Give ’Em the Ax

14

It was precisely three-seventeen when I returned to the office.

The deposition was under way. A court reporter sat at Elsie Brand’s desk, taking down everything that was said in shorthand. Bertha Cool was on the witness chair looking rather triumphant. The man of about fifty with a weak chin and eager greedy eyes who sat next to Frank Glimson would be Rolland B. Lidfield, one of the plaintiffs in the case.

As far as possible, John Carver Mysgart had interposed his bulk between Esther Witson and Bertha Cool. He had Esther parked pretty well behind him and he was scribbling furiously on a notebook as I opened the door, evidently taking down something he wanted to ask Bertha when it came his turn.

They all glanced up as I entered. Then Glimson went on with his questioning. His hands were out in front of his chest, the fingers spread apart, tips touching. His head was tilted back slightly and his bony face was a complete mask. “Now, Mrs. Cool, tell us exactly what you did.”

“I slowed my car at the intersection,” Bertha said, “and then I heard this raucous horn blowing behind me.”

“Yes, yes, go on.”

“And then Miss Witson swung her car around me out into the middle lane of traffic.”

“And what did she do, if anything?”

“She started giving me a tongue lashing because she didn’t like the way I was driving.”

“She stopped her car to do this?” Glimson asked.

“She did not. She was shooting around me with a heavy foot on the throttle.”

“She was, of course, facing you,” Glimson said as one who makes a statement rather than asks a question.

“I’ll say she was facing me,” Bertha said.

“You saw her eyes?”

“I saw her eyes and her teeth.”

Esther Witson moved in her chair.

Mysgart reached back and made little pattie-cake gestures with his hand to quiet down his client.

Glimson’s eyes held a flashing glint of triumph. “Then when Miss Witson drove past you, she was looking at you and talking to you. Is that right?”

“That’s right.”

“Let me see if I have understood your testimony correctly, Mrs. Cool. I believe you said that when you came to the intersection you brought your car almost to a stop.”

“That’s right.”

“Now let’s not misunderstand each other. When Miss Witson went past you, she was looking at you and talking to you, and your car was at the intersection, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“Then the front of her car must have been well into the intersection?”

“Well, yes.”

“While she was looking at you and talking to you?”

“Yes.”

“And all of this time she was traveling at a high rate of speed?”

“She was stepping on it. She had a heavy foot on the throttle.”

“And when did she turn around to look where she was going?” Glimson asked.

“Well, all of a sudden, it seemed to hit her that she hadn’t been looking...”

“Note an objection,” Mysgart said, “that the witness cannot testify as to what seemed to have been passing through my client’s mind. She can only testify...”

“Yes, yes,” Glimson interrupted. “Just tell us the facts, Mrs. Cool, not what you think.”

“Or what she thinks my client thought,” Mysgart added sarcastically.

Glimson glared at him.

Mysgart wiggled his upper lip so that his mustache scratched his nose.

“Well, she suddenly turned around and there was this other car right on top of her,” Bertha snapped.

“You mean the car which was being driven by Mr. Rolland B. Lidfield, the gentleman sitting at my right?”

“Yes.”

“And this car driven by Mr. Lidfield was turning to the left, was it not, so that it was headed up Mantica Street in a northerly direction?”

“That’s right.”

“And Miss Witson, with what you have described as a heavy foot on the throttle, charged her car blindly into the intersection of Garden Vista Boulevard and Mantica Street directly in front of the car driven by Mr. Lidfield. Is that right?”

“That’s right.”

Glimson settled back in his chair and lowered his hands until they rested across his stomach. He turned to Mysgart with a benign expression, “Would you care to cross-examine?”

Esther Witson stirred uneasily in her chair.

Mysgart made another little blind patting gesture in her general direction and said, “Certainly.”

“Go ahead.”

“Thank you,” Mysgart retorted with heavy sarcasm.

Mysgart shifted the position of his chair somewhat, Bertha Cool glanced at me with a triumphant expression as much as to say that no damn lawyer was going to mix her up, and then turned her eager little eyes on Mysgart.

Mysgart cleared his throat. “Now let’s just go back to the beginning and see if we get this straight, Mrs. Cool. You were proceeding in a westerly direction on Garden Vista Boulevard?”

“Yes.”

“And how long had you been driving westerly along Garden Vista Boulevard before you came to the intersection of Mantica Street?”

“Eight or ten blocks, perhaps.”

“Now at the intersection of Mantica Street, you have testified that your automobile was in the extreme right-hand lane, the lane that is next to the curb.”

“Yes.”

“And how long had it been in that lane?”

“I don’t know.”

