Hamilton Burger said, “I submit, Your Honor, that this is my exhibit. I don’t think that counsel and his client are to be permitted at the present time to study my evidence before it is introduced. All they should be allowed to do is to inspect the document and see whether it is in the handwriting of the defendant. They certainly can answer that question very readily.”

  Mason said, “I don’t agree with counsel. I feel that we have a right to read this document before it is introduced in evidence. We may want to object to it. We may not want to object to it. We may stipulate as to the authenticity of the document. We may also find that there have been some passages interpolated which were not in the handwriting of the defendant but were clever forgeries.”

  “I think that is true,” Judge Cody said. “I think that the better practice is for counsel to be permitted to read the entire document before it is offered in evidence.”

  Hamilton Burger said desperately, “I am not offering it in evidence at the present time. I only want it marked for identification. I merely asked the doctor if that was in the handwriting of the defendant and he said it was. Now then, Your Honor, I would like to have it marked for identification. I think under the circumstances counsel is entitled at this time to a brief inspection. Later on, and before I offer it in evidence, he has the right to read it in order to see if he wishes to admit it without objection or whether he wishes to object to it, and if so on what grounds.”

  “Very well,” Judge Cody ruled. “If you merely wish it marked for identification at this time, counsel can be given an opportunity later to inspect the document.”

  Hamilton Burger bore down triumphantly on Perry Mason.

  As reluctantly as had Dr. Candler, Mason surrendered the diary.

  Hamilton Burger said, “That’s all for the moment, Doctor. I want to recall you later, but in the meantime I wish to lay a further foundation for the introduction of this diary.”

  “Just a moment,” Mason said, as Dr. Candler started to leave the stand. “I wish to cross-examine.”

  “But he hasn’t testified to anything on which you can cross-examine him as yet,” Hamilton Burger said. “He will give that testimony when I seek to introduce this diary and when I recall him on the stand.”

  “He’s testified that the document was in the defendant’s handwriting.”

  “Well, there can’t be any question about that,” Hamilton Burger said. “Of course it’s in her handwriting.”

  “Don’t be too sure,” Mason said.

  He got to his feet, walked toward the witness stand where a puzzled, white-faced Dr. Candler sat rigidly erect in the witness chair.

  “Now, Doctor,” he said, “you are familiar with the handwriting of the defendant?”

  “I am.”

  “I show you a photographic copy of a document, Doctor, and ask you if that is in the handwriting of the defendant.”

  Mason whipped from under his arm an enlarged eleven by fourteen photograph of the sheet of figures which had been in the possession of Thomas Sackett.

  Dr. Candler looked at the figures and shook his head. His face, which Mason was studying carefully, was absolutely blank.

  “Just a moment,” Hamilton Burger said. “Now I am entitled to see that document, if the Court please.”

  “Certainly,” Mason said, extending him the photograph. “Take a look at it.”

  Hamilton Burger looked at the photograph. Suddenly his eyes widened in surprise. He turned, hurried toward his seat at the plaintiff’s table, whipped out a notebook from the file of papers on the table, opened it and started comparing numbers with the numbers on the photograph.

  Mason quietly followed him over to the plaintiff’s counsel table. As Hamilton Burger turned toward his notebook to verify a figure Mason quietly slipped the photograph off the table and was halfway back to his own table before Burger knew it was missing.

  “Here,” Burger shouted, “bring that back here! I want to see it.”

  Mason merely smiled.

  “Your Honor, Your Honor,” Hamilton Burger shouted. “This is an important development. This document has no right to be in the possession of counsel. This… I want to see that document.”

  “You had a chance to look at it to see if it was in the defendant’s handwriting,” Mason said.

  “But I demand an opportunity to examine it I insist that—”

  Mason said to the perplexed judge on the bench, “I ask, Your Honor, merely to have this marked for identification. Therefore, under the rule promulgated by counsel himself, he has no right to read it himself at this time. He has glanced at it and that is sufficient.”

  “Your Honor,” Hamilton Burger pleaded, “that is a document so very confidential that… the existence of that document has been one of the most closely guarded secrets in the entire case. That is… I demand that that document be produced.”

  “It was produced,” the judge ruled.

  “I mean I demand it to be put in as evidence in the case.”

  “Is that a part of the prosecution’s case?” the judge asked, obviously interested.

  “It’s probably going to be used as a razzle-dazzle, a red herring, something with which to confuse the issues. It—”

  “That will do,” Judge Cody ruled. “Do you wish to introduce that document in evidence?”

  “I… I will if I have to. Your Honor, that document apparently contains a list of the numbers of bills which were in that five-thousand-dollar package of extortion money.”

  Mason smiled at the angry district attorney. “Later on, when I offer it in evidence you will have an opportunity to examine it, Mr. Burger. Now, under the rule of law you yourself promulgated, you were entitled to look at it. You looked.”

