Mason, freshly shaved and seeming as buoyant as a new tennis ball, deftly scaled his hat over the curved brass hook on the rack, walked over to his desk, picked up the file of important correspondence which Della Street had placed on his blotter, and deposited it on the far corner of the desk. Della Street opened the door of her office, grinned a greeting and said, “Hi, Chief. What’s new?”
“How are the birthdays?” he asked.
“Well,” she said, “I’ve recovered all right, but don’t give me any more.”
He laughed. “After all, it was just a fake birthday, Della. You really aren’t a year older, you know.”
“Well,” she observed dubiously, “I feel a year older.”
“Whose suggestion was the birthday?” he asked.
“The Green Room seemed to be the only thing Mrs. Bedford was interested in,” Della said, “and naturally, I had to have some excuse to put on the party.”
“Some party,” Mason told her. “How about the sheiks?”
“What sheiks?”
“The group that flapped around the table, dancing and...”
“Oh,” she said, “you mean the table lizards. I won’t hear from them.”
“How about it?” he asked, amused. “Did they all ask for Lone Bedford’s telephone number and none for yours?”
“Don’t be silly,” she told him.
“And you mean to say you refused to give them your number?”
She smiled reminiscently. “I told them,” she said, “that my name was Virginia Trent, and gave them her number. It should be a good break for the girl.”
Mason laughed. “Paul Drake,” she went on, “wants to see you as soon as you come in.”
“Give him a ring,” Mason told her. “What’s in the papers? Anything?”
“Oh, a lot of stuff” she said, “and Drake seems to be bursting with information, I’ll give him a buzz.”
She entered her office, and Mason picked up the newspapers, to skim through them. A few moments later, Della Street closed the office to stand by the exit door which opened into the corridor. When she heard Paul Drake’s steps outside, she opened the door, and, making a mock salute, stood at attention. “Hello, Della,” the detective said. “Lo, Perry.”
Mason indicated a chair. “What’s new, Paul?”
The detective sat down in the big leather chair, and turned around, draping his legs over one of its arms. “Lots of things,” he said, lighting a cigarette.
“Well,” Mason told him, “begin in the middle and work both ways.”
“On the gambling business,” Drake told him, “I have a couple of live ones spotted, a contractor about fifty-five who was there with a girl who couldn’t have been over thirty and looked twenty. Then there was a bank executive with a fluffy little blonde. Either of those two should be just what we want.”
“How about Lone Bedford?” Mason asked. “Did you follow her?”
“I’ll say.”
“Where?”
“When she left the property room in the jail,” Drake said, opening a notebook and consulting it, “she was in a hurry to go places. She ran over to the comer to flag a cab, didn’t have any luck, and walked down the street a couple of blocks to the Spring Hotel. There’s a taxi stand there. She had the taxi driver crowding signal lights and cutting corners until she came to the Milpas Apartments on Canyon Drive. She went into apartment three fourteen, which is rented by a Pete Chennery. Apparently she’s Mrs. Chennery.”
“Why, her apartment’s at the Bixel Arms on Madison Avenue,” Della Street said, “under her own name. The name isn’t listed in the telephone book because the phone was connected too late to be put in, but it’s under her name, and you can get it by calling information.”
Drake nodded. “How do you figure she’s Mrs. Pete Chennery at the Milpas Apartments?” Mason asked.
“The boys did a little snooping around,” Drake told him.
“Where is she now?”
“At last reports, still at the Milpas.”
“Did your men go through her apartment at the Bixel Arms?”
“We got in,” Drake said,” but were crowded for time. You met her out at the Green Room, took her down to headquarters, and she didn’t stay long. When she left, we figured she might be headed for her apartment, so I flashed the men on the job the signal to get out. They made a pretty good job of it, though. No letters, no correspondence, no checkbook. Nothing personal, except what you’d expect — tooth brushes, cosmetics, clothes, and a couple of hundred engraved visiting cards, together with the copper plate.”
“How about Chennery, was he home when she got there?”
