The Case of the Drowsy Mosquito

Chapter 23

Sheriff Greggory plunged ahead with his midnight investigation with the bulldog tenacity of a man who has both rugged health and stubborn determination. District Attorney Topham, on the other hand, plainly felt that the matter could well have waited until Monday morning. He hadn’t the physical stamina to waste energy arguing the matter, however, and showed his disapproval only by the passive resignation of his countenance and the manner in which he kept himself in the psychological background.

Sheriff Greggory looked at his watch. “It shouldn’t be long, now,” he said. “I’m going to get at the bottom of certain phases of this matter before leaving here.”

Mason stretched his hands high above his head. He yawned, smiled at the District Attorney, and said, “Personally, I see no reason for such nocturnal haste.”

The District Attorney lowered and raised his eyelids with slow deliberation. “I think we should place a limit on it.”

“The limit,” Greggory said, “will be when we find out what’s been going on around here. There’s evidence that the signature on those stock certificates is not the signature of Banning Clarke.” He glowered at Mason.

Once more Mason yawned. “If you ask me,” he said, “the place fairly reeks with mysteries. If Banning Clarke was dying with poison and had only a few gasps left in his system, why did someone have to hurry it along with a .38 caliber automatic? What could Clarke have done with those last few breaths that would have been so devastating to the one who fired the shot?

“And what are you going to do if you do find the poisoner? He’ll claim the murderer was the man who fired the gun. And how about that person? He’ll claim the victim was suffering from a fatal dose of poison. On the whole, gentlemen, you have a tough nut to crack.”

The chimes at the front door tinkled into noise.

“I’ll open it,” Mason said.

Greggory pushed past him, jerked the door back.

An inebriated Paul Drake elevated a long forefinger, then brought it down on a level with the surprised sheriff’s coat lapel.

“Never jerk a door open like that,” Paul reproached. “If your guests should fall in, flat on their faces, they could bring suit.”

“Who are you?” the sheriff demanded. “Oh yes — I know now. You’re the man who found the mine.”

“ ‘Discovered’ is a better word, Sheriff. Finding implies an element of luck. Discovery denotes planning and—”

“Oh, there’s Small. Come on in, Small. I want to question you.”

Small extended his hand. “How are you, Sheriff? I hardly expected to find you here. How are you?” he greeted. “And Mr. Mason. Good evening, Mr. Mason. I brought a friend with me.”

Sheriff Greggory said, “Small, I want you to answer this question fairly and frankly. Do you know anything about the endorsement on the shares of stock that—”

“Just a moment,” Mason interrupted. “I am going to suggest that any statements from any of these witnesses be made where the answers can be taken down in shorthand. You’ve asked other witnesses various questions in a manner that I don’t think was fair.”

“You don’t have anything to say about my questions,” Greggory interrupted angrily. “I am conducting this investigation.”

“Go right ahead, if you feel that way about it,” Mason retorted.

Paul Drake said, “But not in a drafty hallway, please.”

“What are you doing here?” Greggory asked.

“Waiting for a drink,” Paul told him. “The hospitality with which you greeted me, all but jerking the door off its hinges, seems a most favorable omen. But I find your attitude, my dear sir, sadly at variance with the initial cordiality with which you answered the bell.”

“Get this drunk out of here,” Greggory ordered.

“On the contrary,” Mason announced. “This man has come to talk with me on a business proposition — a matter which relates to the estate of Banning Clarke, deceased. And as the executor of Banning Clarke, I have the right...”

“You come with me,” Greggory said to the reluctant Hayward Small.

Mason handed Hayward Small a key. “Go on up to Banning Clarke’s room,” he said. “You and the District Attorney can conduct your investigation up there.”

“Very good,” Greggory grunted.

They were halfway up the stairs when Mason called, “Oh, Sheriff.”

“What?”

“There’s one thing I think you should know before you proceed with that questioning.”

“What is it?”

