The Case of the Singing Skirt

'Overruled.'

'No, I haven't examined them.'

'I would suggest,' Mason said, 'that during the evening adjournment you examine these guns carefully and see if any one of those three guns does have a mark on the front sight-a mark made by a nail file such as you have described.'

'That's counsel's suggestion,' Hamilton Burger said, 'but you don't have to act on it. I submit to the Court that this witness has given his evidence to the best of his ability.'

'There may, however, have been a confusion in the mind of the witness as to the sequence of events,' Judge Keyser said. 'I think it is established that he gave a gun to Helman Ellis. The gun found near the body of Nadine Ellis was a gun which had been sold to George Anclitas or his associate, Wilton Marcus. The Court is not very greatly impressed by any of these questions concerning the mark on the front sight. It is quite apparent that the witness made a perfectly natural mistake in regard to the sequence of events, and unless it can be shown that there is some significance which is not presently apparent, the Court is not impressed by the absence of a file mark on the front sight. If, however, it should appear that such a mark is on the front sight of one of the three guns remaining in the possession of this witness, it might clarify the situation simply by showing that there was a natural mistake.

'However the Court fails to see where it affects the issues in this case other than, perhaps, to lay a foundation for cross-examining the witness when the matter reaches the Superior Court.'

'Now then,' Mason said, 'I want to account for each one of these weapons. You purchased four weapons. I want to know where you kept them.'

'Your Honor,' Hamilton Burger said, 'may I object, may I please object? This is not proper crossexamination. If counsel is permitted to go into the location of each of these four weapons and cross-examine the witness as to how he knows they're the same weapons, how he knows they were at a certain place at a certain time, this whole situation will become completely interminable. Counsel is very apparently stalling for time, and time is running out. It is now only a few minutes before the hour of the evening adjournment.'

'Nevertheless,' Judge Keyser said, 'while the Court intends to be very strict in enforcing the rules of evidence and of cross-examination, the Court is not going to deprive the defendant of her rights simply because a situation has arisen in which defense counsel may well wish for time in order to prepare himself.

'The Court wishes to point out to the prosecutor that if the prosecutor had called Perry Mason to the stand without making this statement in open court, there would have been no opportunity for what the district attorney refers to as stalling.'

'I thought I was within my rights in calling him,' Hamilton Burger admitted somewhat sheepishly. 'I had forgotten that technically he hadn't concluded his cross-examination of George Anclitas.'

'That,' Judge Keyser said coldly, 'was your mistake, not the mistake of the Court. The Court wants to be fair in the matter. The Court will admit that in the face of statements made which apparently have been checked by the prosecutors, the circumstantial evidence indicates a situation of the utmost gravity. The Court will state further that the Court is going to get at the bottom of this and, while the Court intends to permit a reasonable cross-examination of this witness, the Court does not intend to have it unduly prolonged and the Court has now made up its mind that in the event it becomes necessary to take an evening adjournment, the Court is going to have a night session so that this matter can be disposed of without a delay which might tend to prejudice the rights of the parties.

'Now then, Mr. Mason, proceed with your cross-examination. The witness will answer the question. The objection is overruled.'

'Will the court reporter read the question?' Mason asked.

The court reporter consulted his records, read the question to the witness: 'Now then, I want to account for each one of these weapons. You purchased four weapons. I want to know where you kept them.'

'We kept one gun by the cash register at the bar,' Anclitas said. 'We had one by the registration desk in the motel, and one was in the gaming room.'

'You mean the gambling room?' Mason asked.

'I mean the gaming room.'

'Where was the other?'

'The other was an extra. Sometimes I carried it when I was taking some money home with me. Sometimes I didn't. It was just sort of hanging around and- well, I guess you could call it an extra. That's why I gave it to Ellis.'

'Did you endeavor to keep these guns separate in any way?' Mason asked. 'Did you have any designation, either on the gun or on the holster?'

'There wasn't any holsterjust the gun lying there where a person could grab it quick if he had to.'

'And there was no attempt to designate them? That is, to differentiate one from the other?'

'Only this time that I told you about when we thought we would put some marks on them and then changed our minds.'

'Within the last month,' Mason said, 'have you had any trouble over locating these guns? Has there been any element of confusion at any time within the last month?'

'None whatever,' Anclitas said.

'Has one of the guns at any time been missing from its accustomed place?'

