The Case of the Velvet Claws (19 page)

"Pretty clever work," he said. "Did you have that up your sleeve all the time, or did you just pull it on her when the going got rough?"

Mason's eyes were heavy. "I've had an idea what happened but getting an idea and getting proof are two different things. Now I've got to save her."

"Forget it," said Drake. "In the first place she isn't worth it, and in the second place, you can't. Her only chance is self-defense and that won't work because she admits he was across the room from her when she shot."

"No," said Mason. "She's a client. I stay by my clients. She forced my hand, and I had to make the play I did. Otherwise, we'd both have been in a mess."

"I wouldn't give her any consideration whatever," Drake said. "She's just a two-timing little tart that saw a chance to marry money, did it, and has been giving everybody the double-cross ever since. You can talk all you want to about your duty to a client, but when the client starts framing a murder rap on you, that's different."

Mason surveyed the detective with heavy eyes. "That's neither here nor there. I'm going to save her."

"How can you?"

"Get this straight," said Perry Mason. "She isn't guilty of anything until she's convicted."

"She confessed," said Drake.

"That doesn't make any difference. The confession is evidence that can be used in the case against her, that's all."

"Well," said Drake, "what's a jury going to do? You'd have to save her on the ground of insanity or self-defense. And she hates your guts. She'll get another lawyer now."

"That's just the point," said Mason. "There might be any one of several different methods by which she might be saved. I'm not talking about methods now. I'm talking about results. I want you to get everything you can on that Veitch family from the present time, back to the year One."

"You mean the housekeeper?" asked Drake.

"I mean the housekeeper and the daughter. The whole family."

"You still think that housekeeper is keeping something back?"

"I know it."

"Okay, I'll turn the men loose on the housekeeper. How did that Georgia stuff suit you?"

"Swell."

"What do you want me to find out about the housekeeper?"

"Everything you can. And about the daughter too. Don't overlook a single bet."

"Listen," said Drake. "Have you got something up your sleeve, Perry?"

"I'm going to get her out."

"Do you know how you're going to do it?"

"I've got an idea. If I hadn't had an idea how I could get her out, I wouldn't have got her in, in the first place."

"Not even when she tried to put a murder rap on you?" asked Drake, curiously.

"Not even when she tried to put a murder rap on me," said Mason, doggedly.

"You sure as hell do stick up for your clients," said Drake.

"I wish I could convince some other people of that," the lawyer said, wearily.

Drake looked at him sharply. Perry Mason went on, "That's my creed in life, Paul. I'm a lawyer. I take people who are in trouble, and I try to get them out of trouble. I'm not presenting the people's side of the case, I'm only presenting the defendant's side. The District Attorney represents the people, and he makes the strongest kind of a case he can. It's my duty to make the strongest kind of a case I can on the other side, and then it's up to the jury to decide. That's the way we get justice. If the District Attorney would be fair, then I could be fair. But the District Attorney uses everything he can in order to get a conviction. I use everything I can in order to get an acquittal. It's like two teams playing football. One of them tries to go in one direction just as hard as it can, and the other tries to go in the other direction just as hard as it can.

"It's sort of an obsession with me to do the best I can for a client. My clients aren't blameless. Many of them are crooks. Probably a lot of them are guilty. That's not for me to determine. That's for the jury to determine."

"Are you going to try and prove this woman was crazy?" the detective asked.

Mason shrugged his shoulders. "I'm going to keep a jury from convicting her," he said.

"You'll never get away from that confession," said Drake. "It shows murder."

"Confession or no confession, they can't prove her guilty of anything, until the jury says she's guilty."

Drake shrugged expressive shoulders, and said, "Oh, well, there's no use of our arguing about it. I'll turn the men loose on the Veitches, and get all the dope for you."

"I don't suppose I need to tell you," said Mason, "that minutes are precious. All that I've been fighting for all the way along is time enough to get the evidence I want. You've got to work fast. It's a matter of time, that's all."