“Something that — May I speak with you and the District Attorney for a moment, please?”

Greggory hesitated. Mason started up the stairs, said, “Go right on up to Banning Clarke’s room, Small. I just want a word with the sheriff.”

Small went on up the stairs. Mason climbed to Sheriff Greggory’s side. “Look here, Sheriff,” he said in a low voice, “there’s no need for us to get at loggerheads over this. If you’ll calm down a bit, you’ll see that I’m working toward the same end that you are. I want to solve this murder case.”

The District Attorney said, “Gentlemen, can’t we get it over with without so much friction? After all, it seems to me that all we can hope to do now is to get preliminary statements and then adjourn.”

“I want to warn you,” Mason said, “that you’d better have your interview with Hayward Small reduced to writing; otherwise, you’ll regret it.”

“I haven’t a court reporter here,” Greggory said. “This is merely a preliminary.”

“My secretary can take it.”

The sheriff’s smile was skeptical.

“That’s better than nothing,” Mason said.

The sheriff turned angrily away. “I think not,” he said. “I am beginning now to sympathize with my brother-in-law.”

“Well,” Mason announced, “anything that I say will be taken down by my secretary.”

“I don’t give a damn what you say,” Greggory told him.

“Can’t we keep the questioning on a more dignified plane?” Topham protested wearily.

“Come on,” Greggory said, and started up the stairs.

Mason, descending the stairs, grinned at Della Street. “Now,” he announced, “we’ll find out whether Pete’s psychology actually works in practice.”

Drake said, “Perry, I’m comparatively sober. The long ride in the cool of the night has brushed cobwebs from my brain, but it has also given me something of a chill. Wouldn’t it be possible for you to scare me up a drink?”

“No drink,” Mason told him. “You’re going to need to have your wits about you.”

Drake sighed. “Well, there was no harm in trying.”

“Come on,” Mason said in a low voice. “Give me the low-down. What have you found out?”

“I assume,” Drake said with alcoholic verbosity, “that you wished me to pump the gentleman who accompanied me from Mojave — to turn him inside out, as it were.”

“I did.”

“Your wishes have been followed to the letter.”

“What did you find out?”

“Small has some hold over Bradisson.”

“How long has he had this hold?”

“That,” Drake admitted, “is something that also occurred to me. I realized that one could hardly expect the man to tell me the nature of his strangle hold on Bradisson, but that there might be other and more devious ways of getting the information. I therefore endeavored to ascertain the exact date when Small first became acquainted with Bradisson. Now, Small only met Bradisson in January of nineteen forty-two, and almost immediately moved right into the charmed circle.”

“January of nineteen forty-two, eh?” Mason said musingly.

“That’s right. He—”

A door opened explosively in the upper corridor. Pounding feet came toward the head of the stairs.

“Sounds like our impulsive sheriff,” Drake observed.

Greggory shouted, “Mason, come up here!”

“The summons is a bit peremptory,” Drake observed. “I’m afraid, Perry, you’ve been doing it again.”

Mason nodded to Della Street, then halfway up the stairs said, “You’d better come along, Paul. I may want a witness.”

“Your assignments,” Drake said, “range from the sublime to the ridiculous. How in hell can I climb stairs?”

As Mason entered the room, Greggory indignantly pointed at the typewriter. “What the devil is this?” he demanded.

“Why,” Mason said, “the notes of the investigation you made...”

“But I made no such investigation.”

Mason looked nonplused. “I’m afraid I don’t understand, Sheriff. Della Street certainly took down...”

Greggory’s face purpled. “Damn it, don’t try to pull that innocent stuff with me. You’ve interfered in this case too damn much. I’m conducting this investigation, and I’ll conduct it in my own way.”

“Yes, Sheriff. Certainly.”

“The idea of leaving that sheet of paper there in the typewriter. What are you trying to do?”

Mason turned to Della Street reproachfully. “Della, I thought the sheriff told you to get all of those papers cleaned out of this room and then lock it.”