“Apparently not. The apartment was dark.”
Mason said, “I’d like to know more about Chennery, Paul. I want a description. I’d particularly like to find out if there’s any chance Chennery was also known as Austin Cullens.”
“I’m sending some more men out there,” Drake said. “I’m going to pick up everything we can without making her suspicious. You don’t want her to know she’s being tagged, do you?”
“No,” Mason said. “She mustn’t...”
His desk phone rang and Della Street picked up the receiver, listened a minute, turned to Mason and said, “Dr. Gifford.”
Mason took the telephone. Dr. Gifford, speaking with close-clipped, professional rapidity, said, “Try and get this all at once, Mason. I won’t have an opportunity to repeat. Mrs. Breel is fully conscious. Actually she was conscious but sleeping most of the night. She had a concussion. No fracture, no internal injuries, the fracture in the right leg has been reduced, the leg’s in a cast, she’s been placed under arrest, with an officer on guard at the door of the room, no one is allowed to visit her. She refuses to make any statement except in the presence of her attorney, says you’re her lawyer, Sergeant Holcomb is on his way over here. It might be a good plan for you to come down. She’s in six twenty.”
“You’re at the hospital now?” Mason asked.
“Yes.”
“What’s she under arrest for?”
“Charged with the murder of Austin Cullens.”
“She hasn’t made any statement, not even to the nurses?”
“Not a cheep,” Dr. Gifford said. “I’m sneaking this call through to you. Keep it dark. Good-by.”
Mason dropped the receiver into place, strode across the office and grabbed his hat. “Sarah Breel’s recovered consciousness,” he said. “So far, she isn’t talking. They’ve charged her with first-degree murder.”
Drake said, “That means just one thing, Perry.”
“What?” Mason asked.
“That the ballistics department has tested the bullet which killed Cullens with the bullets found from the gun in Mrs. Breel’s bag and find they’re the same.”
“I’m not so sure that gun actually was in her bag,” Mason said.
“Diggers says there was a gun at the scene of the accident,” Drake said. “He evidently thought the bag might contain something valuable, because he made the ambulance men inventory the contents.”
“Anyone see that accident?” Mason asked.
“You mean see her step out in front of the car?”
“Yes.”
“Apparently not,” Drake said. “There were people along just a few minutes afterwards. Mrs. Breel was lying unconscious on the ground.”
Mason said, “Check on Diggers. Find out everything you can about him. I’m on my way.”
“Can I help, Chief?” Della Street asked.
“No,” he told her. “They’ll have a shorthand reporter. I’ll stand more of a chance of crashing the gate alone.”
He clamped his hat on his head, shot through the door and sprinted for the elevator. He caught a cruising cab and said, “Dearborn Memorial Hospital, and what I mean, make it snappy.” In the taxicab, Mason turned over in his mind the various bits of information which had been given him. Undoubtedly, the revolver found in Mrs. Breel’s handbag had been the determining factor in influencing the district attorney’s office to advise her arrest. Had that weapon not discharged the bullet which had caused Cullens’ death, the circumstantial evidence of the stained shoe would not have been sufficient. On the other hand, given the shoe, the gun with which the murder had been committed, and the indisputable evidence which placed Mrs. Breel at the scene of the crime at approximately the time of the murder, the district attorney had a case which, unexplained, would go far toward trapping Mrs. Breel in a net of circumstantial evidence. At the Dearborn Memorial Hospital, Mason took an elevator to the sixth floor, and found Mrs. Breel’s room without difficulty. An officer was on guard in the corridor. From within the room, Mason could hear the sound of excited voices. Mason started to push open the door. The officer interposed a stalwart arm. “No, you don’t, buddy,” he said.
Mason said with dignity, “I wish to see Mrs. Breel. She has asked for me.”
“I don’t care who she’s asked for,” the officer said. “You get in here on a pass, or you stay out.”
“Who’s in there?” Mason asked.
“The doctor, a deputy D.A., a court reporter, Sergeant Holcomb, and a few others.”
