Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Dubious Bridegroom

“I know,” Drake interrupted, “but get this, Perry. Another car had apparently been parked down at the place where the body was found. When this man drove up with the car containing Ethel Garvin’s body, he was very careful to inch the car into exactly the proper position so that he could open the door of one car and step into the other car. Then he drove away in the other car after pulling the body over behind the steering wheel and dropping the gun.”

Mason said impatiently, “That’s a goofy way to commit a murder.”

“Don’t be too certain it wasn’t done just about that way,” Drake said. “The evidence checks, Perry.”

“What sort of evidence?”

“Well, to begin with, this getaway car was driven down there and parked.”

“How can the police tell it was parked?”

“They can’t be absolutely certain, but that’s what they think. They can see where someone got out of the car and walked across a patch of soft dirt and then over to the highway, but they can’t find where anyone ever walked back to the car.”

“Go on,” Mason said.

“Apparently that gun can be traced to Garvin.”

Mason sat bolt upright in his chair. “What’s that?” he asked.

Drake said, “The police traced that gun to Frank Bynum. He told them about giving it to his sister, Virginia. The police were right on your heels in getting hold of Virginia. She stalled around for a while and then told them a story about watching the office of the mining company in order to protect her mother’s investment. She even told them about you catching her out there on the fire escape and making her come in. She said that’s when she left the gun. She thought you had seen the gun, so she made a motion as though she was throwing it down in the alley and then she swung around to come down the fire escape, gave you a glimpse of legs and, using her body as a shield, put the gun on the platform of the fire escape. She said she thought she could depend on you to be looking at the legs instead of the gun.”

“Tut, tut,” Della Street said in mock reproach.

“I was, too,” Mason admitted. “Go ahead, Paul. Then what happened?”

“From there on,” Drake said, “the police have an interesting trail. It seems that the next day Garvin entered the office right after he’d consulted you. He walked over to the window and stood there, moodily gazing down into the alley below the window. Then something caught his eye and he said to George L. Denby, the secretary-treasurer, ‘Denby, what the devil’s this out on the fire escape?’ ”

“Go ahead,” Mason said. “So far it sounds to me like a scenario.”

“Well, it all checks,” Drake said. “Denby went over and looked out of the window and said, ‘My God, Mr. Garvin, it’s a gun!’ Frank Livesey, the president of the corporation, was there, and he came over. The three of them stood looking, and then Livesey got out of the window, onto the fire escape, and picked up the gun. He looked it over and said, ‘It’s fully loaded,’ and handed it to Denby. Denby looked it over, then handed it to Garvin. Garvin did a little detective work. He said, ‘There isn’t a speck of rust on it. If it had been left out there very-long it would have been rusty. Someone must have been out on that fire escape with a gun. I wonder who it could have been.’

“They had some talk back and forth, and Denby wanted to call the police, but Garvin said he’d think the matter over. He didn’t want to have any disadvantageous publicity just before the stockholders’ meeting.”

“Go ahead,” Mason said. “The thing is really getting interesting now. We have a gun, which subsequently turns out to be a murder weapon, with the prints of three men on it.”

“All of them legitimately placed there,” Drake said. “But here’s the thing. Livesey was on his way out to get a cup of coffee. He said he’d arrived early that morning to do some work on the records so everything would be ready for the stockholders’ meeting, and Garvin said something to this effect: ‘Livesey, I’m just about ready to leave with my wife on a little trip. I’m going to take a short vacation before that stockholders’ meeting, just get away from business for a little while. My car’s parked down there in front — the big convertible. I wish you’d open the glove compartment and put that gun in there. I want to look it over. It’s certainly a nice weapon.’ ”

“Then what?”

“Livesey went down to get his cup of coffee, looked around to make sure no one was watching him, popped the gun in the glove compartment, went out and got his coffee and came back. They talked for a while, and Garvin left some last-minute instructions. Then he and Denby rode down in the elevator together. I believe, by the way, Perry, these last-minute instructions had to do with having his secretary put through a check for a thousand-dollar retainer to you.”

“So that’s the story of the gun,” Drake said. “Denby remembers riding down in the elevator with Garvin and just as he walked away he saw Garvin check the glove compartment to make certain the gun was there. Then Denby got in his own car and left.”

“The girl would be the one that the police would normally go to work on, but she says she has a perfect alibi, that after she entered your office, you searched her very thoroughly...”

Della Street gave a low whistle.

“All kidding aside, Paul, this young woman had been prowling around my office,” Mason said. “For all I knew, she was sneaking down the fire escape, ready to take a pot shot at me as I was lying there, sleeping. I certainly didn’t intend to invite her into the office, then have her pull a gun and start working on me.”

“I don’t blame you,” Drake said.

Mason said to Della, “Get Edward Garvin on the phone, Della.”

Della Street put through the call.

“How about the time element?” Mason asked. “Have police been checking up on what everyone did, why, where and when?”

“You mean as to an alibi for the time of the murder?”

“Yes.”

“They’ve done a little preliminary checking. Understand, Perry, the police don’t take me into their confidence. I have to pick up what I can from pumping newspaper reporters and getting tips here and there.”

Mason said, “You always manage to do pretty well, Paul. What are the police doing?”

“Well, to begin with, they checked on Denby. Denby was up here all night working on the books, dictating some correspondence and getting data ready for the stockholders’ meeting. He says he worked all night. He looks like it. And he had a whole night’s dictation on his secretary’s desk when she arrived this morning. What’s more this story agrees absolutely with a story he told Livesey when Livesey rang him up earlier and before anyone knew that Mrs. Garvin had been murdered. It also agrees with the story that Virginia Bynum told the police a half hour or so later when they located her, by tracing the numbers on the gun. She was watching from her station on the fire escape again last night. They’ve asked her to describe just what she saw, and her story really gives Denby an alibi. She describes everything he did. Not that the police figure Denby has any motive.”

“The story Virginia told me and told the police is fantastic — but some fantastic stories arc true. What about Livesey?” Mason asked.

“Livesey’s a bachelor. He was at home in bed. He says, unfortunately, he can’t furnish any alibi because he was sleeping alone and what would the police suggest in the line of preventive measures in the future. The police suggested matrimony.”

“They would,” Mason said.

“But, of course, the one the police want to talk with now,” Drake said, “is Garvin. They understand he’s going to be here for the stockholders’ meeting and as far as anyone knows he’s simply out on a second honeymoon with his wife, so the police are planning to come down like a thousand tons of brick when he...”