All Grass Isn't Green

15

I was up before daylight and on the long, lonely road north, leaving the tide-flats behind me, climbing up the higher desert, then driving for mile after mile.

The east lightened into a glorious orange, then into blue, and the sun burst over the mountains to throw long shadows from the grease wood and the desert plants.

Finally I came to the turnoff.

By this time it was broad daylight.

It was a job getting to El Centro in time for the preliminary hearing, but I made it.

The deputy district attorney was a man named Rob, Clinton Roberts, and he took himself rather seriously.

He started out by making a speech to Judge Polk who was holding the preliminary hearing.

“The purpose of this hearing, if the Court please, is not to prove the defendant guilty of a crime, but simply to show that a crime has been committed and that there is reasonable ground to believe the defendant is connected with the commission of that crime.”

Judge Polk frowned slightly as though he objected to being educated by a much younger man.

“This Court understands fully the scope of a preliminary hearing, Mr. Prosecutor,” he said. “You don’t need to explain it.”

“I am not explaining it, if the Court please,” Roberts said. “I am trying to set forth the position of this office. Because of the prominence and social standing of the defendant we are going to go further than would ordinarily be the case. We are going to introduce enough evidence to show fully what the prosecution will rely on at the time of trial. And if the defendant can explain that evidence we will be only too glad to have such explanation made so that the case can be dismissed at this time.”

Anton Newberry, twisting his thin lips into a grin, said, “In other words, you are inviting the defense to show its hand at this preliminary hearing?”

“Not at all,” Roberts said angrily. “We are simply trying to show that the prosecution will conduct its case according to the highest standard of professional ethics and that if the defense can explain the evidence we will be only too glad to join with the defense in asking the Court for a dismissal.”

“And if the defense makes no explanation?” Newberry asked.

“Under those circumstances,” Roberts snapped, “We will ask that the defendant be bound for trial in the Superior Court on a charge of first-degree murder.”

“Go ahead with your evidence,” Judge Polk said to Roberts.

Roberts called the county surveyor to the stand to introduce the diagram he had made showing a section of the road between Calexico and Imperial.

There were no questions on cross-examination.

Roberts introduced the testimony of a Calexico officer who was on patrol duty on the night of the tenth and the morning of the twentieth. He had no the pickup with the houseboat trailer parked at a space in the road very near the northern boundary of city limits of Calexico. He had seen it earlier in the evening of the nineteenth and he saw it shortly after midnight on the morning of the twentieth. He decided to leave occupant of the houseboat alone until morning and waken him to tell him that there were laws against camping there by the roadside and that, while he didn’t want to be arbitrary, he would have to insist that the occupant move on.

The officer had knocked on the door repeatedly. There was no answer, so he tried the handle of the door. The door was unlocked. He opened the door and looked inside and saw a body sprawled upon the floor.

He came to the conclusion that the man had been shot. He immediately backed away and closed the door, careful as he closed the door not to leave any fingerprints.

He had then radioed headquarters and they had out a team of investigators and had notified the sheriff in El Centro, who had sent deputies.

The officers had moved the pickup and houseboat to police headquarters at Calexico where there were facilities for a scientific investigation.

An expert fingerprint man from the Sheriff’s Office had taken over and, within a short time, Sergeant Frank Sellers, an expert in homicide from the Los Angeles Police, who was frequently engaged in liaison work in outlying communities, had joined forces with the other officers.

Newberry said shortly, “No questions on cross-examination.”

An officer identified on the diagram, which had already been introduced, the place where the pickup and trailer had been located just within the city limits.

Again there was no cross-examination.

A Sheriff’s Office fingerprint expert was called to the stand. He testified to painstakingly powdering the inside as well as the outside of the pickup and houseboat, searching for fingerprints.

Had he found any?

Indeed he had. He had found many latents that were smudged. He had found some seventy-five latents that couldn’t be identified and he had found some latents that could be identified.

“The latents that could be identified,” Roberts asked, “where did you find them?”

“I found five prints of a left hand that had been placed against the aluminum side of the houseboat, just to the left of the door handle. One of the fingerprints, presumably the thumb print, was smudged. The other four latents were identifiable.”

“Do you have photographs of the fingerprints?”

“I do.”

“Will you produce those photographs, please?”

The witness produced the photographs.

“Now then, you say that those were identifiable. Have you identified those four fingerprints that were clear and unsmudged?”

“I have.”

“Whose fingerprints are they?”

“The fingerprints of Milton Carling Calhoun, the defendant in this case.”

There was a startled gasp from the spectators, Newberry’s eyes were blinking several times to the second, but his face was a wooden poker face.

Calhoun was the one who showed emotion. He should incredulous and then chagrined.

This time Newberry made a perfunctory cross-examination.

“You don’t know when those fingerprints were made,” he said.

“No, sir, I do not. All I know is that they were made at some time before I was called on to go over houseboat for fingerprints, and that was on the morning of the twentieth.”

Was the expert absolutely certain these were fingerprints of the defendant?

“Absolutely.”

“Each print? Or was it the cumulative effect of several prints?”

“No, sir,” the expert said. He had identified each every fingerprint. There had been enough points of similarity in each fingerprint to make an identification positive.

Newberry let the guy go.

A medical examiner summoned by the Sheriff’s Office testified that he had journeyed with the county coroner to Calexico; that the body had been observed m place the floor of the houseboat; that then the body had been removed to the mortuary and there had been a post mortem. Death had been caused by a .38-caliber bull which had penetrated the chest, severed a part of heart, and lodged near the spine on the right-hand side the body, traversing the chest at an angle. The bullet had been recovered. Death had been at some time between 9 o’clock at night on the nineteenth and 3 o’clock in the morning on the twentieth.

Newberry’s cross-examination was perfunctory.

How had the time of death been established? The answer was that the witness had used body temperature and the development of rigor mortis and of post-mortem lividity, had taken into consideration the outer temperature that night, estimated the temperature inside the houseboat, etc.

“What about the stomach contents?” Newberry asked. “Had not the contents of the stomach given a definite idea as to how long after the last meal had been ingested before death occurred?

“The stomach contents would be of no help,” the physician said. “The last meal had been ingested quite a few hours prior to death.”

I passed a note to Newberry. “Find out about conditions in the houseboat,” I said. “Was an electric light on at the time the body was discovered? Was there a gas stove which had been used and which would have changed the temperature in the houseboat and thereby thrown off the calculation of the time of death? And ask if it isn’t a fact that rigor mortis develops sometimes very slowly and at times almost immediately, particularly if death occurs during the height of an argument or quarrel which has raised the blood pressure.”

Newberry read the note thoughtfully, crumpled it, tossed it into the wastebasket, and said to the witness, “No further questions on cross-examination.”

The witness left the stand.

The prosecution introduced a certified copy of the State Firearms Records showing that Milton Carling Calhoun had purchased a certain Smith & Wesson .38-caliber revolver with a one-and-seven-eighths-inch barrel, number 133347, the cylinder of which held only five shells. The weapon had been purchased from the Sierra Sporting Company m March three years earlier.

