The Case of the Careless Kitten

by The Case of the Careless Kitten (retail) (epub)

  “Nope,” Lunk said positively. “He didn’t do it. But up to a few hours ago, you couldn’t have convinced me of that if you’d argued all night. Just goes to show how we get an idea through our heads and it sticks. To tell you the truth, the reason I didn’t want to live on the place any more was on account of the way that Jap was hanging around. Phil was gettin’ worse all the time. I got to feeling kind of sick myself and went to a doctor, and the doctor couldn’t find nothing wrong with me, so I up and left.”

  “Did that cure you?” Mason asked.

  “Perked right up,” Lunk said, warming to his subject. “I got a place of my own, did all my own cooking, and carried my lunches with me. And I’ll tell you something else, Mister, I didn’t leave my lunches hanging around where anybody could open up a box and sprinkle something on my sandwich, either. No siree!”

  “And you were cured immediately?”

  “Within a week or two. But Phil was sick anyway. He didn’t make it. He was all shot.”

  “What did Komo say when you moved out?”

  “The damn Jap didn’t say nothin’. He just looked at me, but I knew he knew what I was thinkin’, and I didn’t care.”

  “What made you change your mind? Why don’t you think he poisoned Mr. Shore?”

  “Nope,” Lunk said, shaking his head positively. “He didn’t poison the boss. I do think he poisoned Phil though, and I think he tried poisoning me; what’s more, he poisoned that kitten, and if Matilda Shore got a dose of poison, you’ll never convince me that Komo didn’t do it. He ain’t foolin’ me none. You mark my words, he wanted to poison someone, but he wanted to see how the poison worked first. Ten years ago he used Phil to try things out on. Last night he used this here kitten. Thought for a while ten years ago he was practicin’ up on Phil to have a go at the boss. Now I know it was me he was after.”

  “But if you thought your brother was poisoned, why didn’t you go to the police, and . . .”

  “Didn’t have a thing to go on. When Phil died, I asked the doc about poison. He laughed at me. Said Phil had been living on borrowed time for five years.”

  Mason said, “Well, here’s the hospital. You want to go in with me and see if the officers are still on duty?”

  “I don’t want to see no officers.”

  “Of course,” Mason said. “But there’s just a chance we can get through to see Mrs. Shore.”

  Della Street looked at Mason apprehensively. “I can run up, Chief,” she said, “and see if they’re on duty, and . . .”

  “No,” Mason said significantly. “I want to take Mr. Lunk up with me. You see,” he explained to Lunk, “I was in to see her once this evening.”

  “Oh,” Lunk said. “Didn’t you say you were working for Gerald Shore?”

  “Yes. He’s a client of mine. I’m a lawyer.”

  Mason opened the car door. “Come on, Lunk. We’ll run up. Della, you won’t mind staying here?”

  She shook her head, but there were little creases of worry down the center of her forehead.

  Mason took Lunk’s arm, and the two climbed up the stone steps to the hospital.

  As they walked down the long corridor past the receiving and admittance desk, Mason said to Lunk, “Probably just as well to let me do the talking. But you listen carefully, and if I’m not doing all right, give me a nudge.”

  “All right,” Lunk said.

  Mason rang for the elevator, went up to the floor on which Matilda Shore’s room was located. A nurse, working on some records at a desk, looked up from her work. Two men got up out of chairs at the far end of the corridor and came marching toward the visitors.

  Mason had his hand on the door of Mrs. Shore’s room when one of the men said, truculently, “Hold it, buddy.”

  The other man said, “That’s Mason, the lawyer. He was here before. Lieutenant Tragg had a talk with him.”

  “What you want?” the man who seemed to be in charge asked.

  “I want to talk with Mrs. Shore.”

  The man shook his head and grinned. “Nix on it. Nix on it,” he said.

  Mason said, “This man with me wants to talk with her.”

  “Well now, does he?” The officer grinned, surveying Lunk as though enjoying a huge joke. “So you both want to talk with her, eh?”

  “That’s right.”

  The man jerked his thumb down the corridor, and said, “Back down the elevator, boys. I’m sorry, but it’s no go.”