“You wouldn’t say for eight or ten blocks?”

“No.”

“Some of the time you had been over on the extreme left-hand lane, the one that’s closest to the center of the road, hadn’t you, Mrs. Cool?”

“I suppose so.”

“And part of the time you had been in the middle lane?”

“No.”

Mysgart raised his eyebrows in surprise. “You’re certain of that, Mrs. Cool?”

“Absolutely certain,” Bertha snapped.

“At no time at all, had you operated your car in the middle lane? Is that right?”

“That’s right.”

“But you had been over on the left-hand lane?”

“Yes.”

“And at the time of the accident you were over on the right-hand lane?”

“Yes.”

“Then,” Mysgart said with elaborate sarcasm, “will you be so kind to tell us, Mrs. Cool, how you could possibly have got from the left-hand lane to the right-hand lane without driving over the middle lane?”

“I may have crossed it,” Bertha said.

“Oh,” Mysgart said with well-simulated surprise, “then you did operate your car on the middle lane?”

“I went across it.”

“Straight across?”

“Yes.”

“Then am I to understand you turned sharply and crossed the middle lane at a right angle?”

“Don’t be silly, I angled over to the right-hand lane.”

“Oh, then, you turned abruptly in front of oncoming traffic?”

“Certainly not,” Bertha said. “You can’t mix me up. I eased my way over.”

“Taking perhaps a block in order to complete your maneuver, or two blocks, or three blocks, or four blocks?”

“I don’t know.”

“It might have been four blocks?”

“I don’t know... It could have been.”

“Then for a long distance, Mrs. Cool, perhaps for as much as four blocks, you were operating your car in the middle lane of traffic?”

“I was easing my way across it.”

“Then what did you mean by telling us that at no time did you operate your car on the middle lane of traffic?”

“Well, I meant that I wasn’t... well, I wasn’t going down the middle lane and intending to keep on it.”

“But you did operate your car across the middle lane?”

“Across, yes.”

“Then for a certain period of time you did have your car moving along Garden Vista Boulevard so that all four of its wheels were within the white lines of the middle lane?”

“I guess so, yes.”

“I don’t want any guessing about it,” Mysgart announced. “I want the facts. Come, Mrs. Cool, if you’re as expert an automobile driver as you claimed, you certainly should be able to tell us frankly and without equivocation whether you did or did not at any time within those eight or ten blocks operate your automobile so that all four wheels were within the white lines of the middle lane of the highway.”

“I did, yes!” Bertha shouted at him.

Mysgart settled back in his chair with sad resignation. “Then you were testifying incorrectly, Mrs. Cool, when you said that at no time did you operate your car on the middle lane.”

Bertha turned to say something but the words sputtered into angry, inarticulate sounds. The court reporter looked up.

“Come, come,” Mysgart said, “try and answer that question.”

Bertha said, “I’ve told you what happened.”

“Exactly. You have told me two different things, Mrs. Cool. I’m really trying to find out which is correct.”

Little beads of perspiration appeared on Bertha’s forehead. She said, “All right, have it your own way.”

“No, no, not my way,” Mysgart interposed hastily, “your way, Mrs. Cool. And may I caution you that you’re under oath, so this time try and tell the truth.”

“All right,” Bertha screamed at him, “I was on the left-hand lane. I crossed over the middle lane to the right-hand lane. Now what’s wrong with that?”

“A great deal might have been wrong with it,” Mysgart said condescendingly. “It depends on how you did it. Did you give any signal before you cut across the right-hand lane?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Did you look behind?”

“Of course I looked behind.”

“Turned your head?”

“No. I glanced in the rearview mirror.”

“And, because of the angle at which your car was being operated, you couldn’t see the road down that lane. In other words, since you had turned your car sharply to the right, your rearview mirror only showed the vehicles directly behind you. What I am getting at,” Mysgart said soothingly, “is that you didn’t see the car operated by Esther Witson which was coming behind you?”

“No, I didn’t,” Bertha admitted.

“When did you first see it?”

“When I got over to the right-hand curb and stopped. Then I looked up in the rearview mirror and saw her right behind me.”

“Oh, you stopped?”

“Yes, I stopped,” Bertha said angrily. “Now try and twist something out of that.”

“Did you give a stop signal when you stopped?”

“Yes, I did.”

“How?”

“I put my arm out of the window on an angle.”

“Your whole arm?”

“My whole arm.”

“And gave a stopping signal?”

“A stopping signal,” Bertha asserted.

“Now why did you stop, Mrs. Cool? You didn’t have any passengers to let out at the curb, did you?”

“No.”

“And you knew that this wasn’t a parking place?”