A photo static copy of the record was introduced showing the signature of Milton C. Calhoun and address.[1]

Roberts said, “I am going to call Sergeant Frank Sellers, of the Los Angeles Police, to the stand.”

Sellers took the oath with the bored manner of who had testified thousands of times.

The prosecutor asked questions showing Sellers’ professional qualifications and the fact that he was in Calexico on the morning of the twentieth.

“What brought you to Calexico?” Roberts asked.

“Our department was asked by the chief of police Calexico to furnish some technical assistance in connection with a matter—”

“Just a minute,” Newberry interrupted. “Unless the matter is connected with the present case, I object to it as incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial.”

“It is indirectly connected,” Roberts said, “but we withdraw the question.”

Newberry smiled as though he had actually accomplished something besides keeping me from getting some information I would have liked to have had.

“But you were in Calexico on the morning of the twentieth?”

“Yes, sir.”

“At what time in the morning?”

“I arrived by plane about five-thirty in morning.”

“And what did you do?”

“I reported to the police.”

“And then what?”

“Then later on I went to the De Anza Hotel for breakfast.”

“And what happened when you arrived in the De Anza Hotel?”

“I found a private detective, one Donald Lam, whom I had known and with whom I had had dealings on several occasions, and he was then and there accompanied by one Milton Carling Calhoun, then defendant in this case.”

“Did you have any conversation with them?”

“Oh, yes. I asked Lam what he was doing there and was given to understand that he was working on a case and that the defendant in this case was his client.”

“Then what?”

“Then a Calexico police officer came and asked me to join him for a few minutes and told me that a murder just been discovered on the outskirts of town.”

“I accompanied this officer to the scene of the crime, a houseboat mounted on pontoons and being in turn mounted on a trailer behind a Ford pickup.”

“Did you search the premises for a possible murder weapon?” Roberts asked.

“We did,” Sergeant Sellers said.

“Was any weapon found?”

“Not at that time.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“I mean that the murder weapon was found at a later time.”

“By whom?”

“I believe,” Sellers said, “the murder weapon was discovered by Donald Lam.”

“Is Donald Lam in court?”

“Yes, he is. He’s seated there in the front row.”

“I ask permission to withdraw this witness temporarily and to call Donald Lam to the stand.”

“For what purpose?” Newberry asked.

“For the purpose of showing the finding of the murder weapon.”

“I don’t think that is proper procedure,” Newberry said.

Judge Polk shook his head impatiently. “We aren’t going to try this case on technicalities, not at this time and in this court. The witness will stand down Donald Lam is sworn. Stand up, Mr. Lam.”

I stood up.

“Hold up your right hand.”

I held up my right hand.

The clerk said, “You solemnly swear that all of evidence you will give in this case now pending before this court will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”

“I do,” I said.

They asked me for my name, address and occupation and I gave that information for the court records and seated myself in the witness chair.

Roberts, who had evidently carefully rehearsed questions and was following a well-thought-out camp said, “You went out to the scene of the murder?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“What do you mean, you don’t know?”

“There was no corpse there when I got there.”

“But you went to the place where the pickup trailer had been located?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, you went to what you thought was place?”

“Objected to,” Newberry said. “What the witness thought doesn’t make any difference.”

“All right,” Roberts snapped, “I’ll withdraw the question. I call your attention to this map or diagram of northern portion of the city of Calexico, Mr. Lam. that mean anything to you? Can you orient yourself that map?”

“Generally.”

“I call your attention to certain marks here which represent the place where the witnesses have said the pickup and trailer with the houseboat were parked. Did you go to that locality?”

“I did.”

“When?”

“I don’t know the exact time. It was during the morning of the twentieth.”

“Did you look for a murder weapon?” Roberts asked;

“I looked around. I wanted to see what evidence had been overlooked,” I said.

Sergeant Sellers had the grace to wince. The deputy sheriff, who was sitting in court, frowned.

“And what did you do?”

“I looked around a place where quite a few people were present and then I walked over to the extreme edge of a wide place by the side of the road.”

“Can you show us on the diagram, People’s Exhibit A, where you walked?”

I went over to the diagram and indicated the place marked “Drainage Ditch.”

“I walked along the edge of this drainage ditch,” I said.

“What were you looking for?”

“Any evidence that had been overlooked.”

“You said that before.”

“You asked me; I tried to tell you.”

“And what evidence did you think might have been overlooked?”

“I wanted to see if anyone had taken the trouble to cross that muddy ditch and look in the alfalfa field on the other side.”

“Did you find any footprints indicating anyone had crossed the ditch?”

“I did not.”

“Therefore, you felt that no one had crossed that drainage ditch since the water had left a deposit of in the bottom?”

“That’s right.”

“And what caused you to cross that ditch?”

“The fact that nobody else had.”

“If the murderer had not crossed the ditch, what you to believe that there was evidence which might have been found on the other side?”

“A man who throws a baseball doesn’t necessarily walk to home plate,” I said.

Someone in the audience snickered.

Roberts cleared his throat, authoritatively. “You’d need to be facetious, Mr. Lam.”

“I wasn’t being facetious. I was pointing out a physical fact.”

“In any event, you decided to cross that ditch?”

“I not only decided to, I did.”

“And what did you do when you crossed the ditch? By the way, how did you cross that ditch?”

“I walked.”

“No, no. I mean, what did you do about your shoes and socks?”

“I took them off and carried them.”

“And you crossed the ditch and climbed barefoot the bank on the other side?”

“That’s right.”

“Then what did you do?”

“I walked up and down the bank.”

“And what did you find, if anything?”

“When I had arrived at a certain place which I will to indicate on the map, I saw something metallic gleaming in the field. I moved over far enough to find that was a revolver.”

“And what did you do?”

“I told a young boy, who had followed me across, call the police.”

“Was that the first time you had seen this gun?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Now, let’s not have any misunderstanding about this” Roberts said. “I am showing you a thirty-eight-caliber revolver with a one-and-seven-eights-inch barrel being numbered one-thirty-three-three-four-seven, and having five shots, or the places for five cartridges in the cylinder. Will you look at this gun, please, referring, if the Court please for the sake of the record, to People’s Exhibit B?”

I looked at the gun and said, “This looks very much like the gun. I never did pick it up. I simply asked the young man to notify the police and to ask them to come at once. That is, I actually asked him to go to his parents and ask his parents to notify the police.”

“Now, this young man, would you know him if you saw him again?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Stand up, please, Lorenzo.”

The ten-year-old kid, looking very bug-eyed, stood up in court.

“Is that the person?” Roberts asked.

“That’s the person.”

“You may sit down,” Roberts said to Lorenzo.

Roberts looked at me long and hard, “Mr. Lam,” he said, “I suggest that you had that murder weapon in your possession when you went out to the place which has been indicated on the map.”

“I did not!”