  Mason, raising his voice, said, “Perhaps this man could do you some good if he could talk with Mrs. Shore. He’s her gardener. I think Lieutenant Tragg would like to see him, too.”

  The officer nodded to his companion as his hand clapped down on Mason’s shoulder. The other officer hooked his fingers in the back of Lunk’s collar. “Come on now, boys. On your way, and don’t act rough about it.”

  Mason said, “I think we’re really entitled to see her.”

  “Got a pass?” the officer asked.

  The nurse came efficiently forward on rubber heels. “There are other patients on this floor, and I’m responsible for them. I want no noise, no argument, and no disturbance.”

  One of the officers rang for the elevator. “There won’t be any disturbance, Miss,” he said. “These men are going out. That’s all.”

  The elevator came to a stop. The door slid open. Propelled by insistent pressure from behind. Mason and Lunk entered the elevator.

  “And don’t try comin’ back without a pass,” the officer called as the elevator doors clanged shut.

  Lunk started to say something as they walked down the corridor, after the elevator had left them at the street level, but Mason motioned him to silence. Nor did the lawyer speak until they were out on the sidewalk.

  Della Street, sitting in the parked car, opened the door. “Things as you expected to find them?” she asked Mason anxiously.

  Mason was smiling. “Just exactly. Now then, we’ll go some place where we can talk.”

  Lunk said doggedly, “I’ve got to reach Mrs. Shore. I don’t want to talk to nobody else.”

  “I know,” Mason said. “We’ll see if we can’t work out some plan of action.”

  Lunk said, “Listen, I ain’t got all night to work on this thing. It’s hot. It’s got to be handled right now. I’ve simply got to see her.”

  Mason turned the car into a broad street which, at this hour of the night, showed no traffic. Abruptly, he swung into the curb, parked the car, switched off the headlights, and the ignition, turned to Lunk, and said sharply, “How do you know Franklin Shore is alive?”

  Lunk started as though Mason had jabbed him with a pin.

  “Come on,” Mason said. “Speak up.”

  “What makes you think I know any such thing?”

  “Because you gave yourself away. Remember you said that up until a short time ago, all the talking in the world wouldn’t have convinced you that Komo hadn’t been mixed up in Franklin Shore’s disappearance. You’ve held that belief for several years. You’ve held it so deeply and sincerely that it’s become a fixed obsession with you. Now then, there’s only one thing that could have changed your mind so suddenly. You’ve seen or heard from Franklin Shore.”

  Lunk stiffened for a moment as though preparing to deny the statement; then settled back in the seat as the resistance oozed out of him.

  “All right,” he admitted, “I’ve seen him.”

  “Where is he?” Mason asked.

  “He’s at my place.”

  “He came there shortly before you took the street car to go to see Mrs. Shore?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And what did he want?”

  “He wanted me to do something for him. I can’t tell you what it was.”

  Mason said, “Wanted you to go to Mrs. Shore and find out if she’d take him back, or something of that sort.”

  Lunk hesitated a moment, then said, “I ain’t goin’ to tell you what he told me. I promised him I wouldn’t ever tell that to any li
ving man.”

  Mason asked, “How long was it after Franklin Shore came to your house that you went out to take the street car?”

  “Quite a little while.”

  “Why the delay?”

  Lunk hesitated, then said, “There wasn’t any delay.”

  Mason glanced at Della Street, then asked Lunk, “Had you gone to bed when Franklin Shore called on you?”

  “Nope. I was listening to a news broadcast when he knocked at the door. I like to fell over dead when I seen who it was.”

  “You recognized him without any difficulty?”

  “Yeah. Sure. He hadn’t changed so much—not near as much as she has. Looks about like he did the day he left.”

  Mason glanced significantly at Della Street and said, “There’s no reason why you should stay up any longer, Della. I’ll take you down the street a few blocks to a taxi stand. You can take a taxi home.”

  She said, “You’re not keeping me up. I wouldn’t miss this for worlds. I . . .”

  “You need some sleep, my dear,” Mason interrupted solicitously. “Remember, you have to be at the office promptly at nine, and it will take you a long time to get home.”