“Well, I’m Mrs. Breel’s lawyer.”
“That’s nice.”
“I want in.’
“You said you did.”
Mason sized the officer up. “Tell Sergeant Holcomb I’m here.”
The officer said, “Nope. I ain’t paid for telling anybody anything. I’m here to guard the door.”
Abruptly Mason raised his knuckles and knocked on the door. The officer frowned and jerked Mason’s arm down. “Now, who told you you could do that?” he asked.
Mason’s voice was conciliatory. “Forget it. You’re here to keep anyone from coming in without a pass. That doesn’t mean I can’t knock...”
A man opened the door, glowered at Mason and said, “What?”
Mason raised his voice. “I’m Perry Mason, Mrs. Breel’s lawyer. I want to see my client.”
Mason heard Mrs. Breel say, “Come in, Mr. Mason,” and, at the same time, the man in the doorway and the uniformed officer on guard converged on him, pushing him back into the corridor. The man who had opened the door pulled it shut behind him and said to the guard, “We told you there were to be no visitors.”
The guard said, “The guy knocked on his own. I wouldn’t let him in.”
“Well, don’t let him knock,” the man said, and turned back toward the door.
The uniformed guard held Mason back in the corridor. The lawyer waited until the detective had opened the door, and then, raising his voice so that it was distinctly audible within the room, said, “Mrs. Breel won’t answer any questions unless you let me in.”
The door swung shut. The officer glowered at Mason belligerently and said, “You’re hard to get along with.”
Mason grinned, offered him a cigarette. “Oh, no, I’m not.”
The officer hesitated a moment, then took the cigarette, scratched a match and jerked his head down the corridor. “On your way,” he said.
Mason smiled. “I’m waiting right here.”
“You just think you are.”
“You,” Mason told him, “are guarding the room. You’re not guarding the corridor.”
“You don’t have any business here.”
“I’m going to have.”
There was a moment of silence, while the officer contemplated the situation in frowning belligerence. Once more, there was the sound of angry voices raised behind the door. A few moments later, Sergeant Holcomb suddenly pushed the door open and said, “All right, Mason, come in.”
Mason entered the room. A court reporter was seated at a small table, a shorthand notebook spread out in front of him, a fountain pen held poised over the page. Larry Sampson, a deputy district attorney, was standing by the foot of the bed with his hands jammed down in his coat pockets. Over by the window, Dr. Gifford stood professionally aloof. Beside him stood a red-headed nurse with large brown eyes, a peaches-and-cream complexion, and a mouth which was a hard, straight line of determination. Lying on the hospital bed, the back of which had been raised a few inches, so as to prop up her bandaged head, Sarah Breel surveyed them with calm, untroubled eyes. A rope attached to the broken leg ran from underneath the covers, up over a pulley, and terminated in a weight which dangled over the foot of the bed.
Dr. Gifford said, “Gentlemen, I want to repeat, all of this argument is getting us nowhere. My patient has sustained a severe nervous shock. I am not going to permit her health to be jeopardized by any sustained questioning, or any browbeating.”
“Oh, forget it!” Sergeant Holcomb said irritably. “No one’s trying to browbeat her.”
“The minute I see any indication of it,” Dr. Gifford said, “the interview will be terminated.”
Sarah Breel smiled at Perry Mason. It was rather a lop-sided smile, what with the bandages about her head and a swelling on one side of her face. “Good morning, Mr. Mason,” she said, “I want you as my lawyer.”
Mason nodded. “I understand,” she went on, “that I’m accused of murder. I’ve refused to make any statement until my lawyer was present.”
Sergeant Holcomb said, “You understand, Mrs. Breel, that your failure to deny the charges against you...”
“Let me handle it, Sergeant,” Larry Sampson interrupted. “I may explain once more to Mrs. Breel, and for the benefit of Mr. Mason, that the object of this interview is not to try to trap Mrs. Breel into making any admissions. The circumstantial evidence, standing by itself, is sufficiently black against her to more than justify the charge of first-degree murder. Now then, if she’s innocent and can explain the evidence in the case, we’ll withdraw the charge. This is an opportunity we’re giving her to avoid newspaper publicity and the stigma of a public trial.”
