to it. Want to look?”

“We’ll look,” the deputy said.

“Got a boat?”

“We have a boat.”

“Let’s go,” Mason told him.

“I’ll stay with the helicopter until you get back,” the pilot said.

The deputy drove them to a landing where they boarded a fast yacht and started up the bay.

“Just keep going,” Mason said. “We’ll tell you when you’re coming to it.”

“It’s about four miles up here near the sand flats,” Bancroft said.

“At anchor?”

“At anchor.”

They moved at high speed up the channel, then slowed as they got into shallower water.

“This is your boat ahead?” the deputy asked.

“That’s it,” Bancroft said.

The deputy piloted the yacht around the boat. “Ahoy the Jinesa! ” he called. “Anyone aboard?”

There was no answer.

The deputy said, “I’m going aboard and take a look.”

“Want us with you?” Mason asked.

The deputy shook his head. “You’d better wait here. You say the boat was stolen?”

Bancroft made no answer.

The deputy manoeuvered the speedboat up to the side of the Jinesa , put over a couple of rubber bumpers and tied the two boats together, then sprang aboard lightly.

Bancroft said in a low voice to Mason, “Mason, I’m going to take the rap.”

“What do you mean?”

“If Gilly is dead I’m going to say that I shot him and—”

“You keep your mouth shut,” Mason said, “The best that we can do now is to rely on the fact that the state has to prove a case against a defendant beyond all reasonable doubt.

“Now, you can take this much responsibility. You can state that your wife was hysterical, that you gave her a strong sedative and insisted that she take enough so that it completely put her out.

“But remember this. They can’t find the gun that did the shooting because your wife dropped the gun overboard when she jumped.”

“But can’t they find where she jumped and send down a diver and pick up the gun? It’s in shallow water on a smooth bottom.”

“She doesn’t need to tell her story,” Mason said. “She’s gone this far without it and she’s got to sit tight now. This isn’t the way I like to handle a case, but we’re in a spot where it’s the only way we can handle the case. If and when the time comes for your wife to tell her story, we’ll tell it. But remember that your wife boarded the yacht with a man by the name of Irwin Fordyce. The police find the yacht with Fordyce gone and Gilly killed. They’re not going to make any charges until they find Fordyce and get his story.”

“And when they get his story?” Bancroft asked.

“When they get his story,” Mason said, “the case may be mixed up all to hell. Your wife has simply got to adopt the position that there are reasons why she can’t tell everything that happened. She is going to have to sit tight as to certain phases of what happened last night. She’ll state that she’ll tell her story at the proper time, but that there are reasons why she doesn’t want to make a public statement at this time.”

“That’s going to look like hell,” Bancroft said.

“You got any suggestions that will keep it from looking like hell?” Mason asked. “What you should have done was to have called me last night and let me tell her story to the police about how she had been attacked and had fired wildly in self-defence, not knowing whether she had hit her assailant or not.”

“She knows she hit him,” Bancroft said. “He fell forward and was motionless. Evidently the bullet killed him instantly. She—”

The deputy came back on deck and said, “Look here, we’ve got a complicated situation. There’s a dead man aboard. He’s been dead for some time. Apparently he’s been shot through the heart.”

“That,” Mason said, “complicates the situation.”

The deputy looked at him soberly.

“That,” he said, “is the understatement of the month, and I am now beginning to wonder just why it happened that a yacht owner reporting a stolen boat has one of the leading criminal attorneys in the state along with him.”

Mason grinned and said, “That’s a long story, my friend.”

“Do you want to start telling it now?” the deputy asked.

“No,” Mason said.

“We can get the facts,” the deputy said. “We can get them the easy way or we can get them the hard way.”

“How long has this man been dead?” Mason asked.

“Quite a while, apparently. I don’t want to disturb things. I’m going to notify the sheriff, take this boat in charge, then we’ll move it over to a wharf where we can get technical assistance in order to evaluate the evidence — and I warn both of you that anything you say may be used against you.”

“You’re going to move this boat?” Mason asked.

“We’ll have to move it,” the deputy said. “We have to get to a point where we can have fingerprint men, photographers and experts take a look at the body while it’s still just the way we found it.”

Mason started to say something, then checked himself.

“You’re in charge here,” he said.

“Want to make any statement?” the deputy asked.

Mason shook his head.

“Do you?” the deputy asked Bancroft.