  “But, Your Honor,” Burger protested. “Those figures are so confidential that even I haven’t been able to secure a copy of the list. And here is counsel for the defense with a copy. It isn’t fair.”

  Mason merely smiled, turned back to the witness.

  “Now then, Doctor, I am going to ask you a technical question. You have stated you are a physician and surgeon.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “There is an X-ray machine in your office?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Doctor, I am going to ask you to go to the blackboard and make a diagram of your office. I want to know the room in which your X-ray machine is located.”

  “What does that have to do with any of the questions in this case, Your Honor?” Hamilton Burger protested. A diagram of his office. That is meaningless.”

  “You qualified him as a physician and surgeon. You had him testify that’s what he was. You also had him testify that he was practicing in Santa Ana. I have a right to test his recollection as to such matters.”

  Judge Cody glanced at Mason with a puzzled frown. “May I have your assurance that this matter is pertinent and important, Counselor?” he asked.

  “You have that assurance, Your Honor. I think it may well be one of the most important factors in the case.”

  “Very well.”

  Dr. Candler went to the blackboard and made a rough diagram of his offices.

  “Now then,” Mason said, “I am going to ask you, Doctor, if two people should be seated here, in chairs against the partition wall of this office, which, as I now understand it, is next to your X-ray room, would it be possible for an X-ray to be turned against the dividing partition in this X-ray room and the current turned on in such a way that it would fog all of the film of any sort that might be in any camera placed upon the little table in the corner of this room, a table directly against the wall in this position as shown in this diagram?”

  Dr. Candler’s face was completely puzzled. “Well, I don’t know… wait a minute. Yes, I guess it could. Yes, that X-ray machine would, of course, penetrate the wall. Now I am assuming the camera did not have a lead shield of any sort, that it was only plastic or some form of the light aluminum that is usually used in cameras.”

  “That is correct.”

  “Yes,” Dr. Candler said, “that would fog the film.”

  “All of it?”

  “Certainly. There is nothing to stop it. The X-ray machine doesn’t go through metal as easily as it penetrates flesh or bone, but it certainly would go through any metal that was not shielded by lead.”

  “So if someone in your office thought I had valuable evidence photographed on a film in a camera and wanted to destroy that photograph, it could be done by using that X-ray machine in that manner?”

  “Yes. If anyone wanted to, which is very unlikely.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Candler,” Mason said. “There’s just one more question. You stated that the full name of your office nurse was Rose Rucker Travis?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Her maiden name was Rucker?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “She was married to a man by the name of Travis?”

  “Yes, sir. I believe so. That was before she went to work for me.”

  “She has a sister, possibly by the name of Helen Rucker?”

  “I believe she has.”

  “Do you know Howard Prim?”

  “No, six.”

  “Does the name mean anything to you?”

  “No, sir.”

  “How about Thomas Sackett? Does that name mean anything?”

  “Thomas Sackett. I… I believe I have treated a patient by that name. Yes, I have treated a patient by that name.”

  “And do you know a William Emory?”

  “Yes, sir, I do.”

  “Mr. Emory was, I believe, the driver of the armored truck from which the cash shipment disappeared in that historic theft of the Mercantile Security.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “He was a patient of yours?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “He still is?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Thank you, Doctor,” Mason said. “That is all.”

  “Any redirect examination?” Judge Cody asked.

  “No, Your Honor.”

  “Call your next witness.”

  Hamilton Burger said grimly, “I will call Perry Mason as my next witness.”

  Perry Mason promptly proceeded to walk forward, hold up his right hand and take the oath.

  “Now then,” Hamilton Burger said, “I demand to know where you got that document.”

  “What document?”

  “The list of the numbers of the bills of the five-thousand-dollars’ extortion money. It was absolutely impossible for you to have obtained that list.”

  “Then if it was absolutely impossible it’s quite apparent that I don’t have it.”

  “But you do have it. That’s what those numbers were.”

  “How do you know?” Mason asked. “Did you check them?”

  “I checked the numbers that I have—that list is so secret that the local head of the FBI refused to deliver it even to me.”

  “Then,” Mason said suavely, “permit me, Mr. District Attorney, to present you with a photographic copy of the numbers you were unable to obtain from the FBI. I have had a copy of the photograph made for your exclusive use.”

  And with something of a flourish Mason left the witness stand, stepped to the counsel table and handed Hamilton Burger an eleven by fourteen photographic enlargement of the numbered list.

  “That isn’t answering my question,” Burger shouted. “Where did you get it?”

  Mason smiled and said, “That question, Mr. Burger, I decline to answer on the ground that it calls for a privileged communication; that it is a part of the case which the defense intends to put on and at this time it is incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial. We are trying the defendant, Arlene Duvall, on a murder case and not for the theft of money presumably taken by her father from an armored truck of the Mercantile Security.”