Perry Mason went back to his office. The puffs under the eyes, which came from fatigue, were more pronounced, but his eyes were steady and hard.

He opened the door of his office. Della Street was at the typewriter. She glanced up, then looked back at her work.

Mason slammed the door shut behind him, walked over to her. "For God's sake, Della," he pleaded, "won't you have confidence in me?"

She flashed him a swift glance.

"Of course I've got confidence in you."

"No, you haven't."

"I'm surprised and a little confused, that's all," she said.

He stood surveying her, moody-eyed, hopeless.

"All right," he said, at length. "You get the State Bureau of Vital Statistics on the telephone, and stay on the telephone until you get the information you want. Get somebody at the head of the department if you can. Never mind what it costs. We want the information, and we want it right now. We want to know whether or not Norma Veitch was ever married. My best guess is that she was. And we want to know if there's been a divorce."

Della Street stared at him.

"What's that got to do with the murder case?"

"Never mind," he said. "Veitch is probably her real name. That is, it's her mother's name, and it would be the name that was on the marriage license as the name of the bride when she was married. Of course, she might not have been married, and she might not have been married in this state. But there's something funny about the whole set up. And there's something in her past that she's holding back. I want to know what it is."

"You don't think Norma Veitch was mixed up in it in any way, do you?" Della Street asked.

Mason's eyes were cold, his face determined.

"All I've got to do is to raise a reasonable doubt in the minds of the jury," he told her. "Don't forget that. Get on the telephone and get that information."

He walked into his inner office and closed the door. He started pacing back and forth, his thumbs propped in the armholes of his vest, his head bowed in concentration.

He was still pacing the floor, half an hour later, when Della Street opened the door.

"You were right," she said.

"How?"

"She was married. I got the dope from the Bureau of Vital Statistics. She was married six months ago to a man named Harry Loring. There's no record of a divorce."

Perry Mason gained the door with three quick strides, pushed it impatiently to one side, strode across the outer office and went at almost a run down the corridor to the stairs. He took the stairs down to the floor on which Paul Drake had his office and banged on the exit door of Drake's office with impatient fists.

Paul Drake opened the door.

"Hell, it's you! Don't you ever stay in your office to see clients?"

"Listen," Mason told him, "I've got a break. Norma Veitch was married!"

"What of it?" asked Drake.

"She's engaged to Carl Griffin."

"Well, couldn't she have gotten a divorce?"

"No. There's no divorce. There wasn't time for a divorce. The marriage was only six months ago."

"Okay," said Drake. "What do you want?"

"I want you to find her husband. His name's Harry Loring. I want to find out when they separated, and why. And I'm particularly anxious to find out whether she ever knew Carl Griffin before she came to the house on her visit. In other words, I want to know whether she'd ever visited her mother while her mother was working at Belter's place, before the date of this last visit."

The detective whistled.

"By God!" he said. "I believe you're going to set up a defense of emotional insanity, and the unwritten law for Eva Belter."

"Will you get busy on that thing right away?"

"I can have it for you inside of half an hour if he's anywheres in the city," said Drake.

"The sooner the quicker. I'll be waiting in the office."

He went back to his own office, walked past Della Street without a word.

She stopped him as he was entering his office. "Harrison Burke telephoned."

Mason raised his eyebrows.

"Where is he?"

"He wouldn't say. He said he was going to call later. He wouldn't even leave me a telephone number."

"Presume he's read about the new development, in the extras," said Mason.

"He didn't say. Just said that he'd call later."

The telephone rang.

She motioned toward the inner office.

"This is probably the call," she said.

Mason went into the inner office.

He heard Della Street say, "Just a moment, Mr. Burke," and then as he took down the receiver, Burke's voice on the wire:

"Hello, Burke," he said:

Burke's voice was still impressively resonant, but there was an over-tone of panic in it. Every once in a while it seemed that his voice would climb to the high notes and crack, but he always managed to get it back after just the one break.

"Listen," he said, "this is awful. I've just read the papers."