“Bunk!” Mason said. “That’s the old line of hooey, Mrs. Breel. Having once filed a first-degree murder charge against you, it’ll take a miracle to make them quit. All this business about giving you a chance to explain is simply an excuse to get you talking, so they can catch discrepancies in your story and trap you into an admission.”
Sampson flushed. Sergeant Holcomb said, “You start cracking wise, and you’ll go out of here on your ear.”
Mason said, “I have a right to see my client. It’s my duty to advise her. I’m advising her.”
“Advising her not to answer questions?” Sampson asked.
“Not at all,” Mason said. “I was merely correcting the inaccuracies in your statement. My client can do anything she wants to. I consider it my duty, however, to advise her that she doesn’t have to answer any questions, and if she is at all nervous or emotionally upset, she can postpone this interview until after she has talked with me.”
“You mean until after you’ve told her what to say,” Sergeant Holcomb sneered.
“I meant exactly what I said,” Mason told him.
“Well,” Mrs. Breel interrupted. “There’s no use arguing about it. I’m going to make a full and complete statement. I just wanted my attorney here when I did it.”
“That’s better,” Sampson told her. “You’re a woman of understanding. You can appreciate the damaging effect of letting this circumstantial evidence stand uncontradicted.”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about when you refer to circumstantial evidence,” Mrs. Breel said.
Sampson said, “Mrs. Breel, I’m going to be frank with you, perhaps brutally frank. I’m doing it for your own good. When you were struck by that automobile last night, there was a thirty-eight caliber revolver in your bag. The police have discharged a test bullet from that revolver. They have made micro-photographs of that bullet. They have also recovered the fatal bullet which killed Austin Cullens. They have made micro-photographs of that bullet. The two bullets, compared side by side under a powerful microscope, and as shown in the micro-photographs, are not only identical bullets, but moreover, they were both discharged from the same gun. In other words, Mrs. Breel, the gun which you had in your possession in your handbag last night fired the bullet which killed Austin Cullens.”
Mrs. Breel regarded him sternly. “Young man,” she said, “are you sure that a gun was found in my bag?”
“Absolutely,” Larry Sampson said. “The bag was lying on the pavement near you when...”
“But that doesn’t indicate that it was my bag,” Mrs. Breel said. “I was unconscious at the time. You can’t hold me responsible for a bag which was found near me. I don’t know who put it there.”
Mason grinned and flashed a wink at Dr. Gifford. Sergeant Holcomb said disgustedly to the doctor, “And this is the woman you said shouldn’t answer questions because her thoughts might not be coherent.”
Larry Sampson hesitated a moment, then opened a leather handbag which was on the floor near the corner. “Mrs. Breel,” he said, “I’m going to show you a handbag. I’m going to ask you to say whether this is your handbag.”
Dramatically, he jerked out the handbag with the two imitation jade rings, and whirled to hold it out in front of him. Mrs. Breel surveyed the bag with an appraisal which was almost disinterested. “I think,” she said, “that I did have a bag like that once, but I can’t be certain. However, young man, I most certainly can’t say that that is my bag... You see, I had it some time ago.”
Sampson looked nonplused. Abruptly, he reached into the bag and pulled out the partially knitted garment. “Try and deny the ownership of this,” he said. “This is yours, isn’t it?”
She looked at it with a perfectly blank countenance, “Is it?” she asked.
“You know it is.”
She shook her head and said, “No, I don’t know it is.”
