The Case of the Dubious Bridegroom

by Erle Stanley Gardner

  “Mason!” Tragg exclaimed. “And the estimable Miss Street. Well, Mason, I’m certainly glad to see you. I don’t get to see you very often these days.”

  “It’s been a while,” Mason admitted. “Lieutenant, shake hands with Mr. Edward Garvin.”

  “Glad to know you,” Lieutenant Tragg said.

  Mason turned toward Lorraine Garvin at the far side of the room. “Mrs. Garvin, may I present Lieutenant Tragg of the Metropolitan police—Homicide Squad.”

  Her smile was a wan motion of tight lips. Of a sudden, she seemed to be cowering by the closet door. “How do you do, Lieutenant? I’m very pleased to meet you.”

  Tragg said to Edward Garvin, “You’ve heard about your wife?”

  “Yes, I was shocked, surprised. I … I hardly know what to do.”

  “There’s a good chance she was killed in Los Angeles and transported to Oceanside. That’s why I’m interested in the case. Now if you want to help,” Tragg said, “you can come on back and make arrangements for the funeral and while you’re back we’ll …”

  “Arrest him on a bigamy complaint that was issued yesterday by the district attorney’s office,” Mason interpolated.

  Tragg turned to Mason, said, “Now, that wasn’t necessary.”

  “I merely wanted him to know what the score was,” Mason said.

  “Now look,” Tragg said, in the voice one used to an obstreperous child, “I want to talk with Mr. Garvin. I’m not going to hurt him, and he certainly has nothing to conceal, but there are some things about his wife’s death that I want to uncover. He can help me.”

  “That’s fine,” Mason said. “We’ll both help.”

  “I can get along without your help.”

  “Come, come, Lieutenant. Two heads are better than one.”

  “We’re getting into the field of a different proverb now,” Tragg said, smiling. “At this point you can refer to the good old proverb that too many cooks spoil the broth.”

  “Didn’t Ethel Garvin commit suicide?” Mason asked.

  “She did not commit suicide,” Tragg said. “The bullet in her head produced almost instant death.”

  “Well?” Mason asked.

  “She was shot while she was in the right-hand seat of the car. Someone drove her for some little distance, then parked the car and pulled and hauled the body over until it was in the driver’s seat. He then pushed the left arm through the spokes of the wheel, shut off the lights and ignition and drove away in another car.”

  “That had been following?” Mason asked.

  Tragg shook his head and said, “Frankly, Mason, I don’t think so. It looks as though the murderer had gone to a certain spot and had parked the getaway car. Then he’d gone out and joined his victim, shot her right in the head at close range, then driven the car for some little distance, perhaps quite a few miles, to the point where his own car had been parked and was waiting for a getaway. The murder may well have been committed while she was in Los Angeles. The murderer drove Ethel Garvin’s car up as close to his own car as he dared, then got out, stood on the running board of his own car, pulled the body over behind the steering wheel, fixed everything the way he wanted, then stepped into his own car and drove away.”

  “Unless, of course, he had an accomplice waiting,” Mason said, “which would make it a two-man job.”

  “Which would make it a two-man job,” Tragg told him, “but for certain reasons, we don’t think that it was. We think that it was a one-man job.”

  “How come?”

  “Well, to begin with, if there had been an accomplice waiting in the getaway car, the tendency would have been for the murderer to have driven the car with the body in it to a stop and then the getaway car would have driven alongside. Actually it was the other way around. The murderer even had to back once in order to get the car with the body in it in exactly the position that he wanted. Then he got over into the other car.”

  “That’s good deductive reasoning,” Mason said.

  Tragg turned to Garvin. “Now, I know this is a painful subject,” he said, “but if your wife was murdered, I know you’ll do everything in your power to clear it up. Despite the fact that you’d been separated, despite the fact there was some friction between you, you would want to clear it up, wouldn’t you?”

  Garvin hesitated.

  “Let’s put it this way,” Tragg said, his eyes cold as ice, “you wouldn’t want to put yourself in a position of seeming to protect a murderer, would you, Mr. Garvin?”