Della’s eyelashes lowered demurely on her cheeks. “I’m sorry.”

Topham glanced from Mason to the sheriff. There was quiet reproach in his eyes.

Mason said, “I’m sorry, Sheriff,” as one apologizing for a justifiable oversight.

The sheriff’s anger made him all but inarticulate. “I tell you I didn’t conduct any investigation here. I merely had an informal inquiry before you got here, Topham.”

“Yes, of course,” Mason agreed hastily — too hastily, in fact. “You wouldn’t want to investigate without Mr. Topham.”

Harvey Small’s restless eyes moved from face to face, missing no flicker of expression, taking in every word that was said.

Mason nudged Della Street quite obviously.

Della said hastily, “That’s right, Mr. Topham. There wasn’t any investigation. I’m sorry.”

Mason ripped the page out of the typewriter, said to Small, “It’s a mistake. We’re sorry, Sheriff.”

Greggory glared at Mason. “You’ll pay for this. You’ll...”

“But I told you I was sorry. My secretary shouldn’t have left it here. We’ve apologized. We’ve told Small that there wasn’t any investigation. We’ve told Topham that. We’ve all agreed on it. You say there wasn’t any, and we say there wasn’t any. Now, what more do you want? The more you say now, the more suspicious you make your witness.”

For the moment, Greggory was at a loss for words.

Mason went on smoothly enough, “And, frankly, I don’t see any reason why you should adopt this attitude. Ever since January of nineteen forty-two, Hayward Small has been blackmailing Bradisson. Of course, that gives Bradisson a motive to pin the murder on Small; but if you ask me, Sheriff, I think Bradisson is—”

“No one’s asking you,” the sheriff interrupted.

Mason bowed after the manner of one who is rebuked by a person in authority. Thereafter, he became conspicuously silent.

Greggory turned to Hayward Small. “What I’m trying to find out,” he said, “is about that stock.”

Small moistened his lips with his tongue, merely nodded.

“What about it?” Greggory asked.

“All I know is what Dorina told me.”

“Well, what was that?”

Mason said reproachfully, “Hearsay testimony. I wouldn’t repeat it, Small. You can’t vouch for it, you know.”

“You keep out of this,” Greggory shouted.

“After he gets that out of you, he’ll start giving you a third-degree on the murder charge, you know,” Mason observed. “How about a cigarette — anyone want a cigarette?”

He calmly took his cigarette case from his pocket.

“Thank you, I’ll take one,” Della Street said sweetly.

Greggory said angrily, “Get out of here. Clear out!”

“But I thought you wanted me,” Mason said.

“I wanted an explanation of this...”

“Oh, yes. Do you want to go into that again?”

“No, I don’t.”

Hayward Small, who had been doing more thinking, said suddenly, “Look here, I’m going to come clean on this thing. I had absolutely nothing to do with that poisoning. I did — well, I did bring a little pressure to bear on Jim Bradisson about eighteen months ago.”

“January, nineteen forty-two, wasn’t it?” Mason asked.

“That’s right.”

“Very shortly after Mrs. Banning Clarke passed away, I believe.”

Small said nothing.

“And Moffgat began exerting a little pressure at about the same time,” Mason said.

“I’m not interested in any of this,” Greggory announced.

“I am,” Topham said, his voice packing quiet authority. “Just let Mr. Mason continue, please, Sheriff.”

Greggory said angrily, “He’s stage-managed this whole damn business. He’s trying to cover up the forgery of a stock certificate and save his own neck by—”

“Nevertheless,” Topham interrupted in a quiet tone which cut through the sheriff’s anger with the force of a cold rebuke, “I want Mr. Mason left entirely alone. Go right ahead, Mr. Mason.”

Mason bowed. “Thank you.” He turned to Small. “About the time Mrs. Banning Clarke died, wasn’t it?”

