Erle Gardner - The Case of the Drowning Duck

Mason said, “Yes. He hired the Allgood Detective Agency in Los Angeles to investigate. They sent Milter; then they fired Milter because he talked too much.”

Judge Meehan said, “Of course, this is all off the record. If you boys want me to go back in there and just sit down and listen, I’ll go back and sit down and listen; but if there’s any point about that note being valuable evidence — or if Witherspoon isn’t guilty of those two murders and someone else is, it might be a good idea to have an informal chat and sort of pool our information.”

“I have nothing to say,” Copeland remarked.

Mason said, “Milter was a blackmailer. He was here to collect blackmail. The evidence shows he told his common-law wife he was about ready to make a clean-up. Now whom was he blackmailing?”

“Witherspoon, of course,” the district attorney said.

Mason shook his head. “In the first place, Witherspoon isn’t the sort of man who would pay blackmail. In the second place, Milter had no means of bringing pressure on Witherspoon. Witherspoon didn’t care if all the facts about that old murder came out. He was getting ready to force his daughter to call of the engagement and wipe the thing off his books.”

“How about Witherspoon’s daughter?” Judge Meehan asked. “Hasn’t she got money?”

“Yes.”

“Well, how about her then?”

“If Milter had gone to her with that story, she’d have married Marvin Adams, anyway. He certainly couldn’t say to her, ‘Look here, Miss Witherspoon, I know something about the man you’re going with that you wouldn’t want to hear. If you’ll pay me umpty thousand dollars, I won’t tell you.’”

“That’s right,” Judge Meehan said, “but that isn’t what he’d have told her. He’d have said, ‘You pay me umpty thousand dollars, and I won’t tell your father .’ ”

“Lois Witherspoon wouldn’t have paid him any umpty thousand dollars,” Mason said, grinning. “She wouldn’t have paid him umpty cents. Shed have slapped his damn face, grabbed Marvin Adams, gone over to Yuma, got married, and defied the world.”

“She would, at that,” Judge Meehan agreed, grinning.

“Now, mind you,” Mason went on, “Milter was going to get a large sum of money. He told his common-law wife it was going to be enough so they could travel anywhere they wanted to. That means he had something that was bigger and better than just the ordinary shakedown. It was connected with something he’d discovered while investigating that old murder case. And the person whom he was blackmailing didn’t have the ready cash available to pay off, but was expecting to get it.”

“How do you know that?” Judge Meehan asked.

Mason said, “I’m making deductions now.”

“They don’t hold water,” Copeland objected.

Mason said, “Let’s forget that we’re on opposite sides of the case. Let’s look at this in the light of cold reason. A blackmailer has information. He naturally tries to get all of the money he can for that information. When he’s once got it, he clears out — until after the money’s gone, and then he’s back for more.”

Judge Meehan said, “Keep right on. You’re doing fine as far as I’m concerned.”

Mason said. “Let’s see where that leaves me. Milter investigated a murder. He uncovered certain information. He came here to blackmail someone. That someone kept him waiting. But on the night he was murdered, he expected to get his money. Now what was the information out of which he expected to make a fortune? Whom was he blackmailing and why?”

“Well,” Meehan said, “suppose you answer that question. You don’t seem to think it could have been Witherspoon or his daughter. Therefore, it must have been young Adams. Now, where was young Adams going to get the money?”

The district attorney suddenly sat up straight in his chair. “By marrying Lois Witherspoon!” he exclaimed. “And then getting control of her fortune.”

Mason grinned, said to Copeland, “Then your theory is that Adams was going to get married, immediately grab his wife’s fortune, and squander it on a blackmailer to keep him from telling something which his father-in-law already knew?”

The smile left Copeland’s face.

“Suppose you tell us,” Judge Meehan said.

Mason said, “The agency Milter worked for was crooked. It ran a Hollywood scandal sheet and wasn’t above blackmailing its own clients. Allgood decided that he’d shake down Witherspoon. He was planning the first step in that campaign when I appeared on the scene. He didn’t change his plan of campaign because of that, but simply started using me as a means of contact. It was a penny-ante sort of blackmail, something which had to be carried on on a wholesale basis in order to pay off. Milter, on the other hand, was after real big game. As I see it, gentlemen, there’s only one thing he could have uncovered in connection with that old case which would have given him information that was important enough to be sold for a small fortune.”

The swivel chair squeaked as Judge Meehan, sitting bolt upright, said, “By George, that sounds reasonable. I take it you mean the identity of the real murderer?”

Mason said, “Exactly.”

“Who?” Judge Meehan asked.

Mason said, “Mr. Burr was staying out at Witherspoon’s house. Mr. Burr had been in Winterburg City at about the time of the murders. Mr. Burr was trying to raise cash. He told Witherspoon he had sent East for some money, that he expected it to arrive the day he was kicked by the horse. The history of that old case shows that Corine Hassen said she had a boy friend who was insanely jealous. Roland Burr would have been about twenty-seven at the time. He knew Corine Hassen. Now put all of those things together, and you can make a pretty good deduction as to whom Milter was blackmailing, and why.”

“But how about this money Milter was going to get from the East?” Copeland asked.

“It arrived, all right,” Mason said. “Let’s look back at that old crime. More than one person was involved in it. Carrying Latwell’s body down into the basement of the old manufacturing plant, breaking a hole in the cement in the cellar, digging a grave, interring the body, placing new cement over the hole, putting a pile of refuse back over that place in the cellar, then dashing to Reno, finding where Corine Hassen was waiting for Latwell to join her, getting her out in a rowboat, upsetting the rowboat, letting her drown, then removing her clothes, and leaving the nude body in the lake — well, I would say all that took two persons, one of whom must have had access to the manufacturing plant. If you were being blackmailed for a murder, and you had an accomplice who had money, you’d naturally send for that accomplice and tell her to pay up, wouldn’t you?”

“You mean Latwell’s widow?” Judge Meehan asked.

“That’s right — the present Mrs. Dangerfield.”

Judge Meehan looked across at the district attorney. “This sounds like it was going to hold water,” he said.

Copeland was frowning. “It doesn’t account for the facts,” he said.

“Now then,” Mason went on, “suppose the accomplice decided that it would be a lot better to get rid of Milter than to pay blackmail. In order to do this successfully, the pair would naturally want what crooks would call a ‘fall guy,’ someone to take the blame, someone who had a motive and an opportunity.”

“Witherspoon?” Copeland asked skeptically.

Mason shook his head. “Witherspoon blundered into it by accident. The one they picked as the logical suspect was Marvin Adams. You can see what a sweet case they could have built up by using circumstantial evidence. When the officers broke in to Milter’s apartment, they’d find a drowned duck in a fish bowl. That would be sufficiently unusual to attract immediate attention. Marvin Adams had to go into town to take that midnight train. He had to do some packing. He was planning to come out to Witherspoon’s ranch in a borrowed jalopy. That meant Lois Witherspoon couldn’t ride back to town with him, because, if she did, she wouldn’t have had any way of getting back to the ranch. Marvin had some packing to do. Therefore, it was almost a certainty that, between eleven o’clock in the evening and midnight. Adams would be in El Templo. He’d leave somewhat early to walk down to the train. No one would be with him. He couldn’t prove an alibi. His motivation would be obvious. Milter had tried to blackmail him to keep the old murder case a secret. Adams didn’t have any money. Therefore, he resorted to murder.”