Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Crooked Candle

“Well, it seemed some man by the name of Palermo had an appointment with Milfield, and...”

“This is all the rankest sort of hearsay,” Linton interrupted.

“Do you want to object to it?” Mason asked.

“I don’t wish to be put in the position of objecting to anything so trivial.”

Mason said to the judge, “Some of this is probably hearsay. Your Honor, but I’m simply trying to get a picture of what happened, and get it in the most expeditious manner.”

“But we’re going to call Frank Palermo, the witness who discovered the body,” Linton argued. “You can ask Palermo what he saw.”

“I’m not going to ask this man about what Palermo saw,” Mason said. “I’m going to ask him about when he met Palermo and what Palermo said. And I’m simply asking him about these other matters so that we can clarify the situation and have a clear picture before the court. I want to present a chronological sequence of events.”

“And why do you want to clutter up the record with a lot of testimony about what Palermo was doing after he discovered the body?” Linton asked.

“Because,” Mason said, smiling, “I might uncover some fact that was favorable to the defense.”

Linton said sarcastically, “ This witness doesn’t know anything favorable to the defense, and no other witness who gets on the stand and tells the truth will know anything that’s favorable to the defense. No one knows anything favorable to the defense.”

“If he did,” Mason observed, “he’d probably be taking his vacation.”

A roar of laughter was silenced by Judge Newark’s gavel. “Counsel will refrain from these side comments. Do you wish to make an objection, Mr. Linton?”

“No, I’m not going to be put in the position of objecting to this testimony, Your Honor.”

“If Counsel for the People doesn’t object, the Court will hear enough of it to get the general background,” the judge ruled. “Go ahead and answer the question.”

“I’ll put it this way,” Mason said. “You were the first person to talk with the man who had discovered the body?”

“I believe so, yes.”

“Tell us exactly what happened.”

“Well, it was Saturday morning around ten-thirty, I guess. I didn’t look at the time. And I saw this boat coming up the estuary with a man standing up sculling.”

“Anything that directed your attention to this boat particularly?”

“Yes.”

“What?”

“The way the man was sculling.”

“And what about it?”

“All this is incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial. It has no bearing whatever on the case,” Linton objected.

“Overruled.”

“Well, there aren’t very many people that can make a really good job of sculling a boat, and this man was sculling right along. That boat was really cutting through the water. And another thing that interested me was the type of boat.”

“What sort of a boat was it?” Mason asked.

“It was a folding boat — one that is made to be folded and carried in an automobile.”

“And who was the man in the boat?”

“When he came closer, he started to talk — all excited — a lot of foreign accent — said his name was Frank Palermo, that he was from up in the Skinner Hills district, and that he had an appointment with Milfield on a yacht, and...”

“This is all hearsay,” Linton pointed out.

“Are you objecting to it?”

“Yes, Your Honor, I’m going to object to this as hearsay evidence, and as not proper cross-examination. This man is...”

“Sustained,” Judge Newark ruled.

“All right,” Mason said to the witness, “just confine yourself generally to what you did.”

“Well, this man made some statements to me about what he’d found, and as a result of those statements, I communicated with the police.”

“Now what did you tell the police?”

“Same objection,” Linton said.

“Overruled,” the judge snapped. “Witness is now being cross-examined as to something he said and did himself.”

“Well, I telephoned Police Headquarters and told them...”

“Never mind what you told them,” Linton said.

“On the contrary,” Mason announced, “I’m interested in what the witness told the police. I believe this is part of the res gestae, and in any event, it will show possible bias.”

“The objection is overruled.”

“Well, I told the police that I was caretaker and watchman at the yacht club, and that some crazy foreigner was claiming that he had an appointment with Milfield...”

“Your Honor,” Linton protested, “this is exactly the same matter which the Court refused to permit the witness to testify to earlier.”

“Oh, no, it isn’t,” the judge said. “At that time he was testifying as to what Palermo had told him. Now he’s testifying as to what he told the police. The defense is certainly entitled to cross-examine this witness as to what he said and did in connection with this matter — if it wants to show bias.”

“But Counsel is going to get it all in just the same,” Linton protested, “because this man is now about to relate his conversation with the police over the telephone.”

“Let him relate it then,” Judge Newark said. “The objection is overruled.”

“Go ahead,” Mason said, “answer the question.”

“Well, I told the police that this man Palermo was there in a boat; that he said he’d had an appointment on Burbank’s yacht with Fred Milfield; that when he went out there to where Milfield had told him the yacht would be, he found it heeled well over on its side, aground on a mud bar. He sculled his boat around it and shouted a couple of times...”

Linton said desperately, “I want the witness to understand that he is only to testify as to what he told the police and not what Palermo told him.”

Cameron said, “I’m telling about what I told the police Palermo told me. Isn’t that all right?”

Judge Newark smiled, “That’s all right. Go right ahead.”

“Well, I said that Palermo said he’d sculled around the yacht a couple of times and then he’d boarded it and called out to find if anyone was aboard. And when he received no answer, he slid back the hatch and went down into the cabin and found Fred Milfield lying dead.”

“Any further conversation?” Mason asked.

“That was about all.”

“Any conversation between you and the police about Palermo?”

“Well, a little. Yes. It seems the police knew who I was and wanted to know if Palermo had rented a boat from me.”

“And what did you tell them?”

The witness smiled. “I told them just what Palermo told me when I asked him where he got the boat.”

“And what was that?”

“Palermo don’t seem to believe in squandering money. He said he knew that he was going to have to row out to a yacht on the estuary; and since he already had this folding boat for use on the Skinner Hills Lake in taking out duck-shooting parties, he saw no reason to pay some city slicker fifty cents or a dollar for boat rental, so he simply loaded his folding boat into his automobile and used that to go out to the yacht.”

“I don’t see what possible bearing this has on the case,” Linton said.

Mason smiled, “It might be a fact favorable to the defense.”

“Well, I don’t see it.”

“That,” Mason announced with mock sympathy, “is the result of a legal astigmatism.”

“Come, come, gentlemen, let’s get on with the case,” Judge Newark said.

“Did you,” Mason asked, “tell the police anything that Palermo told you about the time he had left his residence in Skinner Hills in order to keep his appointment?”

“He told me something about that, but I didn’t tell the police.”