“I further suggest that you looked around to find where would be a good place to conceal the weapon. That when you saw no one had crossed the muddy bottom of that ditch, you decided that it would be a good plan to drop that weapon in the alfalfa field.”

“I did not!”

“I suggest that you, therefore, went out into the alfalfa field; that you dropped the weapon; that you then intended to return to the bank on the other side and say nothing about what you had done, but that the presence of young man, Lorenzo Gonzales, forced you to change your plan; that the keen eyes of this young man detected you had something you were trying to conceal, and asked you what it was, or words to that effect.”

“That is not so.”

“That because this young man was standing where could, within a short time, and would undoubtedly have discovered this gun and, under the circumstances, the fact that you had planted the gun would have been immediately apparent, you changed your plans and pretended have discovered the gun yourself and asked young Lorenzo to run to his parents and get them to notify police.”

“That is not true.”

“I further suggest that you did this in order to protect your client, Milton Carling Calhoun.”

“That is definitely not true.”

“But you did very fortuitously discover this gun?”

“Yes.”

“And by some stroke of reasoning, or perhaps I should say some stroke of genius, you were able to walk directly to the place where this gun had been dropped.”

“That is not true.”

“Why did you go there?”

“I was making a general survey of the terrain.”

“And that survey caused you to take off your shoes and socks and wade across a very mushy, muddy ditch bottom in order to go to an alfalfa field where your keen mind suggested to you that the murderer might have been able to have thrown the gun without leaving any tracks in the bottom of the ditch?”

“I wanted to survey the territory. I crossed the ditch. I found the gun.”

“And you have never in your life seen this gun before?”

“Oh, Your Honor,” Newberry said, “I should have objected a long time ago, but I have let this farce go on because I thought perhaps counsel had some definite objective in view.

“I object to this entire line of questioning on the ground that counsel is attempting to cross-examine his own witness.”

“The objection is sustained,” Judge Polk said.

“And I now move to strike out the entire testimony of this witness on the ground that the testimony was improperly elicited and as the result of improper questions which were the result of an attempt to cross-examine the prosecution’s own witness.”

“The motion is denied,” Judge Polk ruled.

Roberts said, “You wish to cross-examine this witness before I dismiss him from the stand and recall Sergeant Frank Sellers?”

“Certainly not,” Newberry said. “I have no questions of this witness. Here is a man who came out to the scene of the crime and made an investigation which should have been made by the Sheriff’s Office of this county and the police of the city of Calexico, to say nothing of the really great expert imported from Los Angeles.”

And Newberry made a sarcastic bow in the direction of Sergeant Sellers.

Sergeant Sellers angrily half arose from his chair, but thought better of it.

“There’s no need for any grandstand oratory at this time” Judge Polk pronounced. “You may stand down, Mr. Lam. And Sergeant Sellers will return to the stand.”

“Now that we have the background of this murder weapon clarified somewhat,” Roberts said, “will you please tell what happened as far as you know — of your own knowledge?”

“I was at the Calexico Police Station, talking with the Chief,” Sellers said. “There was a phone call and I was advised by the Chief...”

“Just a minute, just a minute,” Newberry said. “I object on the ground that any conversation that you had with the chief of police which was not in the hearing this defendant is hearsay and incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial.”

“Sustained,” Polk said somewhat wearily.

“Just tell us what you did following this conversation,” Roberts said.

Sellers said, “I called to one of the police officers asked him to drive me out to the scene of the crime.”

“Was a deputy sheriff there at the time?”

“There were several deputy sheriffs at police headquarters, but they were working on developing latent fingerprints and doing other things. As a matter of fact, I didn’t think much of this hurried tip...”

“Move to strike out everything after the words ‘As matter of fact.’ ” Newberry said.

Judge Polk said, “It may go out. Sergeant, you know that you are not to offer any opinion.”

“I’m sorry,” Sellers said. “That just slipped out. I was thinking of my reactions at the time and what I did and, how it happened that we didn’t call any of the Sheriff’s Office to go out with us.”

“That’s quite all right. That can come out in cross-examination, if at all,” Judge Polk said. “Just go ahead with what you personally found, Sergeant.”

Sellers, who was not enjoying himself in the least shifted his position uncomfortably and said, “Together with this Calexico officer I went out to the scene of the crime. This young boy, Lorenzo Gonzales, was there waiting for us. He said something to us which, of course, I can’t repeat because it was not in the presence of the defendant, but, as a result of what he said, this officer and I walked across the ditch to a point where Donald Lam was standing over — that is, almost over, that gun, which as it turns out, is the gun marked People’s Exhibit B and introduced in evidence in this case.”

“And what did you do?”

“I inserted a fountain pen in the barrel of the gun so as to keep any fingerprints which might be on the weapon from being smudged. I elevated the fountain pen, thereby picking up the gun, and using this means of holding the gun in a perpendicular position, I carried it back across the ditch.

“We then took the gun to police headquarters where fingerprint men dusted it to try to develop latent prints.

“There were no prints on the gun. I may state that we hardly expected to develop latent prints on metal of this sort.”

“There were no prints at all?”

“Objected to as hearsay,” Newberry said.

Sellers grinned at him and said, “I was present when the dusting was done, Counsel.”

“And there were no fingerprints?” Roberts asked.

“There were some smudges, but nothing that was identifiable on the gun.”

“What was subsequently done with this weapon?” Roberts asked.

“I took it to the Office of the Sheriff in this county where a ballistics expert and I fired test bullets from it and put them in a comparison microscope with the fatal bullet in this case.”

“And what did you find?”

“We found a perfect match.”

“Meaning what?”

“Meaning that this weapon, which has been introduced in evidence as People’s Exhibit B, was the murder weapon, the weapon which fired the fatal bullet.”

“I believe that I have no more questions at the present time of this witness,” Roberts said. “You may cross-examine, Counsel.”

Newberry thought for a moment, then said, “I have no cross-examination at this time.”

“Call Lorenzo Gonzales to the stand,” Roberts said.

Lorenzo, looking suddenly badly frightened, came forward.

“How old are you, young man?” Judge Polk asked.

“Ten — going on to eleven.”

“Do you understand the nature of an oath?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What does it mean?”

“It means that you have to tell the truth.”

“And what happens if you don’t tell the truth?”

“You are punished.”

“And you are afraid of punishment?”

“Everybody is afraid of punishment.”

“Administer the oath,” Judge Polk said to the clerk. The clerk administered the oath.

Roberts said, “You are acquainted with Donald Lam the witness who testified here a short time ago?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And what was he doing when you first saw him?”

“He was walking around the place where all the people were standing.”

“And then what did you see him do?”

“I saw him take off his shoes and socks and cross over the muddy bottom of the drainage ditch.”

“How were you dressed at the time?”

“I had on my pants and a shirt.”

“The pants were long pants?”

“No, sir, they were the kind of an overall pants that had been cut off a little below the knee.”

“And what about your shoes and socks?”

“I don’t have none. I never wear shoes — except a church and — like when I come in here. Shoes hurt my feet.”