  “Of course not,” Garvin said hastily.

  “I thought not,” Tragg told him. “Now then, if you’ll just come back across the border we’ll …”

  “What about this bigamy warrant, Tragg?”

  “I tell you, that’s out of my jurisdiction. That’s between this man and the D.A. But whether he comes back with me or whether he doesn’t isn’t going to help matters any. He’s a defendant in a bigamy rap. I don’t know what the D.A. will do. He may dismiss the case now that the complainant is dead. He may just keep on continuing or he may let the guy plead guilty and apply for probation. I’m not interested in bigamy; I’m interested in a murder.”

  “That’s the difference between us,” Mason said cheerfully. “I’m interested both in the murder and in the bigamy charge.”

  “Well,” Tragg said irritably, Mason’s manner forcing him to lose his good nature, “don’t think that this man has any choice in the matter. He’s faced with a rap for bigamy. We can get him out of Mexico any time we want him out. There’s an easy way and a hard way. I’m asking him to come the easy way.”

  “We prefer to go the hard way,” Mason told him cheerfully.

  “Now, don’t be like that,” Tragg said to Mason. “You know we can bring this man back any time we want him. We can nail him on an absolutely dead-open-and-shut bigamy charge. He has no possible defense to that and we can get him extradited from Mexico to face it. I thought we could expedite this murder investigation by not having to go through all that red tape.”

  Mason said, “You face an interesting situation on that bigamy charge.”

  “Phooey!” Lieutenant Tragg said. “Don’t hand me that line of double-talk, Mason. You know as well as I do that the Mexican divorce this man had isn’t worth the paper it’s written on. You also know that the Mexican marriage is a bigamous marriage.”

  Mason said, “There’s some interesting law involved, Lieutenant. Section 61 of our Civil Code provides that a second marriage made during the lifetime of an undivorced spouse is illegal and void from the beginning.”

  “That’s what I was telling you,” Lieutenat Tragg said.

  “On the other hand,” Mason said, “Section 63 of the Civil Code also contains some very interesting language.”

  “Such as what?” Tragg asked.

  Mason took a piece of paper from his pocket, on which he had copied Section 63 of the Civil Code.

  “Listen to this, Lieutenant: ‘All marriages contracted without this state, which would be valid by the laws of the country in which the same were contracted, are valid in this state.’”

  Tragg said, “What are you getting at? That marriage in Mexico wasn’t any better than the divorce.”

  “Exactly,” Mason said, “but Mexico recognized the divorce.”

  “Well, what if it does?”

  “Notice that language again,” Mason said. “I’ll read it to you once more.” He again held up the paper and read, “All marriages contracted without this state, which would be valid by the laws of the country in which the same were contracted, are valid in this state.”

  Tragg tilted his hat back and scratched his head. “I’ll be damned,” he said.

  “There you are,” Mason said. “The marriage is legal in Mexico. Therefore, it’s legal in every other country, particularly in the state of California, because the California law specifically so provides.”

  “But look here,” Tragg said. “It’ll be possible to prove that these two people left California i
n order to perpetrate a fraud on the marriage laws of California and …”

  Mason smiled, and shook his head. “Read the case of McDonald versus McDonald, 6 California (Second) 457. It’s also reported and discussed in 106 A.L.R. 1290 and is reported in the Pacific Reporter in 58 Pacific (Second) Page 163. That case holds squarely and fairly that where people leave California for the sole purpose of contracting a marriage, in defiance of the laws of California, and go to another state, and, as a part of that general scheme, a marriage is contracted in that state, that marriage is valid. It is a legal and binding ceremony in California, regardless of the fact that such marriage is not only contrary to the laws of California but contrary to the underlying policy of the laws of California.”

  “Well, dammit,” Tragg said, “the divorce in Mexico is no good in California, you have to admit that.”

  “I don’t admit it, but I’m willing to concede it for the purpose of the argument.”

  “Then the marriage has to be bigamous.”

  “The marriage is as good as gold,” Mason said.