  “Oh! I see—I guess so.”

  Mason switched on the ignition, drove rapidly to a nearby hotel where a taxi was parked at the curb. Della Street jumped out with a quick “Good night. See you in the morning, Chief,” and walked across to the taxicab.

  Mason drove down the street for a couple of blocks, then parked the car again. “We’d better get this thing straight, Lunk,” he said. “You say Franklin Shore knocked at your door?”

  The gardener was sullen and suspicious. “I’ve got it all straight. Sure he knocked. The doorbell wasn’t working.”

  Mason shook his head. “I’m not certain that you did right. It might make trouble for you with Mrs. Shore—trying to intercede on behalf of her husband.”

  Lunk said, “I know what I’m doin’.”

  “You owe Franklin Shore a debt of gratitude,” Mason went on. “You want to do everything you can to help him, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you know Mrs. Shore hates him, don’t you?”

  “No.”

  Mason said, “You must have talked with Franklin Shore for a couple of hours before you started out to see Mrs. Shore.”

  “Not that long.”

  “An hour, perhaps?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “How did he seem mentally?” Mason asked abruptly.

  “How do you mean?”

  “Was his mind keen?”

  “Oh, sure. He’s smart as a steel trap—remembers things I’ve even forgotten. Asked about some poinsettia plants I’d put out just before he left. Damned if I hadn’t clean forgotten about ’em until he asked. They didn’t do so good and the old lady had ’em pulled up. We got some rose bushes in there now.”

  “Then he doesn’t seem to have aged much?”

  “No. He’s older; but he’s pretty much the same.”

  Mason said, “Why don’t you tell me the truth, Lunk?”

  “What are you getting at?”

  Mason said, “Franklin B. Shore was a banker, a keen-minded businessman. From all I can learn, he was clearheaded and quick thinking. A man of that type wouldn’t have come to you to ask you to intercede with Mrs. Shore on his behalf.”

  Lunk remained sullenly silent.

  Mason said, “It’s a lot more likely that he’d have gone to your place knowing that you were under a debt of gratitude to him, looking for a place to spend the night where no one would be apt to look for him. You pretended you were going to give him a place to hide out, and then, after he’d gone to bed and to sleep, sneaked quietly out in an attempt to go and tell Mrs. Shore where he was.”

  Lunk clamped his lips together in stolid, defiant silence.

  “You may as well tell the truth,” Mason said.

  Lunk shook his head doggedly.

  “The Homicide Squad wants to question Franklin Shore. They want to examine him about what happened after he communicated with a man named Henry Leech.”

  “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “Leech was murdered.”

  “When?”

  “Some time early last night.”

  “Well?”

  “Don’t you see,” Mason said, “if you conceal a witness, knowing he’s a witness and wanted as such, you’re guilty of a crime.”

  “How do I know he’s a witness?”

  “I’m telling you so. Now then, you’d better tell me everything that happened.”

  Lunk thought things over for a few minutes, then said, “Well, I guess I might’s well. Franklin Shore came to my place. He was excited and scared. He said somebody was trying to kill him. That he had to have a place to hide. He told me about what he’d done for me in giving me a home for my brother and all that and said it was up to me to help him out.”

  “And you asked him why he didn’t go home?”

  Lunk said, “I asked him some questions, but he wouldn’t talk much. He acted like he was still the boss and I was just a hired man. He said he didn’t want Mrs. Shore to know anything about his bein’ here until after he’d found out what had been done with certain property. He said his wife was going to try to strip him of every penny and he didn’t propose to stand for it.”

  “Then what?”

  “So then I told him he could stay with me. It was just the way you doped it out. I got a spare bedroom in the back, and I put him to bed. After he got to sleep I sneaked out and went to tell Mrs. Shore.”

  “You hadn’t gone to bed at all?”

  “No.”

  “And you didn’t go to bed?”

  “Nope. Told him I had some letters to write.”

  “And Franklin Shore didn’t know you had sneaked out?”

  “Nope. He was lyin’ on his back with his mouth open, snoring, when I left.”