“So you were barefooted at the time?”

“Yes, sir.”

“So it meant nothing to you to run across the drainage ditch?”

“No, sir.”

“Now, what caused you to cross the drainage ditch?”

Lorenzo, who evidently had been carefully coached, said, “I saw that this detective man had found something.”

“Now, just a minute, just a minute,” Newberry interrupted. “That question calls for a conclusion of the witness and the answer is a conclusion of the witness.”

Judge Polk was interested. He leaned forward. “The Court will ask a few questions,” he said.

“Young man, was there something in the demeanor of this private detective, Donald Lam, which caused you to believe he had seen something?”

“Yes.”

“What was it?”

“Well, he was walking along, walking along, walking along, and I was watching him, and all of a sudden he stopped still and then turned and started walking out into the alfalfa field; and then he stood with his back to me so I couldn’t see what he was doing and then all of a sudden he turned and started back toward the bank of the ditch.”

“And what did you do?”

“As soon as I saw that he had found something, I ran across the muddy bottom of the ditch, up the bank on the other side, and over in the alfalfa field to where he was standing.”

“Did you run very fast?”

“Very fast indeed, sir. I have my feet very tough. I can run over rocks and the roughness, in the ground just as though I had shoes on — better than if I have shoes on.”

“So then what happened?” the judge asked.

“When this man saw that I knew he had found something was when he told me to go to my parents and have them call the police.”

“Now that, if the Court please,” Newberry said, “is purely a conclusion of the witness, incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial, calling for—”

“Just a minute,” Judge Polk said. “The objection be temporarily sustained, but I want to ask this young man a few more questions.

“Just what did Mr. Lam do which was out of ordinary?”

“Well, he started walking toward the bank of the ditch. Then he had taken a couple of steps and saw me coming running just as fast as I could to join him.”

“So what did you do?”

“I asked, ‘What did you find, mister,’ and he didn’t answer me right away. He sort of thought things over for a little while and then he said, ‘Never mind, but go home at once — do you live near here?’

“I told him I did.

“He said, ‘Go home and tell your father to call police and have them come out at once.’

“So then I said, ‘What did you find?’ and he didn’t say anything, so then I did a little looking and I saw this gun.”

“Was it in plain sight from where you were standing?”

“Not in plain sight, but I would have seen it even if he hadn’t said anything. It was lying where the sun was glinting on the metal enough so that you could see there was something in the alfalfa.”

“I think that tells the story in a manner which is admissible in evidence,” Judge Polk said. “Do counsel for either side wish to ask any more questions?”

“This covers the evidence that I expected this young man to give,” Roberts said.

“Is there any cross-examination?” Judge Polk asked Newberry.

Newberry shook his head emphatically. “No questions,” he said. “I do move, however, to strike out all of the evidence of this witness on the ground that he is too young to understand the meaning of the oath.”

“Motion denied.”

“Upon the further ground that the testimony given by this witness is purely speculative, is not objective, and relates to conclusions formed by this witness.”

“The motion is denied,” Judge Polk said. “I will admit that some of the testimony given by this witness relates to conclusions which he formed in his own mind. But in each instance the basis of those conclusions is set forth objectively in the form of admissible evidence so that any interpolation of what the witness thought or conclusions he reached from what he had seen are immaterial. This is an interesting bit of evidence and I don’t mind stating that the Court is impressed by it, although, of course, at the present time I don’t understand just what it is leading up to.

“Is it your contention, Mr. Prosecutor, that this murder weapon was in the possession of Donald Lam, that it was taken out into the field by Donald Lam and surreptitiously dropped at the spot where it was found?”

“That is correct, Your Honor,” Roberts said.

“Very well, go ahead with the case,” Judge Polk observed, glancing thoughtfully at me.

Roberts called a man by the name of Smith who testified that he was a semi-pro ball player; that he played the position of pitcher; that he had been taken to the scene of the crime by Sergeant Sellers; that he had been given a revolver which was an exact duplicate of the gun introduced as People’s Exhibit B; that it was a Smith & Wesson chambered for five shells with a one-and-seven-eighths-inch barrel; that he had stood by the ditch at the scene of the crime and had thrown the gun as far as he could; that he had thrown it not once but several times, and that he had never been able to throw the gun as far as the spot in which the gun had been found when the police officers arrived.

“Any questions on cross-examination?” Roberts asked.

Newberry shook his head.

“Just a minute, Your Honor,” I said. “Since my integrity is being impugned here, I would like to ask question, whether or not the man tried throwing the from a point farther down the bank or whether he stood right at the scene of the crime, There is no evidence the person who threw the gun had to stand at the scene of the crime and—”

“Now, just a minute,” Judge Polk said. “You are of order, Mr. Lam, although I appreciate the point you are making. If counsel for the defense wishes to bring out the point, he certainly is entitled to do so. On other hand, as far as this Court is concerned, it is self-evident fact. The diagram now shows the alfalfa field and the spot where the gun was picked up. Quite apparently, by moving down the bank of the ditch, throwing the gun straight across, instead of at a diagonal, quite a few feet could have been saved. That is matter of simple mathematics.”

“Just a moment, Your Honor,” Roberts said. “It stands to reason that if the murderer threw that gun he want to get rid of it just as soon as possible. He would have left the trailer, run to the bank of the ditch, trying to dispose of the gun, seen the muddy bottom in the ditch, and decided to throw the gun as far as he could.”

“Are you,” Judge Polk asked, “trying to argue with the Court?”

Roberts thought for a moment, then said, “Well, yes Your Honor.”

“Don’t do it,” Judge Polk said. “There is no more reason for the murderer to have run directly from the scene of the crime at a right angle than there is for him to have angled down so that he came to the bank of the ditch at a point that was right opposite from the place where the gun was found.”

Roberts hesitated for a moment, then sat down.

“Call your next witness,” Judge Polk said.

Roberts said, “I call Maybelle Dillon to the stand.”

Maybelle Dillon was in her late forties, with a flat chest, sagging shoulders, and a general air of despondency, but her eyes were alert and she spoke with a rapid-fire delivery.

She gave her address as 895 Billinger Street, Los Angeles, and her occupation as a typist.

“For whom do you type?” Roberts asked.

“I am a free-lance typist. I type manuscripts and do minor editing. I advertise in the writer’s magazines and get quite a number of manuscripts in the mail. I give these minor editing, type them in acceptable form, and send them back, together with one copy at so much per page.”

“Are you acquainted with one Nanncie Beaver?”

“Oh, yes, yes indeed!”

“And where does Miss Beaver live?”

“At Eight-thirty Billinger Street, Apartment Sixty-two B.”

“Have you had occasion to see Miss Beaver in the last week?”

“Yes, sir.”

“When?”

“It was — now, let me see, it was the fifteenth of the month.”

“And where were you at that time?”

“I was in Nanncie’s apartment.”

“Do you do work for Nanncie?”