'Not that I know of.'

'You state that you sometimes carried one of these weapons when you were carrying a large amount of money.'

'That's right.'

'Does any other person, or did any other person, carry one of those weapons under similar conditions?'

'My partner, Slim, carried one.'

'Anyone else?'

'No one else… Now, wait a minute. I think one of the hat-check girls who sometimes stayed at her mother's house and had to go home late at night, carried one for a couple of nights. I stopped her as soon as I found out what she was doing.'

'You mean she carried one with her while she was on the job?'

'No, no. She had to take a bus and sometimes when she'd get off-around one or two o'clock in the morning-she was nervous about walking the six blocks to the place where she caught the bus and while she was waiting there. She tried to time her departure so she could leave and catch the bus right on the nose but she didn't dare miss the bus so she had to leave a little early to give herself a margin and sometimes the bus would be a little late. She had an embarrassing experience one night with an exhibitionist and… well, she just started borrowing one of the guns to take in her purse.'

'Without telling you anything about it?'

'That's right.'

'How did you find out about it?'

'She left her purse in the washroom. The attendant didn't know whose purse it was and took it to the office. I opened it to look for identification and found it was this girl's purse and a gun was in it. It looked like one of our guns, and I called her in the office and asked her about it, and then she admitted that she'd borrowed one from behind the counter.'

'And you put a stop to it?'

'Sure I put a stop to it. She didn't have any permit to carry the gun in the first place, and in the second place suppose we'd been held up and the men behind the bar had reached down for the gun and there wouldn't have been any gun there?'

'But she brought the gun back whenever she took it?'

'Objected to as calling for a conclusion of the witness, as calling for hearsay evidence and not being proper cross-examination. It is incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial,' Burger said.

'The objection is sustained,' Judge Keyser ruled.

'What is the name of this young woman who borrowed the gun on occasion?'

'She's the hat-check girl.'

'What's her name?'

'Sadie Bradford.'

'Were there any witnesses present when you gave this gun to Helman Ellis?'

'Only my partner, Slim Marcus.'

'And you state that Slim Marcus on occasion carried one of the guns?'

'Objected to as already asked and answered,' Hamilton Burger said.

'Sustained,' Judge Keyser snapped.

'And aside from this one file mark on the front sight of the gun which you think you gave Ellis, there were no identifying marks on any of the guns. Is that right?'

'Objected to as already asked and answered. Incompetent, irrelevant and immaterial. Not proper crossexamination,' Burger said.

'Sustained,' Judge Keyser snapped.

Mason glanced at the clock. 'I have no further questions of this witness,' he said.

Hamilton Burger was instantly on his feet. 'Call Perry Mason as a witness for the prosecution.'

'Take the stand, Mr. Mason,' Judge Keyser said.

'Just a moment, Your Honor,' Mason said. 'I think counsel is forgetting, and perhaps the Court has overlooked the fact, that when Anclitas was put on the witness stand at the request of the district attorney, who wanted to eliminate the necessity of further attendance by Mr. Anclitas, the witness Helman Ellis was on the stand.'

'I had concluded my examination of Mr. Ellis,' Hamilton Burger said.

'I don't think the record so shows,' Mason said. 'I think instead the record shows that you said you thought you would have no more questions of that witness at that time.'

'All right, I'll announce now, then, that I have concluded with that witness and I ask Mr. Mason to take the stand.'

'Just a minute,' Mason said. 'I haven't had an opportunity to examine Mr. Ellis on re-cross-examination. If you have concluded your redirect examination I want to cross-examine him.'

'You don't have anything to cross-examine him about,' Hamilton Burger exploded. 'All he testified to on redirect was that he had been given a gun by George Anclitas and he kept it on the yacht.'

'I want to cross-examine him on that,' Mason said.

'And I want you on the witness stand before you've had a chance to concoct any alibi,' Hamilton Burger shouted.

'It is your contention that I am to be deprived of my right to cross-examine Mr. Ellis?'

Hamilton Burger took a deep breath. 'Very well,' he said, 'I'll stipulate that the entire testimony of Helman Ellis may go out. I'll withdraw him as a witness. I'll strike all of his evidence out of the record.'

'I won't agree to that,' Mason said. 'I won't so stipulate.''

'Why not?'

'Because I want to cross-examine him.'

Hamilton Burger glowered at Mason, then turned toward the Court.