  “To betray the man who had once been so kind to you,” Perry added.

  Lunk’s eyes shifted uneasily. “I wasn’t going to tell her where Mr. Shore was—just that I’d heard from him.”

  “Did you know Henry Leech?” Mason asked suddenly.

  “Yes, I knew him—a long time ago.”

  “Who was he? What did he do?”

  “He was a plumber—used to come to the house and do some work once in a while. Franklin Shore liked him. Mrs. Shore never did go much for him. He and my brother Phil used to get along pretty well, but I never cared too much for him. Thought he was full of hot air—always tellin’ about how he was goin’ to get rich in some mining deal. Told Phil a while before Phil died that Franklin Shore was goin’ to finance him on a mining proposition—said he was goin’ to be living on Easy Street in a couple of months. I’ve been wondering if maybe Franklin hadn’t gone in partners with him, and when Franklin left he went out to work on that mine.”

  “Where was it?’ ”

  “In Nevada somewhere.”

  “Did Leech continue working after Franklin Shore disappeared?”

  “No, he didn’t. Mrs. Shore never liked him. Soon as she got in the saddle she canned him. He was puttin’ in a lot of new plumbing up in the north end of the house, and every time he’d get a chance, he’d talk over this mining deal with Mr. Shore and with my brother. For some reason or other, Shore liked him, and would take time out to kid with him about his mine, an’ when he was goin’ to strike it rich.”

  Mason said, “When Franklin Shore showed up at your house, you asked him some questions about where he’d been, and whether he’d put any money in this mining deal. Now go ahead and tell me the truth.”

  Lunk blurted out, “The boss ran away with this woman. He went to Florida, but he had an interest in some mine out in Nevada. I don’t know whether it was Leech’s mine or not. They struck it kinda rich, and Shore’s partner froze him out for a few thousand, when he could have made a lot more money if he’d held on.”

  “And that partner was Leech?”
Mason asked.

  Lunk faced Mason then with steady-eyed candor. “I’m goin’ to tell you the truth, Mr. Mason. I don’t know who that partner was. Shore wouldn’t say. He dried up when I tried to pump him. It might have been Leech, and it might not.”

  “Didn’t you ask him?”

  “Well, I didn’t come right out and ask him in so many words. When I was talkin’ with him, I’d forgotten what Leech’s name was. I did ask the boss what’d ever become of that plumber that was trying to interest him in a mining proposition, and the boss dried up like a clam.”

  “And you didn’t press the inquiry?”

  Lunk said, “I guess you don’t know Franklin Shore very well, do you?”

  “I don’t know him at all.”

  “Well,” Lunk said, “when Franklin Shore don’t want to tell you a thing, he don’t tell you. And that’s all there is to it. I don’t s’pose he’s got any dough at all now, but you’d think he was still a high-and-mighty millionaire, the way he acts when you try to get any information out of him.

  “Now, I can’t stay away no longer. I’ve got him out there at the house and I’ve got to get back before he wakes up. If he wakes up and finds me gone, there’s goin’ to be hell to pay. Now you drive me back home and I’ll find some way of gettin’ in touch with Mrs. Shore. Ain’t she got a telephone in that hospital?”

  Mason said, “I was in the room for a few minutes. I saw that she had a telephone by the bed, but I don’t think I’d try to telephone her except as a last resort. Even then, I wouldn’t dare to tell her anything important over the telephone.”

  “Why?”

  “Because Lieutenant Tragg will either have taken the telephone out, or have left instructions at the switchboard not to put through incoming calls.”

  “But she could call out all right?” Lunk asked.

  “She might be able to.”

  Lunk creased his forehead in thought. “I got a phone,” he said, “and if we could think up some way of gettin’ her to call my number, I could give her the message.”

  Mason said, “I’ll drive you home and after we get there, we may be able to think up some way of getting her to put through a call. You might send her some flowers with your card on them and your telephone number on the card. The flowers would be delivered. The officers wouldn’t stop them. When she saw your name and telephone number on the card, she’d know that you wanted her to call you on the phone. That might be a good way to work things.”