“Maynard, Maynard, her glasses…. Oh, yes, the broken pair. But I delivered them to her already. She was in a great rush.”

  “I want to know something about the glasses themselves,” Mason said. “They were broken?”

  “One of the lenses was chipped. Both of them were scratched badly from—but what is this you wish to know?”

  “I want to know whether she could see without those glasses.”

  “Whether she could see?”

  “Yes.”

  “Gentlemen, why is it you want this information?”

  “It is necessary that we have it.”

  “You are friends of Mrs. Maynard?”

  Mason hesitated. Drake said, “Yes.”

  The jeweler smiled urbanely. “Then it is easy. You will get the information from Mrs. Maynard herself.”

  “Dr. Radcliff, I’m an attorney,” Mason said. “I’m trying to get certain facts. I want …”

  The man was shaking his head even before Mason had finished the question. “Information about a patient or a customer I don’t give out. No.”

  “But,” Mason said, “this is information which may be important. It might mean that as a witness …”

  “As a witness, yes. You are a lawyer, you know the law. I am only an optometrist, a jeweler and a watchmaker. I do not know law. But this I think I know. I think that as a witness you give me a paper and I come to court, then you put me on the witness stand, I take an oath to tell the truth and I tell the truth. Then I answer questions. Then the judge will tell me I have to answer questions. Now I do not answer questions. I do not have to. Do we understand each other?”

  There was smiling courtesy in the man’s eyes but an inflexible something in his manner which was hard as a granite cliff.

  “We understand each other. Thank you just the same,” Mason said. “Come on, Paul.”

  They turned and walked out.

  Back in Mason’s car Drake said, “Don’t you think we could have found out a little more if …”

  “No,” Mason said. “All we could possibly have done was to have antagonized him. But this much we do know, there was a chipped pair of glasses with scratches on both lenses brought in by Mrs. Maynard. Now then, Paul, when we get her on the witness stand I’m going to cross-examine her about her eyes and about her glasses, how well she can see without them, and then try to prove that she couldn’t have had them on when she was traveling because she’d been carrying them in her purse and they’d become scratched and chipped.”

  “You think she’ll be wearing them in court?”

  “I think she’ll wear them every minute from now on,” Mason said, “but I don’t think she was wearing them when she was on that Greyhound bus.”

  “It’s going to be hard to prove,” Drake said.

  Mason said, “That’s the reason I didn’t question Dr. Radcliff any farther.”

  “I don’t get you, Perry.”

  “If I had been insistent he would have gone to Mrs. Maynard and told her that we were making inquiries. As it is, the chances are fifty-fifty that he won’t even mention it. We didn’t make an issue of it and the glasses have already been delivered, so he’ll go back to his watch repairing. He isn’t the sort of man who will do any gossiping. He’s a tight-lipped, skilled workman who wants only to be let alone to do his job.”

  Drake nodded. “I guess you’re right at that, Perry.”

  “We will, however,” Mason said, “serve a subpoena on him just as soon as the date for the preliminary hearing is set.”

  “When will that be?”

  “That,” Mason said, “may be very soon indeed.”

  Drake said earnestly, “Perry, you don’t stand a ghost of a chance in that case, and you know it. Why don’t you back out of it?”

  Mason said, “I’m not much good at backing out. I’m going to make the prosecution prove every element of this case beyond all reasonable doubt. The truth may be one thing, Mrs. Fargo’s story may be another—but they’re going to have to prove she’s guilty, Paul.”

  “They can do it,” Drake said. “I wish you were out of it, Perry.”

  “We’ll see if they can do it,” Mason said, and then added, “I’m not too happy about being in it myself, Paul, but I’m in it. Don’t make any mistake about that. I’m in it all the way.”

  Chapter 18

  The preliminary hearing of Myrtle Fargo for the murder of her husband had attracted little public interest.

  Courthouse attachés who had followed the spectacularly successful career of Perry Mason suspected that the cross-examination of Mrs. Newton Maynard would be the highlight of the case and it would be well worth watching to see if the astute cross-examiner could shake her testimony, but those who had talked with deputies in the District Attorney’s office were betting as high as twenty to one that her story couldn’t be broken down in any important particular. Mrs. Maynard was going to be a positive, skillful, sharp-tongued witness capable of matching wits with any attorney.

  So far as the general public was concerned Mrs. Fargo was guilty and that was all there was to it. She had tried to manufacture an alibi and had been caught red-handed. The case was hardly worth wasting time over.

  For that reason Mason found himself for one of the few times in his career in a courtroom which was not crowded to capacity. Outside of the first four or five rows of seats, the courtroom was empty of spectators.

  All this was to the annoyance of Hamilton Burger, the District Attorney, who had taken the case out of the hands of his deputies and decided to handle it himself. Those who were in the inner circle of the courthouse knew that Burger had taken this case not because he considered it particularly important, but because he wanted to gratify a lifelong ambition to achieve a smashing triumph over Perry Mason.

