Case of the Footloose Doll (9 page)

“I told you I didn’t want a doctor. He’ll ask me questions and then go to the police. Once he does that, we’re all in the soup.”

“That,” Mason interrupted, “is the beauty of having my doctor on the job instead of yours. He’ll ask you how you feel, he’ll take your blood pressure, he’ll find your exact physical condition. He may ask you questions about how it happened, and if he does, you’re perfectly free to tell him that, for all you know, you were walking in your sleep, stumbled, and fell forward or an ice pick. Or you can simply refuse to answer questions, and tell him that you’ll talk to your own doctor at the proper time.”

“But what good is it going to do to have this doctor of yours see me?”

“It may save some complications,” Mason said. “He’ll be my doctor.

Not yours. He’ll be appraising the injury so as to assess damages.”

“I don’t need to tell him how it happened?”

“No.”

“It won’t cost me anything?”

“Nothing.”

There was a moment’s silence.

Mason went on, “There are some disadvantages. The doctor won’t report to you. He’ll report to me. But if he feels you should have any special treatment, he’ll tell me. That will be for your protection.

“Because he’s my doctor instead of yours, you won’t have to answer any questions that you don’t want to answer, and if he doesn’t have any information from you that indicates you were the victim of a felonious stabbing, he won’t have to make a report to the police.” Harrod grinned. “Particularly if I tell him that I was holding the ice pick in my hand when my wife pushed open the door carrying a bunch of dishes in from the kitchen, and that the door hit my hand and rammed the ice pick into my chest.”

“Don’t let him trap you,” Nellie warned. “That’s exactly what he wants you to do; make some contradictory story to a doctor and—” Harrod’s face showed anger. “Shut up!” he said. “Keep your big bazzoo out of this!”

“Watch your language!” she said.

Harrod laughed. “Your bazzoo, I said, sweetheart. Your bazzoo!” He turned to Mason, said wearily. “That’s what comes of teaming up with an illiterate broad who tries to be refined.” Nellie sucked in a quick breath, started to say something, then changed her mind.

“How long will it take you to get your doctor here?”

“He should be here within an hour.”

“What’s his name?”

“The one I have in mind is Dr. Arlington.”

“He’s worked for you before?”

“Yes.” Harrod said to Nellie, “Give me another blanket, Nellie. I’m still cold.” He turned to Mason, said, “Here’s something you ca be thinking about in the meantime. Your client can’t stand an investigation. Don’t let her pull the wool over your eyes. She isn’t Fern Driscoll. She’s Mildred Crest. She stole Fern Driscoll’s purse, her identity and her money.

“You just let that broad of yours know that you know that, and that I know it. Then you come back and we’ll talk a little turkey. Now then, go get your doctor if that will make you feel any better.” 

Chapter 7

MASON AND Della Street called Dr. Arlington, then took a taxicab to the place where Mason’s car was parked and drove back to the Dixiecrat Apartments.

They had waited some five minutes when Dr. Arlington drove up, parked his car ahead of Mason’s, got out, shook hands, and said, “What’s it all about, Perry?”

Mason said, “It’s a damage claim. That is, it’s going to be a damage claim. The man’s name is Harrod. He’s in Apartment 218. I told him I was sending my doctor. You ring the bell, go on up and take a look at him. Be sure you have it definitely understood that you are there as my physician, making an independent checkup. Explain to him that you are not his doctor, and that there is to be no confidential relationship of physician and patient. If he makes any statement to you about how he feels, I want you to be able to testify.”

“All right,” Dr. Arlington said. “What seems to be the trouble?”

“Something was stuck in his chest.”

“A knife?” Dr. Arlington asked.

“No, no, not a knife,” Mason said. “I think it was a much smaller pointed object.”

“Not a nail?” Dr. Arlington said.

“Probably something about the size of an ice pick.”

“I see.”

“He probably won’t give you any information about how it happened,” Mason said, “although he may tell you that he was standing in front of the kitchen door when his wife came through with a big load of dishes and kicked the door open. He was holding an ice pick in his hand, and the suddenly opened door jabbed it into his chest.”

“Is that the way it happened?”

“He may tell you that’s what happened.”

“Did it happen that way?”

“How do I know?” Mason asked. “You go on up and find out what’s wrong with the guy. He’s having chills.”

“The devil he is!”

“Uh—huh.”

