The Case of the Curious Bride (4 page)

"Are you," inquired Moxley, "telling me?"

"I intended to help Rhoda Montaine."

"You told me that before."

"About a week ago Rhoda Montaine was married to Carl W. Montaine."

"That's no news to me."

"Rhoda's name before she was married was Lorton."

"Go on," Moxley said.

"Her application for license to marry says that she was a widow. The first name of the former husband was Gregory."

"Go on."

"I was just wondering," Perry Mason said, his face utterly without expression, "if perhaps Rhoda might have been mistaken."

"Mistaken about what?"

"About being a widow. If, for instance, the man she married hadn't really died, but had only disappeared for the statutory period of seven years. That makes a presumption of death. It's only a presumption. If the man showed up, alive and well, he'd still be her husband."

Moxley's eyes were glittering now with hostility.

"You seem to know a lot," he said, "for a friend."

Perry Mason's eyes were purposeful. "I'm learning more every minute," he commented.

"You've got a lot to learn yet."

"Such as?"

"Such as not butting into things that don't concern you." A telephone began to ring with mechanical regularity, a steady insistence. Moxley wet his lips with the tip of his tongue, hesitated for several seconds, then walked warily around Mason to the telephone. He picked up the receiver with his left hand, clamped the last two fingers of the hand against the rubber mouthpiece, raised the receiver to his ear, the telephone to his lips. "What is it?" he asked.

The receiver made rasping, metallic noises. "Not now," Moxley said. "I've got visitors… I tell you, not now… You should know who the visitor is… I say you should. I'm not mentioning any names, but you can draw your own conclusions… He's a lawyer. His name is Mason."

Perry Mason jumped to his feet. "If that's Rhoda," he said, "I want to talk with her."

He strode toward the man at the telephone. Moxley's face twisted with rage. He doubled his right hand into a fist, shouted, "Get back!"

Mason continued to advance. Moxley grabbed the telephone in his right hand, the receiver in his left, started to hang up. "Rhoda," called Perry Mason in a loud voice, "telephone my office!"

Moxley slammed the receiver back into position. His face twisted into a snarl of hatred. "Damn you!" he said. "You've got no business butting into this."

Mason shrugged his shoulders, said, "I've told you what I wanted to say," put on his hat, turned his back on Moxley and walked slowly down the long flight of stairs. Moxley came to the head of the stairs, stood staring with silent hostility at the broad shoulders of the departing attorney. Mason slammed the front door shut, stepped into his cab, drove three blocks to a drug store and telephoned Della Street. "Anything new?" he asked.

"Yes," she said, "we've chased back the records on Rhoda Montaine. She was Rhoda Lorton, wife of Gregory Lorton, and Gregory Lorton died in February of nineteen hundred and twenty-nine of pneumonia. The attending physician was Dr. Claude Millsap. He signed the death certificate."

"Where does Dr. Millsap live?"

"The Teresita Apartments – nineteen twenty-eight Beechwood Street."

"What else?" he asked.

"We've traced the gun that was in the purse."

"What did you find out?"

"The gun," she said, "was sold to Claude Millsap, who gave the address as nineteen twenty-eight Beechwood Street."

Perry Mason gave a low whistle. "Anything else?" he asked.

"That's all so far. Drake wants to know how much work you want him to do."

"He can lay off on the other stuff," Mason said, "but I want him to find out all he can about a man named Gregory Moxley, who lives in the Colemont Apartments, three sixteen Norwalk Avenue."

"Want him to put a shadow on Moxley?"

"No," Mason said, "that won't be necessary. In fact, it would be very inadvisable, because Moxley has got a brittle disposition and I don't know just what his tie-up in the case is."

Della Street's voice showed she was worried. "Listen, chief," she cautioned, "aren't you getting in rather deep on this thing?"

Perry Mason's tone was once more good-natured and light-hearted. "I'm having the time of my life, Della," he said. "I'm earning my retainer."

"I'll say you are!" she exclaimed.

The clerk studied him for a moment. "A hypnotic."