Small’s eyes met Mason’s for a moment, then shifted. “Well... yes.”

“Now,” Mason went on, “we have a very interesting situation. We have Mrs. Bradisson tiptoeing into Banning Clarke’s room and substituting an old will in place of the new one. A very adroit method of validating a spurious document. A will, of course, is revoked by a later will where the testator’s intention to revoke is plainly evidenced by the later will; but unless the earlier will is destroyed, there is nothing on its face to show that it has been superseded — a point which, ordinarily, a layman wouldn’t figure out. Such an ingenious bombproof little scheme would be far more apt to have been hatched in the mind of some clever attorney. I can’t help wondering whether Mrs. Bradisson’s idea of exchanging wills didn’t date back to an earlier episode. You wouldn’t know anything about that, would you, Small?”

Hayward Small raised his hand to the collar of his shirt, twitched it as though the neckband were exerting unusual pressure. “No.”

Sheriff Greggory started to say something. Topham motioned him to silence.

Mason said, almost musingly, “You see, gentlemen, we are confronted with a poisoning and with a shooting — two entirely different crimes. Yet we must not overlook the fact that they may have been actuated by the same motive. Two different murderers, each pursuing his way independent of the other because he didn’t dare to take the other into his confidence — one using poison, the other using lead.

“Because of the peculiar circumstances, we are forced to think back over everything that happened, interpreting each clue, and making pure deduction give us the answer we want.

“Now, I submit, gentlemen, here was Hayward Small, a friend and acquaintance of Moffgat, the lawyer, a virtual stranger to James Bradisson, and to his mother, Mrs. Bradisson. In the early part of January, nineteen hundred and forty-two, Mrs. Banning Clarke dies. A will is offered for probate leaving all of her property to her mother and her brother, and intimating that it is no great amount of property. Almost immediately afterwards, Moffgat and Hayward become very favored personages. The lawyer becomes a stockholder in the company. Hayward Small becomes a mining broker, though he has never sold any mines before. Now, however, he sells mines right and left — and sells them all at fancy prices to the corporation which now consists largely of Mrs. Bradisson and her son James. What’s the answer?”

“You’re crazy,” Hayward Small said. “I don’t know what you’re getting at, but you’re all wet.”

“Could it possibly be,” Mason said, “that Small was one of the witnesses to a will made at a later date, and that — with the connivance of all parties concerned — this will was suppressed?”

“You’re making a grave charge,” Greggory blurted.

“Certainly I am,” Mason said, eyeing him coldly. “Perhaps, Sheriff, you have some other logical explanation of what happened.”

“That’s a lie,” Small said. “Nothing like that happened.”

“And,” Mason went on, turning to the District Attorney, “that, Mr. District Attorney, would account for Bradisson’s anxiety to see that the crime was pinned on Hayward Small. It would account for the testimony given by Bradisson and his mother that is so damaging to this witness. If he had been blackmailing them, and if they could get him convicted of murder, without appearing to do so, it would—”

“But,” the sheriff all but shouted at the District Attorney, “there wasn’t any such investigation. Bradisson never made any such statement.”

Topham turned reproachful eyes on the sheriff. It was quite apparent that he didn’t believe him either.

“Call Bradisson in. Ask him,” the sheriff interpolated angrily.

Mason’s patronizing, superior smile disposed of that suggestion without words.

Small blurted abruptly, “Listen, I’m not going to be framed with any murder rap. If Jim Bradisson is trying to push off anything on me, I’ll...”

“You’ll what?” Mason asked as Small became abruptly silent.

“I won’t stand for it, that’s all.”

Mason said, “Don’t worry, Small. You don’t stand a chance. The sheriff in this county is one of the old-fashioned type who believes in acting on secret tips, on keeping his witnesses in the background. You’ve seen the extent to which he’s gone to convince you that Bradisson didn’t do anything of the sort. You won’t ever see Bradisson’s hand in the matter until after you’re standing up in front of the judge to hear the death sentence.”

