The Case of the Daring Divorcee

Chapter Eleven

Back in his office Mason paced the floor, his head thrust slightly forward in frowning concentration.

After a few moments he started talking to Della Street, throwing the words over his shoulder as he paced and turned, paced and turned.

“Garvin Hastings bought two guns, Della,” he said. “One of them was purchased before he married Adelle, one while he was married to her.

“Now,” Mason went on, “would he have given a gun to Minerva? Remember that she had some friends in Carson City. She was driving back and forth — that is, we can assume she was. Hastings could have let her have his gun.”

“But he gave one to Adelle,” Della Street said.

“That’s right,” Mason said. “He gave one to Adelle. She doesn’t know the number. There was no reason for her to look at the number. The way she looked at it, a gun was a gun and that was all there was to it.

“But if Garvin gave her a gun he could well have given Minerva a gun.”

“That would have been the first gun he purchased,” Della Street said.

“Exactly,” Mason agreed.

“And it was that first gun which killed him?”

“We don’t know yet. It was the first gun that Tragg took from the desk drawer.

“It would have been rather easy for Minerva to have killed him after stealing Adelle’s purse, then she could have put the murder weapon in the purse, put on dark glasses, planted the purse here in this office, rushed over to Las Vegas, used a duplicate key which she had had made to Adelle’s apartment, gotten in there and stolen her gun. That would leave her with Adelle’s gun still in her possession.”

“Unless she was smart enough to get rid of it,” Della said.

“No,” Mason said, “she’d be a lot smarter if she kept it. Then when someone asked her if it wasn’t true that Garyin had given her a gun for her protection, she’d say, ‘Why, certainly,’ and produce the gun that he’d given Adelle.”

“And there’d be no way of proving she was lying?” Della Street asked.

“No way on earth,” Mason said. “We can surmise that the first gun was the one he intended to keep for himself, that the gun he bought after his marriage to Minerva was for her — a present to her for her protection.

“Give Paul Drake a ring, Della. Tell him that I want some more information on that Carson City car that was parked in the lot. It belonged to Harley C. Drexel, a contractor.”

“What about him?”

“See if there isn’t some connection between Minerva and Drexel. Remember that Drexel’s car was parked in the parking lot down here all Monday afternoon. There were two cars with Nevada licenses. One of them was a young woman from Las Vegas and I naturally felt that she would be the one to check. But in view of later developments I’m beginning to think this Carson City car may have some significance we don’t want to overlook.”

Della Street put through the call to Paul Drake and gave him the instructions.

The phone rang. Della answered it, said, “Huntley Banner calling for you, Chief.”

Mason picked up his telephone, said, “Hello, Mason speaking.”

“This is Banner, Mr. Mason. I want to impress upon you that I had no intention whatever of representing Minerva until after the developments following Garvin Hastings’ death.”

“And why did you want to impress that on me?” Mason asked.

“It’s a question of ethics.”

“The ethics in the matter,” Mason said, “are between you and your own conscience on the one hand, between you and the bar association on the other.”

“I understand, but I value your good opinion.”

“Don’t ever try to value something you don’t have,” Mason said.

“Now, don’t be like that, Mason. I feel that it would be a great mistake for us to get involved in litigation which would eat up the assets of the estate. After all, there are always two sides to every question, there’s always a middle ground and there are enough assets here for both parties.

“I think our clients might be able to work out a settlement if we can keep personalities out of it.”

“Go ahead,” Mason said. “You’re doing the talking.”

“Well, in the first place,” Banner said, “you must realize that my client has the inside track legally. Once you accept that as a fact, then we can discuss matters.”

“I don’t accept that as a fact,” Mason said.

“I’ll tell you what I’m going to do,” Banner said. “I’m going to have my secretary take a copy of Garvin Hastings’ will to your office.”

“His last will?” Mason asked.

“As far as we know, it’s his last will. It was made shortly after he married Minerva Hastings. He left everything to her and named her executrix of the estate.”

