“I know,” Mason said.

  “Does he have a story, Perry?”

  “No.”

  “Will he have one when the trial opens?”

  “No.”

  “When will he have one?”

  “When he gets on the witness stand,” Mason said.

  The phone rang. Gertie’s voice, sounding syrupy in its smooth cadences, said, “Mrs Northrup left on her vacation yesterday. No one at the store knows where she can be reached.”

  “Why accent the Mrs?”

  “That’s the way they gave it to me, Mr Mason. I asked for Miss Northrup and the girl said Mrs Northrup was on her vacation.”

  “Try to get her home number, Gertie.”

  “I did. I got the number. No one answers.”

  Mason hung up the phone, turned to Drake. “She’s on vacation, probably wouldn’t know anything about it, anyway.”

  Drake said, “It doesn’t make sense, Perry. Ferrell must have been using the same old bait to string that redhead along.”

  Mason nodded. “But why did he want this girl out there Friday?”

  Drake grinned. “Perhaps Wednesday and Thursday were already filled.”

  “Could have been. I’d like to talk with this redhead when the police let her get back in circulation.”

  “Now, I tell you what you do. According to all stories, Laura Mae Dale was running a restaurant in a town in Indiana about fifty miles from Indianapolis. Somehow I believe that story. It’s part of the background Veronica gave Addison when he picked her up. The girl’s accent and manner tends to bear that out. You can probably find records of restaurants on the State Board of Health reports, or city licences, or something of the sort. Have your men get busy and start combing all these towns near Indianapolis. Locate the restaurant, find out who’s in charge, and perhaps then you can find out what her address is here. And if she’s gone back to her restaurant, have your men stick her on a plane and bring her out here. We can use that bad cheque charge if we have to. Spare no expense. I want action and I want it fast.”

  “Just why is she so important, Perry?” Drake asked.

  “I wish knew the answer to that one, Paul. Call it a hunch if you want, but let’s look at certain facts. Veronica is in a spot where Addison picks her up. The time is immediately after Ferrell is murdered. Her testimony will crucify Addison.

  “Therefore, if there’s anything phoney about Veronica it may help Addison’s case. Now, Veronica says she had a battle with a wolf. It sounds convincing and it accounts for her being where she was when she was. But Veronica hit town and was pinched for vagrancy within an hour of the time she moved into her hotel room.

  “You can say all you want about the police being dumb, Paul, but it took some co-operation on Veronica’s part to land in the cooler. Now, why did she want to get arrested?”

  “Blackmail?” Drake asked.

  “So far that’s the answer. That would put her in cahoots with Eric Hansell, but if that’s the picture they don’t need a mother to help them frame it. Yet the mother stepped in, telling me Veronica was eighteen.”

  “Perhaps they intended to use the mother in case the vagrancy plan didn’t work.” Drake said.

  “Could be. I want to talk with the mother and I want to get her before the police do. You know, Paul, the whole thing may not have been as accidental as it seems. Veronica may have been planted as bait for Addison. Hansell may have been deliberately gunning for big game … Get that mother for me. I want her. Check Hansell’s associates, look up his record – and get busy!”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Newspaper reporters were waiting to besiege Perry Mason as the lawyer entered Judge Keetley’s courtroom.

  Court was not yet in session, but because of the importance of the trial, the room was jammed with spectators. Every seat was occupied and an overflow ring of the curious stretched in a semi-circle around the walls, standing shoulder to shoulder.

  Judge Paul M Keetley entered the courtroom.

  A bailiff pounded with his gavel and announced that court was in session.

  Judge Keetley settled himself behind the bench, looked over the crowded courtroom, glanced down at the burly figure of Hamilton Burger, the district attorney, then over at Perry Mason.

  A bailiff opened a door and escorted John Addison into the room. He looked as though he hadn’t slept since police had discovered Ferrell’s body.

  As the department store millionaire walked stiffly and self-consciously over to the table where Mason was seated, the courtroom buzzed with a sudden sibilance of whispered comment.

  The bailiff banged with his gavel.

  Mason dropped a casual hand on Addison’s shoulder, smiled, said in a low voice, “Smile, damn you!”

  Addison tried a twisted grin.

  “That’s better,” Mason said.

  “Case of the People versus Addison,” Judge Keetley called. “This is the time heretofore filed for the preliminary hearing. Are you ready, gentlemen?”

  “Ready for the Prosecution,” Hamilton Burger announced, his manner that of barrel-chested belligerency.

  “Ready for the defendant, Your Honour,” Mason said.

  Hamilton Burger turned to call his first witness.

  Mason took advantage of that dramatic moment. “Your Honour,” he said, “we have issued subpoenas for Veronica Dale. I understand that she is being held incommunicado by the police and it has therefore been impossible for us to have this subpoena served. In view of the fact that this person is a material witness for the Defence, we deem it only fair that the Court instruct the police this witness must be produced at this hearing or that we be given a continuance until the witness can be produced.”

  Hamilton Burger looked at Mason with something of a sneer. “She’ll be here,” he said. “Don’t worry. And her testimony will be on behalf of the Prosecution.”

