Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Crooked Candle

Mason said, “The yacht was anchored at the place you have marked with a cross on People’s Exhibit Number One. Is that correct?”

“That’s correct.”

“How deep was the water at that point?”

The surveyor smiled, “I don’t know. I located the yacht by triangulation, and superimposed the location upon a chart of the estuary.”

“Very interesting. And you don’t know how deep the water was?”

“No, I’m a surveyor — not a diver.”

The courtroom laughed.

Mason didn’t even smile. He said, “That’s all.”

The surveyor was followed by a photographer who introduced various photographs showing the interior of the cabin, the body of Fred Milfield sprawled on the floor, the yacht riding at anchor, a view of the starboard side of the yacht; then a view of the port side of the yacht; then one of the bow, and one of the stern.

“Cross-examine,” Linton said.

Mason said very quietly, “How deep was the water at that point?”

A titter ran through the courtroom.

The photographer said quickly, “I don’t know. I’m a photographer, not a diver.”

The titter swelled into audible merriment. The judge rapped for order.

Mason said casually, “That’s all.”

Jackson, somewhat concerned, leaned forward to whisper to Mason, “I think the audience in the courtroom is laughing at you.”

“Do you, indeed,” Mason whispered without even bothering to turn around.

Burger called Mrs. Daphne Milfield.

Mrs. Milfield, attired in black, her eyes still slightly swollen from weeping, took the witness stand.

“You are the widow of Fred Milfield, the decedent?” the district attorney asked with that sympathetic consideration which district attorneys always show for the widows in murder cases.

“Yes,” she answered in a voice that was hardly audible.

“Mrs. Milfield, are you acquainted with Roger Burbank, one of the defendants in this case?”

“Yes.”

“How long have you known him?”

“Ten years.”

“Do you know whether Roger Burbank asked your husband to meet him at any designated place on the day your husband met his death?”

“Yes. Mr. Burbank telephoned.”

“When?”

“About eleven-thirty that morning.”

“Who answered the telephone?”

“I did.”

“And did you recognize the voice of Roger Burbank?”

“I did.”

“The voice which you have known for some ten years?”

“Yes.”

“And what did Mr. Burbank say?”

“When he found Fred wasn’t there, he said he was very anxious to get in touch with him, that he wanted Fred to come aboard his yacht for a conference at five o’clock that afternoon. He said his yacht would be at the usual place, that the thing he wanted to see Fred about was a matter of greatest importance.”

“And you’re certain this was Roger Burbank with whom you were talking?”

“Yes.”

“Did you communicate this message to your husband?”

“I did.”

“When?”

“About twenty minutes after the call was received.”

“How?”

“My husband called up on the telephone to tell me he wouldn’t be home for dinner, might not get in until after midnight.”

“And you gave him this message from Roger Burbank?”

“Yes.”

“What did your husband say, if anything?”

“He said he bad already talked over the telephone with Mr. Bur...”

“Objected to,” Mason interposed, “as incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial, not part of the res gestae, and therefore hearsay.”

“Sustained,” Judge Newark ruled.

“You may cross-examine,” Hamilton Burger announced.

Jackson leaned forward to whisper to Mason, “That ‘knowing him for ten years’ business is a trap. He’s hoping you’ll walk into it and give her an excuse to get that old case in front of the court.”

Mason nodded, said to the witness, “You say you have known Roger Burbank for ten years, Mrs. Milfield?”

“Yes,” she answered in a voice that was hardly more than a whisper.

“Have you known him well?”

“Quite well.”

“Was he in Los Angeles all of that time?”

“No.”

“Where was he when you first got acquainted with him?”

“In New Orleans. I did some yachting, and Mr. Burbank was an enthusiastic yachtsman. We met that way. Actually, the first time I met him I was rowing a skiff out to a yacht, and Mr. Burbank in another rowboat started racing me.”

“You have known him longer than your husband?”

“Yes.”

“Was it through you that your husband got in touch with Mr. Burbank?”

“I believe so, yes.”

“There was an interval of some years during, which you hadn’t seen Mr. Burbank?”

“Yes.”

“And then you telephoned him?”

“I did.”

“You mentioned your old acquaintanceship?”

“Yes.”

A look of triumphant satisfaction began to manifest itself upon the district attorney’s face.

“Just what did you say to him, Mrs. Milfield?”

She flashed a glance at the district attorney, received in return what might have been a signal, said very rapidly, “I took pains to assure him that I would say nothing about the trouble he had been in New Orleans when he had killed a man with a blow of his fist.”

The judge frowned.

Mason, not changing his voice in the least, said, “But, notwithstanding that promise, you did tell your husband?”

“Well, I’d already told Fred.”

“And did you tell any of your husband’s business associates — Harry Van Nuys, for instance?”

“Yes, I told him.”

“Anyone else?”

“No, just these two.”

“And told them so they could go to Burbank and force him to finance them...”

“Absolutely not!”

“Then why did you tell them?”

“Just because I thought my husband had a right to know.”

“And how about Van Nuys? Did you think he had a right to know?”

“Of course,” Burger objected, “this inquiry is now going far afield, Your Honor.”

Mason said, “Not at all, if the Court please. The Court will have noticed the eager alacrity with which the witness rushed into the discussion of Burbank’s past. I am now showing bias, as well as asking her to elaborate on the answer she was so anxious to rush into the record.”

“It is only natural this witness should have a bias,” Burger snapped. “After all, this man murdered her husband.”

“And it is only fair that I have a chance to show the extent of that bias,” Mason said.

“Answer the question,” the judge instructed. “The question was whether you thought a certain Harry Van Nuys had a right to know about this former trouble Burbank had been in.”

“Well, he was my husband’s business associate.”

“And, therefore, entitled to know?” Mason asked.

“In a way, yes.”

“Because you considered the information a business asset?”

“No! Absolutely not.”

“But the information was used as a business asset, was it not?”

“By whom?”

“By your husband and Harry Van Nuys.”

“That calls for hearsay,” Burger objected. “This witness wouldn’t know about anything that took place between her husband and Burbank except through what her husband may have told her. Moreover it calls for a conversation between husband and wife.”

“The question was whether she knew,” the court said. “That calls for her own knowledge.”

“I don’t know — of my knowledge,” Mrs. Milfield said sweetly.

“But prior to this conversation you had with Burbank your husband had never met him?”

“No.”

“Nor Harry Van Nuys?”

“No.”

“But within a week or ten days after you told them of Burbank’s past they had met him and had arranged with Burbank to finance them in an extensive business venture?”