  Because that triumph would be so sweet to a district attorney who had smarted under a series of defeats, Burger was prolonging this case as much as possible.

  Patiently he called witnesses to build up the case, yet at the same time tried to keep from disclosing too much information.

  Burger introduced a plan of the premises where the murder had taken place, photographs of each room in the house. An autopsy surgeon testified as to the cause of death. The murder weapon had been found and introduced in evidence. It was a kitchen knife, well sharpened and honed, covered with sinister stains, but devoid of fingerprints.

  Burger had even found a witness who testified that he had paid Arthman D. Fargo five hundred dollars in currency the night before the murder took place, that in his presence Fargo had placed this money in the safe and had given the witness a receipt. The witness was interrogated as to the denominations of the bills. The bills, he explained, were ten fifty-dollar bills, making a total of five hundred dollars. He had drawn those bills from the bank that same afternoon.

  Then Burger introduced evidence of the open safe, the contents piled on the floor where they had been dumped out of the safe. Then, as a crowning touch, a police officer testified that at the time of her arrest Mrs. Fargo had in her purse ten fifty-dollar bills.

  Then started the procession of the dramatic witnesses, the ones who were to show flight from the scene of the crime. Burger called Percy R. Danvers, the parking station attendant at the Union Terminal.

  Danvers testified that about eleven o’clock on the morning of the murder a woman had parked an automobile in his section. She had received the usual parking station ticket. The other section of the ticket had been placed under the windshield wiper of the automobile. He had gone off duty two hours before the police had found the car.

  The witness gave the license number and the engine number of the automobile and the name on the certificate of registration, the name of Myrtle Ingram Fargo.

  Then came the dramatic question, “Could you identify the woman who left that car with you?”

  “I could. Yes, sir.”

  “Did you see her again?”

  “I did. Yes, sir.”

  “Where?”

  “In a shadow box at police headquarters.”

  “How many women were in that shadow box?”

  “Five.”

  “All of approximately the same height, weight, age and complexion?”

  “Yes.”

  “And did you pick the person out whom you had seen parking the car?”

  “I did. Yes, sir.”

  “Who was it?”

  The witness pointed a dramatic finger. “Mrs. Fargo, the defendant there.”

  “Cross-examine,” Burger said triumphantly.

  Mason smiled reassuringly at the witness. “Mr. Danvers, you did that very nicely,” he said.

  “Did what?”

  “Point your finger.”

  “Oh.”

  “How did it happen that you pointed directly at the defendant when you identified her?”

  “Because she was the one I saw.”

  “But you didn’t need to point your finger. You could simply have said that the woman you saw was the defendant.”

  “Well—I didn’t want any mistake about it. I pointed.”

  “I know you pointed,” Mason said. “Now who told you to point your finger?”

  The man seemed suddenly uncomfortable.

  “Come, come, Mr. Danvers,” Mason said, “your gesture was hardly spontaneous. There was a studied something about it as though it had been rehearsed. Now remember you’re on oath. Did someone tell you to point your finger when you were asked to identify the witness?”

  “Yes.”

  “Who?”

  “Oh, Your Honor,” Hamilton Burger said, his voice carefully modulated to show that his patience had been taxed far beyond human endurance, “all of this petty embroidering of irrelevant details, that’s not proper cross-examination. The witness identified the woman. The question is whether that’s the woman or whether she isn’t the woman, not whether he was told to point when he identified her…. Why, I’m perfectly willing to stipulate that I told this witness, in my office, when I was discussing the case with him, that if the defendant seated in the courtroom was the woman he had seen he was to point to her so there would be no misunderstanding. I’ll take the responsibility of that.”

  And Hamilton Burger beamed at the spectators as much as to say, “See, this bombshell of Perry Mason’s was very much of a dud after all.”

  “Thank you,” Mason said to Hamilton Burger. “I’m quite certain you told the witness to point, and I’m quite certain that your desperate attempt to make it appear as a casual, everyday occurrence hasn’t really fooled anyone.”

  Mason turned back to the witness. “So the District Attorney told you what to do in giving your testimony. Now then did he tell you what to say?”

  “Oh, Your Honor,” Hamilton Burger shouted, “that is entirely out of order! It is incompetent, irrelevant, and immaterial. It’s not proper cross-examination.”

  “Objection overruled. Answer the question.”

  “Well, he told me to point out this woman and to point to her when I indicated who she was.”

  Hamilton Burger, his face flushed, slowly sat down, but remained poised on the edge of his chair, showing plainly that he was ready to rise militantly to protect the rights of the People on the one hand and the dignity of the District Attorney on the other.

  “What color stockings did this woman have on?” Mason asked.

  “I don’t know. I didn’t notice how she was dressed.”

  “What sort of a skirt?”

  “I tell you I didn’t notice, but I think it was some sort of a—oh, a darkish color—I can’t say.”

  “What color shoes?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did she wear a hat?”

  “Yes, I think she did.”

  “Do you know what color?”

  “No.”