  “You mean that this man has two wives and …”

  “He doesn’t now,” Mason said, “but until an early hour this morning he did have. He’s in the rather unique position of having committed legal bigamy and having had two perfectly legal wives.”

  “You’re nuts, Mason. You’re pulling a lot of double-talk and a lot of fast legal stuff in order to get me mixed up. You may be able to put up a good razzle-dazzle for a jury, but that’s all it is.”

  Mason said, “Tragg, I’m telling you, the minute this man sets foot in Mexico, he’s married to this woman standing here at his side. I’m willing to concede that when he goes back to the United States, he may be held to have committed bigamy. That’s why I don’t propose to have him go back to the United States. He’s living here with his lawfully wedded wife.

  “Now, Mexico will grant extradition for a crime that is a crime against the laws of the United States, but it’s not going to grant extradition for an act performed under the laws of the Mexican government which is perfectly legal here but which could be held to be illegal in California.”

  Tragg said irritably, “You make the thing sound so damn convincing that … That’s the trouble with you, you’ve built up a reputation because you are able to make things sound so convincing.”

  “You don’t want to go back to the United States, do you, Garvin?” Mason asked his client.

  Garvin shook his head.

  “There you are, Tragg,” Mason said.

  Tragg took a small fingerprint outfit from his pocket. “Well,” he said, “I take it you’ll at least be willing to do whatever you can to help us clear up that murder case.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I want your fingerprints.”

  “Why?”

  “I think I found one of your fingerprints on the weapon with which the crime was committed.”

  “You don’t need to bother about that,” Mason said. “I can tell you very frankly, Tragg, that my client handled that gun—that is, if it’s the gun we think it is.”

  “What gun?” Tragg asked suspiciously.

  “A gun,” Mason said, “that was left on the fire escape outside of the window of the Garvin Mining, Exploration and Development Company. That gun was handled by Mr. Garvin and was, in fact, placed in the glove compartment of his automobile. Someone removed it from the glove compartment before he had left Los Angeles.”

  Tragg threw back his head and laughed. “You do have the most naïve, ingenious explanations! You admit your client put that gun in the glove compartment of his automobile?” Tragg asked.

  “It was put there for him,” Mason said.

  Tragg turned to Garvin. “You admit you put that gun in the glove compartment of your car?”

  “He admits someone else put it there,” Mason said.

  “I’m taking to Garvin,” Tragg said irritably.

  “I’m talking for him.”

  Lorraine Garvin said, “Well, I know very well that gun was not in the glove compartment after we left Los Angeles. Someone took it out.”

  “How do you know?” Tragg asked.

  “Because my husband had left his sunglasses in the glove compartment. After we got going he asked me to get them out for him. I opened the glove compartment and took out the dark glasses. If there had been a gun in there I certainly would have seen it, and if I’d seen it, I naturally would have demanded to know what Edward was doing with a gun.”

  “And you’re sure there was no gun in there?”

  “Absolutely certain.”

  “After all,” Tragg said, suavely, “by that time your husband could have removed it from the glove compartment. He might have put it anywhere.”

  Lorraine glowered at Lieutenant Tragg and said, “If you’re not going to believe any statements made by a person, what’s the use of asking him to submit to an inquiry and answer questions?”

  Tragg grinned, and said, “It’s the way we solve murder cases sometimes. You have to admit, Mrs. Garvin, that a man who would commit murder would be perfectly willing to tell a falsehood.”

  “Well, I can tell you one thing,” Lorraine snapped, “my husband might have taken that gun but he never could have used it. He was here with me all night.”

  “All night?” Tragg asked.

  “Yes, all night.”

  “You didn’t sleep a wink?”

  “Well, I know I woke up around one o’clock and he was lying in bed right beside me and snoring. I was awake from around quarter to three to three-thirty and he was there.”

  “You looked at your watch to check the time, of course,” Tragg said sarcastically.

  “I listened to the time.”

  “You listened?”

  “Yes. They have a clock—just listen for yourself.”