“Of course.”

“You were right at the intersection?”

“Right at the intersection.”

“And there was a traffic signal on Mantica Street?”

“Yes.”

“And that signal was in a position that held traffic open for travel along Garden Vista Boulevard?”

“That’s right.”

“And yet you stopped?”

“Well, I just about stopped.”

“Not whether you just about stopped, Mrs. Cool. I want to know whether you stopped.”

“Well, I... I may have been moving very slowly.”

“But a moment ago, Mrs. Cool, you said you stopped.”

“All right,” Bertha shouted at him, “I stopped, then.”

“Brought your car to a dead stop?”

“To a dead stop, if you want it that way.”

“Not the way I want it, Mrs. Cool, but what did you actually do?”

“All right, I stopped my car.”

“To a dead stop?”

“I didn’t get out and stick up my finger and sight along the edge of it to see if the car was moving,” Bertha said sarcastically.

“Oh, I see,” Mysgart said as though that explained everything. “I think you misunderstood me, Mrs. Cool, or I misunderstood you. As I get your testimony now, you aren’t absolutely certain whether your car was at a dead stop or whether it was moving?”

“That’s right.”

“But you did give a full arm signal that you were going to stop?”

“That’s right.”

“A stop signal?”

“That’s what I said.”

“And that’s what you meant?”

“Of course that’s what I meant.”

“Now let me ask you again, Mrs. Cool, why did you stop? You didn’t intend to park there.”

Bertha said, “I intended to turn left as soon as this other car got around me.”

“Oh, you intended to turn left? Did you convey your intention by means of any signal?”

“Certainly.”

“You mean you gave a left-turn signal?”

“That’s right.”

“And how did you do that, Mrs. Cool?”

“How does anyone do it?”

“No, no, Mrs. Cool, I want to know how you did it.”

Bertha said, “I stuck my left arm out of the window — straight out.”

“A full arm signal?”

“A full arm signal.”

“And then you saw this car behind you.”

“Yes.”

“For the first time?”

“Yes.”

“And you wanted that car to go around you?”

“Yes.”

“Did you convey your intention to the driver of that car by means of any signal?”

“Certainly.”

“What did you do?”

“I motioned her to go ahead.”

“How?”

“By waving my arm.”

“Just what do you mean, by waving your arm, Mrs. Cool?”

Bertha thrust her arm out and made a series of circular motions.

“Let the records show,” Mysgart said, “that Mrs. Cool at this point extends her left arm and makes a series of circular motions — motions which go higher than her head when the arm is elevated, and down almost to the floor when the arm is lowered. That’s right, Mrs. Cool?”

“That’s right,” she said, and then added sarcastically, “I’m glad you’ve got something right.”

“And as soon as she received that signal, Miss Witson drove around you. Is that right?”

“Drove around me, giving me a piece of her mind,” Bertha said.

“Now your window was down on the left-hand side, was it not?”

“Yes.”

“And how about the window on Miss Witson’s car? — Careful now, Mrs. Cool. I don’t want to trap you. I simply want to test your powers of observation, and see what you can remember. Was the right-hand window on Miss Witson’s car down or up?”

Bertha thought for a minute, then said, “It was up.”

“You’re positive?”

“Positive.”

“All of the windows on the right-hand side of Miss Witson’s car were up?”

“Yes.”

“All the way up?”

“That’s what I said.”

“And exactly what did Miss Witson say to you? What words did she use?”

A gleam of triumph came into Bertha’s eyes. “You’re not going to trap me that way,” she said.

Mysgart raised his eyebrows. “What do you mean?”

“I mean that if the windows on the right-hand side were up, I couldn’t hear what she was saying, and you know it as well as I do. I could see her talking.”

“But you couldn’t hear the words?”

“Naturally not. Not with the windows up.”

“Couldn’t hear any words?”

“No. Well, I heard... no, I won’t swear to it.”

“Then how do you know that Miss Witson was giving you what you have referred to as a piece of her mind?”

“I could tell it by the expression on her face.”

“You didn’t hear a word she said?”

“No.”

“Then when you say she was giving you a piece of her mind, you’re depending upon mental telepathy.”

“I could see the expression on her face.”

“Can you tell what people are thinking by the expressions on their faces?”

“Yes. When their lips are moving.”

Mysgart immediately moved his lips soundlessly for several seconds and then asked, “What did I say then, Mrs. Cool?”

“You didn’t say anything then.”

“But I was moving my lips. I was actually stating something. I made a very definite statement, Mrs. Cool. I was moving my lips, and you could see the expression on my face, couldn’t you?”

Bertha didn’t say anything.