“Then that will was invalidated by his subsequent marriage to Adelle Sterling,” Mason said.

“Now wait a minute, wait a minute. That wasn’t legal marriage,” Banner pointed out. “Therefore the provisions of the law regarding automatic revocation of wills in whole or in part has no application here.”

“And,” Mason went on, “I am inclined to think he made another will which revoked the will you’re referring to.”

“I don’t think he did,” Banner said. “If he did, I think I’d have known of it. I know what he was intending to do. I’ll be fair with you on that.

“Actually he had given me the data and told me to draw up a will and revoke all prior wills. Then this separation with Adelle developed and he told me to hold up drawing that last will until we could negotiate a property settlement. He told me that he would give her a sum of money payable in annual installments over a ten-year period and make provision for her in a lump sum in his will. That was all to be part of the property settlement. For that reason he instructed me to hold off drawing the will.”

Mason said, “So it is your contention that the will leaving everything to your client is the only valid outstanding will?”

“I feel certain that was his last will. Now, I want to be fair with you, Mason. I have a machine in my office which makes photographic copies of documents and I’m going to make a copy of that will, signatures and all, and have my secretary take it to your office. You read it, look at the date, the signatures of the witnesses, and then call me.”

“Who executed as witnesses?” Mason asked.

“My secretary, Elvina Mitchell, and I signed as witnesses.”

“The will was signed in your presence?”

“Not only signed in our presence but Mr. Hastings declared that the document was his last will and testament and asked us to execute the document as witnesses... I’m going to let you question my secretary. She’ll tell you the circumstances under which the will was executed.

“After you’ve familiarized yourself with the circumstances, we can talk. And remember this: A murderer cannot inherit from the victim.”

“Adelle is not affected in any way by that provision of law,” Mason said.

“You claim she isn’t.”

“On the other hand,” Mason went on, “how about your client? How do you know Minerva didn’t kill him? In which event, regardless of her deception, regardless of her status as the surviving widow, regardless of the will, she can’t inherit.”

“But that’s absurd,” Banner said. “Minerva can’t be dragged into this thing in that manner.”

“You think she can’t,” Mason said. “For your information, there’s some evidence pointing directly to her.”

“What evidence?”

“I don’t care to discuss it at this time.”

“I’m sending Elvina — Miss Mitchell — down to your office with a photostatic copy of the will,” Banner said.

“When will she be here?”

“Within the next fifteen minutes.”

“All right, I’ll see her. Now, she’s one of the subscribing witnesses?”

“Yes.”

“It’s all right if I talk with her?”

“Of course it’s all right. That’s why I’m sending her over to talk with you. I’m putting my cards on the table, Mason.”

“All right,” Mason said, “I’ll take a look at anything you want to show me. I’m not closing the door on a compromise, but I’m not going to be stampeded into waiving any of my client’s rights.”

“I don’t want you to,” Banner said. “I’m trying to be fair with you, Mason. I have the greatest respect for your ability and I don’t want to lock horns with you.”

“Then draw in your own horns,” Mason said. “And if you want to show me a copy of that will, get your secretary started.”

Mason hung up and turned to Della Street who had been monitoring the conversation.

“Give Elvina a good once-over when she comes in, Della. I’d like to have you size her up from a woman’s standpoint.”

“Think she’s more than a secretary?” Della Street asked.

“That I wouldn’t know but want to find out,” Mason said, “but she’s evidently a great little business getter. Apparently she’s very friendly with Maynard and through that friendship she managed to ease Banner into the picture so that with Maynard’s acquiescence, and probably little resistance from Hastings, Banner started moving in a little at a time. That probably explains a good deal of the way our client feels toward Banner, and it just may be that Banner has been representing Minerva all along.”

“Well,” Della Street said, “you don’t need to tell me to size up Elvina. I’ll certainly give her a double take.”

Mason said, “Now this man, Banner, is pretty much of a schemer, himself. Notice the adroit way that he’s feathered his nest. He uses his secretary to get the legal business of the Hastings Enterprises, then becomes Hastings’ personal lawyer and now shows up representing Minerva.”