Mason said, "It's not so bad. You're out of the murder case. You can pose as a friend of the family on the other. It isn't going to be pleasant, but it isn't like being held for murder."

"But they'll use it against me in my campaign."

"Use what?" Mason inquired.

"My friendship with this woman."

"I can't help that," Mason told him, "but I'm working on an out for you. The District Attorney isn't going to let your name get mixed into the case unless he has to show a motive at the trial."

Burke's voice became more orotund.

"That," he said, "was what I wanted to discuss with you. The District Attorney is very fair. Unless there's a trial my name won't be dragged into it. Now you might fix things so there wouldn't be a trial."

"How?" Mason asked.

"You could persuade her to plead guilty to second degree murder. You're still acting as her attorney. The District Attorney would let you see her – on that understanding. I've talked with him."

Mason snapped a swift reply. "Nothing doing!" he said. "I'm going to try to protect your interests, but I'll do it my way. You keep under cover for a while."

"There'd be a nice fee," said Harrison Burke in a suave, oily voice, "five thousand in cash. Perhaps we could even make it a little more…"

Perry Mason slammed the receiver back on its hook.

The lawyer resumed his pacing of the floor. Fifteen or twenty minutes later the telephone rang.

Mason took down the receiver and heard Paul Drake's voice. "I think we've got your man located. There's a man named Harry Loring who is at the Belvedere Apartments. His wife left him about a week ago and is said to have gone to live with her mother. Do we want him?"

"You bet we want him," Mason said, "and we want him quick! Can you go out there with me? I'll probably want a witness."

"Okay," Drake said. "I've got a car here if you haven't."

"We'll take two cars. We may need them."

"No," he said, "you've got the wrong party. I'm not married."

Drake looked at Perry Mason. Mason gave a faint shrug to his shoulders, which Drake interpreted as a signal to him to do the talking.

"Did you ever know a Norma Veitch?" he asked.

"Never," said Loring, darting his tongue to his lips.

"You're moving out?" asked Drake.

"Yes," Loring said. "I can't keep on with the rent here."

"Never been married, eh?"

"No, I'm a bachelor."

"Where are you moving?"

"I'm sure I don't know – yet."

Loring looked from face to face with his eyes blinking.

"Are you gentlemen officers?" he asked.

"Never mind about us," said Drake. "We're talking about you."

Loring said, "Yes, sir," and lapsed into silence.

Drake flashed Mason another glance.

"Packing up rather suddenly, aren't you?" Drake went on.

Loring shrugged. "I don't know as it's sudden. There isn't much to pack."

"Now listen," Drake said, "there's no use for you to try to string us along, because we can check up on you and find out the facts. You say you have never been married. Is that right?"

"Yes, sir. I'm a bachelor, just like I told you."

"Okay. Now the neighbors say you were married. There was a woman here who lived in the apartment with you, as your wife, up until about a week ago."

Loring's eyes blinked rapidly. He shifted his position on the trunk, nervously.

"I wasn't married to her," he said.

"How long have you known her?"

"About two weeks. She was a waitress at a restaurant."

"What restaurant?"

"I've forgotten the name."

"What was her name?"

"She went under the name of Mrs. Loring."

"I know that. What was her real name?"

Loring paused and darted his tongue to his lips. His eyes fidgeted uncertainly about the room.

"Jones," he said, "Mary Jones."

Drake laughed sarcastically.

Loring said nothing.

"Where is she now?" asked Drake, suddenly.

"I don't know. She left me. I think she went away with somebody else. We had a fight."

"What was the fight about?"

"Oh, I don't know. It was just a fight."

Drake looked over at Mason once more.

Mason stepped forward and took the conversational lead. "Do you read the papers?" he said.

"Once in a while," said Loring, "not very often. Sometimes I look at the headlines. I'm not very much interested in newspapers."

Mason reached to his inside pocket, and took out some of the clippings from the morning newspaper. He unfolded one which showed a picture of Norma Veitch.

"Is that the woman that was here with you?" he asked.