“No, sir, she does her own typing, but we’re very good friends, and Nanncie occasionally comes up with a client for me, some beginning author who either doesn’t have a typewriter or who can’t think on a typewriter or who doesn’t turn out good enough work for submission to the magazines... you see I work with amateurs.”

“Was anybody else present at that time when you saw Miss Beaver?”

“No, sir, there were just the two of us.”

“Now, at that time, did Nanncie show you a gun?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I show you a gun, People’s Exhibit B, and ask you if that looks like the gun that she showed you at that time.”

The witness handled the gun gingerly and said, “Yes, sir, it looks very much like the gun.”

“And what did Nanncie tell you?”

“She told me that she had tipped off one of her writer friends to a dope-smuggling racket and that he was about to write it up; that one of her friends, a Mr. Calhoun—”

“Just a minute, just a minute,” Newberry interrupted on his feet, his voice filling the courtroom. “This is improper and counsel knows it. This is irrelevant, immaterial, and is hearsay. It is completely outside of the issues. Unless it can be shown that the defendant was there or unless the witness heard the words of the defendant anything that this Nanncie Beaver told her about the source of the gun is completely irrelevant.”

“I think that’s right,” Judge Polk said.

“May I be heard?” Roberts asked.

“You may be heard, but this conversation seems to me to be hearsay.”

“Surely, Your Honor,” Roberts said, “we have here murder weapon. We have this weapon in the hands of the very close friend of that defendant. We have—”

“Object to that statement as prejudicial misconduct. I move it be stricken from the record,” Newberry shouted.

“It will go out,” Judge Polk ruled. “Now, try to confine yourself, Mr. Prosecutor, to the facts of this case as they are admissible in court.”

“We expect to prove a friendship, Your Honor. We expect to prove that statements as to this gun are really part of the res gestae.”

Judge Polk shook his head. “You can’t do it by hearsay.”

“Very well,” Roberts said, “we’ll go at it another way. I’ll excuse this witness from the stand and. I’ll call Mrs. George Honcutt to the stand, please.”

Mrs. Honcutt was a matronly woman with square shoulders, big hips and a bulldog jaw. She came swinging up to the witness stand like a full-rigged ship plowing into the harbor.

“What is your name, address and occupation?” the clerk asked.

“Mrs. George Honcutt. I manage the Maple Leaf Motel in Calexico.”

“I ask you if, on the early morning of the twentieth of this month, you had a tenant in your motel by the name of Nanncie Beaver?”

“I did.”

“How was she registered?”

“Under the name of Nanncie Beaver, but she first tried to register under the name of Nanncie Armstrong.”

“And what caused her to change her registration?”

“I said, ‘Look, dearie, when a single woman comes in here I have to know something about her. Now, I want to take a look at your driving license.’ So then she produced her driving license and said she was sort of hiding and didn’t want anyone to know she was registered there, and I told her it was all right by me as long as she behaved herself; that I was running a decent, respectable place and that I’d expect her to behave herself, otherwise out she went.”

“And she stayed on there?”

“Yes.”

“Until what time?”

“I don’t know when she actually left the motel, but the rent was paid up until the twentieth. When I went in to check her room on the morning of the twentieth, there was the key in the door on the outside and she had gone. All of her baggage — everything.”

“Was the rent paid?”

“You bet the rent was paid,” Mrs. Honcutt said. “With a woman like that I collect in advance, day by day.”

“Thank you, that’s all,” Roberts said.

“Any questions?” Judge Polk asked Newberry.

The lawyer seemed puzzled. “No questions.”

“Now then,” Roberts said, “I’m going to call Mr. Herbert C. Newton.”

Herbert Newton was a middle-aged individual with a quick, nervous manner and a wiry frame. He quite evidently enjoyed being a witness.

He gave his name, address and occupation to clerk, then turned expectantly to Roberts.

Roberts said, “Where were you staying on the evening of the nineteenth and the morning of the twentieth?”

“At the Maple Leaf Motel in Calexico.”

“At any time during the night did you have occasion get up and look out of your window?”

“I did.”

“What was your unit?”

“I was in Unit One which is right next to the street right across from Unit Twelve.”

“And what happened, if anything?”

“It was around two or three o’clock in the morning when I heard voices across in Unit Twelve, and the light came on in Unit Twelve which threw a light in my bedroom. The voices and the light wakened me and kept me from sleeping. I became very irritated.”

“And what did you do?”

“After a while I got up.”

“And what did you see or hear?”

“I could hear a man’s voice and a woman’s voice. They seemed to be arguing. After I got up out of bed heard the man say, ‘You’ve got to get out of here. You’re in danger. You come with me and I’ll take you to another place where you won’t get mixed up with this writer friend and be in danger.’ ”

“Anything else?”

“Yes. He said, ‘Get packed and meet me out in the car and I’ll take the gun. You can’t keep it with you in Mexico.’ ”

“What was that last?”

“He said, ‘I’ll take the gun.’ ”

“And then what happened?”

“Then he said, ‘Pack just as fast as you can.’ ”

“Anything else?”

“Yes. He said. ‘You’re foolish to have got mixed in this thing. Now, I’ll take charge of things and get you off the hook, but you’ve got to quit being tied up with that crazy writer.’ ”

“Then what happened?”

“Then the door opened and this man came out.”

“Did you get a good look at him?”

“I certainly did. The light from inside the apartment was full on his face.”

“And do you see this man in the courtroom?”

“Certainly. He is the defendant.”

“That’s the man you saw emerging from the apartment?”

“That’s the man I saw.”

“That’s the man who said, ‘I’ll take the gun’?”

“That’s the man who said, ‘I’ll take the gun. You can’t keep it with you in Mexico.’ ”

“Then what happened?”

“Then the door was closed, and after a very few minutes the light went out and some woman whom I couldn’t see opened the door and put a bag and a suitcase on the threshold, and this man who had been waiting in a big car, parked at the curb, came and picked up the bag and the suitcase and put them in the car. Then they drove away.”

“Any questions on cross-examination?” Judge Polk asked.

Newberry said, “I have just one or two questions of this witness. Can you give us the exact time of this conversation Mr. Newton?”

“No, I cannot. I was aroused from sleep and I was annoyed and irritated. In fact, I was so angry I couldn’t get back to sleep for I guess an hour. I know it was before three o’clock because I didn’t get to sleep until after three o’clock. I finally got up and took a couple Bufferin.”

“There’s no question in your mind that the man you saw was Milton Carling Calhoun, the defendant in case?”

“Absolutely no question.”

“Do you wear glasses?”

“I wear glasses when I read, but I can see with glasses at a distance and I saw this man just as plain as day, standing there in the doorway.”

“I think that’s all,” Newberry said.

Roberts said, “If the Court please, that concludes our case. We ask that the defendant be bound over to Superior Court on a charge of first-degree murder.”

I said to Newberry, “Ask for a continuance.”

