“Is there anything peculiar about her walk?”
“Yes, sir. She drags her right foot when she walks, and uses a cane. The thump of the cane, and the peculiar dragging noise of the right foot are very distinctive.”
“And this walk sounded like your aunt’s walk?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then what happened?”
“I knew that my aunt wasn’t in the house. I told that to Jerry. He immediately walked down the corridor and opened the door of the bedroom. Jerry had always been so big and strong that I guess I considered him invincible. I never realized the danger in which I was placing him. I...”
“What happened?” Burger asked.
“Someone in the room shot twice. The first bullet just missed my head. The second one... hit Jerry.”
“What did you do after that?”
“I don’t know. I dragged Jerry away from the door, and then he recovered consciousness. He was unconscious for some little time. I don’t know just how long. When he opened his eyes, I told him I must get an ambulance and a doctor. He said we could get a taxicab quicker, and I telephoned for a taxicab. We rushed him to the hospital, and an hour or two later on, Dr. Everett Rosllyn operated on him.”
“You remained at the hospital?”
“Yes, sir, until after the operation, and until after — after I’d seen he was going to be all right.”
“Cross-examine,” Burger snapped.
Mason said, “You don’t know how long Jerry Templar was unconscious?”
“No. It was all a nightmare to me.”
“You don’t know how long it was after the shot was fired before you got to the hospital?”
“No, sir. I can’t tell you the time.”
“And you don’t know exactly how long it was after we left you at the house that last time before the shooting took place?”
“Well... it might have been... it might have been an hour. It might not have been more than half an hour. It was perhaps somewhere between half an hour and an hour.”
“You can’t fix it any closer than that?”
“No.”
“You were about fourteen years of age when your uncle disappeared?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Can you fix exactly the time when the kitten was first taken sick — that is, with reference to the time of that telephone conversation with your Uncle Franklin?”
“It was immediately after I had hung up the telephone that I noticed the kitten was sick.”
“Did you notice that?”
“My attention was first called to it by my aunt.”
“By your aunt you mean Matilda Shore?”
“Yes, sir.”
“What did you do with the kitten?”
“I took it to the veterinary.”
Burger said, “Just a moment, Your Honor, one important question I forgot to ask. I would like to interrupt to get it in the record.”
“No objection,” Mason said affably.
“After dinner that night, did you go back to see the veterinary?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And what was the condition of the kitten at that time?”
“The kitten seemed to be well, but weak.”
“What did you do with him?”
“I took him with me. The veterinary suggested that...”
“Never mind what the veterinary suggested.”
Mason said affably, “Oh, go ahead, let her tell it. I take it, Miss Kendal, the veterinary suggested that if some person were trying to poison the kitten around the house, that it would be better to take it away from the house, and so you took it down and left it with Thomas Lunk, the gardener, did you not?”
“Yes, sir.”
Mason said, “That’s all.” And Burger nodded.
Hamilton Burger called Lieutenant Tragg to the stand. Tragg testified in the close-clipped, efficient manner of the police officer who has been on the witness stand on numerous occasions. He testified to receiving a telephone call, to going to the hills back of Hollywood, finding the body, identified the articles which were tied up in a handkerchief near the body, and testified as to the identity of the body.
Tragg then stated positively that he had advised Mr. Mason that night, while the lawyer was at the Shore residence, that he desired the presence of Franklin B. Shore as a witness to appear before the grand jury, and that he stated to Mason the importance to the police of finding and examining Franklin Shore.
Tragg then went on to state his experiences at the Shore home later on that night when he had been summoned to investigate the shooting of Jerry Templar. He testified what he had found, calling particular attention to a writing desk on which a lock had been forced open. He identified photographs showing the condition of the bedroom when he had arrived on the scene. Burger introduced these photographs in evidence.
On cross-examination, Mason adopted a manner of good-natured affability.
“Lieutenant, referring to this handkerchief, I call your attention to a laundry mark. Have you made any effort to trace that laundry mark?”
“Well, yes.”
“And you found, did you not, that it was a mark given to Franklin Shore by a laundry in Miami, Florida, and that the laundry had been out of business for some six years?”
“That is right.”
“You’ll remember that when you first showed me the watch up in the hills back of Hollywood, I pointed out to you that, according to the indicator, the watch must have been wound at approximately four-thirty or five o’clock the day of the murder?”
“Yes.”
“Now, have you examined the fountain pen?”
“Yes.”
“And what was the condition of that fountain pen?”
Tragg said, “It was dry.”
“According to your observations at the scene of the shooting of Jerry Templar, the assailant had entered through a ground-floor window on the north side of the house. Is that right?”
“Yes.”
“And, in entering the room, had knocked over a night stand or taboret which was by the side of Mrs. Shore’s bed?”
“Yes.”
“Then had picked up a cane which apparently was in the room, and had imitated the steps of Mrs. Shore?”
“I think that’s a fair deduction from the evidence. Of course, I don’t know that of my own knowledge.”
“But you did find a cane which was lying on the floor near the corner from which the shots had been fired?”
“Yes.”
“By the way, Lieutenant, you stated, I believe, that you took Thomas Lunk into custody at a downtown hotel where he was registered under the name of Thomas Trimmer?”
“Yes.”
“How did you happen to go to that hotel to make the arrest?”
Tragg smiled. “I am not going to divulge that.”
“It’s not proper cross-examination,” Hamilton Burger objected. “The witness certainly is entitled to protect the source of his information.”
Mason said, “I will withdraw that question and ask this in its place. Isn’t it a fact, Lieutenant, that you went to that hotel because you received an anonymous telephone tip from some person who told you where Lunk was, the name under which he was registered, and the number of his room?”
“Same objection,” Burger said.
Judge Lankershim deliberated the matter thoughtfully, then asked Mason, “What is the reason for asking this question, Mr. Mason?”
“It simply goes to show the entire res gestae,” he said, “As a matter of fact, Your Honor, it may be quite material. Suppose, for instance, that I had been the one who had given Lieutenant Tragg that telephone tip?”
“You don’t claim that you were?” Judge Lankershim asked.
“Not at present, Your Honor. But I think it’s only fair to the defendant that the witness should answer that one question.”