“Yes.”

  “Looking at it from the standpoint of the police,” Mason said, “they’ll claim you did the flushing and it will be considered an attempt to conceal the evidence. Then you weren’t content with that, they’ll say you washed the cardboard containers out with hot water. You told your uncle to do that?”

  “Yes.”

  “That and the will you let him make out in your favor can send you to the penitentiary for life,” the lawyer said.

  Drake’s code knock sounded on the door.

  Della Street let him in.

  Drake looked serious.

  “How bad is it, Paul?” Mason asked.

  “Bad,” Drake said.

  “Give us the lowdown.”

  “Someone in Unit 22 had been out to dinner, came home and smelled gas coming from Unit 21. They notified the manager of the motel. He got a passkey and opened the door. The gas just about knocked him down. He opened the door, ran to the windows, opened them, and dragged the man’s body out into the open. He notified the police. Police arrived and tried resuscitation. It didn’t work.”

  “Why did they figure homicide instead of suicide?” Mason asked.

  “The gas stove is vented,” Drake said. “Someone had unscrewed the feed pipe so the gas could escape directly into the room. The guy had been eating Chinese food. The doctor who is riding with the deputy coroner suspected barbiturates. He made a quick test. Apparently, the food was loaded. I think they also found evidence of drugs in the bathroom.”

  Mason looked at Daphne Shelby.

  Her eyes refused to meet his.

  “You stayed with your uncle while you both ate Chinese food?” he asked.

  “I left before he was finished.”

  “Did you,” he asked, “give him any barbiturates?”

  “I—I don’t know.”

  “What do you mean, you don’t know?”

  “I told you he couldn’t sleep without these sleeping pills. He has developed such a need for them that he had to have them. I knew that, so when I left him I gave him the sleeping pills that I had.”

  “Where did you get them?”

  “They were given me by a doctor—the same doctor who treats Uncle Horace. You remember when I went away, I was all rundown and nervous. The doctor gave me some sleeping medicine in case I had any trouble sleeping.

  “I never needed to use it. From the time I got on that boat, I slept like a log. I felt that Uncle Horace might need those pills, so I gave them to him to use if he needed them.”

  Mason said, “You have put yourself in a beautiful spot for a first-degree murder rap.”

  Drake said, “The proprietress of the motel got a little suspicious that everything wasn’t quite on the up-and-up. This young woman rented Unit 21 and said her uncle was going to occupy it that she would bring him in later. She got the license number of her automobile—it was a new Ford.”

  Mason turned to Daphne and said, “And there you are, Daphne!”

  Paul Drake caught Mason’s eye jerked his head, indicating he wanted a private conference.

  “Excuse us a moment,” Mason said, and walked over to the far corner of the room with the detective.

  Drake lowered his voice to a half-whisper. “Look, Perry,” he said, “you’re in a spot. Your client is in a spot. The minute she produces that will, she’s convicted herself of murder.

  “That girl isn’t any sweet, innocent, naïve rose-bud. She’s shrewd, scheming and clever.

  “She located her uncle. She spirited him out of the institution. She was too smart to put him in the motel where she was staying, but she took him to another motel.

  “Everything that she’s done indicates that she’s quick-thinking and ingenious.

  “Now then, she found out that she wasn’t actually related to Horace Shelby. She can’t get any of his money unless she has a will.

  “So she spirits him out from under the hand of the authorities and the guardianship of the Court, gets him to make a will, and then the guy promptly dies.

  “Now then, if you want to forget about that will, I’ll forget about it.”

  “What do you mean?” Mason asked.

  “It’s the strongest single fact against her,” Drake said. “Just take that will and burn it up. Have her refrain from mentioning it to anyone, and we can refrain from mentioning it. In that way, we can dispose of some of the worst evidence against her.”

  Mason shook his head.

  “Why not?” Drake asked. “I’ll stick my neck out. I’ll put my license on the line to give your client a break.”

