Эрл Гарднер - The Case of the Careless Kitten

“I endeavor to anticipate your every wish,” said Mason with mock formality.

“That’s very thoughtful of you.”

Lieutenant Tragg turned, pushed his head through the door, called out to someone, “Close that bedroom door.”

He waited until the sound of a door slamming shut indicated that his order had been obeyed.

“Come on in, Mason.”

Tragg led the way into the living room. Mason’s eyes, by this time thoroughly adjusted to the light, took in the significant details with photographic clarity.

Gerald Shore, apparently perfectly calm and composed, was sitting in an easy chair, his knees crossed, puffing placidly at his pipe. A plain-clothes officer stood unobtrusively in the shadows, his hat brim pulled down so that his face was completely in the shadow. The ruddy tip of a lighted cigarette glowed and paled alternately as he smoked. A man whom Mason took to be Komo, with a distinctly Oriental cast of countenance, was seated within a few feet of the officer.

That end of the long room was shadowed by a relatively dim illumination, but the end over toward the hallway leading to Matilda’s bedroom and the hallway itself blased with the brilliant light thrown by powerful floodlights in reflectors which were supported on metal stands. These lamps quite evidently had been used to give illumination for photographic purposes. The wires which led to them from outlets in various parts of the living room and hall criss-crossed over the floor.

The closed door and the end of the hall concealed the interior of the room beyond. The blazing floodlights standing just outside the door, showed quite plainly that Lieutenant Tragg had wanted photographs of the bedroom, and the sinister red stain on the hardwood floor by the door showed why.

“Sit down, Mason,” Tragg said. “I don’t want to take any unfair advantage of you. I have asked you for cooperation in times past. I’m not doing that now, because I’m in a definitely hostile position.”

“How so?” Mason asked.

“Mr. Shore says you’re his attorney. He isn’t doing any talking. I don’t like that.”

“I don’t blame you,” Mason said.

“And,” Tragg went on, “I don’t propose to stand for it. When a man tries to conceal something from me in a murder case, I consider it an admission of guilt.”

Mason’s nod was sympathetic.

“I’m hoping,” Tragg said to Mason, “that you’ll talk. It’s going to be unfortunate for your client if you don’t.”

Mason nodded to Gerald Shore, sat down in a chair by the table, and said, “Of course I’ll talk, Tragg. I’m always willing to talk.”

Tragg drew up a chair.

Shore removed the pipe from his mouth. “Lieutenant Tragg has been asking me questions. I told him you were my lawyer.”

Tragg said, “That doesn’t prevent you from answering questions about an entirely different matter.”

“How do you know it’s an entirely different matter?” Mason asked.

“Because it must have occurred after he’d employed you.”

“I see.”

Shore tamped the tobacco down into the bowl of the pipe with his finger and said, “It’s an axiom of the profession, Lieutenant, that a lawyer who seeks to advise himself has a fool for a client.”

Tragg said, “The point is, Shore refuses to tell me where he was when this crime occurred.”

Mason said, “Suppose you tell me what crime we’re talking about, Tragg.”

Tragg said, “All right — I’ll tell you that. Helen Kendal was sitting on that davenport talking with Jerry Templar, her — well, if she’s not engaged to him, she ought to be. They heard a noise in Mrs. Shore’s bedroom.”

“What sort of a noise?” Mason asked, his eyes showing keen interest.

“As though a bedside stand or something of the kind had been knocked over.”

“By an intruder climbing in through that window on the north side?” Mason asked.

Tragg hesitated for a moment, then said, “Well, yes.”

“Go on.”

“Naturally, Helen Kendal was startled,” Tragg said, “as she knew that her aunt was not in her bedroom. After that they both heard sounds that should have been Matilda Shore walking across the room, the thump-thump of a cane and the slightly dragging steps. It’s significant that if Miss Kendal hadn’t known that Mrs. Shore was in the hospital, she would not have paid any attention to the sounds, thinking that her aunt had accidentally overturned some object in getting out of bed to go to the bathroom. But since she knew Mrs. Shore was not in the house, they started to investigate.”

“Mrs. Shore was in the hospital?” Mason asked.

Tragg said, “She was. I can vouch for that. Templar opened the door. While he was fumbling for the light switch, someone who was in the room shot him with a revolver. Two shots were fired. The first missed. The second struck him in the left side.”

“Killed?” demanded Mason quickly.

“No. I understand his chances of recovery are about fifty-fifty. The doctors are performing an emergency operation.”

“This seems to be one of your more lurid nights, Tragg,” Mason broke in dryly.

Tragg ignored him. “They ought to have that bullet shortly, if they have not already recovered it. I’ve got here, though, the bullet which missed him and which hit the woodwork just to the side of the door. It missed Helen Kendal’s head by a scant inch or two. It’s a .38 caliber slug, apparently fired from a conventional double-action, self-cocking revolver. I haven’t as yet matched it up with the bullet which killed Henry Leech, but I won’t be at all surprised if all three shots were fired from the same gun. That means, of course, they were fired by the same person.”

Mason drummed softly with the tips of his fingers on the arm of the chair. “Interesting,” he observed.

“Isn’t it?” Tragg said acidly.

Mason nodded. “If we concede in advance that all three shots were fired from the same gun and that, therefore, they must have been fired by the same person, we can exclude Leech because he is dead, Matilda Shore because she was in a hospital at the time the last crime was committed, Gerald Shore because he has a perfect alibi for that same period, also Helen Kendal and Jerry Templar. Moreover...”

“I’m quite capable of working out the theory of elimination,” Tragg interrupted. “What I am interested in is your statement that Gerald Shore has an alibi.”

Mason said, “He has.”

“Well, what is it?”

Mason smiled. “You haven’t told me the time the crime was committed.”

“Then how do you know he has an alibi?” Tragg countered quickly.

“That’s right,” Mason said, smiling, “I don’t, do I? Now let’s see. The person who entered that room knew that Mrs. Shore wasn’t in the room, but didn’t know that Helen Kendal knew it. ”

“How do you make that deduction?” Tragg asked, interested.

Mason said, “Because he tried to deceive Helen by impersonating Mrs. Shore, and walking across the room just as Mrs. Shore would have done. That proves Gerald Shore couldn’t have done it. Gerald knew that Helen knew her aunt wasn’t in the house.”

Tragg frowned. It was plain that Mason’s reasoning impressed him, and also upset some theory he had formed.

Suddenly the guard at the other end of the room said, “This Jap’s doing a lot of listening, Lieutenant. His ears are sticking out a foot.”

Tragg turned, his face showing annoyance. “Get him out of here.”

Komo bowed. “Excussse please,” he said with dignity. “I am not Japanese. I am Korean. My sentiments for Japanese are not friendly.”

“Get him out!” Tragg repeated.

The guard clapped a hand on Komo’s shoulder. “Come on, Skibby,” he said. “Out!”