Greggory said, “I’m not going to stand for—”

“Please!” Topham interrupted.

Greggory checked himself under the domination of the District Attorney’s tired eyes.

“Now,” Mason went on, “personally I’d be very much inclined to doubt Bradisson’s statement. It doesn’t sound logical to me. I see no reason why Hayward Small should have put arsenic in the sugar bowl. On the other hand, there are plenty of reasons why Bradisson should have put the poison in the sugar. Look at the evidence impartially, gentlemen. Bradisson and his mother apparently developed symptoms of arsenic poisoning. It turns out that this poisoning was self-induced, caused by taking ipecac. Need we look far for a reason? They intended that on the next night Hayward Small should die of arsenic poisoning. Then you’d have a baffling mystery in which the real poisoners would never be suspected because they themselves had apparently been first on the list of victims. A person who is blackmailing doesn’t want to kill the goose that lays the golden eggs, but the person who is being blackmailed always wants to kill the blackmailer.”

Topham glanced speculatively at Small, almost imperceptibly nodded his head.

Small said, “You’re making all this up. You’re just talking.”

“But,” Mason went on, “the scheme went astray because that night Hayward Small didn’t go over and help himself to his usual evening cup of tea. The reason he didn’t was that he was planning to run away with Mrs. Sims’ daughter, and he knew that Mrs. Sims didn’t approve of him. He was somewhat afraid of her uncanny intuitive powers, her sharp tongue, and her shrewd eyes. So he kept on the outskirts, leaving Dorina to put the note under the sugar bowl. That upset Bradisson’s plans.

“Now, we can almost determine the exact time when that arsenic was placed in the sugar. It was placed in there after Della Street, Banning Clarke, Mrs. Sims and I had had our first cups of tea, because Mrs. Sims poured herself a fourth cup of tea, was the fourth to take sugar from the bowl — And she felt no ill effects. Then the persons who had been at that stockholders’ meeting entered the room. There was, of course, a certain amount of confusion with people passing back and forth around the table. Then Banning Clarke had a second cup of tea and put sugar in it. At that time he got the largest dose of poison, showing that the arsenic was at that time on top of the sugar, so that he got nearly all of it... Then, Della Street and I had a second cup, had sugar, and received a relatively small amount of arsenic. Now then, gentlemen, I submit that Bradisson was trying to poison Hayward Small, counting on Small’s habit of usually having a cup of tea when he entered the kitchen. Failing in his attempt at poison, Bradisson now tries to accomplish his end by making a highly confidential statement to the sheriff that he knows Hayward Small is guilty, and if the sheriff will get Small to trial on other evidence, Bradisson will be the surprise witness who sends him to the death cell.”

Mason stopped talking, apparently centering his attention entirely on the District Attorney, paying no more attention to Harvey Small than if Small had been a mere casual spectator.

“How does that sound, Mr. District Attorney?”

“It sounds very, very logical,” the District Attorney said.

Small blurted out, “The lawyer’s right. Damn Jim Bradisson for a double-crossing back-stabber. I should have known he’d try something like that. All right, damn him. Now I’ll do a little talking, and I’ll tell the truth.”

“That,” Mason said, “is very much better.”

Small said, “I knew Moffgat, used to hang around his office a bit. I dug up a little business for him. Nothing like an ambulance chaser, you understand, but just a friend of his who brought in business, and he did favors for me. I happened to be in his office one Friday morning. I’ll never forget the date — the fifth of December, nineteen hundred and forty-one. The reason I’ll never forget is that we all know what happened on December seventh. Well, I was waiting in the outer office to see Moffgat. Mrs. Banning Clarke was in the office with him. I’d never met her. Moffgat opened the door of the private office and looked out to see who was in the outer office. He saw me sitting there and asked if I’d mind stepping in and acting as witness to a will.”

“And you did so?”

“Yes.”

