Erle Gardner - The Case Of The Dangerous Dowager

The district attorney frowned. Mason said, "Go ahead, Belgrade."

Belgrade said importantly, "I was shadowing Sylvia Oxman. I saw her go into the offices. While she was in there, Frank Oxman went down the corridor, just as he says he did. Then he turned around and came out again. It couldn't have been more than seven or eight seconds. After he'd gone out, Mr. Mason went in. Then Sylvia Oxman came out and stuck around the casino. Then Charlie Duncan and Perkins went in. Then Mason and Perkins came out and, within a few seconds, Charlie Duncan came out, and Sylvia Oxman went up on deck. I followed her up on deck and saw her..."

"Wait a minute," Duncan interrupted. "You were where you could see the entrance to the offices, weren't you?"

"Yes."

"And you know how long it was after Mason and Perkins came out that I came out?"

"It couldn't have been over a few seconds."

"As much as a minute?" Duncan asked.

"No, Charlie, I don't think it was."

"You see," Duncan said to the Federal District Attorney, "this substantiates my statement that..."

"Fiddlesticks!" Mason interrupted. "If you were there alone for as much as three seconds, you had an opportunity to pitch a gun out of the porthole."

Basil Wilson said, "I think as far as this office is concerned, Duncan, you're out of it. The evidence points to Sylvia Oxman as being the guilty party. Do you wish to make any statement, Mrs. Oxman?"

"No," Mason said, "she doesn't."

Wilson frowned at Mason. "Do I understand that, as her attorney, you're advising her to make no statement?"

"That's right."

"The Federal Grand Jury," Wilson said coldly, "will hold that against her."

Mason nodded easily. "That's all right. You see, Wilson, she can't very well make a statement without implicating me."

The Federal District Attorney picked up a file of papers. "Well, we'll go into the Grand Jury room and... What was that last statement you made, Mason?"

"I said," Mason repeated, the corners of his mouth twisting into a smile, "that she couldn't very well make a statement without implicating me."

"I think I know what you mean," Wilson said, "but if you'd like to elaborate on your remark, I'd be willing to listen."

Mason said, "Sylvia Oxman went aboard the gambling ship to see Sam Grieb. She found the door of the office slightly ajar. She pushed it open and found Sam Grieb murdered. He was seated at his desk in exactly the position the officers subsequently found the body. The three IOU's she'd given him, in an amount of seventy-five hundred dollars, were on a corner of the desk. About that time, she was alarmed by the noise made by an electric signal, which indicated someone was coming down the corridor. She was rattled, and didn't know just what to do, so she turned around and ran into the outer office and sat down, pretending she was waiting for a chance to see Grieb. A few moments later I entered that office and found her there. She was holding an open magazine. I said something to her, and then, noticing the door of the inner office was ajar, pushed it open and entered..."

"Wait a minute... Wait a minute," the Federal District Attorney interrupted, jabbing frantically at the push-button on his desk, "I'm going to have this statement taken down in shorthand."

"Go ahead," Mason said easily.

Paul Drake looked across at Mason, an expression of startled incredulity on his face. Duncan glanced triumphantly about him and lit a cigar. A man with a shorthand notebook and fountain pen came hurrying in from an adjoining office. The Federal District Attorney said, jabbing his finger at Perry Mason, "This is Perry Mason, the lawyer. He's making a confession. Take it down."

"A confession?" Mason asked.

"Go right ahead," the Federal District Attorney said, "we won't quibble over words. You've already admitted pushing open the door. You've admitted Sylvia Oxman was in the outer office at the time, and had been in the private office. You gentlemen have heard that statement?"

Wilson's eyes swept the circle of faces, and received grave nods of acquiescence. "Let the record show," he said to the shorthand reporter, "that the people in this room all reply in the affirmative."

"Let the record show that I'm nodding too," Mason said, grinning, apparently enjoying himself hugely... "Well, as I was remarking, I entered the inner office and found Grieb's body slumped over the desk. I grabbed Sylvia Oxman as she was leaving the office. She admitted then she'd been in there before. I told her to go on out. When she'd gone, I opened the drawer of Grieb's desk, deposited seventy-five hundred dollars, the face value of the three IOU's Sylvia Oxman had signed, touched a match to the IOU's and burned them up."

"You what?" the district attorney asked, his eyes wide.

"I burned them up."

"Didn't you know you were committing a crime when you did that, Mr. Mason?"

Mason raised his eyebrows and said, "Why, no. What crime?"

"Compounding a felony."

"In what way?"

"Those IOU's furnished a motive for the murder."

"Did they?" Mason said. "Well, of course, that's news to me."

"And when you destroyed them, you destroyed evidence. You were also guilty of a felony in wrongfully taking those IOU's."

"Personally," Mason said, "I don't think they're evidence of anything. Therefore, I wasn't guilty of anything when I destroyed them. Furthermore, I didn't take them, I paid for them."

"Wait a minute," Wilson said, frowning. "This doesn't agree with Oxman's statement."

"That's right," Mason said easily.

"I'm afraid," the Federal District Attorney went on, "that so far as the Federal Jury is concerned, Mr. Mason, they will be far more inclined to take Oxman's word than yours."

Mason shrugged his shoulders. "Well, that's all right. Let them. But I don't think they'll take Oxman's written statement against my word. Oxman had better show up and try to substantiate his story if he wants to make it stick."

The district attorney frowned. "I don't care to argue the point, Mr. Mason. Do you have any further statement to make?"

"Yes," Mason went on easily. "Shortly after I'd destroyed the IOU's, an electric signal in the office announced someone was coming down the corridor. I slipped back into the outer office and pulled the door shut behind me just as Duncan and Perkins entered the office. I believe Mr. Duncan has correctly stated what happened after that... Oh, yes, there's one point I wanted to make: you'll remember, Perkins, that Duncan crossed over to the vault, saying he wanted to open it. He grasped the door handle, and turned the knob of the combination. You advised him not to open it."

"That's right," Perkins said.

"That's true?" Mason asked Duncan.

Duncan mouthed his cigar for a second or two, and then slowly nodded and said, "Yes, that's true. I wanted to look in the vault and see what had happened to those IOU's."

Mason grinned at the district attorney and said, "Well, there's your murder case."

"What do you mean?" the district attorney asked.

"My God," Mason said, "do I have to draw you a diagram? Don't you see it yet?"

The district attorney flushed, and said with dignity, "I see, Mr. Mason, that, according to your own confession, you have involved yourself as an accessory after the fact. You have aided and abetted Sylvia Oxman in her escape. You have failed to do your duty as an attorney and an officer of the court."

Mason lit a cigarette, grinned across at the district attorney and said, "Where was Manning?"

Duncan said, "You know where Manning was. He was out in the casino. And as soon as I pressed the signal which summoned him, he entered the offices and took charge. Didn't you, Arthur?"

"Well," Manning said with slow deliberation, "there was a delay of a few seconds after you gave the signal, before I actually reached the offices."