  Carl B Knight, the assistant prosecutor and one of Burger’s most aggressive young deputies, smiled approvingly at Burger and whispered something which caused Burger’s grim mouth to soften into a slight smile. Burger settled his thick torso back into the swivel chair at the counsel table.

  Judge Keetley said, “I take it, Mr Mason, that you are not going to make any showing as to what this witness will testify to but will content yourself with the assurance of the Prosecution that this witness will be here and your request for a continuance is withdrawn?”

  “Yes, Your Honour.”

  Judge Keetley nodded, said to Hamilton Burger, “Call your first witness, Mr District Attorney.”

  “Charles W Neffs,” Burger called.

  Charles Neffs proved to be a deputy sheriff who had, he testified, been on duty on the night of the eleventh instant. On that evening, shortly before midnight, a call had been received from the defendant, John Racer Addison, stating that Addison, in company with Lorraine Ferrell, the widow of Edgar Z Ferrell, was at a certain designated service station; that they had discovered the dead body of Edgar Ferrell and had proceeded to the nearest telephone.

  “What did you do?” Hamilton Burger asked.

  “I went to the place where …”

  “Alone?” Hamilton Burger interrupted.

  “No, sir. I took another deputy with me and there was a private detective, a Paul Drake, who was in my office at the time and who had been asking questions …”

  “Just a moment,” Mason interrupted. “Any conversation between Paul Drake and this witness, which took place without the hearing of the defendant, certainly is not binding on the defendant.”

  “That’s right,” Judge Keetley ruled.

  “Your Honour, I think the situation is a little peculiar here,” Hamilton Burger said, “inasmuch as I think it can be proven that Paul Drake was, in fact, from a legal standpoint, the agent of the defendant.”

  “Can you prove it?” Mason asked.

  “I can present facts from which it can be deduced.”

  “Can you prove it?” Mason repeated.

  Judge Keetley rapped on the bench. “There is no need for heated argument between counsel,” he said. “The Court made its ruling. The ruling will stand. The witness will not be permitted to testify as to any conversation with any third person outside of the presence of the defendant unless it can first be established there was some connection between such person and the defendant. Proceed with your testimony, Mr Neffs.”

  Neffs said, “I went out to the place where Addison and Mrs Ferrell were waiting. It was a service station about a mile and a half from an old farmhouse. In this farmhouse …”

  “Just a moment,” Hamilton Burger interrupted. “I think we can have a map introduced at this point so we can clarify the situation. Here is a map which I will ask you to examine and see if you can tell on this map exactly where you went. I take it, Mr Mason, you will stipulate that this map may be used at this time, subject to the fact that I promise to connect it up later by showing that it is an accurate map drawn to scale, and showing the section of this country which it purports to portray.”

  “So stipulated,” Mason said.

  Neffs said, “Yes, I can identify the course we took very readily from this map. I went down this highway, which I will mark with a pencil line, to the point which I will mark on this map by a numeral one with a circle drawn around it.”

  “That was the service station?” Burger asked.

  “That was the service station where Mr Addison and Mrs Ferrell were waiting,” Neffs said.

  “Then what happened?”

  “Then I picked up Mrs Ferrell and Mr Addison. They directed me to the house where they had discovered the body of Edgar Ferrell.”

  “I show you a series of photographs,” Burger said, “and ask you if you can identify those photographs.”

  “Yes, sir. These show the house where the body was discovered. They show it from various points of the compass. The body was discovered in this room near the Southwest corner of the house, as shown on this photograph.”

  “Did you take these photographs?”

  “No, but I was present when they were taken.”

  “Have you examined them?”

  “I have.”

  “What do they show, generally?”

  “They show the conditions I found existing in and around that farmhouse. They show the surroundings, the rooms, the terrain, just as I saw it when I arrived.”

  “Let’s have all those photographs marked for identification, and introduced in evidence,” Burger said.

  “And the room where the body was discovered, as shown in the photograph, can be marked with a circle,” Mason said. “We consent to letting the photographs go in evidence.”

  “The window of that bedroom is shown in the photographs,” Burger supplemented.

  There was a moment’s delay while the photographs were being marked, and then Burger went on with his examination. “What did you find, Mr Neffs?”

  “I entered the house with these people. I warned them to touch nothing. They advised me, however, they had already left quite a few fingerprints on various objects. I ascended the stairs to this bedroom and, on opening the door, I found a body lying on the floor.”

  “Can you describe the position of that body?”

  “I had a camera in the car. I took a photograph of the body on the floor.”

  “Will you produce that photograph, please?”

  Neffs produced the photograph and it was marked as an exhibit and received in evidence.

  “Did you notice anything else in the room?”

  “I did. Yes, sir, quite a few things.”

  “What were they?”

  “There was a gasoline lantern which had been shut off by turning the knob which controls the supply valve so that the gasoline was shut off. That lantern was almost full. There was a bullet hole in the window and I …”

  “The words ‘bullet hole’ indicated a conclusion of the witness, Your Honour,” Mason said.