  “It isn’t that,” Mason said. “In the first place, as an officer of the court, I can’t tamper with evidence. As a licensed detective, you can’t. In the second place, I’ve always found that truth is the strongest weapon in the arsenal of any attorney. The trouble is lawyers quite frequently don’t know what the truth is. They get half-truths from the evidence or from their clients and try to get by on those half-truths.

  “As far as we are concerned, we are—”

  Mason stopped talking abruptly as heavy steps sounded on the wooden porch of the motel, knuckles pounded on the door.

  Mason said, “Permit me, Daphne.” He walked across the room and opened the door.

  Lieutenant Tragg, accompanied by a uniformed officer standing on the threshold, had a hard time hiding his surprise.

  “What the devil are you doing here?” Tragg asked.

  “Talking with my client,” Mason said.

  “Well, if your client is the owner of the new Ford automobile out in front, she’s going to need an attorney in the worst way,” Lieutenant Tragg said.

  “Come in,” Mason invited. “Daphne, this is Lieutenant Tragg of the Homicide Department. Lieutenant Tragg, Daphne Shelby.”

  “Oh ho,” Tragg said, “I’m beginning to see a great light. Headquarters tell me they’ve been looking for Horace Shelby, who was spirited out of the Goodwill Sanitarium despite an order of Court.”

  Tragg turned to the uniformed officer and said, “Bring in the woman. Let’s see if we make an identification.”

  “Let me point out that that’s hardly the best way to make an identification,” Mason said.

  “Well, it is in this case,” Tragg said. “We’re working against time.”

  The officer left the porch, a car door slammed, then there were steps on the porch, and the officer escorted a woman into the motel unit.

  “Look around,” Tragg invited, “and see if there’s anyone here you know.”

  The woman instantly pointed to Daphne Shelby.

  “Why, that’s the woman who rented Unit 21,” she said. “She told me that her uncle was going to be occupying it.”

  Tragg turned to Mason with a grin. “This,” he said, “is your exit line, Counselor. We can get along without you from here on.”

  Mason smiled. “I think you’re forgetting about the recent Supreme Court decisions, Lieutenant,” he said. “Miss Shelby is entitled to have an attorney representing her at all stages of the investigation.”

  Mason turned to Daphne and said, “Before you answer any questions, Daphne, look at me. If I shake my head, don’t answer if I nod my head, answer it and tell the truth.”

  “That’s going to be one hell of a way to interrogate a witness,” Lieutenant Tragg said.

  “It may be a poor way to interrogate a witness, but it’s the only way you can interrogate a prospective defendant,” Mason said. “Perhaps I can make some stipulations which will make things easier for you, Lieutenant.”

  “Such as what?” Tragg asked.

  “This is Daphne Shelby,” Mason said. “Until a short time ago, she believed in good faith that she was the niece of Horace Shelby.

  “However, whether there is any blood relationship or not, Daphne is very fond of the man she has always regarded as her uncle. She lived in the house and took charge of his rather restricted diet. She was on the verge of a nervous breakdown from trying to nurse him, do the cooking, and supervise the housekeeping problems.

  “When Horace Shelby was sent to the Goodwill Sanitarium by a conservator and a doctor who was employed by the other relatives, Daphne obtained employment at the sanitarium. She found Horace Shelby strapped to a bed, she took a knife, cut the straps, took Horace Shelby to the Northern Lights Motel and established him in Unit 21.

  “Now then, Lieutenant, that’s as far as we are going to go at the present .time.”

  Tragg whirled to Daphne. “Did you bring him some food tonight?”

  Mason shook his head.

  Daphne remained quiet.

  “Chinese food in particular,” Lieutenant Tragg said. “We know you did so you might just as well make it easy on yourself. After all, Miss Shelby, we’re trying to get at the truth in the case and, if you’re innocent, you have nothing to fear from the truth.”

  Again Mason shook his head.

  “Shucks,” Tragg muttered, then turned to Mason. “Any objections to letting her identify the body?”

  “None whatever,” Mason said.

