Erle Gardner - The Case of the Haunted Husband

“What did you do?”

“Saw that she got some coffee to sober up on, and told her not to worry, that we would make the chauffeur talk. And I told her never, under any circumstances, to call me again at night.

“I thought she had good judgment, too. You haven’t heard anything more from Mrs. Greeley?”

“No.”

Mason looked at his watch. “Well, she should be here. She...”

Drake said abruptly, “That sounds fishy as hell to me, Perry.”

“What is that?”

“That story about the Zitkousky girl.”

Mason grinned. “All right then, I will change it. What sounds fishy about it?”

“About her getting so hysterical and offended at a guy making a pass at her. She is too damned attractive and too good-natured not to have had...”

“All right,” Mason said, “I shall change it. Thanks for the tip.”

Drake looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Now what?” he asked.

Mason said, “I have got to make this sound good for Tragg.”

“What’s the idea? Hold it, Perry. Here’s someone coming. Sounds like a woman.”

Mason walked over to the door which led to the corridor. He said, “As far as you know, I haven’t left the office, Paul. That may be better than telling Tragg about how Horty got sore at her boyfriend.” He flung open the door. Mrs. Greeley, garbed in black and carrying a light suitcase, stood in the corridor.

“Come in,” Mason invited, reaching out and taking the suitcase and when she had entered the office and he had closed the door, he went on, “Sit down, Mrs. Greeley. I am sorry we had to intrude on your dinner.”

“Oh, it is all right. To be perfectly frank, Mr. Mason, I don’t suppose I should go out so soon, but I feel a lot better doing that than I would sitting home and doing nothing. It is a frightfully all-gone feeling.”

“I understand.”

“I guess people never realize how much they take for granted in life,” she said with a little laugh. “Here it was only last week I was fussing because my husband had to work so much at nights, and now... and now... Oh, well, I will get to feeling sorry for myself if I keep on. Wish I could get something to work on — something to sink my teeth into.

“Death is so horribly final, Mr. Mason. I–I have never been touched closely by death before. Somehow, it shakes my faith in... things. And no one has been able to say anything that helps. Death is... it’s cruel, it’s terrible.”

“It’s no more terrible than birth,” Mason said. “We can’t understand it any more than we can understand life — or the sky at night. If we only had the vision to see the whole pattern of life, we would see death as something benign.”

She stared up at him. “Please go on. If you can only say something practical and sensible. I have heard so much hypocritical ‘all-for-the-best?’ business that I am sick and tired of it. How can it be for the best? Bosh!”

Mason said, “Suppose you couldn’t remember anything from one day to the next. You would get up in the morning without any recollection of yesterday. You would feel full of energy. Dew would be on the grass. The sun would be shining bright and warm. Birds would be singing, and you would feel that nature was a wonderful thing. Then the sun would rise higher in the heavens. You would begin to get a little fatigued.

“Along about noon you would be tired, then clouds would blot out the sun. There would be a thunder squall, and the heavens which had once been so friendly would be menacing. You would see water falling out of the sky, and would wonder if you were going to be totally submerged. You would see spurts of lightning tearing the sky apart. You would hear roaring thunder. You would be in terror.

“Then the clouds would drift away. The sun would come out again. The air would be pure and sparkling. You would regain your confidence. Then you would notice that the shadows were lengthening. The sun would disappear. There would be darkness. You would huddle around a light waiting to see what would happen next. You would feel weary, more than a little frightened. You would think that nature, which had started out to be so beautiful, had betrayed you. You would fight hard to keep your faith, and it would be a losing battle.

“The loved ones who were sitting around the fire with you would show signs of fatigue. Their heads would nod forward. They would lie down. Their eyes would close, and suddenly their personalities would be gone. Then you yourself would want to be down, and yet you would feel that as soon as you did, this awful unconsciousness would come over you...”

Mason broke off, smiled and said, “My words don’t carry conviction because you do know all of these symptoms as a part of life. You know that this unconsciousness is only asleep. You know that in the course of a few short hours, you will wake up completely refreshed, that the dawn will be breaking, that the sun will be coming up, the birds singing. You know that the awful visitation of noise and flashes was only a thunder shower, part of nature’s scheme to bring water from the ocean up into the mountains, to feed the streams and the rivers, to make the crops green. You would realize that sleep is nature’s means of strengthening you for a new day, that it is profitless to try to prolong the waking activities too far into the night, that nature is cooperating with you. But suppose you didn’t understand these things? Suppose you could see only from day-to-day?”

She nodded slowly. After a moment, she heaved a deep sigh.

Mason said, “Life is like that. We can only see from birth to death. The rest of it is cut from our vision.”

Drake stared up at Mason. “I shall be doggoned,” he said.

“What’s the matter, Paul?”

“I never knew you were a mystic!”

“I am not a mystic,” Mason said, smiling. “It is simply the application of what you might call legal logic to the scheme of existence, and I don’t ordinarily talk that way. I am doing it now because I think Mrs. Greeley needs it.”

Mrs. Greeley said with feeling, “Mr. Mason, I can’t begin to tell you how much better you have made me feel. Your words carry conviction. I... I guess I am getting my faith back.”

Mason said, “I don’t think you had ever lost it, Mrs. Greeley. Now this is going to be disagreeable. Do you want to get it over with as quickly as possible?”

“I don’t care,” she said. “I... Oh, Mr. Mason, I can’t tell you how much you have comforted me. After all, death is only a sleep. It has to be. I am ashamed of myself, Mr. Mason. I was doubting the whole scheme of things. I was... Is this someone coming?”

“Should be Lieutenant Tragg,” Mason said. “You know him.”

“Oh, yes.”

There were quick steps in the corridor, then the tapping of knuckles on the door. Mason nodded to Drake, who opened the door, and Tragg came in. “Sorry I was detained,” he said. “Good evening, Mrs. Greeley. I hope you don’t think we are entirely unfeeling.”

“No, I understand. I want to show you these things.”

She took the suitcase which Mason handed her, placed it on the floor at her feet, opened the lid, and took out a crumpled shirt. A vivid crimson streak was slashed across the front of the stiffly starched bosom, a streak perhaps five inches long. Above it was the smudged imprint of red lips, partially opened.

The men bent over the smear.

Tragg said, “Notice here. You can even see where the finger was first pressed against the shirt. Then follow the mark to the place where it vanishes. She was trying to push him away.”

Mason nodded.

Tragg looked down at the suitcase. “You have some other things, Mrs. Greeley?”

She said, “After Mr. Mason asked me about his tuxedo, I looked it over. There aren’t any spots on it.”