"What's a hypnotic?"

"A species of sedative. It induces sleep, not a drugged sleep, but a restful slumber. In proper doses there's no after effect."

"Would it act like knock-out drops?"

"Not at all – in any proper dose. I told you, it induces a natural, restful and deep slumber. Can I?…"

Mason nodded, turned away from the counter. "Thanks," he said.

He emerged from the drug store whistling light-heartedly. The cab driver jumped to the sidewalk, opened the door of the cab. "Where to?" he asked.

Perry Mason frowned speculatively, as though weighing two possible plans of campaign in his mind. Three blocks down the street a car swung into Norwalk Avenue, the body swaying far over on the springs with the momentum of the turn. Mason's eyes focused on it, and the eyes of the cab driver followed those of Mason. "Sure is coming," said the cab driver.

"A woman driving," Mason observed.

Abruptly, Mason stepped from the curb, held up his hand. The Chevrolet swerved toward the curb. Tires protested as brakes were applied. Rhoda Montaine's flushed face stared at Perry Mason. The car jerked to a dead stop.

The lawyer's first words were as casual as though he had been expecting her. "I've got your purse," he said.

"I know it," she told him. "I knew it before I'd gone half a block from your office. I started back after it, and then decided to let it go. I figured you'd open it and ask a lot of questions. I didn't want to answer them. What were you doing at Gregory's?"

Perry Mason turned to the cab driver. "That, buddy," he said, "is all."

He extended a bill, which the cab driver took, staring in puzzled speculation at the woman in the coupe. Mason jerked open the door of the car, climbed in beside Rhoda Montaine and grinned at her. "Sorry," he said. "I didn't know you'd left a retainer. When I found out about it, I did what I could to help you."

Her eyes were glittering points of black indignation. "Did you call it helping me to bust in on Gregory?" He nodded. "Well," she said bitterly, "you've raised the devil. As soon as I knew you were there, I started to drive out as quickly as I could. You've spilled the beans now."

"Why didn't you keep your five o'clock appointment?" he asked.

"Because I couldn't reach a decision. I telephoned him, to tell him that he'd have to wait until later."

"How much later?"

"A lot later."

"What," asked Perry Mason, "does he want?"

"That," she said, "is none of your business."

The lawyer stared at her speculatively, and said, "That is one of the things you were going to tell me when you called at my office. Why won't you tell me now?"

"I wasn't going to tell you."

"You would have if I hadn't hurt your pride."

"Well, you did!"

Mason laughed. "Look here," he said. "Let's not work at cross purposes. I've been trying to get in touch with you all day."

"I presume," she said, "you went through my purse."

"Every bit of it," he admitted. "What's more, I purloined your telegram, went to see Nell Brinley, started detectives to work getting all the dope I could."

"What did you find out?"

"Plenty," he said. "Who's Doctor Millsap?"

She caught her breath in quick consternation. "A friend," she explained vaguely.

"Does your husband know him?"

"No." Mason's shoulders gave an eloquent shrug. "How did you find out about him?" she asked after a moment.

"Oh, I've been getting around," he told her. "I've been trying to put myself in a position to help you."

"You can't help me," she said, "except by telling me the one thing, and then leaving me alone."

"What one thing do you want to know?"

"Whether, after a man has disappeared for seven years, he's presumed to be dead."

"Under certain circumstances he is, yes. It's seven years in some cases, five in others."

There was vast relief on her countenance. "Then," she said, "a subsequent marriage would be legal."

Mason's face was lined with sympathy as he slowly shook his head. "I'm sorry, Mrs. Montaine," he said, "but that's only a presumption. If Gregory Moxley is really Gregory Lorton, your first husband, and he showed up alive and well, your marriage to Carl Montaine is voidable."

She looked at him with eyes that were dark with suffering. Slow tears welled up in them. Her lips quivered. "I love him so," she said simply.

Perry Mason's hand dropped to her shoulder, patted it reassuringly. It was the impersonal gesture of the protective male. "Tell me about him," he invited.

