The Case of the Careless Kitten

Chapter 23

As soon as court had adjourned and the Judge had left the bench, Hamilton Burger came pushing his way across to Mason.

“Mason, what the devil does this mean?”

Mason smiled affably. “I’m sure I couldn’t say, Burger. All I’m doing is defending Miss Street against a criminal charge. I don’t think the jury will convict her, do you?”

Burger said, “To hell with that. We all have a duty to perform — apprehending a murderer. Did Franklin Shore do it?”

“I’m sure I couldn’t tell you.”

Lunk came through the rail which separated the counsel tables from the spectators. “I want to talk with the district attorney.”

“What is it?” Burger asked, turning to him.

Lunk said, “Franklin Shore may have put that gun in the flour, but I don’t think he did. And I know darn well he didn’t put the money in there.”

“How do you know that?” Mason asked.

“Because Shore was trying to get me to give him some money,” Lunk said.

“You didn’t do it?”

“No.”

“Why?” Mason asked.

“Because I wanted him to stay where he was until I’d had a chance to talk with Mrs. Shore.”

“And why was he so anxious to get money and get away?” Mason asked. “Come on, Lunk. You told me that you might let me know what it was Shore really told you. Now, you’ve done a lot of covering up. Suppose you come clean now.”

“I reckon I better,” Lunk said. “Shore came to the house. He was nervous. He said that he’d had some trouble with a man and had shot him. He said he had to get away quick, that he’d had to shoot to keep the other guy from shooting him, but he was afraid the police might think it was murder. He said Matilda wouldn’t like anything better than to get him in a spot. I told him I thought he’d better talk with her anyway before he left, and he didn’t want to, so I told him that he could hide at my place, but that as soon as I could get in touch with Mrs. Shore the next morning, I’d try and get an advance on my salary and give him a stake so he could get out. After I told him that, he went to bed and to sleep. That’s when I went out to see Mrs. Shore. I wanted to tell her I’d seen her husband. I wanted to see whether she wanted to stake him or whether she didn’t.”

“If she hadn’t,” Mason asked, “would you have surrendered Shore to the police?”

“I don’t know, Mr. Mason. Shore had used me pretty square. Understand, I didn’t intend to tell Mrs. Shore that he was staying at my house. I was going to tell her that I’d seen him. I was trying to give them both a square deal.”

Mason said, “Go ahead, Lunk, tell the district attorney the whole truth. You’ve got to do it now. Tell him what Shore told you about where he’d been.”

“He didn’t... we didn’t talk much.”

“At least as long as it took him to smoke a cigar,” Mason said. “Tell Mr. Burger what he said.”

Lunk hesitated, then blurted, “Well, he ran away with that woman.”

“Where and why?” Mason asked.

“It was like I told you,” Lunk said. “When Franklin Shore was down in Florida people began to mistake him for another man. Shore looked this man up. They might have been twins. So they had a joke and had their pictures taken, and Shore started joshing his wife that he was going to tell this man all about the people he knew and have the guy be at the bridge parties as his stooge.

“Then Shore fell in love with this younger woman, so he got the idea that he maybe could disappear, take this dame with him, and go to Florida, and start training this other guy to be his double, telling him all about his business affairs and the people he was dealing with.

“Then after six months, when this man had everything all down pat, he would show up and claim he was Shore. He’d say his mind had suddenly gone blank, and even after his memory got back he was still shaky.

“Well, Shore did it. Things went fine. Inside of six months his double was all ready, so Shore sent a postal card to his niece from Miami. He figured police would come and find this double, apparently still in sort of a daze, but claiming to be Shore. And his memory would come back a little at a time. Of course, he’d be too sick to be very active in business, but he’d draw plenty of dough from his investments and he’d send the real Shore a cut out of it, and Franklin Shore would take the other guy’s name, and marry this dame and it would be okay. Then the night Franklin Shore sent the postal, this guy was killed in an auto accident. Well, there was Shore with his bridges all burned up, holding the sack.”

“How about Leech?” Mason asked.

“Leech had got the boss sold on his mine. So the boss had given Leech some dough in cash to put in the mine, saying it wasn’t from him, but from a guy in Florida — and Leech, thinking the Florida guy was a sucker, froze him out when he struck it rich... Of course, the boss was the real Florida guy. He’d just given Leech a phony name.

“Lately Shore got to needing money. He went to Leech. Leech was to have given him the dough, but he was stony broke by this time... So Shore had to come back. The dame left him a couple of years ago and Shore was flat broke. And that’s everything I know about it. That’s the whole story the way the boss gave it to me there in the shack.”

Hamilton Burger said, “The thing’s incredible! That’s the damnedest story I ever heard.”

Lunk said in the flat, emotionless voice of a man who isn’t trying to convince anyone, “It sounded all right to me. Maybe hearing it from the boss’s own lips made it seem more convincin’, but that’s the story he told me.”

Mason said to the district attorney, “Suppose it’s all true — up to the point where the auto accident took place, Burger. Then suppose it was Shore who was killed. This double had been training to take Shore’s place. He knew intimate things that Shore had told him, and he’d written them down and memorized them. A fortune was waiting for him if he could impersonate Franklin Shore and make it stick.”