“That’d better be looked into,” Dr. Arlington said. “An ice pick can be damned serious.”

“All right,” Mason told him. “Go look into it.” 

Chapter 8

DR. ARLINGTON took his professional bag, walked up to the door of the apartment house and pressed the button on 218.

A few moments later the buzzer sounded and Dr. Arlington pushed the door open and went in.

“Well,” Mason said to Della Street, “we’ll soon find out just how much of a problem we have. You got that ice pick placed all right?”

“I’ll say I did. I put it in the utility drawer in the kitchen.”

“You were working pretty fast,” Mason told her.

“You gave me a wonderful opportunity, inquiring about the woman’s marital status. Wasn’t that rather mean, Chief?”

“It was a good way to keep her attention occupied,” Mason said.

“You didn’t need to rub it in! She’ll know what’s in the apartment and, when she finds that extra ice pick, particularly since the price mark was left on it, she’ll know it was planted and then she’ll put two and two together.”

Mason said, “And again she may feel that the ice pick with a price tag still on it must have been the one used in the stabbing.” Della Street thought that over for a moment, then smiled. “I think I begin to see a light,” she said, “a very interesting and significant light.” Mason lit a cigarette. “We’ll see what they tell Dr. Arlington.”

“Don’t you think you should have gone up with him?” Mason said, “I don’t want to be a witness. Let Dr. Arlington talk with the guy. Any court in the land will take Dr. Arlington’s testimony at face value.”

“I’ll say,” she agreed. “He makes a fine witness.” Della Street, who was standing by the side of Perry Mason’s automobile, looking toward the back of the car, suddenly stiffened to attention, said, “Oh—oh, Chief! Here’s trouble!”

“What?” Mason asked.

“A very official—looking car with a red spotlight.”

“Coming here?” Mason asked.

“Looks like it.”

“Jump in,” Mason told her. “We’ll get going. We don’t dare to get caught—”

“There’s not time,” she interrupted. “They’re right on us. Make up a good story.”

“Get in,” Mason said, sliding over so Della could get in behind the steering wheel. “They may not notice you.”

Della Street, with quick, supple grace, twisted in behind the steering wheel, slammed the door shut, rolled the window down.

“Act as though you hadn’t seen them,” Mason said, “and be talking.

They probably won’t notice a parked car. They—” He broke off as the interior of the car was flooded with red light from a police spotlight.

“Turn around,” Mason said. “Look surprised! Otherwise they’ll know we had seen them coming.”

Mason turned quickly, then faced Della Street and said, “Look, look!” He pointed back toward the spotlight.

“How’s that, Della?” he asked.

“Corny, but good,” she said. “Here they are.”

Sgt. Holcomb of Homicide Squad came walking up on the right side of the car. An officer moved up to the left-hand side. “Well, well, well,” Sgt. Holcomb said. “What are you doing here?”

“And what in the world are you doing here?” Mason asked. “We were just leaving.”

“Were you really!” Holcomb said. “It didn’t look like it to me. It looked as though you were waiting for someone. You know. Mason, you shouldn’t have such an attractive secretary. When you get a girl with a figure like Miss America . . . ”

“Miss Universe,” Mason interrupted, grinning.

“All right, all right,” Holcomb said with the easy good nature of one who has trumped all the aces in the deck. “When you get a good-looking secretary with a figure like Miss Universe, we naturally notice her when she slides in behind the steering wheel of an automobile. Now, suppose you tell me just what you’re waiting for?”

Della Street, looking toward the door of the apartment house, nudged Perry Mason.

Dr. Arlington came hurrying out, took a step toward Mason’s car, then seeing the officers, veered over toward his own car. Holcomb watched him with smiling amusement.

“Oh, Doctor,” he called.

Dr. Arlington stopped, looked back over his shoulder, said, “Yes?”

“You are a doctor, aren’t you?” Sgt. Holcomb asked, staring pointedly at the medical bag.

“Yes.”

“May I ask where you’ve been, Doctor?”

“In that apartment house,” Dr. Arlington said.

“Wonderful!” Sgt. Holcomb observed. “Since we saw you come out of the apartment house, I have no reason to doubt your statement. Now, could you be a little more specific, Doctor, and tell us just what apartment you were in, in that house?”

“I fail to see that it concerns anyone,” Dr. Arlington said.

