Erle Gardner - The Case of the Drowning Duck

Mason said, “Get his fingerprints, Paul. Find out if he ever did time. The coroner’s office probably took his fingerprints.”

“Come on,” Drake said. “You were playing something more than hunch in this thing. Kick through and give me the low-down.”

Mason said, “There isn’t any low-down yet, Paul. I’ll tell you though some of the things which made me get those hunches. Understand, when I start work on a case, I act on the assumption my client is innocent. Therefore, it was no trick at all to get the hunch that Corine Hassen might have gone to Reno. Now then, if Adams was telling the truth and Latwell had intended to run away with her, and if she had gone to Reno, then it’s obvious that something must have intervened to change the entire picture. That something resulted in the murder of David Latwell. Wasn’t it reasonable to suppose that that same something could have resulted in the murder of Corine Hassen?”

“There were no marks of violence on the body,” Drake said. “A canoeing party happened to glimpse the body in the clear waters of the lake. They sent in an alarm to the sheriff’s office, and the body was recovered. There was evidence indicating she must have come from Reno. The body was taken back to Reno, photographs were made, and a coroner’s jury returned a verdict of death by drowning.”

“It still could have been murder,” Mason said.

Drake thought that over. “Well, as I get the picture, Milter wasn’t playing the blackmail angle. That must have been Burr and his wife who had moved in on Witherspoon and were planning to collect from him. But I don’t see how that helps us any, Perry. It simply builds up an added motive for murder. Witherspoon’s got himself in a spot, and...”

He broke off as knuckles tapped on the door. Della Street called, “How about it, Chief? Are you decent?”

“Just,” Mason said. “Come on in.”

Della Street slipped into the bedroom, said, “She’s out there.”

“Lois Witherspoon?”

“Yes.”

“What does she want?”

“She wants to see you immediately,” Della said. “She’s reached a decision. I think she’s going to tell it all right now.”

Mason said, “Okay, we’ll have it over with.”

Lois Witherspoon got to her feet as Mason entered the sitting room of his suite in the hotel. She said, “I want to talk to you alone.”

“That’s all right,” Mason said, indicating Paul Drake and Della Street. “You can say what you have to say in front of these people.”

“It’s about that duck you had me plant in Marvin’s car,” she said. “It looks now as though they’re going to be successful in dragging the Milter murder into it. That means the duck becomes important. I’m not going to sit by and let my father get smeared with that...”

“I don’t blame you,” Mason said.

“I’m going to tell them about the duck. You know what that will mean.”

“What will it mean?”

She said, “I’m sorry I did it. I’m sorry for my sake. I’m sorry for Dad’s sake. And I’m sorry for yours.”

“Why for mine?”

“They won’t let you get away with anything like that down here, Mr. Mason.”

“Why not?”

“It was planting evidence. I don’t know much law, but it certainly seems to me that it’s a violation of law. If it isn’t, it’s a violation of legal ethics — or so I should think.”

Mason lit a cigarette. “Know anything about surgery?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

Mason said, “There are times when you have to cut, and cut deep in order to save the patient’s life. This was what you might call legal surgery.”

“Isn’t it illegal?”

“Perhaps.”

“Is it going to make trouble for you if I tell?”

“Definitely.”

Her eyes softened somewhat. She said, “Mr. Mason, you’ve been very, very nice. I don’t know why you made me do that — yes, I do, too. You sympathized very much with Marvin, and I think you’re holding something back from me.”

Mason said, “That’s what I want to talk with you about. Sit down. Let’s have a cocktail and a cigarette and talk.”

“We’ll dispense with the cocktail,” she said. “Let’s make it a cigarette, and I’d like to have you hand it to me straight from the shoulder.”

” Can you take it?”

“Yes.”

Mason said, “I’ve already told you the truth about Marvin’s background and why your father employed me. And I told you that I hadn’t found anything in the record of that murder case, but that I was working on another angle. Well, I now have the proof I need. I can clear Marvin of the stigma of his father’s tragedy — but I can’t do it unless I can do it my way. Once you say anything about the duck, I’m mixed up in the case — up to my neck. Once I’m mixed in it, I can’t be free to do the things I want to clear up that old case. Once Marvin hears of that old case, he’ll run out on you. You should know that.

“The district attorney would love to get me hooked with that duck business. He also wants to put on evidence about that old murder case. You’re going to play right into his hands. If the district attorney tries to put on evidence concerning that old case as additional motivation for Burr’s murder, the witnesses will commit perjury. I want the thing handled my way.”

“How is that?” she asked, apparently hesitating about forming her decision.

“I want you to get one message to your father.”

“What?”

“Tell him to make his damn fool lawyer sit down and shut up ,” Mason said, with so much feeling that his hearers were startled.

“Why? Why, what do you mean? He hasn’t said very much. He’s cross-examined the witnesses and only made one or two objections.”

“He’s objecting to that question about what the officer found when he went up to Milter’s apartment,” Mason said.

“Well, good heavens, isn’t that the whole thing? Doesn’t the whole case hinge on that? As I told you, I don’t know much law, but it seems to me that if they can drag that other murder into it, and smear Dad with a lot of suspicion in the one case and a lot of suspicion in the other, then people will think he’s guilty and...”

“Of course they will,” Mason said, “and so will the judge. But the newspapers have already commented on that stuff. Every man, woman, and child in the courtroom who’s old enough to read or think knows the evidence that the district attorney is trying to bring out. If your dad manages to suppress it by a legal technicality, it will still be lurking in the back of the judge’s mind. What does your father’s lawyer intend to do?”

“I don’t know.”

Mason said, “I heard that he thinks the case is so black that the judge won’t dismiss it, that therefore he’s not going to try to put on any evidence at this time, but let your father be bound over for trial, and put on his evidence at the time of the trial.”

“Well, isn’t that good legal policy?”

Mason looked at her and said, “No.”

“Why?”

“Because your father is a proud man. This thing is eating into his spirit. A little of it will do him good. Too much of it will ruin him. What’s more, it will ruin him in the community. This is a small place. Your father is prominent. He’s got to smash this thing right in its tracks or it will smash him. If his lawyer starts taking advantage of technicalities, and people feel that your father was acquitted on a technicality... oh, well, what’s the use?”

She said, “Do you want me to talk with Dad?”

“No,” Mason said morosely.

“Why not?”

Mason said, “Because it’s not my case. It’s even unethical for me to say a word about what the other attorney is doing.”