  And Mason resumed his position on the stand, crossed his long legs, folded his arms and smiled patronizingly at the angry and harassed district attorney.

  “Of course,” Hamilton Burger said with exasperation, “it was to have been expected that counsel would resort to every technicality in the books to try and protect himself, but I intend to keep hammering away here until I at least get the pertinent facts before this court.”

  “Keep your questions as to pertinent facts and I won’t raise a single objection,” Mason said.

  “All right,” Hamilton Burger said. “I’ll ask you again point blank, did you go out to Jordan L. Ballard’s house on the night of Wednesday, the tenth?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you go to the window in the front of the living room?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you lower and raise the roller shade?”

  “Yes. Certainly.”

  “What!” Burger shouted. “You admit that now?”

  “Certainly I admit it.”

  “You denied it before the grand jury.”

  “I did nothing of the sort,” Mason said. “You asked me if I had lowered and raised the roller shade as a signal to the defendant. I told you I had not. You asked me if I lowered and raised it as a signal to anyone. I told you I did not.”

  “But you now admit you lowered and raised the roller curtain?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Why didn’t you say so before the grand jury?”

  “Because you didn’t ask me.”

  “I’ve asked you now.”

  “I’ve told you now.”

  “Then what possible explanation do you have for lowering and raising that shade if you weren’t signaling someone?”

  Mason said, “I found that I had in my possession a thousand-dollar bill and a five-hundred-dollar bill; that the thousand-dollar bill had the number 000151.”

  Burger’s jaw sagged open. His eyes seemed about to pop out like marbles. He looked at Mason with an expression of such utter incredulous surprise that some of the spectators, equally startled by Mason’s answer, nevertheless began to laugh surreptitiously.

  Judge Cody pounded for order.

  “Go on, Mr. District Attorney,” he said.

  “But you appeared before the grand jury and produced two other bills—another five-hundred-dollar bill and a thousand-dollar bill. Where did you get those?”

  “Just where I told the grand jury I received them—in a letter purporting to come from Arlene Duvall.”

  “And where did you get the other money, that which you have just testified to as having been in your possession?”

  “In a letter purporting to come from Arlene Duvall.”

  “You didn’t tell us that.”

  “I wasn’t asked that”

  “I asked you to produce all money that you had received from Arlene Duvall.”

  “Certainly. I told you that I didn’t know I had received any money from Arlene Duvall, that I had received a letting purporting to be in her handwriting containing a thousand-dollar bill and a five-hundred-dollar bill. I then specifically mentioned that the money I was then producing was the money I had received in the letter I had just referred to. You didn’t bother to ask me if that was all the money I had received which purported to come from Arlene Duvall. If you can’t interrogate a witness so as to close up loopholes I see no reason for the witness to voluntarily assist you.”

  “That will do,” Judge Cody warned. “I have warned counsel to refrain from personalities.”

  “If the Court please,” Mason said, “this is not a personality between counsel and counsel—it is a personality between witness and counsel. Counsel chose to interrogate me as a witness and I have answered him as a witness.”

  “Very well, the matter is finished. Go on with the examination,” Judge Cody said, but there was the ghost of a smile at the corners of his mouth.

  “Why, I never heard anything like this,” Hamilton Burger said.

  “Doubtless,” Mason commented dryly, and there was a quick burst of laughter in court which was again silenced by Judge Cody.

  “And where did you get this other five hundred dollars and thousand dollars? How did it come to you?”

  “It was delivered to me by Paul Drake, who in turn said it had been delivered to him by a messenger.”

  “And what did you do with the money?”

  “I lowered the window shade at Ballard’s house while he was in the kitchen, inserted the two bills in the top of the roller, then raised the shade and left it in that position. I slipped back through the drapes, finished my drink with Jordan Ballard, and left.”

  “Then you want us to understand that Jordan Ballard was alive when you left?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Then since Arlene Duvall entered immediately after your departure—”

  “I beg your pardon,” Mason said, “you’re overlooking one essential fact.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The person having my size and build who was keeping the house under surveillance, the person who saw me lower and raise the curtain and wondered why I had done so, the person who parked his car in the driveway and entered the house immediately after my departure, the person whom Jordan Ballard knew well enough to receive in the kitchen, the person who had a bourbon and Seven-Up after Ballard had emptied the ice from my glass, which had contained the Scotch and soda, into the kitchen sink.”

  “And how do you know there was any such person, Mr. Mason?” Burger demanded sarcastically.

  “For the simple reason that when the police officers went out and made the experiment of lowering and raising the curtain they didn’t find any money there—unless, of course, it is your contention that the police officers found the two bills, appropriated them and decided to say nothing about them. Otherwise it stands to reason there must have been some other person in the house.”