“So you don’t know what I said?”

Bertha took refuge in a sullen, badgered silence.

Mysgart waited for several seconds, then said, “Let the record show that the witness either cannot or will not answer the question.”

Bertha was sweating now.

Mysgart went on, “So, Mrs. Cool, having suddenly shot from the left lane of traffic over to the right lane of traffic, directly in front of the car being operated by my client, Miss Witson, you suddenly gave a stop signal, slowed your car somewhat, you don’t know how much because you don’t know whether it was stopped or whether it was still moving. You abruptly gave a left-hand turn signal, then you suddenly gave this whole wild series of arm signals, and thereupon proceeded to block traffic completely and thoroughly so far as the right-hand lane of traffic was concerned. Can you give any logical explanation of why you did that?”

“I tell you I wanted to turn left, and I wanted this car to go around me.”

“You knew that you had no right to stop in the intersection when the signal was for open traffic along Garden Vista Boulevard?”

“Well, if you want to be technical about it, yes.”

“So you brought your car to an illegal stop.”

“All right.”

“You knew that you had no right to turn to the left from the right-hand lane of traffic?”

“Of course. That’s why I wanted this other car to go by me.”

“So you gave two signals for two illegal maneuvers, one right after the other?”

“Well, if you want to put it that way, yes.”

“Now this car that was being driven by Mr. Lidfield, when did you first see it?”

“Just before the crash.”

“Exactly how long before the crash?”

“I can’t tell you. I’d say it was a second.”

“And where was it when you first saw it?”

“It was just swinging into a left-hand turn.”

“And you know where the actual collision took place?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“Right in front of my car. It blocked me so I couldn’t move one way or another.”

“Exactly. I don’t want to trap you, Mrs. Cool. I’ll say that an actual survey shows that the distance from the place where the cars were found to the center of the intersection was exactly thirty-one feet. That distance seems just about right to you, does it?”

“Just about.”

“It’s the exact distance, Mrs. Cool. I think Counsel on the other side will agree with me.”

Mysgart looked at Glimson and Glimson said nothing.

“Now then, Mrs. Cool, when you first saw this Lidfield car, it was some distance back of the intersection?”

“Well, it hadn’t reached the center of the intersection yet.”

“Exactly. So the car had to reach the center of the intersection, make a turn on the far side of the center of the intersection, and then go thirty-one feet before it hit the Witson car.”

“I guess so, yes.”

“A distance, in all, perhaps of fifty feet?”

“Well, somewhere around there, yes.”

“So that you would say the Lidfield car had to travel at least fifty feet from the time you first saw it before the time of the collision?”

“I’d say so, yes.”

“And you have stated positively, Mrs. Cool, that you saw the car just one second before the collision.”

“That’s right,” Bertha said.

Mysgart said, “Has it ever occurred to you, Mrs. Cool, that a car which travels fifty feet in a second is traveling at the rate of three thousand feet a minute. And three thousand feet a minute is faster than thirty-four miles per hour?”

Bertha blinked her eyes.

“So then,” Mysgart said, “by your own figures, Mrs. Cool — now I don’t want to trap you, but by your own figures, this Lidfield car was whirling around that intersection at a speed in excess of thirty-four miles per hour. Is that about right?”

Bertha said, “I don’t think it was going that fast.”

“Then your other testimony must have been wrong. Do you think that it was more than fifty feet from the intersection?”

“Well, not more.”

“But at least fifty feet from the scene of the accident?”

“Yes.”

“Then your time must have been wrong. You think it was more than a second?”

“Perhaps.”

“But you have already stated positively that it was just one second, Mrs. Cool. Do you want to change that testimony?”

Bertha was sweating all over her forehead now. She said, “I don’t know how fast the car was going. I just looked up and saw it and then there was a crash.”

“Oh, you looked up and saw it!”

“Yes.”

“Then you must have been looking down before the crash.”

“Well, I don’t know where I was looking.”

“I see. You don’t know whether your car was moving or whether it was stopped. You don’t know whether you were looking to one side or looking to the other?”

“I was looking down,” Bertha said.

“Then you weren’t looking to one side?”

“No.”

“Then you couldn’t have been looking at Esther Witson.”

“I was looking at her.”

“Make up your mind,” Mysgart said.

Bertha remained doggedly silent.

Mysgart smiled triumphantly. “I think,” he announced, “that is all.”

The man who was taking down the record closed his shorthand notebook. Esther Witson smirked at Bertha and walked out. Mysgart scratched his nose with his mustache.

Swiftly the people thinned out until Bertha and I were alone once more in an office that seemed something like a prize ring after the contestants had left.