The Case of the Demure Defendant

Chapter Two

Perry Mason was preparing to leave his office for the afternoon when Della Street, his confidential secretary, said, “Dr. Logbert P. Denair is in the outer office, Chief. He was pounding on the door. I told him it was after five o’clock and—”

“What does he want?” Mason asked.

“He says he has to see you at once. He’s carrying a heavy instrument of some kind. It looks like a tape recorder.”

“I’ll see him,” the lawyer said. “Dr. Denair wouldn’t have dashed up here personally unless it was a matter of major importance.”

“Dashed up?” Della Street asked, raising her eyebrows.

Mason nodded. “Otherwise he’d have telephoned. When Dr. Denair is too excited to telephone it’s very, very urgent. Send him in, Della.”

Della Street started for the outer office but Mason motioned her back. “I’ll go out and escort him in personally, Della. Professional courtesy, you know.”

Mason pushed back his swivel chair, stretched to his full height^ and walked out to the outer office.

“Hello, Bert,” he said to Dr. Denair. “What brings you up here in such a rush?”

Dr. Denair got up from his chair, shook hands with the lawyer, said nervously, “Perry, I want to consult you professionally.”

“That’s fine,” Mason said. “Come on in.”

Mason led the way into the private office.

“You know Della Street, my secretary.”

“Certainly,” Dr. Denair said. “How are you, Miss Street?”

“She’ll stay, if you don’t mind,” Mason said. “I like to have her take notes.”

“It’s quite all right,” Dr. Denair said, “provided that it’s definitely understood that I’m here consulting you in a professional capacity and that everything I say must be held in the strictest confidence. I know that I can trust you, I know that I can trust your secretary. I am in a position where I don’t know what to do. I need advice.”

Mason indicated the walls of the room in a sweeping gesture. “You’re within the four walls of a lawyer’s office, Bert. Anything you say will be treated as confidential.”

“Suppose,” Dr. Denair said, “that you should find there are some technical limitations of the law safe-guarding confidential communications. Suppose that something I might say to you would be within one of the exceptions and—”

Mason said, “The law lays down a definition of what professional communications are confidential, Bert. That’s one branch of the law that I don’t bother to study. As far as I’m concerned anything a client tells me is confidential.”

“Thank you,” Dr. Denair said, his frosty blue eyes twinkling with cold humor. “Now then, I want to know about that law.”

“What law?”

“The law of confidential communications.”

“What about it?”

“I have been treating a young female patient who seemed to be suffering from a guilt complex. She is definitely in a state that I can best describe in common, everyday language as emotional unrest with the possibility of what we might call a psychic deterioration.

“I tried to reach her by ordinary means and failed. I had the feeling that she was withholding something. That frequently happens with young, unmarried women. I suggested that she take a so-called truth serum test. She consented. I administered that test this—”

“Just how effective are they?” Mason asked.

“It depends on what you’re looking for and what you get,” Dr. Denair said. “From an experimental laboratory standpoint they’re effective just about a hundred per cent of the time, as far as specific information in regard to certain acts is concerned. In other words, you can take a bunch of students, have them commit synthetic crimes, and they’ll promptly tell you all about what they have done when you put them under the influence of one of the so-called truth serum drugs — scopolamine, sodium pentothal, sodium amytal — or any of the others, provided, of course, the proper technique is used.

“On the other hand, you take the hardened criminal who has been denying guilt of one crime and another over a period of years, who has been subjected to all sorts of third-degrees and examinations under pressure, and you don’t know what you are getting. Neither does anyone else. Frequently we’ll get protestations of innocence concerning a crime where you have pretty definite assurance that the man is guilty, and it often happens that while he is denying the crime under investigation, which may have been merely a burglary, he will casually let his guard down and talk freely about some murder he has committed and for which he has as yet gone unpunished.

“In dealing with people who are suffering from a sense of guilt, and where you feel there is some significant fact which is being withheld, the truth serum treatment, so-called, is effective. Once you can learn the thing the patient has been afraid to tell you, you can rapidly gain the complete confidence of the patient. This is particularly true in the case of women.

“In this case I was dealing with a young woman, quiet, refined, appealing, and emotionally disturbed. I felt certain that under the influence of the drug she would confess to some indiscretion, perhaps an interrupted pregnancy — instead of which she confessed to what apparently is a murder.”

Mason’s eyes narrowed.

“You say apparently?”

“Apparently.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because I don’t know at the moment how to evaluate the results.”

“Can you repeat exactly what she said?” Mason asked. “Do you take notes or—?”