Newberry shook his head. “It won’t do any good. We aren’t going to put on any defense. I never put on defense at a preliminary hearing. It just tips your hand and—”

I interrupted him to say in a whisper, “They haven’t proven anything except a bare case of circumstantial evidence and—”

“Don’t be funny,” Newberry broke in. “They’ve shown his fingerprints on the houseboat. They’ve shown his ownership of the fatal gun. They have evidence showing that he went to the Maple Leaf Motel at two o’clock in the morning to get the gun. He was going to take care of things to protect his light-of-love. He went out and took matters into his own hands. He killed the dope runner.”

“That’s not the kind of a man Calhoun is,” I said. “For God’s sake, move for a continuance!”

Judge Polk said, “Gentlemen, is there any defense?”

“A half hour’s continuance,” I said.

Calhoun looked at me and then looked at his attorney.

“A half-hour continuance won’t hurt anything,” he said to Newberry.

Newberry got to his feet reluctantly.

“There seems to be some question as to procedure,” he said. “May I ask for a thirty-minute recess?”

Judge Polk looked at his watch. “The Court will take a fifteen-minutes recess,” he said. “That should be ample for counsel to confer with his client.”

Judge Polk left the bench and retired to chambers.

I grabbed Newberry’s arm and pulled him and Calhoun over to a secluded corner of the courtroom under the watchful eye of the deputy sheriff who had Calhoun in custody.

“You lied to me,” Newberry said to his client.

Calhoun said, “I only lied to you on an unessential matter. It was absolutely vital to me to keep Nanncie out of it. Yes, I did go to the motel. I wanted to get the gun back because I had an idea that I was going to stay and protect Nanncie. But she told me she didn’t have the gun, that she had given it to this writer, this Colburn Hale.”

“And that made you mad?” I asked.

“It made me very angry. I had given her that gun for her own protection.”

“So what did you do?”

“I took her over to the Lucerna Hotel in Mexicali, got her a room and paid for it. Then I came back across the border and registered at the De Anza Hotel.”

I shook my head and said, “No, you didn’t. You drove along the road to that place where the pickup was parked. Now, what caused you to go in that houseboat?”

“I didn’t go in the houseboat,” Calhoun said.

“All right, what did happen?”

Calhoun said dejectedly, “I have held out on you people, I shouldn’t have done it, but I was trying to protect myself.”

“Go on, go on,” I said. “We haven’t got all day. What happened?”

Calhoun said, “When I was driving into Calexico headlights picked up this pickup and the houseboat the trailer, and as they did I saw a man jump out of door of the houseboat, hit the ground in a flying leap start running just as fast as he could go over toward the drainage ditch. After he got a few yards over there on angle, he got out of the range of my headlights.”

“And what did you do?”

“It was around two o’clock in the morning. I stopped my car, went over to the houseboat and called out, ‘Is everything all right?’

“There was no answer. I rapped with my knuckles the door. That was probably when I put my left hand against the side of the houseboat to brace myself. And then I thought better of it. After all, it wasn’t any of my business. I called out again, ‘Is everything all right there?’ I received no answer so I got back in my car drove on to Calexico.

“I went at once to the Maple Leaf Motel and I did have the conversation with Nanncie that this man overheard. I took Nanncie across the border to a hotel where I thought she would be safer than in that Maple Motel. And I wanted to get her out of the clutches of writer friend of hers.”

“What about the gun?”

“I did tell her that I’d take the gun back because knew it would make complications if she had a across the border in Mexico, and she told me she didn’t have it, that she’d loaned it to Hale.

“I’ll admit I became angry. I had given her that for her personal protection. Certainly not with the idea that she was going to pass it around to some down-at-the-heel writer friend.”

I turned to Newberry. “All right,” I said, “you’re going to have to use heroic measures.”

“What do you mean?”

I said, “They’re going to bind him over for trial unless you pull a fast one.”

“They’re going to bind him over for trial in any event. I’m not even going to object. I’m not going to put up a whisper of an argument except that I’m going to put up the old song and dance that there’s nothing in this case except circumstantial evidence; that they can show that the murder was committed with his gun and that there are fingerprints on the houseboat, but they can’t tell when those fingerprints were made or who was holding the gun when it was fired. The fingerprints may have been made at any time.”

“And your client is going to get bound over.”

“He’ll get bound over.”

I looked at Calhoun. “Do you like that?”

“Good God, no!” Calhoun said.

“But you can’t stop it,” Newberry said, “He’s stuck.”

“Not if you play it right,” I told him.

Newberry looked at me with sudden distaste. “Are you,” he asked, “now trying to tell me how I should handle this case?”

I looked right back at him and said, “Yes.”

“Well, don’t do it,” Newberry warned. “I don’t know just how you fit into the picture, Lam, but I think you’re in this thing up to your necktie. Are you sure that you weren’t the man Calhoun saw running out of the houseboat trailer?”

“I’m sure I wasn’t the man he saw,” I said, “and if you use your head a little bit we may be able to knock this whole thing into a cocked hat right now.”

“You’re crazy,” he told me. “It’s an axiom of criminal law that you can’t do anything on a preliminary examination, You cross-examine the witnesses, you get as much of the prosecution’s case as you can, and then you just ride along with the punch.”

“To hell with the axioms of criminal law,” I said. “I’m talking about a particular case. This case. You let Calhoun be bound over and there will be headlines over the country.”

“We can’t control the press,” Newberry said. “We have a free press in this country. They can print the news any way they want to just so they confine themselves to truth.

“Now then, a feminine angle has been introduced in this case and, believe me, that’s going to give the newspapers a field day. MILLIONAIRE DEFENDANT IN SURREPTITIOUS MIDNIGHT RENDEZVOUS...”

I said to Calhoun, “Do you want to put on a defense?”

“I want to get out of this,” he said.

“It isn’t what Calhoun wants, it’s what I want,” Newberry said. “I’m the lawyer and I don’t brook any interference from a client. I’ll tell you right now, Lam, I don’t brook any interference from some smart-aleck private detective either.”

“I’m not a smart-aleck detective,” I told him. “I’m a damn good detective.”

Calhoun looked from one to the other.

“What do you want to do, Calhoun?” I asked. “Make up your mind.”

“I guess there’s nothing I can do,” Calhoun said. “Newberry has reached a decision.”

“And who is Newberry working for?”

“Why... I guess he’s working... he’s working for me.”

“I don’t work for anybody,” Newberry said. “I’m a professional man. I’m an attorney. I permit myself to be retained in cases. I go to court and I handle those cases my way. Make no mistake about it, my way.”

Calhoun shrugged his shoulders and looked helplessly at me.

I said, “You want my judgment, Calhoun? I think we can spring you out of this. In fact, I’m pretty damn sure we can.”

“I’ll bet a thousand to one against it,” Newberry said.

“I’ll take a hundred dollars of that right now,” I told him.

He said angrily, “I don’t want to make any actual bet I was just simply giving the odds. It wouldn’t do any good to make an actual bet because I’m going to stand up and tell the Court that we consent to an order binding the defendant over.”

I looked at Calhoun and said, “Fire him!”

“What?” Calhoun asked incredulously.

“Fire him!” I said.