“Oh, but I think it does,” Sgt. Holcomb observed. “If you were up in Apartment 218, it would be of the greatest concern to the police. And if you were sent there by Mr. Perry Mason, then the situation would be more than interesting. It would be downright exciting.

“The fact that Mr. Mason was quite apparently waiting for you to come out indicates that he knew you were in there. If he knew you were in there, the probabilities are that he was responsible for you being there.

The fact that you started to walk toward Mr. Mason’s car as though to make a report to him, then saw the police car parked behind and made a sudden swing over to the car which, I take it, is your car, was quite a giveaway. What did you find, Doctor?”

Dr. Arlington reached a quick decision. He smiled and said, “I was making a checkup on a person who had been injured. I assumed it was a civil case with the possibility of malingering.” He looked past the officer standing by the side of the car to Perry Mason, raised his voice and said, “The man was dead by the time I got there. The woman who was with him, and who I assume is his wife, gives a history of an ice pick having been inserted in the man’s chest. I made a quick examination and convinced myself that there had indeed been a small puncture wound in the chest. Under the circumstances, I felt that it was a case for the coroner and did nothing further.”

“You called the police?” Sgt. Holcomb asked.

“The police had been called before I arrived,” Dr. Arlington said. And then, with a meaning glance at Perry Mason, said, “I would, of course, have notified the coroner if the young woman hadn’t already called the authorities.”

“That’s most interesting,” Sgt. Holcomb said. “Now perhaps someone will tell us how it happened that Mr. Mason knew this man had been injured.”

Mason said, “Just a moment, Doctor. Was there anyone in the apartment when you left?”

“Just the young woman.”

“Do you know whether she’s his wife?”

“I don’t know. How should I? I didn’t ask to see the marriage license.”

“In other words, then, she’s up there alone with the body and any evidence that may be in the apartment.”

“That is correct,” Dr. Arlington said.

Sgt. Holcomb sighed. “All right, Mason,” he said, “you win. Much as I would like to interrogate you, I realize that my first duty is to get up there and investigate the homicide.”

“Homicide?” Mason asked. “Wasn’t it accidental?” Sgt. Holcomb grinned. “The story we got over the telephone is that some woman pushed an ice pick right into his chest. However, we’ll find out a lot more about it. Don’t go away, Mason.”

“Why not?” Mason asked.

“I’m going to want to talk with you.”

“You can talk with me at my office.”

“I don’t want to waste the time,” Sgt. Holcomb said. “I’m not going to detain you any longer than necessary, but you and the doctor stay right here. Now, let me ask you, have you been up in that apartment, Mason?”

“Yes,” Mason said.

“That’s what I thought.”

“You want me with you, Sergeant?” the other officer asked.

“I want you with me,” Holcomb said. “Another car with a deputy coroner and a fingerprint man will be here any minute.” He turned to Mason. “I’m giving you a lawful order from an officer in the performance of his duty. Don’t leave here until I have a chance to talk with you.” 

Mason said, “All right, if it’s a reasonable order, I’ll obey it. But it has to be reasonable. I’ll give you fifteen minutes. That’s a reasonable length of time. If you have any questions you want to ask me or Dr. Arlington here, be back inside of fifteen minutes.”

“I’ve a job of investigation to do up there.”

“You can get the woman out of the apartment, seal up the apartment so that nothing will be touched,” Mason said, “and you can do all that within two minutes. You’ll have ten minutes for a first investigation and then you can come down here and talk with me. At the end of fifteen minutes I’m going to be on my way, and Dr. Arlington is going to be on his way.”

Sgt. Holcomb hesitated a moment, then turned to the officer. “Come on, let’s go!” he said.

When they had gone. Dr. Arlington said in a low voice to Perry Mason, “I didn’t know what to do. Perry. The man was dead when I arrived. He evidently had been dead for about ten minutes.”

“How about the woman with him. Hysterical?”

“Upset . . . But I wouldn’t think he was irreplaceable in her life.”

“Did she tell you anything I should know?” Mason asked.

“Only that she’d telephoned the officers. She said she told them Carl Harrod had been murdered.”

“Murdered?”

“That’s what she said: murdered. I was in a spot. Perry. I didn’t know what you wanted; whether I should dash back down here and tell you that the man was dead and that she had called the authorities, or whether I should take a quick look at the body so I could see the nature and location of the wound.