“I can do better than that,” Dr. Denair said. “I take down everything that is said on a tape recorder. You will, of course, have some difficulty understanding some of the words. A patient frequently mumbles and talks with the slurring accents of someone talking during sleep. That’s the beauty of using a tape recorder. We can play back a patient’s words over and over until gradually we can begin to decipher most of what is said. However, this young woman, while she was very definitely within the limits where truth is to be expected, spoke quite clearly.”

“What drug did you use?” Mason asked.

“A combination of drugs. I prepare the patient with premedication. Then I use a combination of drugs and let the patient become completely unconscious. Then as the patient begins to come out of it I use a dilute solution of sodium pentothal, and at the same time use a mental stimulant to bring about a desire to talk. The higher cortical cells are, so to speak, in conflict. There is a physical lethargy and yet a certain desire to talk. It is a nicely balanced condition which exists in an ideal state for perhaps only a few minutes. Sometimes it lasts much longer. It depends upon the individual.”

Dr. Denair took the cover from the tape recorder, plugged the cord into an outlet, and turned the switch.

“I want you to listen carefully and closely,” he said.

Perry Mason and Della Street listened to the recorded conversation.

When the tape had unwound to the point where there was no further sound, Dr. Denair snapped the machine into the rewind position, rewound the tape and shut off the machine. After he had replaced the cover on the tape recorder, he looked up at Mason and said, “Well, what’s the answer?”

“What answer do you want?” Mason asked.

“I want to know my legal rights.”

“Why?”

“So I’ll know what to do.”

“If I tell you that the law requires you to disclose this information to the authorities will you do it?”

Dr. Denair thought for a moment, then said, “No.”

“Why not?”

“I have my own conscience, my own code of ethics. Our laws regarding confidential communications were made before the days of psychiatry. In order to treat patients today a physician must learn the deeply embedded secrets in a patient’s mind. My life is dedicated to the art of healing.”

“All right,” Mason said, “you know what you intend to do. The law doesn’t enter into it. So why did you come here?”

Dr. Denair stroked his jaw. “I’m afraid I came here to pass the buck. I wanted to be able to say I had consulted an attorney.”

“In other words,” Mason said, “if I had told you that under the law you were entitled to respect the confidence of your client and that you didn’t need to pass the information you had received on to the police, you would then have been in a position to defend yourself by stating that you had gone to a lawyer and had followed his advice?”

“Exactly,” Dr. Denair said.

“If, on the other hand,” Mason said, “I should advise you that under the law you had no alternative but to report to the authorities what you had discovered, you would refuse to follow my advice.”

“That’s right.”

“In which event,” Mason told him, “you would place yourself in a thoroughly untenable position. You would not only withhold information from the law but you would have done it under such circumstances that you would have known you were violating the law. In other words, you would have become what the law calls an accessory after the fact.”

“That,” Dr. Denair said, “puts a somewhat different light on it. I acted on impulse in coming here and I can appreciate that there are complications.”

“There are,” Mason said. “Now let me ask you this. What are the chances that this young woman was telling the truth?”

“I think that we can definitely regard her statements to be the truth, particularly considering the manner in which they were made. But she may not be telling the whole truth. Her mind was too wearied with the drug to assume the task of explaining. Therefore she instinctively avoided anything requiring complicated thought processes. She would make the naked statement of fact and then fail to amplify.”

“Or rationalize?” Mason asked.

“Put it that way, if you want to. She was on the very borderline of consciousness. Her guard was down.”

Mason thought that over. “Is there any chance that the so-called crime she mentioned is a figment of the imagination?”

“I hardly think so.”

Mason said, “Listen carefully, Bert. I am asking you if there is any chance that the crime to which she apparently confessed is a figment of the imagination.”

“Oh,” Dr. Denair said, grinning, “I get you now. Yes, there is a chance.”

“How much of a chance?”

“Not much, but some chance.”

“Then,” Mason said, “as a doctor, if you should rush to the police with a story of murder that should subsequently turn out to be merely the result of a drug-induced hallucination, your patient would be in a position to sue you for slander, for defamation of character, for an invasion of privacy and for a betrayal of professional confidence. It would ruin you professionally. It would also have very unfortunate repercussions as far as your patient is concerned. Therefore if, as a doctor, you can tell me that there is some chance that the crime to which she confessed is merely the figment of a drugged mind, I would be forced to advise you that you should proceed cautiously, that your first duty would be to make a factual investigation.”

“Very well,” Dr. Denair said, his voice showing obvious relief, “I now tell you there is some chance, a chance which I think is slight, a chance which may in fact be mathematically infinitesimal, but nevertheless a distinct chance, that this confession was in fact the figment of a drug-stimulated imagination.”