  Judge Keetley nodded his head.

  Hamilton Burger said irritably, “All right, all right. If Counsel wants to be technical, we’ll strike out the word ‘bullet’ and leave just a hole in the window. What sort of a hole was it, Mr Neffs?”

  Neffs smiled and said, “A round hole, Mr Burger, almost exactly the size of a .38 calibre bullet.”

  Spectators in the courtroom laughed appreciatively and were silenced by the judge.

  “You have photographs of that hole in the window?”

  “I have. Yes, sir, I have photographs of that entire window.”

  Neffs produced these photographs and they were introduced in evidence.

  “Also,” Neffs went on, “I removed the glass from that window and placed it between two sheets of transparent plastic.”

  “Why did you do that?”

  “Because, when the bullet went through the window, it had cracked the glass and I was afraid sections of the glass might fall out at any time, thereby destroying the evidence, since the hole would no longer be visible as a round hole.”

  Burger nodded to one of the bailiffs who tiptoed from the room, returned shortly with a wooden box only a few inches deep but about two feet square.

  Burger took this box up to the witness stand, pulled out a sheet of glass cemented between two thick sheets of plastic.

  “Is this the glass?” he asked.

  “Yes, sir. That is the glass.”

  “Now, can you tell the Court just what you did in preserving the evidence?”

  “Yes, sir. I secured a glasscutter and carefully cut a section from the windowpane, taking care to cut back so far from the cracked glass that there was no possibility of a fracture. I had first cemented this sheet of plastic over the glass to hold it in place. When I lifted it out, I cemented another sheet over the other side, thus preserving the glass as evidence.”

  “Did Mr Addison or Mrs Ferrell make any statements to you at the time?”

  “Yes.”

  “What were they?”

  “I object to any statements made by Mrs Ferrell which were not made in the presence of the defendant,” Mason said. “I have no objection to anything the defendant may have said or to anything which was said in the presence of the defendant.”

  “Very well,” Burger said, “what did Addison say and what was said in the presence of Addison?”

  “Addison said he knew where the place was because he’d looked at it three weeks ago when it had been offered for sale; that he hadn’t been out there since that date, but when Mrs Ferrell talked with him and told him she was worried about her husband, he asked her if she had considered the possibility her husband might be at his country place. He said that she had told him she didn’t know anything at all about her husband having purchased a country place.”

  “Exactly,” Burger said. “Now, let’s go back for a moment. I want to have one thing absolutely straight so there can be no possibility of a misunderstanding. Did the defendant, John Racer Addison, tell you at that time and at that place and in the presence of yourself and Mrs Ferrell that he had not been out to that house before, save for a single time some three weeks ago when he had looked at the place when it was offered for sale?”

  “Yes, sir, he did.”

  “Now, did you notice any tracks around the outside of that place?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What sort of tracks?”

  “Automobile tyre tracks.”

  “Can you describe them to us?”

  “I have photographs which I can introduce.”

  “These photographs were taken by you?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Produce them, please.”

  The witness produced photographs of tyre marks and they were duly marked and received in evidence.

  “Now, then,” Burger said, “directing your attention to this photograph, to tyre marks A, B, C and D, what do they show?”

  “They show where an automobile had turned around shortly after a rain. Those tracks were made in mud and at the time of the murder. The sun had baked the mud.”

  “And because the car was turning, the tracks of all four tyres were evident at this particular point?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Do you know when it had last rained?”

  “Yes, sir. On the evening of the eighth and the morning of the ninth.”

  “That was Monday night and early Tuesday morning?”

  “Yes, sir. It quit raining about four o’clock Tuesday morning.”

  “And at the time you went out to this house, in the company of the defendant and Mrs Ferrell, what was the condition of the ground?”

  “At this particular point and at that time the ground was quite dry.”

  “Were there any automobile tracks evident, other than those shown in the photograph?”

  “Yes, sir. There were other automobile tacks, but these tracks lettered A, B, C and D were made by tyres that were almost new, therefore they show more distinctly than do the others. Also those four tracks at the point marked on the photograph passed over a strip of claylike mud where very distinct tracks were left.”

  “So, these tracks which are lettered A, B, C and D must have been made some time previously, while the ground was soft.”

  “Yes, sir, I would say within twenty-four hours of the time the rain ceased.”

  “Now, then,” Hamilton Burger said triumphantly, “I notice that these four tyres show very distinctive and individual tyre patterns, in other words, the tyres apparently were almost new and the treads in this soft, wet soil left almost a perfect imprint of each of the tyres.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Now, did you have occasion to examine the automobile of the defendant?”

  “I did, yes sir.”

  “When?”

  “On the afternoon of the twelfth.”

  “And what did you find?”

  “I prepared a soft substance which would yield imprints of tyre tracks. I then ran the automobile over this substance, turning the steering wheel so that the wheels would leave individual patterns; in other words, so it would be possible to duplicate the turning radius of the automobile which had made the tracks A, B, C and D shown in this photograph.”

  “And what did you find?”

  “I have here a photograph of that plastic material after the tracks were made.”