Sampson said, “Now, look here, Mrs. Breel, this isn’t a game. This is a serious matter. You’re charged with the crime of first-degree murder, which is the most serious crime known to our law. The questions which I am asking, and the answers which you are giving, are being taken down in shorthand. They can be used against you at any time. Now then, Mrs. Breel, I am not going to take an unfair advantage of you. I am going to state to you frankly in the presence of your counsel that the circumstantial evidence against you looks very black. I am going to state further, however, that the evidence is largely circumstantial; that perhaps some of that evidence can be explained away. If you cooperate with the authorities, if you make every effort to assist us in uncovering the truth in this matter, it will go a long Way toward establishing your innocence. If you make a single false statement, and it can be proven that statement is false, it is going to crucify you so far as this charge is concerned. Mr. Perry Mason, your own lawyer, is present. He will tell you that I am telling you the truth. Now then, if you deny the ownership of this bag, and we can prove that it really is your bag, that statement will absolutely pillory you. Now, Mrs. Breel, I am asking you: Is that your bag? ”
“I don’t know,” she said calmly.
“Look at it,” Sampson said, “examine it. Take it in your hands. Look it over and then tell us whether it is your bag.”
“I tell you I don’t know.”
“Do you mean you can’t tell whether this is your bag or whether this is not your bag?”
“That’s right.”
“You were carrying a bag last night, weren’t you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Do you mean to say that you don’t know whether you were carrying a bag in your hand when you went to call on Mr. Austin Cullens?”
“That’s right — I don’t even know that I went to call on Mr. Austin Cullens.”
“You don’t know that? ”
“No,” she said placidly. “As a matter of fact, I’ve been trying to cudgel my brains ever since I regained consciousness. I can remember yesterday morning, that is, I guess it was yesterday.” She turned to Perry Mason and said, “This is Tuesday, isn’t it, Mr. Mason?”
He nodded. “Yes,” she said, “it was yesterday morning. I can remember yesterday morning. I can remember everything that happened. I can remember receiving the keys to my brother’s car. I remember going and getting the car. I can remember putting it in the garage. I can remember waiting in the shoe department of a department store. I remember, later on, being accused of shoplifting. I remember having lunch with Mr. Mason... And I can’t remember one single thing that happened after I left that store.”
“Oh,” Sampson said, sneering, “you’re going to pull that old stuff, that your mind’s a blank, are you?”
Mason said, “That isn’t a question, Sampson, that’s an argument.”
“Well, suppose it is an argument?”
Dr. Gifford said, “I think Mr. Mason is right. Within reasonable limits, you may question my patient, but you certainly aren’t going to argue with her, or attempt to browbeat her.”
“That old alibi has whiskers on it a foot long,” Sergeant Holcomb said sneeringly.
Dr. Gifford said, “As a matter of fact, in case you gentlemen are interested, it quite frequently happens that following a concussion, there’s a complete lapse of memory covering a period of from hours to sometimes days prior to the shock. Occasionally, with the passing of time, that memory slowly returns.”
“How much time, would you say, would have to elapse in this case,” Sampson asked sarcastically, “before Mrs. Breel would recover her memory?”
“I don’t know,” Dr. Gifford said. “It depends upon a variety of factors which are outside of my consideration.”
“I’ll say it does,” Sampson said disgustedly.
Mason said, “Let me ask you, Dr. Gifford, is there anything particularly unusual in this lapse of memory in connection with a concussion history such as we have in the present case?”
“Nothing whatever,” Dr. Gifford said.
Sampson pulled the knitting from the bag. “Look here, Mrs. Breel,” he said. “Can’t you recognize your own knitting?”
She said, “May I see it, please?”
Sampson extended it to her. She looked it over critically and said, “Rather a nice job of knitting. Whoever did this was very expert.”
“You knit, don’t you?” Sampson asked.
“Yes.”
“Do you consider yourself an expert knitter?”
“I am very good,” she said.
“Do you recognize that as your knitting?”
“No.”
“Would you say that it was not your knitting?”
“No.”
“Would you say that if you were knitting a blue garment, of that sort, you would knit it in about that manner?”
“I think any expert knitter would.”
“That isn’t answering my question. Would you knit in that way?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“And you won’t say that is your knitting?”
“No. I don’t remember ever having seen it before.”
