Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Careless Kitten

“What is the meaning of this?” she demanded.

“Why,” Gerald Shore explained, “we heard you were ill, and naturally wanted to see if there was anything we could do.”

“Who told you?”

“Mr. Mason learned about it.”

She turned to Mason. “How?” she demanded.

Mason bowed. “Just casually.”

Gerald Shore put in hastily, “We had to see you, Matilda. Some things have happened which you should know about.”

“I’ve been sick. I don’t want visitors. How did you know where I was? Why did you bring these people?”

Gerald Shore said, “Perry Mason, the lawyer, and Della Street, his secretary, are interested in certain matters which are important to you.”

Matilda Shore swung her big head on its thick neck, surveyed Perry Mason, and said, “Humph!”

“How did you know where I was?” she asked after a moment.

Helen Kendal said, “Komo was very much alarmed about you. He said you’d been poisoned, that you acted just like the kitten. You told him to drive you to a hospital.”

“Why, the little slant-eyed hypocrite,” Matilda Shore said. “I told him to keep his mouth shut.”

“He did,” Mason said, “until after he learned that we knew all about it. I am the one who found out about what had happened. I didn’t talk with Komo. Your niece talked with him after I had told her where you were.”

“How did you find out?”

Mason merely smiled. “I must protect my sources of information.”

Heaving herself up to a more erect sitting position, Matilda Shore said, “And will you kindly tell me why my whereabouts and my physical condition should be any of your business?”

“But, Matilda,” Gerald interrupted to explain. “There’s something about which you have to know. We simply had to reach you.”

“Well, what is it? Stop beating around the bush.”

Gerald said, “Franklin is alive.”

“That’s no news to me, Gerald Shore. Of course, he’s alive! I’ve always known he was alive. Ran off with a trollop and left me to twiddle my thumbs. I suppose this means you’ve heard from him.”

“You shouldn’t condemn him too hastily, Aunt Matilda,” Helen Kendal said in a voice which failed to carry the least conviction.

“No fool like an old fool,” Matilda grumbled. “Man who was almost sixty running off with a woman half his age.”

Mason turned to Gerald Shore. “Perhaps you’d better tell her how it happens you know he’s alive.”

“He telephoned us this afternoon — rather, he telephoned Helen.”

The bedsprings heaved as Matilda twisted her big body around. She opened a drawer in the table near the bed, took out a pair of steel-rimmed spectacles, adjusted them to her nose, and looked at her niece as though she were examining a bug through a microscope.

“So — he telephoned — you . Afraid of me, I suppose.”

The door opened. A nurse glided into the room, her starched uniform giving forth a businesslike rustle.

“You mustn’t excite the patient,” she warned. “She really isn’t supposed to have visitors. You can only stay a few minutes.”

Matilda glared at her. “I’m all right. Please leave us alone.”

“But the doctor...”

Matilda Shore motioned imperiously toward the door.

The nurse hesitated a moment.

“I’ll have to notify the doctor,” she murmured, then withdrew.

Matilda swung back to Helen Kendal. “So he telephoned you, and you didn’t say a word about it. That’s gratitude. For ten years I devote myself to your—”

Gerald Shore spoke hastily, “You see, Matilda, she thought she might be dealing with an impostor, and she didn’t want to disturb you with the news until she had made certain.”

“Why did he telephone her? ” Matilda demanded.

“That’s just it,” Gerald said placatingly. “Everything indicated that we were dealing, not with Franklin, but with some impostor who wanted to impose upon the family. We thought it would be better to establish a preliminary contact before telling you anything about it.”

“I’m not a child.”

“I understand, Matilda, but we thought it was better this way.”

“Humph!”

Helen Kendal said, “He told me particularly that I couldn’t see him unless I followed his instructions to the letter.”

“Did you see him?” Matilda asked, peering through her spectacles at her niece.

“No, we didn’t. A man by the name of Leech was to lead us to him — and something happened so that Leech couldn’t do it.”

Matilda Shore said, “It was Franklin all right. Sounds just like him — trying to sneak in the back way — wants to get hold of Helen, play up to her, get her sympathies aroused, and get her to intercede with me. Tell him to stop hiding behind a woman’s skirts and come out in the open and meet me. I’ll tell him a thing or two. I’ll file suit for divorce the minute he shows his face. I’ve been waiting ten years for this.”

Mason said, “I trust your poisoning wasn’t serious, Mrs. Shore.”

She rolled her eyes toward him, said, “Poisoning is always serious.”

“How did it happen?” Gerald asked.

“Got hold of the wrong bottle, that’s all. Had some heart medicine and some sleeping tablets in the medicine cupboard. Had a bottle of stout before I went to bed. Then went to get some sleeping tablets. Got the wrong bottle.”

“When did you suspect it was the wrong bottle?” Mason asked.

“Had a little spasm,” she replied. “Rang for Komo, told him to get out the car, to notify my doctor, and get me up to the hospital. Had enough presence of mind to drink a lot of mustard water and to get rid of as much of the stuff as I could. Told the doctor about how I’d gone to the medicine cabinet in the dark to take some sleeping medicine after I’d had my stout, told him I’d got the wrong bottle by mistake. Not certain he believes me. Anyhow, he got busy and fixed me up. I’m all right now. Want you to keep your mouth shut about that poisoning. I don’t want to have the police interfering in my business. Now then, I want to find Franklin. Let’s get him out into the open.”

Mason said, “Has it ever occurred to you, Mrs. Shore, that there might be some connection between the return of your husband and the two instances of poisoning which have occurred in your household?”

“Two?” she asked.

“The kitten and you.”

Matilda Shore studied him for the space of several seconds, then said, “Fiddlesticks! I got the wrong bottle, that’s all.”

“I’m asking you if the idea has occurred to you that the drink was poisoned.”

“Bosh! I tell you I got the wrong bottle.”

“Don’t you think you owe it to yourself to do something about it?”

“What should I do?”

Mason said, “At least, you should take steps to prevent a recurrence. If someone has made an attempt on your life, you certainly should do something about it.”

“You mean the police?”

“Why not?”

“The police!” she exclaimed scornfully. “I’m not going to have them messing in my life and giving out a lot more stuff to the newspapers. That’s what always happens. You call in the police to protect you, and some idiot who wants to see his picture in the paper rushes out to the reporters and tells them the whole story. I won’t have it. Besides, I just made a mistake.”

Mason said, “Unfortunately, Mrs. Shore, after what’s happened tonight, there is going to be a lot of publicity.”

“What do you mean, after what happened tonight?”

“This man Leech who was to lead us to your husband failed to do so.”

“Why?”

Mason said, “Because someone stopped him.”