“Then,” Mason said, “I advise you that under the circumstances you should quietly launch an investigation.”

“And,” Dr. Denair said, “since I am inept and inexperienced in such matters I hereby commission you to launch that investigation.”

Mason grinned. “Of course, Bert, we don’t have the facilities that the police would have. We have to go about these things more slowly and more conservatively. Furthermore, we can’t take chances on asking questions that would tip our hands and stir up the very troubles we are trying to avoid.”

“Exactly,” Dr. Denair said. “I leave the matter entirely to your discretion.”

“You have a nurse present at these examinations?” Mason asked.

“Yes, of course.”

“Who is the nurse who was present at this one?”

“Elsa Clifton. Do you know her? She’s the tall, slate-eyed brunette that—”

“Yes, I’ve met her.”

“I’m not sure of her. She’s an enigmatic personality.”

“Is there any chance she might tell what took place at this examination?”

“I don’t know.”

“Specifically,” Mason asked, “what medical treatment is indicated for a patient who has confessed to murder?”

“Meaning Nadine Farr?”

Mason nodded.

“Nadine Farr,” Dr. Denair said, “is suffering from a guilt complex. The fact that her crime, if you want to refer to it as such—”

“One customarily refers to murder as a crime,” Mason interposed.

“Remember,” Dr. Denair said, “we don’t know the extenuating circumstances. We don’t know all of the facts. We only know the bare statement that this young lady made. Specifically she feels that she has committed a sin, that she has escaped punishment, that this is wrong. She therefore has a desire to punish herself. She wants to make atonement. With a young woman who is emotionally disturbed and has a sensitive disposition, that feeling can be exceedingly serious. One of the first things she needs is to confess. Subconsciously she realizes that. That is quite probably why she agreed to submit to the truth serum test.

“One of the first things that I am going to do by way of treatment is to give her an opportunity to confess to me after she regains consciousness. Then I am going to bring her in to you, Perry, and she is going to confess to you.”

“To me?”

Dr. Denair nodded.

“Of course,” Mason said, “I don’t need to tell you, Bert, that we’re playing with legal dynamite.”

“I know, but I try to help my patients. That’s the basis of my creed.”

“And I try to help my clients,” Mason said. “That’s the cornerstone of a lawyer’s creed.”

They were silent for a few moments.

“Now then, as your client,” Dr. Denair said at length, “what do you advise me to do?”

“I advise you that we must investigate the facts and that we must proceed cautiously.”

“That’s fine,” Dr. Denair said. “You’ll hear from me again. I’ll bring her to your office at nine-thirty tomorrow.”

“What about this Uncle Mosher whom she mentions?” Mason asked. “Evidently you knew him.”

“I knew of him. He was some sort of a relative. He actually wasn’t her uncle, but he had her visiting with him. She was there in the house during his last illness. Mosher Higley died some three months ago. The attending physician gave the cause of death as coronary thrombosis.”

“There was no post-mortem?”

“No post-mortem. The man was buried.”

“Embalmed?”

“Certainly.”

“Now then,” Mason said, “that raises a very interesting problem. In the event the poison used was cyanide of potassium, the embalming, as you know, would completely destroy evidences of that poison. Unless there could be some independent proof that the man had been poisoned, unless the bottle containing poison could be recovered, or the young woman’s confession could be corroborated in some way, there would be no corpus delicti. There could be no conviction.”

“And if there could be no conviction,” Dr. Denair said, “it would be useless for me to communicate my information to the police?”

“I didn’t say that,” Mason said.

“Well, that’s the interpretation that I place upon what you did say.”

“Don’t do it,” Mason told him. “I am merely pointing out certain rather important facts. You want me to investigate the case. I will investigate it. If it should turn out that in all probability the poison used was cyanide, and it should further turn out that the body was embalmed, then it might well be impossible for the authorities to secure a conviction. If under those circumstances you should go to the district attorney and should tell him that an emotionally disturbed young woman, while under the influence of drugs, had made a confession to a crime of such a nature that it was virtually impossible to secure a conviction, that furthermore there was always the chance the so-called confession might have been the hallucination of a drugged mind, the district attorney would promptly usher you to the door, tell you to forget the whole business and suggest that the matter be given no publicity whatever.”

“Now that,” Dr. Denair said, “would be a most satisfactory solution — but what happens if there was some other poison used?”

Mason said, “The poison used must have been very quick-acting. The attending physician signed the body out as a coronary thrombosis. Those two factors would indicate cyanide.”

Dr. Denair nodded.