Della Street said, “Listening to that phone conversation, it seemed to me that Banner was going out of his way to convince you that he has all the trump cards.”

“He certainly is,” Mason said, “and he’s overdoing it so much that you feel he’s vulnerable somewhere along the line and because he doesn’t want me to discover just where he’s vulnerable, he’s trying to convince me that his position is impregnable.”

“Can she get away with that, Chief?”

“With what?”

“Minerva. With pretending she had a divorce, taking Hastings’ money, assuring him that she was using it to get a divorce, then sending him word that the divorce had been granted, getting a lump-sum settlement, sitting silently on the sidelines while he went through what apparently was a bigamous marriage, and now showing up to claim the estate.”

Mason said, “There are some interesting legal questions, Della. She is not claiming the estate as the surviving widow alone. She’s claiming it under the terms of a will which was never changed.”

“Doesn’t the law give any protection whatever to Adelle?”

“That,” Mason said, “depends on a lot of factors; whether the marriage to Adelle was void from the beginning, or whether it is a ceremony that is effective until it is vacated by court decree. The law provides generally that if a person marries after making a will, any prior will is revoked as far as the surviving spouse is concerned. That rule of law is of course subject to certain exceptions but that’s generally the rule.”

Mason walked over to the shelf of reference books lining one side of his office, took down Volume 53, California Jurisprudence 2d, thumbed through the pages and said, “Here’s a summary of the California law on it, Della. You might take this down:

Of course there may have been some recent decisions on this point in the last two or three years since this particular volume was printed, and we’ll have to do a little research work. But I think we can safely act on the assumption that this is the law.”

The telephone rang, and Della, picking up the instrument, said, “Yes, Gertie.”

Della listened for a moment, then said, “You mean his secretary is here... Wait just a minute, Gertie.”

She turned to Mason and said, “Huntley Banner is here himself, not his secretary but the lawyer.”

Mason replaced the law book on the shelf, said, “Tell him to come in, Della.”

Della hurried to open the connecting door and Banner entered the office, his face smiling, his manner conciliatory.

“I’m certainly sorry about that scene down at the Hastings offices,” he said. “My client has always hated Simley Beason and she blew her top. Naturally, as her attorney, I had to back her play. You’ll understand that. Of course you have to make allowances for the fact that she’s been under very great strain, but even so the matter could have been handled much more diplomatically.”

“Sit down, Banner,” Mason said. “I thought your secretary was coming over.”

“I did too,” Banner said. “I told her to come over here but she got stage fright. She was afraid you’d start cross-examining her about the execution of the will and all of that and she chickened out on me. So I told her I’d come myself.

“After all, it’s only a hop, skip and a jump. Our offices are just a block and a half apart, and I wanted to show you the photostat of the will. I’ve already filed the original with a petition for probate.”

Mason extended his hand for the papers which Banner held out.

“You’ll notice,” Banner said, “it’s a very short will. He simply revokes all prior wills, states that he is of sound and disposing mind and memory, that he has no living relatives other than his wife, Minerva Shelton Hastings; that he therefore leaves all his property to her.

“Then we have a safety clause in it, for whatever it’s worth, providing that if any person should appear and claim relationship of any sort to him, whether as descendant, common-law wife or otherwise, and establish such relationship, that person is left the sum of one hundred dollars.

“Now then, you’ll notice the will is executed in the presence of witnesses and the witnesses are Elvina Mitchell and myself.

“If you’d like to ask any questions about that will, go right ahead.”

“That will was executed at the date appearing in the will?”

“That’s right. It was executed in my office. Garvin Hastings signed it in my presence and in the presence of Elvina Mitchell, the other witness. He asked us to sign as witnesses and declared in our presence that this was his last will and testament. That will is absolutely ironclad.”

“How soon after his marriage to Minerva was the will made?” Mason asked.

“I think within forty-eight hours. As I remember it, he rang me up and told me that he was getting married, that he wanted his wife to have protection.”

