“Simply that you tipped him off.”
Mason shook his head. “I’m afraid he misunderstood my signal.”
Tragg regarded the lawyer speculatively.
“Also,” Tragg went on, “what you were doing in Clarke’s room when Sam and I came in.”
“Waiting for Della Street,” Mason replied innocently enough, and then added with a prodigious yawn, “It makes me sleepy every time I think about it.”
Tragg said dryly, “It makes me a little tired myself. Did you know Clarke had left a will in that desk?”
“Did he, indeed?”
Tragg made as if to go. “I guess I’m just an incurable optimist,” he announced. “I always kid myself into believing you might say something you didn’t intend to, some day.”
“Just what happened to Clarke?” Mason asked. “Exactly how did he die?”
“Just about the way it’s in the papers,” Tragg said. “They started for the desert. Salty was up in front driving. Clarke was stretched out on the bed in this house trailer apparently sleeping. It was something of a novel experiment for both of them. They’d neglected to provide any means of communication by which Clarke could get in touch with Salty up in front. And that pickup made such a choice assortment of noises Salty couldn’t have heard a clap of thunder, let alone a shout.
“Salty stopped, after they got out a way on their trip, to see how his passenger was making it. He found him very ill and weak, with the same symptoms of arsenic poisoning that the Bradissons had shown. Salty jumped back into the pickup, turned around, and drove like mad back to San Roberto. He rushed to Dr. Kenward’s house. Dr. Kenward wasn’t there. Salty went down to a drugstore that was open all night, telephoned the hospital, said he had a poisoned man and was coming right out. He went through a boulevard stop. A radio prowl car picked him up. He kept right on driving, shouting fragmentary explanations to the officers. They went ahead with the siren clearing the way, and reported to headquarters. And that, as the radio commentators say, is all the news right up to this moment. That is — all that I’m going to tell you.”
“It was the bullet that killed him?” Mason asked.
“The bullet killed him,” Tragg admitted.
“But he was dying of poison?”
“Well...” Tragg hesitated.
“What does the post-mortem show?” Mason asked.
Tragg smiled. “I think I’ll save that.”
Chapter 15
George V. Moffgat was full of eager efficiency and impatience to get on with the matter in hand. But he went through the motions of being politely solicitous. “You’re certain you feel like going ahead with these depositions, Counselor?”
“I think I can make it all right,” Mason said.
“Why don’t you wait a day or two?”
“Oh, it’s all right. I’ll go ahead. I’m feeling a little wobbly, that’s all.”
Jim Bradisson said, “Any time will suit me. Don’t bother about inconveniencing me, Mr. Mason. I appreciate the circumstances and I’ll be glad to...”
“No. It’s all right,” Mason told him.
Moffgat turned to the notary public with the alert eagerness that characterizes a Boston bull pup about to pounce on a ball as soon as it is tossed by his master.
Moffgat announced, “This is the time and place heretofore fixed for taking the deposition of Peter G. Sims, one of the defendants in the action of Come-Back Mining Syndicate versus Sims et al., and of James Bradisson, the president of that mining company. The defendants are represented by Mr. Perry Mason. I represent the plaintiff. The witnesses are both present ready to be sworn.”
The notary public said, “This deposition is being taken pursuant to stipulation, gentlemen?”
“That’s right,” Mason said.
“Correct,” Moffgat announced.
“The witness, Sims, will be sworn,” the notary public said.
Pete Sims looked inquiringly at Perry Mason.
“Stand up,” Mason said.
Sims, a gaunt man in the fifties, with the whimsically woebegone facial expression of a man who has wrestled with life and been worsted in the fight, stood up.
“Hold up your right hand.”
Sims raised his right hand.
The notary public made something of a ceremony of administering the oath. “Do you solemnly swear that the testimony you are about to give in the case of Come-Back Mining Syndicate versus Sims et al., will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”
There was awed solemnity in Pete Sims’ voice. “I do,” he promised, then sat down, crossed his legs, and looked with cherubic innocence at George Moffgat.
Moffgat opened the brief case, jerked out a file of papers, hitched a small suitcase into position near his right hand, glanced at the court stenographer who had been selected to take down everything that was said, then turned to the witness. “Your name is Peter Sims. You are the husband of Nell Sims. You are familiar with the mining claims known as the Shooting Star Group?”
“That’s right,” Pete agreed in a drawl of disarming frankness.
“Some six months ago, Mr. Sims, you had a conversation with Mr. James Bradisson, did you not?”
“I’m talking with him all the time,” Pete said, and then added, “off and on.”
“But about six months ago you had a specific conversation in which you told him about discovering certain ore on the Shooting Star claims, didn’t you?”
“Well, now,” Sims drawled, “I just can’t remember.”
“You mean you can’t remember a conversation you had ninety days ago?”
Sims said, “I guess I’ll have to explain.”
“I guess you will,” Moffgat said sarcastically.
“Well,” Pete said, “it’s like this. I’ve got one of these here split personalities you read about. Most of the time I’m me, but every so often Bob takes charge — and then I just ain’t me.”
Moffgat snapped, “You’re under oath, Mr. Sims.”
“Sure I’m under oath,” Mr. Sims said.
There was gloating triumph in Moffgat’s voice. “Go right ahead, Mr. Sims,” he said. “Remember you’re under oath. Tell us about your split personality and why you can’t remember your conversation with Mr. James Bradisson.”
“Well, it’s like this,” Pete explained, glancing guilelessly at the somewhat startled notary public. “Personally, I’m a pretty good sort of a fellow. I can take a drink or I can leave it alone. I’m ambitious and I want to get ahead, and I’m truthful. I’m in love with my wife and I think I’m a pretty good husband.”
Mason said, “Make your answer responsive to the question, Mr. Sims.”
Moffgat snapped, “He considers it responsive and so do I. Go right ahead, Mr. Sims. I want you to explain about this split personality. Remembering, of course, that you are now under oath.”
“That’s right,” Sims said. “Well, I call this other personality Bob. He may have some other name. I don’t know what it is. To me, he’s just Bob. — Well, I’ll be getting along all right, and all of a sudden Bob will come and take possession of me. And when that happens, I just pass out. I just don’t know what Bob does while he’s sort of in charge of things.”
“Do you,” Moffgat asked triumphantly, “have any preliminary warning when this secondary personality is about to take possession of you?”
“Only a sort of a thirst,” Sims said. “I’ll get this awful thirst and sort of head toward some place where there’s a cool drink of beer, and about the time I get that beer ordered, Bob will take charge. — Now I was going to tell you about the difference between me and Bob.”
“Go right ahead,” Moffgat said, “That’s what I want to hear.”
“Well, Bob can’t leave booze alone. He’s an awful drunkard. That’s what makes it so annoying to me. Bob will be sort of runnin’ things and take me out and get me awful drunk. Then when I wake up with a headache, Bob is gone. It wouldn’t be so bad if Bob would stick around to wrestle with the hangover, but he never does that. He pushes me out and has all the fun of doing the drinking, and then goes away and leaves me to handle the headache that comes the next day.”