Sampson exchanged an exasperated glance with Sergeant Holcomb, then dug down into the bag and said, “All right, Mrs. Breel, I’m going to show you something else and see if this refreshes your recollection.” He unwrapped the paper from the diamonds. “Did you ever see this jewelry before?”
“I’m sure I couldn’t tell you,” she said.
“You can’t tell us?”
“No. I cannot remember ever having seen it before. But, until I completely recover my memory, I wouldn’t care to make a positive statement.”
“Oh, no, certainly not,” Sampson said sarcastically. “You want to give us every assistance in the world, don’t you?”
Dr. Gifford said, “May I remind you once more, Mr. Sampson, that this woman has suffered a very severe nerve shock?”
Sampson said sarcastically, “She seems to need a mental guardian, all right. It’s too bad about her being such a babe in the woods.”
Mason said, “As Mrs. Breel’s lawyer, I am going to ask you gentlemen to complete this examination as quickly as is humanly possible. Are there any further questions you wish to ask of Mrs. Breel?”
“Yes,” Sergeant Holcomb said. “Mrs. Breel, you went out there to Austin Cullens’ house, didn’t you?”
“I don’t remember.”
“You knew where Austin Cullens lived, didn’t you?”
“I can’t even remember that.”
“His name’s on the address book at your brother’s office, isn’t it?”
“I suppose so, yes... Come to think of it, I believe I’ve mailed a few letters to him at his address... out on St. Rupert Boulevard, I believe.”
“That’s right. Now, you went out there last night, at about what time?”
“I tell you that I don’t know that I went out there.”
“You entered that house,” Sergeant Holcomb said, “and you entered it surreptitiously. You unscrewed one of the electric light globes and placed a copper penny inside the socket so that in case Cullens should come home and press the light switch, the copper coin would short-circuit the wires and burn out every fuse on the circuit, didn’t you?”
“I’m sure I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.
“You don’t remember doing that?”
“Most certainly not. I tell you the last thing I remember was shaking hands with Mr. Mason in the department store.”
“Then,” Holcomb said triumphantly, “if you can’t remember where you were or what you did, you can’t positively swear that you didn’t take a thirty-eight caliber revolver and shoot Mr. Austin Cullens last night about seven-thirty, can you?”
“Of course not,” she said. “I can’t tell you what I did, and it follows that I can’t tell you what I didn’t. I may have assassinated the President. I may have wrecked a train. I may have forged a check. I might have got married. I don’t know what I did or what I didn’t do.”
“Then you won’t deny that you killed Austin Cullens, will you?”
“I most certainly have no recollection of having killed Austin Cullens.”
“But you won’t deny that you did it?”
“I can’t remember having done so.”
“But you may have done so.”
“That,” she said, “is another matter. I’m certain that I can’t tell what might have happened. I only know that I never killed anyone before yesterday afternoon, and I have no reason to believe that yesterday afternoon was any different from any other afternoon in my life.”
“You were worried about your brother, weren’t you?”
“No more so than I have been on other occasions.”
“You knew he’d gone out to get drunk?”
“Yes. I surmised that.”
“Let me ask you this,” Larry Sampson said. “Do you remember doing any shoplifting?”
She hesitated a moment, then said, “Yes.”
“You do?”
“Yes.”
“Where? When?”
“Yesterday afternoon, or rather yesterday noon, just before I met Mr. Mason.”
“And you did do what is generally known as shoplifting?”
“Yes. You see, my brother had gone on one of his periodical toots. I was worried about him. Sunday I went to the office to check on the contents of the vault. I couldn’t find the diamonds which had been given to my brother Saturday morning by Austin Cullens. It occurred to me that my brother must have taken them with him. Cullens knows all about George’s periodical sprees. He’s absolutely the only one who does — aside from my niece and myself. I was afraid Mr. Cullens might want his stones before George sobered up. I was afraid it might make something of a scandal, so I decided to cover up for George. I thought I could pretend I’d developed a kleptomania. Looking back on it, it seems very foolish now, but at the time it seemed the only thing to do, the only way I could stall things along until I could find George and sober him up.”
