Erle Gardner: The Case Of The Dangerous Dowager

"Frank Oxman isn't here," one of the deputies at the door said. "He's not in his room at his hotel. He must have sneaked out the back door. The clerk swears he didn't go out past the desk."

The district attorney showed his irritation. "We want him," he said. "He's a material witness. We can make out a case without him, but his testimony corroborates the circumstantial evidence. Get him!"

"We're expecting to pick him up at any time," the deputy said, in a voice which somehow failed to carry assurance.

"Well, we have his signed statement and know what his story is," the district attorney remarked. "For the purpose of this inquiry, we'll take that statement as being true. He's under a subpoena and if he tries to skip out, it'll be that much the worse for him when we do catch him."

Mason stole a surreptitious glance at Paul Drake. The detective slowly closed his glassy eyes, almost imperceptibly nodded his head. Mason settled back in his chair.

Basil Wilson said, "I want you people to realize the position you're in. I'm not making any definite charges right now, but I think it's due to the influence of Mr. Mason that you've been playing fast and loose with the law. You can't do that and get away with it. You're all of you under subpoena to appear before the Federal Grand Jury, which is now in session. I'm not making any promises of immunity, and I'm not making any concessions, but I've called you together in this office to tell you that each and every one of you is going before the Federal Grand Jury and is going to be put under oath. I'm not particularly disposed to be harsh on those who have innocently followed the advice of an attorney.

"You can expedite matters in front of the Grand Jury if you'll state freely and frankly at this time exactly what you know about Grieb's murder."

Mason lit a cigarette and said cheerfully, "Well, if I'm going to be the goat in this thing, I should have an opportunity to say something in my own behalf."

The district attorney said, somewhat testily, "I don't care particularly about a statement from you, Mr. Mason. I know what you have done. You have made yourself an accessory after the fact and compounded a felony."

Mason said, "You'll agree with me that one can't be an accessory after the fact unless the person he aids is actually guilty of a felony."

Wilson's mouth, under his frosty, gray mustache, became uncompromisingly hard. "If," he said, ominously, "you think you can find a legal loop-hole for Sylvia Oxman, your previous victories, which have been due largely to luck, have left you unduly optimistic."

Mason waved his hand in a gesture of dismissal, as though brushing the district attorney's comment aside. "The gun," he said, "which the officers found in Sylvia's room was planted there by someone who knew she was in the hotel and who tossed it over the transom of Sylvia's room. Find the one who did that, and you'll find the murderer."

"We've already heard that story," Wilson said, "and you are at liberty to raise the point in front of a jury if you wish. I think you will find that even the most impressionable masculine juror will consider that explanation too weird to be taken seriously."

Mason nodded to Arthur Manning.

"All right, Manning," he said, "do your stuff."

Manning raised his eyebrows and said, "You mean..."

"Yes," Mason said, "I mean tell them what you know."

Manning took a deep breath. "I know," he said, "that Sam Grieb committed suicide."

"Did what!" Basil Wilson exclaimed.

"Committed suicide."

"Impossible!" the district attorney said.

"Go ahead, Arthur," Mason said, "and tell the district attorney what you told me. Tell it as briefly as possible."

"Well," Manning said, "it's this way: Sam Grieb kept a .38 automatic in the upper left-hand drawer of his desk. He was left-handed. He'd been dipping into the partnership funds, I think. When he knew Charlie was going to have a receiver appointed, and the books audited, he pulled the gun out of the desk drawer and shot himself.

"I hate to say this, but..."

"That's all right," Mason said, "go right ahead, Arthur, and make your statement."

"Well," Manning went on, "you see, it was like this: Grieb and Duncan took out partnership insurance. The policies didn't pay anything if the man who was insured should commit suicide within a year. They paid twenty thousand if he died a natural death, and forty thousand if he died by violence. Charlie Duncan found Sammy Grieb had committed suicide, and he thought fast enough to know it'd make just forty thousand dollars difference to him if he could make it look like a murder. So he got Mason and the deputy marshal out of the office long enough to pick up Grieb's gun, where it had fallen under the desk, and pitch it overboard."

The Federal District Attorney frowned at Manning and said, "Do you understand what you're saying?"

"Of course I do," Manning said.

"Have you any proof, or is this just surmise?"

"Well," Manning said, "you can figure it out for yourself. Grieb was shot with his own gun. Charlie Duncan saw to it that he was left alone in the room with the body..."

"No, I didn't," Duncan blazed. "Mason, you'll have to admit that I pressed the button which gave the signal for Manning to come before you left the office. Didn't I?"

"Yes," Mason admitted, "you did."

"And how long was it after the signal lights went on before you got into the office, Arthur?" Duncan demanded.

"Well," Manning said, "it was a little while."

"Not over six or eight seconds, was it?"

"Well, I don't know exactly how long it was, but..."

"Where was Perry Mason when you started for the office?"

"He'd just left the office. Perkins had him handcuffed."

"And it didn't take you over four or five seconds to answer my call, did it?"

"Well, no. But you had plenty of time to throw a gun overboard, and I can prove that Sammy was killed with his own gun."

"How?" Duncan asked.

"You remember the time you and Sammy shot at that piece of tin can down below the casino?"

"Yes, what of it?"

"I dug out the bullets. They were fired from the same gun that killed Sammy. And you know you were using Sam's gun on that target practice."

"All right. What if we were?" Duncan asked. "That doesn't prove anything. And you're all wet about this insurance business. There wasn't any insurance."

"I was in the room when you signed the papers," Manning said. "Maybe you don't remember, but I was standing right by..."

Duncan interrupted him. "Sure you were, Arthur. We signed the applications, all right, but Sam couldn't pass the physical examination, so the policies were never issued."

Manning's face showed consternation. "You mean there wasn't any insurance?"

"Exactly!" Duncan said. "It didn't make a dime's worth of difference to me whether Sam was murdered or committed suicide."

The Federal District Attorney glanced at Perry Mason and permitted himself a smile.

"So," he said, "that seems to dispose of that phase of the inquiry. And I'm willing to admit Grieb was killed with his own gun. Our ballistic experts have fired test shots from the weapon which was found in Sylvia Oxman's room when she was arrested, and there's no question but what it's the murder gun. Now, if you want to prove it was Grieb's gun, so much the better. That simply accounts for the fingerprints left by Sylvia Oxman when she leaned over the desk. She braced herself by leaning on her left hand when she jerked the gun from the drawer with her right hand."

Perry Mason asked easily, "Well then, how about Oxman?"

"What do you mean?" Wilson asked.

"Why did he skip out?"

"Probably because he feared publicity. Oxman's statement checks in every detail with the testimony of Mr. Belgrade."

Belgrade nodded, frowned, cleared his throat, and said, "Pardon me, Mr. Wilson."