Newberry looked at me and said, “Why, you smart-aleck son of a...”

I turned away from him and said to Calhoun, “He’s your lawyer. You fire him and do as I say and you’ll get out of this.”

“So you’re practicing law,” Newberry said.

“I’m telling Calhoun what to do. Calhoun can be his own attorney. You do what I tell you to, Calhoun, and we’ll be home free.”

Calhoun looked dubious.

The door from chambers opened and Judge Polk came in. The bailiff rapped the Court to order. We all stood up, then were seated.

“Very well,” Judge Polk said, “we will take up the case of People versus Calhoun. Is there any defense?”

“Fire him,” I said to Calhoun. “Now!”

Calhoun reached a sudden decision. He got to his feet and said, “Your Honor, I want to be my own lawyer.”

Judge Polk was startled. Roberts whirled around looked at us as though we had all taken leave of senses.

“You want to discharge your lawyer?” Judge P asked.

Newberry grabbed up his briefcase. “There’s no need to discharge me,” he said. “I’m quitting the case.”

“Now, just a moment,” Judge Polk said. “You can’t quit the case without the consent of the Court.”

Newberry hesitated and said, “I don’t want anything of this client. I don’t want any part of him or of smart-aleck private detective.”

“Just control yourself,” Judge Polk said. “Mr. Calhoun, what seems to be the situation?”

“I want to put on a defense and I want to conduct own case,” Calhoun said.

“You want to discharge your lawyer?”

“I want to discharge him.”

Judge Polk looked at Newberry. “You want to withdraw from the case?”

“I withdraw from the case. I have withdrawn. I do withdraw. I don’t want any more to do with it.”

Judge Polk sighed. “Very well,” he said, “the order will be granted. The defendant will act for himself in propria persona.

“Now then, Mr. Calhoun, do you wish to put on another witness?”

“Call Colburn Hale,” I whispered.

Calhoun looked at me, then looked at the indignant back of Newberry who was stalking out of the courtroom.

“I’ll call Colburn Hale as my first witness,” he said.

While Colburn Hale came limping forward and held up his right hand as though his entire body hurt, Calhoun whispered, “What the devil do I ask him?”

“Sit down beside me,” I said, “and ask the questions as I feed them to you.”

I whispered to Calhoun, while Hale was giving his name, address and occupation to the clerk, “Make your questions as short as possible and encourage him to do the talking.

“Now, your first question is whether or not he ever saw the gun, People’s Exhibit B. Hand the gun to him and ask him if he ever saw it, and if he says, ‘Yes,’ ask him when was the last time he saw it. Encourage the guy to talk.”

Calhoun was as awkward as a man trying to water-ski for the first time. He floundered around and said to the clerk, “Please show this witness the gun and I want to ask him if he ever saw that gun before.”

“What is the object of this?” Judge Polk asked.

Calhoun looked at me.

I said, “We want to find out how the gun got into that field.”

Calhoun passed my comment on to the judge.

“Very well,” Judge. Polk said. “I think that is probably a legitimate part of the defense, since the prosecution has made a point of it. Let the witness answer the question.”

“I have seen the gun before,” Hale said.

“Where? How? When? And what happened to it? When did it leave his possession?” I asked Calhoun.

“When did you see it?”

“I saw it — well, I guess it was about the seventeenth.”

“How did you get it?”

“Nanncie Beaver gave it to me. She told me that—”

“Just a minute,” Roberts said. We object to any conversation between the witness and Nanncie Beaver.”

“Sustained,” Judge Polk said.

“When did you last have the gun?” Calhoun asked.

“I lost it on the evening of the nineteenth.”

“How did you lose it?”

“Puggy took it from me.”

Calhoun looked at me.

“Who’s Puggy?” I whispered to him.

“Who’s Puggy?” he asked. “Tell me all about it.”

Hale said, “I was on the track of this dope shipment. I had this gun. I was following the dope shipment up from San Felipe. I thought I was being smart.

“I didn’t know there was a tail car behind me. When we got almost to where the La Puerta road turns off, this tail car closed in on me and crowded me to the side the road. Then the pickup with the houseboat trail stopped.

“The man who was driving the tail car was evidently a pugilist, because the other guy called him Puggy started working me over. I tried to pull the gun on and the man from the dope car — I guess that was Ed Sutton — had me covered and said, ‘Get your hands up, or your brains will get smattered all over the side of your car.”’

I nudged Calhoun. “Tell him to go on.”

“Go on,” Calhoun said.

I whispered to Calhoun, “Every time he stops talking, just tell him, ‘Go on.’ ”

Calhoun nodded.

“Well,” Hale said, “they really worked me over. That’s where I got this shiner, and I got a bloody nose and a cut lip. There was blood all over my shirt and I was pretty much of a mess by the time they got done with me.”

“Go on,” Calhoun said.

“They got me down and they kicked me and really gave me a beating. Then they put me in my car, tied me up with some kind of a thin, strong cord, sort of like a fishing line — that is, a heavy fishing line — and they drove me down the side road, put a gag in my mouth, parked the car and said, ‘Now, stay there, you smart son of a bitch. That’ll teach you to interfere in things that don’t concern you.’ ”

“Go on,” Calhoun said.

“They took the gun. The man called Puggy took the gun.”

“Go on,” Calhoun said.

“Well, that’s all of it,” Hale went on, “except the fact that about — I don’t know — seven o’clock in the morning — eight o’clock, I guess, this very fine Mexican gentleman by the name of José Chapalla came along and saw my car by the side of the road. He stopped to take a look and saw me tied and gagged and he untied the ropes and took the gag out of my mouth. I was about half dead by that time, and José Chapalla took me to his home and they gave me coffee and some eggs and tortillas and then I went to sleep, and then José took me back to my car and after a long while I drove away. I started for Mexicali and got as far as a roadside restaurant where I went in to get some beer, and that’s where Donald Lam and Nanncie Beaver found me.”

“Ask him if he’s sore and stiff,” I said.

“Are you sore and stiff?” Calhoun asked.

“Of course I am! My ribs are just about caved in. I’m more sore now than I was the day of the beating. I not only have this black eye, but I’m afraid my ribs are cracked.”

“Tell him to show us the bruises,” I whispered to Calhoun.

“Can you show us the bruises?” Calhoun asked.

Hale pointed to his eye.

“On his ribs, on his sides, on his torso,” I said.

“The other bruises,” Calhoun said. “Where are they?”

Hale put a hand tenderly to his side. “All over.”

“Show us,” I said.

“Show us,” Calhoun echoed.

“What do you mean, show you?” Hale demanded.

“Pull up your shirt,” I whispered.

“Pull up your shirt,” Calhoun echoed.

Hale looked at us and suddenly there was panic in his eyes. “I am not going to disrobe here in public,” he said.

“Just show us a bruise,” I whispered. “Show us a bruise on your arm. Show us a bruise anywhere on your torso — just one single bruise — one black-and-blue mark.”

Calhoun stammered, “Show us your body, anything that’s black and blue.”