“And what happened subsequently?”

“You know.”

“You don’t know what was in that will?”

“No. I only know that along in January I read about Mrs. Clarke’s dying and about a will’s being offered for probate. I asked Moffgat if I didn’t have to testify as a witness to that will, and he acted so strangely about it I began to do a little thinking. I went and looked up the records. Well, it didn’t take me long to figure out what had happened when I saw that they were probating a will dated a year or so earlier and signed before two other witnesses. — I just climbed aboard the gravy train, that’s all. Nothing crude, you understand, but I made myself a broker of mining properties. Then I called on Bradisson, mentioned casually that I had known his sister, that I’d been a witness to a will she’d made very shortly before she died. That was all I needed to say. After that, when I suggested that the mining company should buy one of my properties at the price I put on it, the money was forthcoming. I didn’t run a willing horse to death, you understand, but I saw to it that my business was reasonably profitable.”

“Now,” Mason said to the District Attorney, “if we could locate the other witness to that will, we might find out something about Banning Clarke’s murder.”

Small said, “The other witness was named Craiglaw. He was waiting in the office at the same time I was. We happened to strike up an acquaintance. That’s all I know about him — that his name was Craiglaw, and that he was a man about fifty-four or fifty-five years old.”

Mason said to the District Attorney, “There is one phase of this matter that has never been explained. When Banning Clarke left the room immediately after drinking the poisoned cup of tea, Moffgat was trying to get me to stipulate to taking his deposition. Moffgat had a subpoena all ready to serve on him, and Moffgat said that he was going to serve that subpoena. It would have been logical for Moffgat to try to do so; yet apparently he made no such attempt. That would seem to indicate that he had other plans.

“At the time, I was just a little stupid. I underestimated Moffgat’s intelligence. I thought that he was dumb enough to let a witness he wanted slip through his fingers. But Moffgat wasn’t dumb — he was shrewd enough to know that if he flashed this subpoena on me, I would signal Banning Clarke to get out of the way. Then, Moffgat would have had an excellent excuse to go out in the cactus garden to try and serve his subpoena. If he had been caught there, he could simply have said, ‘Why, I’m here trying to serve this subpoena.’ But if he wasn’t caught there, if no one saw him enter, if he found Banning Clarke lying asleep on the sand, then he needed only to squeeze the trigger on an automatic and get off the premises. I notice that the sheriff checked on where everyone was at the time Dr. Kenward was wounded, but he didn’t check on Moffgat. Moffgat had announced he was driving back to Los Angeles, and for some reason, Sheriff Greggory took that entirely at its face value.

“A short time ago, Moffgat was trying very hard indeed to have the sale of the Shooting Star Group rescinded on the ground of fraud. More lately, he’s been talking about settling the case and keeping the claims. There’s just a chance that Moffgat spied on Banning Clarke when he was working on his wall. Or Moffgat may possibly have manipulated a beam of invisible light from a machine of his own. And if you turn a beam of invisible light on the lower part of that rock wall you’ll see what I mean — the low portion where even a man with heart trouble could manipulate the little rocks around.

“Evidently Banning Clarke was beginning to suspect something about what Moffgat had done, something of the true nature of Small’s hold over Bradisson. I wouldn’t doubt that Banning Clarke had some rather damaging bit of evidence which he was keeping in his desk. I do know that evidence had been tampered with. I found only a small phial and a dying mosquito. If Clarke had put that mosquito in the little bottle at the time he made the will, the insect would have been dead before I ever saw it.

“You know, Sheriff, if I were you, and if I had a brother-in-law in Los Angeles who is as clever and adroit as Lieutenant Tragg, I think I’d ring him up and suggest it would be a feather in both of your caps to apprehend Moffgat on a charge of first-degree murder, and whisk him out of Los Angeles County and up to San Roberto before he had a chance to start using any habeas corpus or taking steps to bring pressure to bear on the witnesses.”