“So you deliberately planned to get caught stealing...?”
“Not exactly,” she said. “Somewhere, I’d read that a person couldn’t be charged with shoplifting until they’d removed the things from the store. However, if it hadn’t been for Mr. Mason...”
Sergeant Holcomb interrupted. “All right, now I’m going to tell you something else. Your brother was found...”
Dr. Gifford came charging forward. “No, you don’t!” he shouted. “I warned you my patient was to be spared that nerve shock. You agreed to this interview on that understanding. You can’t...”
“I can do anything I damn please,” Holcomb said. “You aren’t in charge here. I’m in charge here.”
“You may not think I’m in charge here,” Dr. Gifford said, “but this woman is under my care. I stretched a point in letting you question her at this time. You’re not going to inflict any shock on her. That was definitely understood before the interview commenced.”
“Well, as it happens,” Holcomb said, “I’ve changed my mind. I may not know a lot about medicine, but I think this woman is in full possession of her faculties right now and...”
Dr. Gifford nodded to the red-headed nurse. She produced a package from under her arm. Dr. Gifford said. “Just a moment,” and stepped forward. “Let me see your left arm, please, Mrs. Breel,” he said.
She extended her left arm. Dr. Gifford made a quick jabbing motion with his right hand. Sergeant Holcomb pushed forward and said suspiciously, “Say, what are you doing?”
Dr. Gifford stood so that his body shielded his hand and Mrs. Breel’s arm from Sergeant Holcomb’s eyes. Then he stepped away and motioned to the nurse. She handed him a piece of cotton. Dr. Gifford placed the piece of cotton to the neck of an alcohol bottle and swabbed off a place on Mrs. Breel’s arm. He turned to the court reporter and said, “You might make a note at this time that I have just given Mrs. Breel a powerful narcotic and sedative, administered hypodermically. While I don’t ordinarily consider such treatment indicated in a case of this nature, I consider that it is infinitely preferable for the patient than being subjected to further nerve shock.”
Sergeant Holcomb said, “I don’t give a damn what you’ve given her. I’m going to go ahead with this thing...”
“Go right ahead,” Dr. Gifford advised. “The patient is now beginning to feel the influence of the narcotic. As a physician, I would say that any answer to any question she might make from now on will be completely unreliable.”
Mrs. Breel sighed, settled back on the bed, and closed her eyes. There was the faint trace of a smile visible at the corners of her mouth. Sergeant Holcomb yelled, “She’s shamming. That’s a damn fake. That hypodermic couldn’t have taken effect this soon.”
“I take it,” Dr. Gifford said, “that you consider your knowledge of medicine superior to mine.”
Sergeant Holcomb lost his temper. His face darkened as he shouted, “Well, I know what I think. I think she’s shamming. I think this whole thing is a stall. Now then, I’m going to tell her about her brother. Mrs. Breel, you can play possum all you want to, but your brother was found... ”
Sampson lunged for Holcomb, clapped his hand over Holcomb’s lips. “Shut up, you fool. I’m in charge of this.”
Holcomb jumped back with his fist doubled, then squared away to face Sampson belligerently. “All right,” he said, “you asked for it. You...”
“Shut up!” Sampson said. “Can’t you see that you’d be playing right into their hands?”
Sergeant Holcomb said, “I’ll show you,” and swung.
Sampson jumped back. Gifford said, “Gentlemen, I’m going to order hospital attendants to clear this room. This is a disgraceful scene, and it’s having a most harmful effect on my patient.”
Sampson said, “Don’t be a damn fool, Holcomb. Can’t you see that if you...”
Holcomb, still facing Sampson with his fists doubled, said, “Stand up and fight, you little rat! You can be taken in by all this flim-flam, but I’m not being taken in by it.” Still holding his fists doubled, and keeping Sampson away from him, he turned around to face the bed. “All right, Mrs. Breel,” he said, “let’s see how you take this... Your brother’s body was found in his office. He’d been shot by a thirty-eight caliber revolver and the body jammed in a packing case.”