“I don’t have to,” Hale said.

Calhoun seemed to be at an impasse.

“Tell him he’s a liar,” I said. “Tell him he can’t show a single bruise, that he hasn’t got a spot on his body. Ask that the Court appoint a doctor to examine him.”

Calhoun ran his fingers through his hair and said, “How about having a doctor make an examination, Your Honor? This man hasn’t got a bruise on his body.”

“He’d have to have,” Judge Polk said.

“He’s lying,” Calhoun said.

“Wait a minute,” Roberts said. “You can’t impeach your own witness. I don’t like to be technical with a man who is putting on his own defense, but we have to protect the rights of the people. He can’t impeach his own witness.”

I said, “Ask the judge if he wants to get at the truth in the case.”

Calhoun was good that time. He said. “Does Your Honor want to get at the truth of this case or not?”

Judge Polk looked at the uncomfortable Colburn Hale and hesitated.

“Just a minute,” Roberts said. “Who’s trying this case? What does this private detective think he’s trying to do? Donald Lam isn’t an attorney. He doesn’t appear in the case. He has no standing in court.”

It was too much for Hale. He jumped out of the witness chair and scurried like a rabbit for the side door of the courtroom.

“Stop that man!” Judge Polk yelled at the bailiff.

They couldn’t stop him. Hale was long gone.

I looked at the judge and said, “He recovered from all that stiffness and soreness pretty fast, didn’t he, Your Honor?”

Judge Polk looked down at me, started to rebuke me, then suddenly smiled and said, “He did for a fact.

“I would suggest that the Sheriff’s Office put out an all-points bulletin for this man. His black eye should make it very easy to pick him up.”

“But this Donald Lam doesn’t have any right to ask questions in this case,” Roberts objected.

Polk smiled at him and said, “Quite right, Mr. Roberts, but this Court does have the right to ask questions and this Court intends to ask some very searching questions.”

The officers caught Hale at the courthouse door and returned him to court.

Judge Polk said, “Young man, you are on the witness stand. Now, you get right back there in that witness chair and you listen to me.

“It appears that you may have committed a crime. The Court warns you that you don’t have to make any statement whatever. If you feel it may incriminate you, you don’t have to talk. Or, if you just want to keep quiet, you have that privilege. You are entitled to have an attorney represent you at all stages of the proceeding and if you don’t have money enough to get an attorney, the Court will appoint one. But you aren’t going to get up off that witness stand and run out of the courtroom the way you did a moment ago.

“Now then, do you care to answer questions?”

Hale shifted his position and said nothing.

“Do you want an attorney to advise you? The Court is going to call a doctor to examine you.”

Hale said, “I may as well come clean. I haven’t got any way out, and, after all, I acted in self-defense. If I keep on being as foolish as I have been, I’ll wind up facing a murder rap.”

“You can either talk or not talk, just as you want,” Judge Polk said, “but you’re going to be examined.”

Hale started talking, the words just pouring out of his mouth. He said, “I knew that dope shipment was coming across the border. I knew that they intended to make a rendezvous with the driver of a scout car at the Carlo Café at seven o’clock. I told my girl friend that I would meet her there at seven o’clock.

“It started to rain. The shipment was delayed. I followed it across the border. There were two men in a car. One of the men picked up the scout car and went ahead. The pickup with the houseboat trailer parked the side of the road.

“I had the story I wanted. It was one whale of a story, but I didn’t have it all. I wanted to see where they placed this houseboat. I sensed the scout car had found a road block or something that caused a delay.

“I stayed where I could keep the houseboat under surveillance. It was a rainy night. I waited and waited. The driver of the pickup had gone back into the house-boat. I had an idea he’d gone to sleep.

“I was overly confident. I was a plain fool. I couldn’t, resist trying to get one detail I hadn’t been able to get and that was the license number of the pickup. Because of the houseboat that number was hard to see. I felt man who was driving the pickup had gone to sleep in houseboat. I sneaked up, hoping I could get the number I wanted — and I walked right into a trap. This man had spotted me and he suddenly opened the door, held a on me and ordered me to get into the houseboat.

“I knew it was either him or me. He wasn’t sure what I was doing there. I could tell from the way he acted he didn’t think I was an officer. He wanted to know what I wanted and what I was doing snooping around. Well, he got just a little careless. I suddenly jerked out my gun and said, ‘Stick ’em up.’ I was nervous. I waited maybe a tenth of a second to see what he was going do. I waited too long. He fired. If the officers will look in that houseboat, they’ll find a bullet hole somewhere near the front of the boat.

“I fired at about the same time he did. He missed. I didn’t.

“I got in a panic. I took his gun, put it in my pocket and threw it away a couple of hours later. I took the Calhoun gun and ran down toward the place where I had parked my car and then threw the gun across the ditch as far as I could throw it.

“Then instead of going to the police the way I should have done I drove down across the border and tried to think of some way out of the mess. I stayed in the car all night. Finally, when one of the stores opened up, I bought some fishline and tied myself up at a place where I felt certain I’d be discovered. If I went too long without being discovered I could untie myself, but I felt certain I could get away with my story.

“I hit myself a good punch in the eye, bloodied my nose, and I made up that story about having been beaten up and kicked. It hadn’t occurred to me that people would be looking for black-and-blue marks on my body.”

“Donald Lam kept trying to get me in the swimming pool at the hotel, and that was when I realized how vulnerable I was. My story wouldn’t stand up if— Well, I don’t want to get blamed for murder. I acted in self-defense.”

Judge Polk looked down at Sergeant Sellers. “Did the officers” he asked, “make a careful examination of the front of that houseboat to see if there was a bullet hole in the boat?”

“There was no hole in the boat, Your Honor,” Sellers said, “but there was a sofa pillow on the davenport that had a very small hole in it. We didn’t take the pillow to pieces to see if there was ‘a bullet on the inside of it.”

“You’d better do that,” Judge Polk said, and then added gratuitously, “It seems to me that the police work in this case had been slightly below par.

“The sheriff will take this man into custody. The case against Milton Carling Calhoun is dismissed.

“Court’s adjourned.”

Judge Polk left the bench and there was pandemonium in the courtroom. A couple of newspaper reporters jammed in the door as they ran simultaneously for nearest telephone.

I looked over at Calhoun and said, “Congratulations!”

The guy grabbed me in an embrace. I was afraid might try to kiss me.

It took us nearly half an hour to get past the newspaper reporters and out to my car. I managed to Calhoun to say “No comment” often enough to make newspapermen give up, but the television men kept hounding us with portable cameras.

Finally we got free.

I gave Calhoun a road map. “What’s this?” asked.

“A map of the road to El Golfo.”

“What’s at El Golfo?”

“Nanncie Beaver,” I said.

“Why at El Golfo?”

“That’s so you can go down and get her without newspaper reporters tailing you — that is, if you’re smart. Then you can come into our office the first of next week and settle up.”

He looked at me with dawning comprehension, then gripped my hand, hard.