  She held up her hand for silence. The musical chimes of the big clock in the lobby melodiously tolled a preamble, and then after a pause, chimed the hour.

  “Okay,” Tragg said. “If you’ll swear to those times …”

  “I’ll swear to them.”

  “And if you’re not mistaken …”

  “I’m not.”

  “In that event I’m all finished,” Tragg said, “Except that I want to get Mr. Garvin’s fingerprints. I want to see whether or not he left a fingerprint on that gun. Any objection, Garvin?”

  “Certainly not,” Garvin said. “I’m only too eager to do anything I can to help clear this matter up.”

  “Except return to California,” Tragg said.

  “So far as that is concerned, I am not going to subject my wife to a lot of vulgar curiosity, nor am I going to walk into a trap that was set for me by …”

  “Go on,” Tragg said, “by whom?”

  “There’s no need mentioning her name now,” Garvin said with dignity. “She’s dead.”

  “All right,” Tragg said, opening his fingerprint outfit and taking the cover off a blank ink pad, “let’s have your hands and we’ll get the fingerprints. At least we’ll accomplish that much.”

  Garvin extended his hands. Tragg carefully took finger-prints, marked them with the name, date and place, then grinned cheerfully. “That’s fine. I hope you enjoy your stay in Mexico.”

  He bowed, said, “Glad to have met you, Mr. and Mrs. Garvin. You’ll hear from me later.” Then he opened the door and was gone, as though suddenly in a great hurry.

  Chapter 12

  It was dark by the time the limousine returned Perry Mason and Della Street to San Diego. Mason stopped long enough to telephone Paul Drake.

  “Okay, Paul,” Mason said. “Della and I are leaving San Diego. We’ll go to Oceanside and have dinner there. Then we’ll meet you and go on out to see what we can do with Hackley.”

  “He’s going to be a tough nut,” Drake warned. “I’ve been getting a little more dope on him. He’s considered pretty hard.”

  “That’s fine,” Mason said. “I like ’em tough. When can yo
u get to Oceanside?”

  “I’m ready to start right now.”

  “All right,” Mason told him. “Della and I will pick up our cars at the airport and then go get some dinner. You can cruise slowly along the main street until you find us … you can’t miss my car. I’m driving the convertible with the light tan top.”

  “Okay,” Drake said. “I’ll find you.”

  “We’re on our way,” Mason told him, and hung up.

  The limousine purred smoothly along the coast route until it reached Oceanside. Mason had the driver take them to the airport where he and Della Street picked up their respective automobiles, paid off the limousine, and drove back to the center of Oceanside where Mason found two parking places near a restaurant.

  They entered the restaurant, enjoyed a leisurely dinner, and were chatting over after-dinner coffee and cigarettes when Drake walked in, looked around, spotted them, waved his hand and came over to join them in the booth.

  “What’s new, Paul?” Mason asked.

  “I could use a cup of coffee,” Drake said, “and a piece of that lemon pie. I had a late lunch but I’m beginning to get hungry … Hang it, Perry, there just isn’t any easy way out of Los Angeles. You have to fight traffic no matter what you do.”

  “I’ll say,” Mason told him. “What’s new in the case, anything?”

  “The police have found Edward Garvin’s fingerprint on the murder weapon,” Drake said.

  “Why not? Garvin admits that he handled it. What else is new?”

  “Not very much. I got a little dope on this Hackley. He was mixed up in some gambling. I didn’t find out too much about it but people who know him think he’s dangerous.”

  “Well, that’s fine,” Mason said. “We’ll go look him over. We should be able to give him quite a jolt. He doubtless thinks that no one is ever going to connect him with Ethel Garvin.”

  Drake said, “Well, I’ll have that piece of pie and a cup of coffee before the shooting starts anyway.”

  They waited until Drake had finished, then left the restaurant. Mason said, “We may as well all go in one car. Let’s get in my bus. It has a wide front seat.”

  “That’s an idea,” Drake said. “Put Della in the middle. It will give me an excuse to put my arm around her. I haven’t made even the preliminary approaches to a pretty girl for so long I’ve forgotten how.”