“Then why didn’t he show up sooner?” Burger asked.

“One possible explanation is that Mrs. Shore knew about this double her husband had dug up,” Mason replied. “Remember, Shore had started it as a joke, and his wife knew all about it. But if Mrs. Shore should die, then the double could show up as the missing husband and claim the whole estate.”

Burger gave a low whistle — then said, “Damn,” explosively. “And that would explain the poison.”

Mason lit a cigarette.

Lunk said, “This wasn’t no double that came to my place. It was the boss.”

“How do you know?” Mason asked.

“Because he told me some things only the boss knew.”

Mason smiled at Hamilton Burger.

Lunk frowned, then said suddenly, “Well, no matter who this was, he was broke. Why should he steal the few hundred I kept hid in my clothes and then leave a fortune in my flour can?”

Burger looked at Mason for an answer.

“No comment,” Mason said, smiling.

“Do you think the man who called on Lunk was the double, or Shore himself?” Burger asked Mason.

Mason said, “I don’t know, Burger. I didn’t see him. After all, you know you’ve said you’d prefer I minded my own business and let the police solve their murders. Suppose you wrestle with that problem?”

“Damn it, it could have been either one!” Burger exclaimed.

Mason seemed completely disinterested. “Well, I think my clients are in the clear, both Della Street and Gerald Shore.”

Hamilton Burger’s voice showed exasperation. “This is the damnedest case!”

Mason stretched and yawned.

“I don’t find it so,” he said. “However, I’m not interested in anything except getting Miss Street acquitted.”

“What the devil is that business about cat psychology you’re talking about, and what does it have to do with the case?” Burger asked.

Mason said, “I’m afraid if I told you, Burger, you’d accuse me of trying to outwit the police. I’ve been thinking over what you said to me there in your office. I think there’s a great deal to be said in favor of your position. You think an attorney has no business going out trying to solve murders, that he should confine himself to handling his own law practice, and I’m forced to agree with you. I’m representing Gerald Shore, and I’m representing Della Street. I have no interest in solving murders as such.”

“But you want to get Gerald Shore entirely out in the clear, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“There’s no better way to do it than by showing us who committed the murders.”

“No,” Mason said, “that isn’t the law. It’s what you were objecting to about my methods, Burger. You see, it’s up to you to prove that my clients committed some crime. As long as I confine myself to representing those clients, I’m practicing law in a staid, conventional manner. The minute I go out and try to ‘outwit the police’, as you called it, I’m guilty of that unconventional conduct which has proven so irritating to you. In fact, Mr. District Attorney, I’ve decided to let you solve your own mysteries — and that’s the last word I was telling you I was going to have.

“Come on, Della. Let’s leave Lieutenant Tragg and the district attorney to work out their little picture puzzle. After all, it’s no skin off our noses.”

Burger said, “Look here, Mason, you can’t do that! I’m satisfied you know a lot more about this case than we do.”

“No, I don’t,” Mason said. “You have every essential fact that I have.”

“Well, perhaps you’ve applied the knowledge we all have to better advantage.”

Mason bowed. “Thank you, counselor.”

“All right, you owe it to us to tell us what conclusion you’ve reached.”

Mason said, “I’ll tell you what I’ll do, Burger. I’ll put you on an equal footing with me. There’s one thing I know that you don’t. Lunk told me that he was satisfied Komo, the houseboy, had been experimenting with poison, that he’d first started experimenting about ten years ago, that shortly before Franklin Shore’s disappearance, Lunk’s brother died, and Lunk has always been under the impression the houseboy poisoned him.”

“Is that right?” Burger asked Lunk.

Lunk said, “That’s right. I don’t think that damn Jap had anything against my brother in particular, but I think he was experimenting with poison — just the way he started experimenting on the kitten.”

Lieutenant Tragg, who had just come up to join the group, said, “There were four bottles of stout in the icebox. Everyone of them had been loaded with strychnine. Do you think the houseboy did that?”

“I know damn well he did it,” Lunk said vehemently.

“How do you know?”

“Well, just from putting two and two together, the same as you know anything.”

Burger said to Tragg, “There’s some new and startling evidence here, Lieutenant. I want to talk with you.”

Mason smiled and said, “What Lunk means, Lieutenant, is that he feels very positively Komo is the poisoner. You’ll remember, Lieutenant, that you told me you thought the evidence would show the bullets had all been fired from the same gun, and that would mean that one person had been guilty of both crimes. Now, follow that reasoning out. Matilda Shore has a perfect alibi. She was in the hospital when the second crime was committed. Gerald Shore has an alibi. You probably know what it is, but I’m not going to stick my neck out by telling you that because I don’t want to be a witness. And you can eliminate Helen Kendal and Jerry Templar. You can eliminate darn near everyone under that theory except three or four people. There you are, Lieutenant. Pay your money and take your choice. But if I were you, I really would investigate the death of Lunk’s brother, and see if it isn’t possible that the death was due to poison rather than natural causes.

“And now if you gentlemen will excuse me, I have a dinner date with the defendant.”