Mrs. Breel might not have heard him. With her eyes closed, her face utterly without expression, she breathed steadily and deeply, as though sleeping. Sampson said sarcastically, “All right, flat-foot, now you’ve done it! You’ve played the one trump card we had at a time when she was under the influence of a narcotic.”
“She’s no more under the influence of a narcotic than I am,” Sergeant Holcomb said, but his voice somehow lacked conviction.
“No?” Sampson said. “Well, you’ll never be able to surprise her with that bit of information now. You’ve put your cards on the table. She’ll sleep that hypodermic off and decide how she wants to play her cards after she wakes up.”
Mason said, “Now that there’s a lull in the furious recriminations, I want the court reporter to be quite certain that he has noted the time at which Dr. Gifford gave the patient the hypodermic. I want him to note that, notwithstanding the nervous condition of the patient, the deputy district attorney and the sergeant of the homicide squad engaged in a fist fight, across the foot of the bed...”
“There wasn’t any fist fight,” Sampson said. “Don’t be a fool, Mason.”
“I considered it a fist fight,” Mason observed.
“Well, I didn’t,” Sampson said. “I didn’t even make a pass at Holcomb. I kept out of his way.”
“Holcomb certainly made a swing at you,” Mason said.
“Well, that’s neither here nor there,” Sampson remarked.
Mason grinned his fighting grin. “It may not be here, but it’s either in that shorthand record or I’m going to find out why it isn’t.”
The court reporter nodded wearily and said, “It’s in.”
“Thank you,” Mason said.
There was a moment of silence. Mrs. Breel, on the bed, gave a peculiar gurgling sound which might have been a snore. Sergeant Holcomb asserted once more, “No hypodermic in the world ever took effect that quick.”
“Did you,” Mason asked, “note the exact time when Dr. Gifford administered the hypodermic?”
“No,” Holcomb said, “but it was less than two minutes ago.”
Mason said, “Time passes very rapidly, Sergeant, when you’re engaged in fisticuffs with a deputy district attorney in the room of a patient whose physicial condition is so grave that the doctor has warned you not to subject her to any undue shock.”
Sampson said disgustedly, “Come on, we’re not getting anywhere with this. We’re just playing into Mason’s hands now.”
Holcomb said, “Well, there’s a lot about this that needs to be explained.”
“Not here,” Sampson told him.
Sergeant Holcomb stood staring at the woman on the bed, as though the sheer impact of his eyes would stir her to life. Dr. Gifford said, “You gentlemen might just as well do your brawling elsewhere. My patient is now completely oblivious to everything which is taking place.”
Holcomb turned to the doctor and said, “You’ll hear more about this.”
“Yes, there’ll be a lot more heard about it,” Dr. Gifford said grimly. “If there are any resulting complications, I am going to hold you personally responsible.”
Mason said, “I think, Doctor, we can get a court order restraining the officers from asking any further questions until after you have decided that such questions won’t jeopardize her health.”
“That interval,” Dr. Gifford said with dignity, “will, of necessity, be somewhat prolonged because of the mental strain to which she has just been subjected. Gentlemen, I am going to ask you to clear the room.” As they hesitated, Dr. Gifford said, “In the event you don’t go now, I am going to ask the hospital office to send up sufficient orderlies to see that the room is cleared.”
Sampson said, “Come on, Holcomb. We can’t do anything here.”
Holcomb said, “Well, I’m not going to leave Mason behind to tip her off what to say.”
Mason started toward the door. In abrupt contrast to the vociferous recriminations which had taken place in that room, he made an elaborate show of tiptoeing so that he would not disturb the sleeper. “I,” he said in a hoarse whisper, “see nothing gained by trying to disturb the slumbers of a drugged woman.”
Dr. Gifford nodded. Despite himself Sampson suppressed a smile. Sergeant Holcomb, seeming about to choke with indignation, started to say something, but Sampson touched him on the shoulder and said, “That’s all of it, Sergeant.”