Loring barely glanced at the photograph, but he shook his head emphatically.

"No," he said, "that wasn't the woman."

"You haven't even looked at the picture yet. You'd better look at it before you get too positive in your denials."

He thrust the picture in front of Loring's eyes. Loring took the clipping and studied the picture for some ten or fifteen seconds.

"No," he said, "that isn't the woman."

"Took you quite a while this time to make up your mind, didn't it?" Mason pointed out.

Loring said nothing.

Mason suddenly turned and nodded to Drake.

"All right," he said to Loring, "if that's the attitude you want to take, you'll have to take your medicine. You can't expect us to protect you if you're going to lie to us."

"I'm not lying."

"Come on, Drake. Let's go," Mason said, grimly.

The two men walked from the apartment, and closed the door behind them. In the corridor, Drake said: "What do you make of him?"

"He's a rat or he'd have tried the stunt of becoming indignant, and asking us what the hell we meant by inquiring into his business. He looked to me as though he'd been on the dodge sometime in his life, and he's afraid of the law. He's used to being bullied by detectives."

"About the way I've got him sized up," said Drake. "What are we going to do?"

"Well," said Mason, "we can take this picture and see if we can find some of the neighbors in the apartment who can identify her."

"The newspaper picture isn't so very good. I wonder if we can't get a photograph," Drake said.

"We're working against time," Mason reminded him. "Something may break in this thing almost any minute, and I want to keep ahead of the game."

"We didn't get very rough with him," Drake pointed out. "He's the kind of a man who would cave in if we went after him, hammer and tongs."

"Sure," said Mason. "We'll do that when we get back. I want to get a little more dope on him if I can. I think he'll turn yellow as soon as we put a little pressure on him."

Steps sounded on the stairs.

"Wait a minute," said Drake, "this looks like somebody coming."

A thick-set man, with heavy shoulders, plodded patiently up the stairs and into the corridor. His clothes were shiny, and his cuffs were frayed. Yet there was an air of determination about him.

"Process server," whispered Mason to Drake.

The man came toward them. His manner was that of one who had, at one time, been a peace officer, and still retained something of the bearing of an officer.

He looked at the two men and said, "Are either of you Harry Loring?"

Mason promptly stepped forward.

"Yes," he said, "I'm Loring."

The man reached in his pocket.

"I guess," he said, "you know what this is about. I have here a summons and a copy of a complaint, and copy of summons in the case of Norma Loring versus Harry Loring. I hereby show you the original summons, and deliver to you a copy of the summons and the complaint."

He smiled wanly.

"I guess you know what it's all about. I understood it was a case that wasn't going to be contested and you were expecting me."

Mason took the papers.

"Sure," he said, "that's all right."

"No hard feelings," said the process server.

"No hard feelings," said Mason.

The process server turned, made a notation on the back of the original summons in pencil, and walked slowly and methodically to the stairs. As he went down, Mason turned to Drake and grinned.

"A break," he said.

The two men unfolded the copy of the complaint.

"It's an action for an annulment instead of a divorce," said Mason.

They read down the allegations of the complaint.

"That's the date of the marriage, all right," said Mason. "Let's go back."

They pounded on the panels of the door to the apartment.

Loring's voice sounded from the inside.

"Who is it?" he asked.

"Papers to be served on you," said Mason.

Loring opened the door and recoiled as he saw the two men standing there.

"You!" he exclaimed. "I thought you'd gone."

Mason pushed his shoulder against the door, and walked into the apartment. Drake followed him.

Mason held out the papers which he had taken from the process server.

"Listen," he said. "There's something funny. We had these papers to serve on you, and understood that you knew all about it. But before we could serve them, we had to make certain that we were serving the right party, so we asked you the questions about your marriage, and…"

Loring said, eagerly, "Oh, that's it, is it? Why didn't you say so? Sure, that's what I was waiting for. They told me to wait here until the papers came, and then to get out just as soon as they were served on me."

