Erle Stanley Gardner
The Case of the Crooked Candle
Cast of Characters
PERRY MASON — Prominent lawyer, who loves to skate on thin ice
DELLA STREET — Mason’s secretary and skating partner
JACKSON — Law clerk in Mason’s office
MR. and MRS. ARTHUR BICKLER — Whose auto accident seemed trivial... at first
PAUL DRAKE — Private detective and Perry Mason’s trouble-shooter
FRED MILFIELD — Who knew very little about sheep
DAPHNE MILFIELD — Fred’s wife, who knew a great deal about wolves
HARRY VAN NUYS — A wolf in sheep’s clothing
LIEUTENANT TRAGG — A clever policeman, but not quite clever enough
CAROL BURBANK — A girl with both beauty and brains
ROGER BURBANK — Carol’s father, who needed an alibi
DOUGLAS BURWELL — A nice woolly lamb
FRANK PALERMO — Who clipped sheep and people
JUDGE NEWARK — Who was curious about ocean tides
HAMILTON BURGER — Prosecutor, determined to put an end to Perry Mason’s career
J. C. LASSING — A reluctant witness
T. L. CAMERON — Boatman who knew a great deal about ocean tides
Chapter 1
Perry Mason pushed open the door of his private office, smiled at Della Street who was dusting the corners of his desk with secretarial solicitude.
“Good morning Chief,” she said.
Mason gravely deposited hat in the hat closet, walked over to the desk and looked down at the mail, neatly arranged in three piles, on the first of which was a placard, “Should be read-needs no answer.” The second pile was labeled, “Must be read, but can be answered without necessity of your dictation.” The third pile consisted of some half dozen letters which had been marked, “Must be read and answered by you personally.”
Della Street entered her secretarial office which adjoined that of Perry Mason’s. She dropped the dust cloth in a drawer in her desk, returned to Mason’s office, and dropping her shorthand notebook over her crossed knee, held a pencil poised, waiting for Mason to begin dictating.
Mason started with the pile of letters demanding his personal attention, read through the first one, paused to look out of the window, and then, with his eyes fastened upon the Southern California cloudless sky, said abruptly. “It’s Friday, Della.”
Della nodded, held her pencil in readiness.
“Why,” Mason asked abruptly, “do they invariably exempt murderers on Friday?”
“Probably because it’s considered unlucky to start a journey on Friday,” Della said.
“Exactly,” Mason announced. “It’s a barbarous custom. We should give the murderer a chance to start the next world with a clean slate.”
“Other people die on Fridays just the same as any other day,” Della observed. “Why should murderers be exempt?”
Mason lowered his eyes from the window to look at her. “Della, you are fast becoming a realist. And has it ever occurred to you that we may get in a rut?”
“Getting in a rut around this office is the last thing that would ever enter my mind,” Della said with feeling.
Mason indicated the suite of offices on the other side of the closed doors which led to the law library and the reception room. “Beyond those doors, Della, is a hum of routine activity. Gertie at the switchboard putting through calls, getting the names, addresses and occupations of clients who come in. In an office which opens from the reception room, Jackson is sitting in beetle-browed efficiency. There’s something for you to consider, Della, the case of Jackson — a man who has become so steeped in legalistic lore that a ‘negative pregnant’ elicits greater emotional response than a thirteen-inning baseball game. His life has been so ordered by the conventional rules of law that he simply can’t adjust himself to anything new. He...”
Knuckles tapped on the door from the law library.
Mason said to Della, “This will be Exhibit A in making my point — Jackson himself. Come in!”
Jackson pushed the door open. His spare frame seemed somewhat bowed under the weight of the ponderous dignity which it carried about. His face, thin and sharp, cast in lines of austere concentration, showed a long nose, and thin determined mouth which was beginning to turn sharply down at the corners. Deep calipers had etched themselves down from the nostrils, but the frown in the forehead, only the calm of complete tranquillity. Jackson’s conviction that everything must be done according to law was, which gave him an omnipotent serenity.
Jackson, too engrossed with his legal problem to waste time in “Good mornings,” said, “I have a very perplexing case. I hardly know whether I’m justified in going ahead. A big truck owned by the Skinner Hills Karakul Company transporting some Karakul fur sheep, came to a sudden stop. The driver failed to give any signal. A car operated by Arthur Bickler, who is asking us to represent him, ran into the rear end of the truck and was rather seriously damaged.”
“Anyone in the car with him?”
“Yes, his wife, Sarah Bickler.”
Mason, grinning, said, “I suppose the truck driver says he gave a signal; that he was going to stop; that he was looking in his rearview mirror and saw this car approaching rapidly; that he could see the man was talking to the woman and wasn’t even watching the road; that he blew his horn three times, waved his hand frantically, then switched on and off his rear lights, trying to attract the man’s attention as he slowed down.”
Jackson didn’t even smile. He peered in owlish concentration through his glasses as he consulted his notes. “No. The truck driver insists that he gave a signal and that he saw the car approaching rapidly in his rearview mirror; that the car made no attempt to stop, but slammed into the rear of his truck. He doesn’t say anything about noticing that the man at the wheel of the sedan wasn’t watching the road.”
Mason gave Della Street an amused glance. “Probably an inexperienced truck driver.”
“A most peculiar situation thereupon developed,” Jackson went on. “Arthur Bickler got out of the sedan. The truck driver emerged from behind the wheel of the truck. There was the usual exchange of comment, of recriminations and assertions. Then Arthur Bickler took a pencil from his pocket and wrote down the name, ‘Skinner Hills Karakul Company,’ which was on a placard fastened to the side of the truck. No one made any objection.”
“Why should they?” Mason asked.
Jackson blinked thoughtfully. “That,” he said, “is the peculiar part of it. Mr. Bickler then went around to the rear of the truck and wrote down the license number of the truck. No sooner had he done this than the truck driver reached out, said, ‘Naughtly, naughty!’ took Bickler’s pencil and notebook away and dropped both of them in his pocket, then climbed back in his truck and drove away.”
“Any physical injuries?” Mason asked.
“Mrs. Bickler sustained a nerve shock.”
“Any listing in the phone book of Skinner Hills Karakul Company?”
“No. What’s more they haven’t filed any declaration of firm name, nor of fictitious name.”
“All right,” Mason said, “get Paul Drake on the job. There are only a few places that sell Karakul breeding stock. Drake can get in touch with those places and see if they have recently sold sheep for delivery in the Skinner Hills district; or if they know anything about the Skinner Hills Karakul Company. It shouldn’t be hard to get a lead on them.”
“We are confronted in this case by all the uncertainties of the average accident case,” Jackson pointed out. “Our client may be without a remedy under the doctrine of ‘Last Clear Chance.’ Then there is also the question of contributory negligence. I am somewhat dubious...”