“The jury has now viewed the remains,” he said, “and we’re ready to take testimony. The proceedings here are going to be informal. In other words, I’m not going to stand on a lot of technicalities. Apparently this man didn’t commit suicide. Three people are being held by the authorities. They’re Rosalind Prescott, the widow, Rita Swaine, the decedent’s sister-in-law, and James Driscoll. Driscoll waived extradition and is here. Miss Swaine and the widow refused to waive extradition and are not here, so we can’t call them as witnesses. Oscar Overmeyer, the deputy district attorney, is representing the interests of The People. Perry Mason is representing Miss Swaine and Mrs. Prescott, and Rodney Cuff is representing Mr. Driscoll. Now, obviously, if these attorneys start getting technical and are allowed to get away with it, we’ll be here all night. The idea of this inquest isn’t to prove anybody guilty beyond all reasonable doubt, it’s simply to ascertain how the decedent met his death. In other words, we want to know just what caused Walter Prescott to die. And if the probabilities are someone killed him, we want to know who that someone was.
“Now, I’m to go ahead with this inquest, and if any of the interested parties want to co-operate with me, I’ll be glad to have them. But I’m not going to have this inquest used as an excuse to mix things up. Do you gentlemen understand me?”
The three attorneys nodded.
“The first witness,” Scanlon said, “will be George Wray.”
Wray held up his hand and was sworn.
“You’ve seen the remains of the decedent?” Scanlon asked.
“Yes.”
“Can you identify them?”
“Absolutely. Those are the remains of Walter Prescott, who was my partner in the firm of Prescott & Wray.”
“What sort of business?” Scanlon asked.
“Insurance adjusting.”
“When did you last see him alive?”
“The day before yesterday.”
“Did you talk with him yesterday?”
“Yes”
“Over the telephone?”
“That’s right.”
“At what time?”
“At approximately five minutes to twelve. I happened to look at the clock at the time.”
“Did he say where he was?”
“No, he didn’t. He said he expected to arrive at the office during the first part of the afternoon, and I happened to notice the time when he was telephoning because I’d had rather a busy morning and had more or less lost track of time.”
“What time was it?”
“Almost exactly five minutes of twelve. I think it was about five and one-half minutes.”
“By an office clock?”
“Yes.”
“You’ve checked that office clock since?”
“Yes, it’s an electric clock. It’s absolutely right to the second.”
“That’s all,” the coroner said.
“May I ask one question?” Perry Mason inquired.
The coroner nodded his permission, and Mason said, “Did you go out to lunch shortly after that telephone conversation, Mr. Wray?”
“Immediately afterwards,” Wray said.
“That’s all, thank you.”
Dr. Hubert, an autopsy surgeon, was called, identified three bullets, one of which had been taken from the body of the deceased, the remaining pair having been found in the room after having evidently passed entirely through the decedent’s body.
The physician described the course of the bullets. One of them had inflicted a wound which would not necessarily have been fatal. The other two inflicted wounds which were instantaneously fatal. Powder marks indicated the shots had been fired at close range. He described how the body had been found, and testified that death had been instantaneous. He fixed the time of death as between noon and two-thirty in the afternoon. The body had been discovered shortly before five o’clock in the evening.
E. Q. James, a criminologist attached to the district attorney’s office, identified a gun, together with micro-photographs of test bullets which had been fired from that gun which showed that they were identical with the three bullets which had been placed in evidence by the autopsy surgeon.
The coroner called Stella Anderson. She strode up to the witness stand, back rigid, chin up, eyes flashing, her flushed face showing her enjoyment at finding herself in the limelight. While she testified as to her name and residence, newspaper photographers snapped flashlight photographs of her on the witness stand.
Under questioning by the coroner, she repeated what she had seen in the Prescott house the previous day.
“And you saw this young man give the young woman a gun?” Scanlon asked.
“Yes, sir, I saw him hand her a gun. She opened the drawer in the desk and pushed it down in behind the drawer, then closed the drawer.”
“Who was this man?”
“That man sitting right there. The one in the blue suit.”
“You mean James Driscoll?... Stand up, Mr. James Driscoll... Is that the man, Mrs. Anderson?”
“Yes — that is, he’s the man I saw running out of the Prescott house right after the accident, and he looks just like the man I saw with the gun. You see, those windows have very thin lace curtains behind them, and you can’t see quite as clearly as if they weren’t there. Not quite, but pretty near. I’m pretty positive that man I saw with the gun was this young man, James Driscoll.”
“Now, who was this woman?”
She faced him frankly and said, “I don’t know. I thought it was Rosalind Prescott. But later on, Rita Swaine appeared at the window wearing exactly that same dress, and trying to make me think—”
“Never mind what she tried to make you think,” the coroner said. “Just tell what you saw.”
Mrs. Anderson pressed her lips tightly together and said, “Well, I have my own opinion.”
There was a titter in the room, which was silenced by the coroner’s gavel. “Just what did you see, Mrs. Anderson?” he asked.
“I saw Rita Swaine standing at the window and clipping the canary’s claws.”
“Which foot, the right or the left?”
“The right.”
The coroner thanked her, excused her from the stand, and nodded toward Driscoll, who sat between a deputy sheriff on one side and Rodney Cuff on the other.
“Mr. Driscoll,” the coroner said, “as a matter of form, I’m going to ask you to take the stand and answer some questions. I realize, of course, that your attorney won’t allow you to answer them, but, just for the sake of keeping the record clear, I want your refusal to answer my questions to appear in the record of this inquest.”
Rodney Cuff, on his feet, was smiling and urbane. His voice, seemingly elevated hardly above a conversational tone, filled the crowded room with a vibrant resonance. “I think,” he said, “your Honor misunderstands our position. It is only the guilty who need to take refuge in technicalities. So far as James Driscoll is concerned, he will unhesitatingly answer any question put to him by the coroner or the deputy district attorney.”
There was a ripple of audible surprise in the room. Emil Scanlon exchanged puzzled glances with the deputy district attorney, then swore Driscoll as a witness.
“You’re acquainted with the decedent, Mr. Driscoll?” the coroner asked.
“Yes, I’d seen him once or twice.”
“You were acquainted with Mrs. Prescott?”
“Yes.”
“How long had you known her?”
“Something over eighteen months.”
“Had you at one time been engaged to her?”
“Yes.”
“What happened to that engagement?”
Driscoll moistened his lips with his tongue and said, “It was broken because of a quarrel.”
“How soon after that did she marry the decedent?”