  “You didn’t notice her very closely, did you?”

  “Well, I didn’t notice her clothes, but I did notice her face. She parked the car and then wanted to get a taxi and that was a little unusual, so I just happened to remember her. Usually people who park their cars go right into the station.”

  “You don’t know what percentage of the people park cars in your parking lot and then take a taxi, do you?”

  “No. All I know is that this woman asked me about getting a taxi.”

  “Don’t you know as a matter of fact that a great many people who dislike to drive in traffic utilize the parking facilities at Union Terminal and then use taxicabs to do their running around in the city?”

  “Well, I suppose so, yes.”

  “Don’t you know?”

  “Well, I don’t know because I don’t know—I don’t ask them.”

  “So in this case when this person asked you about getting a taxi it made an impression on your mind?”

  “Yes.”

  “And that was the first time you really noticed the person whom you now identify as the defendant?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Coming out of the space allotted for parking automobiles?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “A good many automobiles were coming in at that time?”

  “We had quite a brisk little business, yes.”

  “Now, as I understand it, Mr. Danvers,” Mason said, “the customers drive up in front of the entrance to the parking place. Yon give them a ticket and place the stub under the windshield wiper of the automobile, then you collect some money and then the customer drives into the parking lot, finds a parking place, locks the car and walks back out.”

  “That’s right.”

  “So there’s some little time consumed between the time the stub is first given and the time the person walks out.”

  “A minute or two.”

  “Sometimes more than that?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Now the first time you noticed this person whom you now identify as the defendant was when she emerged from the parking lot and asked you about where to get a taxicab. Is that right?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And you noticed her then?”

  “Well, not well enough to tell you everything she had on, but well enough to be pretty sure that this defendant is the woman.”

  “Oh, you’re pretty sure,” Mason said.

  “Yes, sir.’”

  “You’re not absolutely sure?”

  “Well, I think I am.”

  “Why didn’t you say so then? Why did you say you were pretty sure?”

  “Well, I am pretty sure.”

  “Are you absolutely sure?”

  “Well, I think so, yes.”

  “Which is it? Pretty or absolutely?”

  “Well, I guess it’s absolutely.”

  “You guess it’s absolutely?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Then why did you say you were pretty sure?”

  “Well, I wanted to give the defendant the benefit of all the doubt.”

  “Oh, then there is a doubt.”

  “Well—I didn’t say I had a doubt. I said I was giving the defendant the benefit of any doubt.”

  “What doubt?”

  “Any doubt.”

  “Then as I understand it, you did have a doubt, and it was to resolve this doubt in favor of the defendant that you said you were pretty sure. Is that right?”

  “I guess so—yes.”

  “Now then,” Mason said, “if you’re only pretty sure that it was the defendant who emerged from that parking place, and if when she came out was the first time you took particular notice of her, you can’t be absolutely sure that she was the woman who drove the Fargo automobile into that parking space, can you?”

  “Well, it stands to reason she had to be.”

  “I’m not talking about what stands to reason,” Mason said. “I’m asking you if you know.”

  “Well, if you want to put it that way, I assume that she’s the same person. She must have been.”

  “But you don’t know?”

  “No, I don’t know.”

  “You aren’t sure?”

  “Well, I’m not absolutely sure.”

  “Are you pretty sure?”

  “Well, I’m—I just acted on the assumption that …”

  “I know you did,” Mason said. “You acted on the assumption that she must have parked that car, but you didn’t particularly notice the driver of that car when it came in, did you?”

  “Not particularly, no.”

  “You simply followed your usual routine of handing the driver a stub, getting the money necessary for the parking privilege and putting the other end of the ticket under the windshield wiper. Isn’t that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And under those circumstances you don’t take any particular notice of the drivers, do you?”

  “Well, sometimes.”

  “All right, Mr. Danvers,” Mason said, “now describe the drivers of the two cars who came in before the defendant.”

  “I can’t remember them now.”

  “You don’t even know whether they were men or women, do you?”

  “No.”

  “And at that time there was no particular reason for you to notice the woman who you now claim is the defendant. She hadn’t said anything or done anything that had attracted your attention.”

  “No.”

  “This person was in the parking space for several minutes. During that time other cars came in?”

  “I think so. I would assume so.”

  “You can’t remember?”

  “No.”

  “Then you saw some woman coming out of the parking place, who asked you something about a taxicab.”

  “That’s right.”

  “And the District Attorney told you that when you got on the witness stand you were to point at the defendant and say, ‘That was the woman.’ ”

  “Yes,” the witness said before Burger could get an objection in.

  Burger said, “Your Honor, I ask that that answer be stricken so that I can interpose an objection. That’s assuming a fact not in evidence. It’s a misquotation of the previous evidence.”

  “The witness has already answered,” Mason said.

  “And I’m asking that the answer be stricken out so that the Court can consider my objection.”

  “The witness said ‘Yes,’ ” Mason said. “He was under oath. Do you claim that answer was incorrect?”