She nodded.
“Now,” Mason said, “you’re going to keep quiet all the way along the line. With the evidence the district attorney has against you, he’ll never release you. The only way you’ll ever get out of jail is by having a jury say ‘Not guilty,’ or having three juries in a row fail to agree on a verdict. Do you understand that?”
Again she nodded.
“All right,” Mason said. “Whenever anyone asks you to say anything, whether it’s district attorney or newspaper man, or some very sympathetic fellow-prisoner who just ‘happens’ to be put in the same cell with you, you’ll say that you want to talk; that I’ve ordered you not to talk; that as long as I’m your attorney, you’re going to obey orders; that you think it’s all foolishness; that you want to tell your story in a simple, straightforward manner, but that for some reason I’m ordering you to keep quiet. In other words, you pass the buck, and pass it big. Do you get that?”
“I get it,” she said.
“Do you have nerve enough to do it?”
“I think so.”
“It’s going to take a lot of will power.”
She said, “I know all about that, too. After all, Mr.Mason, I’m twenty-seven years old. A girl develops will power in twenty-seven years.”
“Bosh!” he told her. “You’ve been out with some young sprout who’s tried to do a little necking in an amateurish way and you think you’ve built up a mental discipline and an ability to take care of yourself. You’re going up against men now, men who have handled so many hundred similar cases that it’s a matter of routine with them. They know all the tricks that work, and those that don’t work. You’re a babe in the woods, going up against it for the first time. Keep your mouth shut, except for that one statement about wanting to talk but not being allowed to. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” she said, her eyes indignant, “I understand. And don’t think young men are as amateurish as your little speech would imply.”
Mason got to his feet, started to turn away from the screen, then swung back to sit down once more. “How far can I go with this thing?” he asked.
“What do you mean?”
“You know what I mean.”
“Don’t involve Rossy,” she said.
“Suppose I have to drag Rossy in to get you out?” he inquired, watching her narrowly.
“Then don’t get me out.”
“Do you know what you’re saying?”
“Of course I do.”
“You’re in bad,” Mason said, “Plenty bad. Anything may happen. With your looks, your brain and your figure, a jury isn’t apt to hang you. You may get life imprisonment. You may get a first-degree murder verdict without any recommendation, which will automatically mean the death penalty. It’s all right now for you to stick your chin up and tell me to keep Rossy out of it, but what’ll happen when the zero hour comes? Will you reproach me for letting you tie my hands?”
She got to her feet then, stood facing him across the screened table. “Mr. Mason,” she said, “when I do anything, I do it wholeheartedly, and I’m not inclined to regret it afterwards, no matter what the circumstances are. That’s my code of life. Lots of people live namby-pamby littles lives, in which they try to blame their mistakes on someone else. I don’t. You’ve asked me if I can take it. Now I’m asking you if you can take it.”
Mason grinned, said, “Okay, Rita, I’m going places.”
Rita Swaine watched the jail matron moving toward her, smiled gamely and said, “I’m not.”
Chapter twelve
Rosalind Prescott sat in Perry Mason’s office, clenched her little gloved hands until the soft leather grew tight across the knuckles, and said fiercely, “No, I didn’t kill him! I tell you I didn’t. I didn’t! I didn’t! I didn’t!”
“Who did?”
“I don’t know. I wish I did.”
“Suppose you did know, then what?”
Her eyes were hard, as they met Mason’s. “I’d tell the police.”
“Suppose Rita did it?”
“What makes you think Rita did it?”
“That isn’t what I said. I asked you what your attitude would be if Rita had killed him.”
“If Rita killed him,” she said, “she isn’t entitled to any consideration from Jimmy or from me. She put us both in an awful spot.”
“Suppose Jimmy killed him?”
“If Jimmy killed him he isn’t entitled to any more consideration — well, hardly any more — well—”
Mason nodded and said, “So it’s different if Jimmy killed him, is it?”
“Well,” she said hotly, “if Jimmy killed him, he had some reason. He had plenty of reason.”
“Did Rita have any reason?”
“I don’t know. If she did it, it was probably in self-defense.”
“Isn’t that a good reason?” Mason asked.
“Yes. The reason’s all right, but it’s the way she handled it, sneaking out and leaving the body in such a way that Jimmy would be blamed for it.”
“And if Driscoll did it, then what?”
“Jimmy did it to protect me — but he didn’t do it — that is, I don’t think he did it.”
“Did Mrs. Anderson have any grudge against Walter Prescott?”
Her eyes opened wide with surprise. “Why, Mr. Mason! What makes you ask that?”
“I’m just trying to cover every angle of the case,” he said. “Also, I’m trying to cover every possible defense which we might raise. Did she have anything against him?”
“I don’t think so. Of course, Walter had objected to her snooping around. He’d told her a couple of times to mind her own business and quit peering into our windows, and she told him he could keep the shades drawn if he didn’t want her to see him. She said she wasn’t going around her house and pull down all the shades at night.”
“Was it much of a battle?” Mason asked.
“Not particularly. She’s snippy, and Walter was very sarcastic.”
“And that’s all she had against him?”
“All that I know of, yes.”
“Now, your husband had threatened to kill you?”
“Yes.”
“Many times?”
“Twice. The first time was a couple of months ago over something which needn’t make any difference here. The last time was the morning when I ran away.”
“Why did you go to Reno?”
“I had an idea of establishing a residence there and getting a divorce. I thought if I were out of the state Walter wouldn’t do anything right away, and after he’d had a chance to cool off, I might be able to fix things up with him so there wouldn’t be a scandal.”
“You went with Driscoll?”
“Yes.”
“You knew he was jealous of Driscoll?”
“He wasn’t jealous of anyone. He was just a coldblooded, selfish, calculating—”
“Wait a minute,” Mason interrupted. “That isn’t going to be the attitude you’ll take on the witness stand. Cut out that vicious hatred when you speak of Walter Prescott. Remember, he’s dead.”