  Tragg turned to Daphne Shelby and held out his hand. “Would you mind giving me those sleeping pills you have, Miss Shelby?” he asked. “The ones you’ve got left.”

  She started to reach for her purse, then caught Mason’s eye.

  “No dice, Lieutenant,” Mason said. “We don’t want to have you resort to subterfuge because, under those circumstances, we might quit cooperating.”

  Lieutenant Tragg said bitterly, “It’s one hell of a note when the Court takes the handcuffs off the defendant and puts them on the wrists of honest officers who are trying to enforce the law.”

  “I don’t see any handcuffs,” Mason said.

  “Well, I can feel them,” Tragg snapped.

  “We were going to identify a body,” Mason reminded him.

  “All right, come on,” Tragg said and then added, “We’re going to have to deprive you of that Ford automobile for a while, Miss Shelby. It’s evidence, and we’ve got to have it identified.”

  “That’s all right,” Mason said. “We’re cooperating in every way we can in the investigation.”

  “Yes,” Tragg said, drawing his extended fore-finger across his throat. “I can feel the cordiality of your cooperation.”

  Tragg turned to the officer, said, “Call in on the radio. Have a fingerprint expert come out and check that Ford car for fingerprints.”

  He turned to Daphne and said, “You come with me.”

  “I’ll ride in the car with you,” Mason said.

  Tragg shook his head.

  “Then Daphne rides with me,” Mason announced.

  Tragg thought things over, then said, “All right, Daphne rides with you. You follow me.”

  “I’ll tag along behind to make the procession complete,” Drake added.

  “Come on, Della, you and Daphne sit in the back seat of my car,” Mason instructed.

  “Daphne, you’re not to answer any questions by anyone unless I am present and advise you to answer. Do you understand?”

  She nodded.

  “Now, you’re in for a shock,” Mason said in a low voice. “They’re going to take you to identify your uncle’s body. You can make the identification, that’s all. I don’t want you to volunteer any information or answer any questions, do you understand?”

  She nodded in a tight-lipped silence.

  “This is going to be a very harrowing experience,” Mason said, “and you’ve had plenty of them within the last twenty-four hours. But you’re going to have to brace yourself and bear up.

  “All right, Lieutenant, let’s go.”

  The cars made a procession down the road until they came to the Northern Lights Motel.

  A stretcher wagon was waiting to take the remains to the morgue for autopsy.

  Lieutenant Tragg walked over to the stretcher, took hold of a corner of the blanket and said, “This way, please, Miss Shelby.”

  She came to stand by the officer. Mason stood at her side, holding her arm.

  Tragg jerked back the blanket.

  Suddenly, Mason felt Daphne stiffen. She clutched at the lawyer, then gave a half scream.

  Mason patted her shoulder.

  “That isn’t Uncle Horace,” she said. “That’s Ralph Exeter!”

  Lieutenant Tragg was puzzled. “Who’s Ralph Exeter?” he asked.

  Daphne’s numb lips made two futile attempts before words came. “A friend of Uncle Borden.”

  “And who’s Uncle Borden?”

  “A half brother of Horace Shelby.”

  “Then how did Exeter get in this unit of the motel and where is Horace Shelby now?”

  Mason said, “Those are two questions. Lieutenant, which you are going to have to answer all by yourself.”

  The woman who had identified Daphne Shelby came over to the officers. “Want to take a look?” Lieutenant Tragg asked her.

  She nodded.

  Tragg drew back the blanket.

  “I don’t think that’s the man who’s supposed to be in Unit 21!” she said. “It looks like the man who rented Unit 20 about three hours ago.”

  “How did he come here?” Tragg asked.

  “He had his own car. It had a Massachusetts license. There may have been someone with him—a woman. I can get the registration card.”

  “We’ll get it,” Tragg said.

  He accompanied her to the office, came back holding the registration card.

  “That’s right,” he said. “He registered under his own name. He gave the license number of his car—a Massachusetts license number.

  “Now then, where’s his car? What became of it? It isn’t here.”