“What about his estate prior to that time?” Mason asked. “He must have had a will.”

“I don’t know about the terms of that will,” Banner said. “I wasn’t his attorney at that time.”

“Then you started doing his legal work at about the date he married Minerva?” Mason asked.

“I didn’t say that,” Banner said. “Now, don’t put words in my mouth, Mason. Actually I had been doing some legal work for him for a period of several months prior to the execution of this will, but shortly after this will was executed I began doing more and more of his work and he began to rely on me more and more. I think I was doing his legal work exclusively at the time this will was executed.”

“Then his marriage with Minerva went on the rocks?” Mason asked.

“Well, it depends on what you mean by that. Actually his marriage started breaking up about... oh, I’d say about the time Adelle Sterling was employed as secretary.

“Now, I’m not saying anything against your client, Mason, but I will say that it was the contention of Minerva that the marriage would have continued if it hadn’t been for Adelle. She claims that Adelle insinuated herself into Hastings’ confidence and alienated his affections.”

“So then Minerva went to Nevada to establish a residence and get a divorce?” Mason asked.

“That’s right. There’s no secret about that. Hastings told her that he thought the marriage was a failure and that he thought they should dissolve it. I believe it was at that time he told her that he had fallen in love with his secretary, that he wanted to be free to marry her, that he wanted Minerva to go to Nevada and get a divorce.”

“And Minerva agreed?” Mason asked.

“No, she didn’t,” Banner said. “She filed suit for divorce right here. She named Adelle as corespondent. She asked for separate maintenance and a big chunk of alimony. She also asked that a receiver be appointed to take charge of the property. She demanded attorney’s fees and all the rest of it.”

“What happened to that suit?” Mason asked.

“There’s no question about that suit,” Banner said. “That suit was dismissed. I checked on that personally.”

“What caused her to dismiss it?”

“Hastings went to her and persuaded her that it would be better for her to dismiss the suit and give him his freedom.”

“What did he use as a persuader?” Mason asked.

“It’s anybody’s guess,” Banner said. “Hastings didn’t tell me the amount. It was a personal conversation between Hastings and Minerva and I didn’t want to have anything to do with it because actually Minerva had an attorney of record.”

“What happened to him?”

“I suppose Minerva compensated him in some way — that is, Hastings did. Anyway, it was all taken care of very hush-hush and Minerva got a check for, I believe, some two hundred or two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and went to Nevada, established a residence, and agreed to get a divorce.

“Now of course you heard her state that she decided to fight fire with fire, that she told her husband she had secured a divorce and sent him what purported to be a copy of the decree of divorce, but that decree wasn’t certified.

“Now that of course is fraud, and whether she can capitalize on that fraud is a legal question, but there were very great pressures being brought to bear upon her and she did what she thought was best to protect her interests.

“The fact remains that legally she still remained Hastings’ wife and Hastings’ marriage to Adelle was therefore bigamous and void.”

“No property settlement was ever executed between Minerva and Hastings?” Mason asked.

“Not to my knowledge. Hastings simply went to her apartment and said, ‘Look here, Minerva, why do you want to get an attorney and fight this thing through the courts? When you get done the lawyer will get a big percentage of what you recover, and you may not get a dime. Virtually all the property is my sole and separate property and’— Well, he intimated that he’d had detectives on her trail and that there was some scandal in connection with her.”

“You don’t know what it was?”

“No, I don’t.”

“Don’t you know, or aren’t you saying?”

“Honestly, Mr. Mason, I don’t know. Hastings never confided in me on that point and of course Minerva hasn’t. It was a private conversation and I don’t know what happened. I do know generally that there was something in Minerva’s past that Hastings had found out about, something that she didn’t want to have publicized— Well, I guess it was a standoff and they made this settlement.”

“But no papers were ever drawn?”

“No papers were ever drawn. She agreed to dismiss the action down here, to go to Nevada and get a divorce and stipulate in the divorce decree that there had been a complete property settlement made and she waived all claims to alimony.”