Mason gave an exclamation of disgust. "Well, why the hell didn't you say so instead of putting us to all this trouble? Your name is Harry Loring, and you married Norma Veitch on the date mentioned in this complaint. Is that right?"

Loring leaned forward to look at the date mentioned in the complaint.

Mason indicated it with his right forefinger.

Loring nodded his head. "That's right."

"And you separated on this date. Is that right?" said Mason moving his forefinger down to the next date.

"That's right."

"All right," said Mason, "this complaint says that at the time you were married, you had another wife living, from whom you had not been divorced, and that therefore the marriage was illegal, and that the plaintiff wants to have the marriage annulled."

Again Loring nodded.

"Now listen," said Mason, "that's not right, is it?"

Loring nodded.

"Yes, sir," he said, "that's the ground she's getting the marriage set aside on. That's right."

Mason asked, "Is it true?"

"Of course it's true."

"Then it becomes my duty to arrest you for bigamy."

Loring's face blanched.

"He said there wouldn't be any trouble," said Loring.

"Who said that?" asked Mason.

"The lawyer that called on me. Norma's lawyer."

"Just stringing you along," Mason declared, "so that they can get the marriage set aside and Norma could marry this fellow who's heir to a couple of million dollars."

"That's what they said, but they said there wouldn't be any trouble, that it was just a formality."

"Formality be damned!" Mason told him. "Don't you know there's a law against bigamy?"

"But I wasn't guilty of bigamy!" protested Loring.

"Oh, yes, you were," said Mason. "Here it is set forth in black and white, over the signature of the lawyer, and the oath of Norma. It says right here that you had another wife living at the time of the marriage, and that you were never divorced from her. Therefore, we've got to ask you to go to Police Headquarters with us. I'm afraid you've got in serious trouble over this thing."

Loring became nervous.

"It isn't true," he said, finally.

"How do you mean it isn't true?"

"I mean that it isn't true. I mean I was never married before. Norma knows that! The lawyer knows that! I talked with them and they said that they couldn't wait to get a divorce, because that would take a long time, but that Norma had a chance to marry this man and that I would get a piece of change out of it if I let Norma go ahead and file this action. Then I was to file some kind of an answer in which I admitted that I had had another wife living, but claimed that I thought that I was divorced at the time of the marriage. They said that that would keep me in the clear, but it would fix things so she could get the marriage annulled. The lawyer had an answer of that kind already fixed up, and I signed it. He's going to file it tomorrow."

"And then rush the annulment through, eh?" asked Mason.

Loring nodded.

"Well," said Mason, "it doesn't ever pay to try and lie to people who are trying to get the facts of the case. Why didn't you tell me that in the first place and save all this trouble?"

"The lawyer told me not to," said Loring.

"Well, he was crazy," Mason said, "we've got to make a report on the thing. So you'd better give us a written statement to that effect, and then we can turn it in when we make our report."

Loring hesitated.

"Or else," suggested Mason, "you can come on down to Headquarters and explain it down there."

Loring said, "No, no. I'll give you the statement."

"Okay," Mason said, and took a notebook and fountain pen from his pocket. "Sit down there on the trunk," he said, "and write out the statement. Make it complete all the way along the line. Say that you never had another wife, that the lawyer explained to you that he wanted Norma to get a quick annulment, and that he fixed it up that you were to say you had another wife living so that Norma could marry this chap that's going to inherit the fortune."

"That won't get me in any trouble then?"

"That's the only way you can keep out of trouble," said Mason. "There's no use of my explaining it to you, but you almost got yourself in a pretty serious mess. It's a good thing you came clean with us. We were just planning to take you down to Headquarters."

Loring sighed. "All right," he said, and took the fountain pen. He sat down and began a laborious scrawl. Mason stood and watched him, feet planted wide apart, eyes steady and patient. Drake grinned and lit a cigarette.

It took Loring five minutes to make the statement. Then he passed it over to Mason. "Will this do all right?" he asked. "I'm not much good at this sort of stuff."