Erle Gardner - Case of the Silent Partner

“Did you sleep?” Mason asked.

She shook her head.

Mason said, “I’m going to get you a doctor.”

“No, no. I’m — I’ll be all right.”

“I have one I can trust.”

“He’ll know who I am.”

“Certainly he will. You’re Mrs. Charles Dunkurk of San Diego. You’re here to consult me on a very important matter. The excitement has undermined your health.”

Mason crossed over to the telephone and called Dr. Willmont’s office. He found the doctor was at the hospital, and left word for him to call Mrs. Dunkurk’s room at the hotel. Then he went back to talk with Mrs. Lawley. “Feel up to telling me what happened?” he asked.

She said, “I had a shock.”

Mason’s nod was sympathetic. “Don’t talk any more than you have to. I can tell you most of it. There are only one or two details I need to have you fill in.”

“What are they?”

Mason said, “Your sister came to your house last night. She said enough to make it seem your husband had been in some rather serious difficulties. He raised his voice in an angry denial, and you heard him, got out of bed, and started downstairs.”

“No,” she said. “I was eavesdropping. Millie and Bob never did get along. I always felt that she...”

“I know,” Mason interrupted. “Anyway, you heard enough to make you determined you were going to learn more. When your husband went out, you followed him.”

She started to say something, then checked herself.

Mason said, “Lynk was murdered up in Lilac Canyon. Your sister knows something which makes her think you did it.”

“That I killed Lynk?”

“Yes.”

“She wouldn’t think that.”

“Either that, or there’s some bit of evidence which makes her think the police will arrest you.”

The woman on the bed said nothing, but stared past Mason with a look of almost dreamy abstraction.

“Can you tell me what it is?” Mason asked.

“No.”

“Did you kill Lynk?”

“No.”

Mason said, “Lynk had some stock which he was holding as collateral security — stock in the Faulkner Flower Shops.”

“No, that’s a mistake. He didn’t have that.”

“He didn’t?”

“No.”

“Who does have it?”

“I do.”

“Where?” Mason asked.

“As it happens,” she said, “I have it with me.”

Mason pursed his lips in a silent whistle. “So that’s it,” he said after a moment.

“What is?”

“You got that stock from Lynk.”

“Don’t be silly. I had it all the time.”

“Remember,” Mason went on, “Lynk had a partner. Clint Magard put screws on Lynk yesterday afternoon, and found out everything that had been going on.”

“I don’t see what that has to do with me.”

“A great deal. Magard knows that Lynk had that stock with him last night when he went to Lilac Canyon.”

“He’s mistaken, Mr. Mason.”

He said, “I’m afraid I can’t help you, Mrs. Lawley. I don’t defend murderers. If I handle a case, I want some assurance that my client is innocent.”

She stirred uneasily on the bed. Mason said, “I’m sorry. I’m not going to put you to any more strain. I’d like to help you, but the way things are now, I can’t.”

She sighed, closed her eyes, interlaced her fingers, and said wearily, “I’ll tell you... how it happened.”

“Cut out all the trimmings, just give me the bare facts.”

“After Millie left, I wanted to ask Bob some questions, but I didn’t want him to know I’d been listening. I went back to my room and dressed. I heard Bob moving around downstairs. He did some telephoning. He talked with a friend of his named Coll, and he kept dialing some number that didn’t answer. About eleven-thirty, I heard him go out. I hesitated for a while, wondering whether I dared. Then I decided to take a chance. My coupe was in the garage. I didn’t turn the lights on. I pulled out before he’d gone two blocks and managed to follow him.”

“Where?” Mason asked.

“Lilac Canyon.”

“You followed him?” Mason asked.

“Without any difficulty. He was completely engrossed. I didn’t have any trouble until he got up to Lilac Canyon. Then the road twisted and turned so much I couldn’t see which way he turned.”

“So you lost him?” Mason asked, keeping his eyes and voice without expression.

“I knew from what I’d overheard of his conversation over the phone that a man named Lynk had a place up at Lilac Canyon.”

“So you went to Lynk’s place?” Mason asked.

“Yes.”

“How did you find it?”

“I made inquiries.”

“Where?”

“There’s a little store and service station, just a neighborhood affair, down by the foot of the grade. I remembered having passed that. Lights were on and a lot of cars in front. They were having a birthday celebration for the man that runs it. Of course, I didn’t know that at the time. I just knew the lights were on... They told me when I went in... I asked him if they knew where Mr. Lynk’s place was... I asked indirectly.”

“They told you?”

“Yes. One of the guests knew.”

“And you went up there?”

“Yes.”

“Now approximately how much of an interval had elapsed from the time you lost sight of your husband until you arrived at Lynk’s cabin?”

“Ten minutes.”

“All right, go ahead.”

“I went to the cabin and knocked. There was no answer. The door was slightly ajar — open perhaps an inch.”

“You went in?” Mason asked.

“Yes.”

“And what did you find?”

“You know what I found — a man — I suppose it was Lynk — slumped over against a table. He was dead — shot.”

“What did you do?”

She indicated that she wanted to rest. For more than a minute she lay with her eyes closed, breathing heavily. At length she said, “The shock should have killed me, but, strangely enough, I didn’t have any shock — not then... For some reason, I was as detached as though I had been watching a mystery play on the screen.”

“You weren’t frightened?”

“I seemed to be without any emotion whatever. My feelings were completely numbed. The shock — that is, the emotional shock — came later.”

“Go ahead,” Mason said.

“I knew, of course, that Bob had been out there, that they’d had a quarrel, and Bob had shot him.”

“How did you know that?”

“For one thing,” she said, “my gun — that is, Millie’s gun, the one that she gave me — was on the floor.”

“How did you know it was that same gun?”

“Because there’s a little corner chipped off of the mother-of-pearl handle.”

“Where was the gun?”

“Lying on the floor.”

“What did you do?”

“Picked it up.”

“Were you wearing gloves?” Mason asked.

“No.”

“Then you got your fingerprints all over it?”

“I suppose so.”

“You didn’t think of that at the time?”

“No.”

“Then why did you pick up the gun? Did you think you might have to defend yourself?”

“No, of course not. I thought it was evidence Bob had left. I was protecting him. I... love him. I’m his wife.”

“All right, you picked up the gun. What did you do with it?”

“Put it... in the pocket of my coat.”

“And then what?”

“There were papers on the table,” she said.

“You looked through those papers?”

“No, I didn’t. But something caught my eye. The stock in the Faulkner Flower Shops.”

“How did that happen to catch your eye?”

“It’s distinctive, the lithography on the stock certificate. I saw this stock certificate, picked it up — saw what it was.”