“And she deliberately planned to double-cross him at the time she was making that settlement,” Mason said.

Banner shook his head. “I don’t think so, Mason, I think she intended to live up to the terms of the agreement. I think it was made in good faith, but afterwards when she saw the manner in which Adelle was insinuating herself into Hastings’ life— Well, of course you can’t understand the emotions of women; they do strange things.

“I’m not here to state that my client is completely blameless, but I am here to state that, in my opinion, her legal position is impregnable and I’m here to make a reasonable settlement.”

“I take it you’ve checked the records to find that there was no final decree of divorce in Nevada?” Mason asked.

“That’s right, Mason. I’ve checked the records on that point. Naturally I did that before I agreed to represent Minerva.

“She filed the action, all right. She stayed there for six weeks, established a legal residence, filed the action — and then just never did bring the action to trial.”

“But she did send a forged decree of divorce to her husband.”

“No,” Banner said.

“Now wait a minute,” Mason said, “she admitted as much in the presence of witnesses there at the company offices.”

“No, she didn’t,” Banner said. “There’s a peculiar distinction, Mason. That decree of divorce wasn’t forged.”

“What do you mean?”

“She was smart enough not to sign the name of any judge to what purported to be a copy of the decree. She simply signed a purely fictitious name. It may be a fraud. I doubt if it is a forgery. There’s no question but what she was guilty of fraud. As between her and Hastings, if Hastings had lived, there would have been an action for fraud. But as between her and her husband’s mistress, the situation is different.

“My client isn’t blameless but, on the other hand, she’s still the wife of Hastings. That is, she’s his widow.”

The phone gave several short, sharp rings — Gertie’s signal of an emergency.

The door from the outer office opened and Lt. Tragg entered the room.

“Well, well, Perry,” he said. “I seem to have caught you busy. Hello, Banner, what are you two doing? Hatching up a plot of some kind?”

Mason said, “Tragg never does me the courtesy of having the receptionist announce him. He always walks right in this way.”

“That’s right,” Tragg said, beaming. “The taxpayers don’t like to have us cooling our heels in some attorney’s office and if you know I’m coming you have a chance to prepare yourself a bit in advance.”

“How much preparation do you think I need?” Mason asked.

“Not very much,” Tragg said. “I came to advise you, Perry, that I’m here to pick up your client.”

“On what charge?”

“Murder, of course,” Tragg said cheerfully. “That gun turned out to be the fatal gun, and we found a fingerprint on it.”

“You don’t get fingerprints from guns,” Mason said. “You, yourself admitted that, Tragg. Moreover the gun was handled by Beason and by his secretary after...”

Tragg was positively beaming. “This isn’t a fingerprint powder would bring out, Perry,” he interrupted, “it’s very unusual. Quite a break, I’d say.”

“Fingerprint of my client?” Mason asked.

“I don’t know yet,” Tragg said. “We haven’t taken her prints. ‘We’re going to. I’m pretty sure, however, it’s the print of a woman and — that’s quite a break, you know, Perry. I don’t believe there’s one time out of twenty-five that we can get a fingerprint off a gun — I’ll make it one in fifty — and, as I said, this isn’t the usual type of fingerprint. The person who handled it had evidently been eating candy, or handling a type of nail polish or some liquid cement. While the print is dry and powder won’t stick to it, it’s nevertheless visible, and a very workable print.”

“What if I don’t surrender my client?” Mason asked.

“Then we’ll get her,” Tragg said, “and of course we’ll have a point in our favor because we’ll let it be known that we had told her not to leave town, that we’d get in touch with her through you if we wanted her. And now we’ve told you we want her.”

Tragg settled himself comfortably in a chair, smiled at Banner and said, “How are you doing, Banner?”

“Very well,” Banner said, grinning. “Very well indeed!”

Mason nodded to Della Street. “You win, Tragg,” he said. “Get Adelle Hastings on the phone, Della, and tell her to come at once.”