  There was an interval of silence, then Tragg said, “Let’s take a look in Unit 20 and see what we find in there.”

  He turned to Mason. “Since you aren’t of any help in this phase of the investigation, you and your client can go, but I want both of you to be available where I can reach you on short notice.”

  Mason said, “Excuse me a minute. Daphne. It will only take a moment.”

  The lawyer moved over to Paul Drake, lowered his voice, said, “Paul, Horace Shelby was in that cabin. He isn’t there now. He left under his own power or he was taken away.

  “If he was taken away, we’re in trouble. If he left under his own power, I’d like to make sure that he’s on his own and see if we can take steps to keep him on his own.”

  Drake nodded.

  “Start your men covering the taxicab companies right away,” Mason said.

  Again Drake nodded.

  “Now then,” Mason went on, “it would be fatal if the police managed to implant in the proprietress” mind the idea that Ralph Exeter was the man Daphne brought to the motel.

  “She’s seen Daphne. She identified the license number of the car Daphne was driving, and she’s identified Daphne.

  “Get to work on her in advance of the police. Get her to state that she can’t identify the woman who was with Exeter in the car in which Exeter arrived at the motel. And be darned sure to tie her up so that she can’t testify later on that the more she thinks of it, the more she believes Daphne was the one who was in Exeter’s car.

  “You know and I know that personal identification evidence is just about the worst, the most unreliable type of evidence we have—not when a person identifies someone he knows but when he gets a glimpse of an individual and then later on makes an identification—either from a photograph or from personal contact.”

  “Sure, we all know that,” Drake said. “I’ll do what I can. Anything else?”

  “That’s all,” Mason said. “Get your men working. Use that telephone in your car. Put your men out and get busy on that woman while Lieutenant Tragg is searching Unit 20 for clues.”

  “On my way,” Drake said. “Which comes first?”

  “The talk with the proprietress of the motel,” Mason told him. “We don’t know how long Lieutenant Tragg is going to be in Unit 20. You can telephone the taxicab companies shortly after that.”

  Chapter 12

  Mason put an arm around Daphne Shelby, drew her over to his car, felt her trembling like a leaf beneath her coat.

  “Take it easy, Daphne! Take it easy!” the lawyer warned. “We’re running up against something that may be pretty complicated. This man was found in Unit 21. Now, that’s the unit you rented for your uncle?”

  She nodded.

  The lawyer escorted her into the back seat of his car, had Della Street move in on the other side, said to Daphne, “You went to the Chinese restaurant and got Chinese food to take out?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who waited on you?”

  “Heavens, I don’t know. It was some girl.”

  “Not Chinese?”

  “No. The cook was Chinese.”

  “How did you happen to go to that restaurant?”

  She pointed and said, “You can see the sign there—right over there.”

  Mason followed the direction of her finger and saw the big illuminated sign in green letters reading CHINESE COOKING.

  Mason said, “When Lieutenant Tragg asked you for the sleeping pills you had, you started to open your purse.”

  She nodded.

  “You have sleeping pills in there?”

  “No, it was because he extended his hand and acted the way he did. I forgot for the moment that I had given the sleeping pills to Uncle Horace.”

  “Keep on forgetting it for the time being,” Mason said. “Don’t answer any questions about the sleeping pills.

  “Now then, Exeter checked into this motel sometime this afternoon. That means that they knew where you had placed Uncle Horace and were just biding their time.”

  “Then why didn’t they get officers and take him back to the sanitarium?” she asked. “That’s what both Uncle Horace and I were afraid of.”

  “Probably because they were afraid that the Court-appointed doctor would then examine him, and they wanted to work him over a little bit before they let Dr. Alma get in touch with him.”

  “Then you think they have Uncle Horace with them?”

  “It’s a very distinct possibility,” Mason said.

  “What will happen now?” she asked.

  Mason said, “They’ll get him all doped up. They’ll terrify him. They will then return him to the sanitarium and notify Dr. Alma.”