“So,” Mason said, “I will proceed with an investigation. In the meantime, in case you should be officially questioned you will state that you uncovered certain information, that you consulted an attorney, that the attorney suggested that an investigation should be made before you took hasty and irrevocable action. My own charges will be purely nominal. It will, however, be necessary for me to hire investigators. I’ll try to keep the expenses down as much as possible. Does Miss Farr have any money?”

“She doesn’t, but I have.”

“Well, I don’t want to run up a bill on you that—”

“Forget it,” Dr. Denair told him. “I’m in the high brackets this year. Whatever amount I have to pay for legal services will be a business deduction. I have my own peace of mind, my own professional reputation at stake. I want you to go to work and spare no effort.”

“I will,” Mason said, “try to keep the charges as low as possible.”

“I said I wanted you to spare no effort.”

“I will,” Mason repeated, “try to keep the charges as low as possible.”

Dr. Denair started to say something.

“Of course,” Mason said, “that will perhaps retard the speed at which the investigation is made, but, after all, as a private citizen, as a doctor consulting me in connection with the case of a penniless patient, we have to—”

Dr. Denair suddenly grinned. “I get you, Perry. Go ahead. Use your own judgment. Handle it as you see fit.”

“That tape recording,” Mason said, “what are you going to do with that?”

Dr. Denair headed for the door, carrying the tape recorder. “As far as I’m concerned only five people in the world will ever hear this tape — you, Della Street, my office nurse, Nadine Fan and myself.”

Mason looked thoughtful. “Five people,” he said, “are a lot o£ people.”

“Can you suggest how the number could be lessened?” Dr. Denair asked.

Mason shook his head. “Not now. I wish your nurse hadn’t been present.”

“So do I, now; but not only do you need a nurse in order to hold the patient at just the right level of narcosis, but you definitely don’t put an emotionally disturbed young woman under the influence of drugs unless you have a nurse in the room.”

Mason nodded.

Dr. Denair said, “I’ll see you at nine-thirty, then.” He waved good-by from the door.

Della Street looked at the lawyer. “Paul Drake?”

Mason nodded. “Give him a ring. Ask him if he can step in here right away.”

Since Paul Drake, head of the Drake Detective Agency, had his offices on the same floor as those occupied by Mason, it was only a few minutes after Della Street’s call had been completed that the detective tapped his code knock on the door of Mason’s private office.

Della Street let him in.

Despite his height, Paul Drake had so mastered the art of self-effacement that he was always unobtrusive.

He glided into the office, slid into the client’s big, overstuffed chair, and hitched himself around so that one rounded arm of the chair was against the small of his back. His legs were draped casually over the other arm.

“Okay,” he said. “Shoot.”

Mason said, “I have a rather peculiar case, Paul. You’re going to have to get information. You must proceed slowly and cautiously. I don’t want anyone to know that an investigation is being made. In this case you’re not working against time. You can go about things in a more leisurely way—”

Drake rubbed his eyes, tugged at his ears.

“What’s the matter?” Mason asked.

“I think I’m dreaming,” Drake said. “Usually you call me in, tell me that I have a matter of hours or minutes to produce re-suits, to engage any number of men that I need, to make complicated investigations, and have the results ready by morning. And now you come along with something like this.”

“Exactly,” Mason said, grinning. “You’ve always told me that you could do a much better job if you had time and didn’t have to employ so many operatives.”

“Now wait a minute,” Drake said. “I said we could do a more economically efficient job. When you have a lot of operatives working at high speed there’s a certain duplication of effort and a terrific nerve strain and resulting expense. You—”

“I know,” Mason said. “I want you to work in the most economically efficient manner possible in this case. I want to find out about the background of a man named Mosher Higley. He lived in this city. He died about three months ago. The cause of his death was given as coronary thrombosis. I don’t know whether anyone has filed papers in the estate, the nature or extent of the estate, or anything about it. I want to know all those facts. I want to know the names of his heirs. I want to know who was with him when he died. I want to know when his will was made if he left a will. I’d like to know whether there was any insurance. You’re going to have to talk with the attending physician who signed the death certificate. I’d like to find out specific symptoms. It may be necessary for you to pretend you’re representing an insurance company.”

“Shucks,” Drake said, “we do that kind of stuff all the time. Quite frequently we are representing an insurance company.”

“I thought they had their own investigators,” Mason said.

“They do, but sometimes the investigators call us in.”

“Okay,” Mason said. “Launch an investigation. Do it quietly. There’s no great rush. Handle the matter with what you are pleased to describe as economic efficiency.”

“Can do,” Drake said and walked out.