“And,” Mason went on dryly, “the fact that Harvey J. Lynk was shot in the back isn’t going to help a self-defense plea any.”
Mildreth Faulkner slowly walked across to where the gun reposed on the taboret by Mason’s chair. “I suppose I shouldn’t have got my fingerprints on it.”
“That’s right,” Mason said. “Couldn’t we wipe them off?”
“I couldn’t.”
She grabbed up the gun, crossed over to her purse, took out a handkerchief, and started scrubbing vigorously away at the metal.
Mason sat calmly at ease, sipping his Scotch and soda, watching her frantic motions.
“Careful with that gun,” he warned. “You have your finger inside the trigger guard.”
A siren sounded close at hand, rising to a scream, then fading to a low, moaning sound as a car pulled up at the curb outside.
Mason said, “Unless I’m greatly mistaken, that will be Lieutenant Arthur Tragg of the Homicide Squad, and when he finds that gun absolutely devoid of fingerprints, he’ll...”
“Look out...”
Mason jumped up from the chair, lunged toward her, grabbed for her wrist — and was too late.
The revolver roared into noise. The bullet, sailing through a plate-glass window, sent tinkling fragments of glass dropping to the cement porch.
In the interval of startled silence which followed, the doorbell rang insistently. Knuckles pounded on the panels. Lieutenant Tragg called, “This is the police. Open up, or I’ll smash the door in.”
“That,” Mason said calmly, “is the pay-off.” He walked back to his chair, settled down in the cushions, picked up the drink, and lit a fresh cigarette. “It’s your party now.”
Mildreth Faulkner stood staring at the gun. “Good Heavens! I had no idea it was going off. My handkerchief caught on the hammer and pulled it back. My finger was on the trigger, and...”
“Better let Lieutenant Tragg in,” Mason interrupted. “I think he’s getting ready to smash in a window.”
She stooped and slid the gun along the floor under a davenport at the corner of the room.
Mason tolerantly shook his head at her. “Naughty, naughty! Lieutenant Tragg won’t like that.”
She went rapidly through the door to the reception hallway, started to run the last few steps, and opened the door. “What is it?” she asked.
“Who did the shooting just now?” Lieutenant Tragg asked, pushing his way into the hallway. “And is that Perry Mason’s car out there? Is he here?”
“Yes, he’s here.”
“Who did the shooting?”
“Why... er... was there shooting?”
“Didn’t you hear the shot?”
“Why, no. I can’t say that I did. I heard something that sounded like a backfire.”
Lieutenant Tragg made a sound which was midway between a sniff and a snort, and walked on into the living room. “Well, Mason,” he said, “you certainly get around.”
“Travel,” Mason told him, “is broadening. As you doubtless know, this is Miss Faulkner. Lieutenant Tragg, Miss Faulkner. You’ll find that Miss Faulkner has excellent taste in Scotch whiskey, and, for your further information, I’m not representing her.”
Tragg stood staring down at Mason. “You’re not representing her?”
“No.”
“Then what the devil are you doing here?”
Mason said, “Paying a social call and sipping a very delightful whiskey and soda.”
“You fired that shot?”
“No.”
The lieutenant’s eyes moved rapidly around the room. He saw the hole in the plate-glass window, and walked across to examine it.
“For Heaven sakes,” Mildreth exclaimed. “It’s a bullet hole in the glass! Then it was a shot. Someone must have shot at me, Mr. Mason.”
“Through the window?” Tragg asked.
“Yes.”
“You didn’t hear it?”
“No. I heard your car coming up. That is, I guess it was your car, and I thought there was a backfire. I had no idea it was a shot.”
“I see,” Tragg observed calmly. “Then someone must have shot at you from outside.”
“Yes.”
“Well, let’s see. Here’s a hole in the drapes, and here’s a hole in the glass. That gives us the line taken by the bullet. Now, sighting along that line, you can see that — Here. Pull that drape to one side. Now you can see my car parked at the curb. The line runs just in front of the car.”
“That’s right, it does.”
“Then someone must have stood directly in front of my car and fired the shot. He must have been standing on stilts some fifteen feet high.”
“You didn’t shoot, did you?” she asked.
Tragg ignored the question. “Furthermore,” he said, “by the time you’ve had as much experience with bullets as I have, you’ll be able to tell the direction in which they’re going when they go through glass. And there’s the odor of smokeless powder in the room. I’m afraid, Miss Faulkner, that I’ll have to look around.”
“You can’t. I forbid you to do it.”
“Well, I’m going to just the same.”
“He can’t do it without a warrant, can he, Mr. Mason?”
Tragg said, “Mason isn’t representing you.”
“I know, but he can tell me that.”
Mason sipped his Scotch and soda, puffed placidly at his cigarette, and said nothing. Lieutenant Tragg said, “You know, Miss Faulkner, we’re going to quit playing horse right now, and get down to brass tacks. If you’ll tell me who fired that shot and what was done with the gun, I won’t take you down to police headquarters, have you searched, and have detectives come out and go through the house...
“Wait a minute. You must have been standing about here. You heard me coming in the car. You must have fired that shot just as I was bringing my car to a stop. Now, figuring the angle of that shot... I was ringing the doorbell. Well, the natural place for you to have concealed the gun would have been under the cushions of this davenport.”
He calmly walked over to the davenport and started raising the cushions.
“You can’t do that,” she said, grabbing his arm.
Tragg pushed her to one side. “Don’t act up, sister,” he warned, “or I’ll have the place crawling with cops inside of twenty minutes.”
“But you can’t. You... Oh...”
Tragg dropped to his knees, placed his head down close to the floor, peered under the davenport, and said, “Oh-oh!”
Mason heard the grind of a car motor coming up the steep incline of a cross street. He carefully pinched out his cigarette, dropped it in the ash tray, stretched, yawned, and said, “Well, if the lieutenant will pardon me...”
“The lieutenant won’t pardon you,” Tragg said, sliding his left arm under the davenport.
“Meaning you’re going to try to hold me?” Mason asked.
“Meaning I’m going to find out what you have to say about this before you go anywhere,” Tragg said.
The car was coming closer now.
Mason said, “Sergeant Holcomb never liked to have me present when he was trying to get a statement from a suspect. He always thought that I was a disturbing influence. Funny thing about me that way. When I’m in the room, I simply can’t keep from advising a person about constitutional rights, warning about traps, and so forth.”
Tragg said, “You win. Get the hell out of here.”
Mason smiled reassuringly at Mildreth Faulkner. “Be seeing you. Don’t bother to let me out. I know the way.”
As Mason turned from the living room into the corridor, Lieutenant Tragg said, “All right, Miss Faulkner. Tell me about the gun. Why did you fire it?”