"Oh," she said, "you wouldn't understand. No man would understand. I can't even understand, myself. I nursed him when he was sick. He had a drug habit and his folks would have died if they'd known. I'm a trained nurse, you know – that is, I was."

"Go on," Mason said. "Everything."

"I can't tell you about my marriage to Gregory," she said, her lips quivering. "That was ghastly. It happened when I was just a kid – young, innocent and impressionable. He was attractive – and nine years older than I was. People warned me against him, and I thought it was just jealousy and envy. He had that air of sophisticated deference that captivates a kid."

"Go on," Mason prompted as she paused.

"I had a little money saved up. Well, he took it and skipped out."

Mason's eyes narrowed. "Did you give him the money," he asked, "or did he steal it?"

"He stole it. I gave it to him to buy some stock. He told me about a wonderful bargain he could get by picking up some securities from a friend who was hard up. I gave him the money. He went out and never came back. I'll never forget the way he kissed me just before he beat it with all of my money."

"Did you tell the police?" Mason asked.

She shook her head, said, "Not about the money. I thought he had been in an accident of some kind, and I got the police to look over the records of accidents, and I telephoned all of the hospitals. It was a long time before I realized what had really happened. I was frantic."

"Why not have him arrested?" Mason asked.

"I don't dare to."

"Why?"

"I can't tell you."

"Why can't you tell me?"

"It's something I don't dare tell any one. It's something that has driven me to the verge of suicide."

"Was that what the gun was for?"

"No."

"You intended to kill Moxley?" She was silent. "Was that," Mason inquired, "why you wanted to know about the corpus delicti?"

Again she was silent. Mason pressed his finger into her shoulder. "Look here," he said, "you've got a lot on your mind. You need some one to confide in. I can help you. Suppose you tell me the truth and the whole truth?"

"I can't, it's terrible. I wouldn't dare to tell you the truth!"

"Does your husband know about any of this?" Mason asked.

"Good heavens, no! If you understood about his background you wouldn't ask."

"All right, what's his background?"

"Did you," she asked, "ever hear of C. Phillip Montaine of Chicago?"

"No, what about him?"

"He's a very wealthy man – one of those old fogies who traces his ancestry back to the Revolution, and all that sort of stuff. Carl is his son. C. Phillip Montaine disapproved of me, very, very much. He's never seen me. But the idea of his son marrying a nurse came as a shock to the old man."

"You've met the father?" Mason asked. "After the marriage?"

"No, but I've seen his letters to Carl."

"Did he know Carl was going to marry you, before the wedding?"

"No. We ran away and were married."

"And Carl is very much under the influence of his father?" Mason queried.

She nodded vigorously. "You'd have to see Carl to understand. He's still weak – mentally and morally – because of the drug habit he had. That is, he hasn't a strong will power." She flushed, realizing what she was saying. "He'll be all right in time. You know what drugs do to a man." She went on nervously. "Now, he's still easily influenced. He's nervous. He's very impressionable."

"You see all of those defects in his character clearly," Mason said, in thoughtful speculation, "and yet you love him?"

"I love him," she said, "more than anything in the world. And I'm going to make a man of him. All he needs is time and some one strong to help him. You'd have to understand what I went through, in order to realize how I love him and why I love him. I went through hell for years after my first marriage. I wanted desperately to commit suicide, and yet I didn't have the nerve. That first marriage killed something in me. I could never love any man the way I could have loved my first husband. After that I didn't want that same kind of a marriage. I suppose there's a lot of the maternal in my love now. My first love was that of illusion. I wanted a man to worship, a man to look up to – oh, you know." She broke off.

"Does your husband," asked Perry Mason, "appreciate that kind of love?"

"He will," she said. "He's been accustomed to knuckling under to his father. He's had it drilled into him that his family name and his family position are the two main things in life. He wants to go through life carried on the shoulders of his dead ancestors. He thinks family means everything. It's become a species of obsession."

"Now," Mason told her, "we're commencing to get somewhere. You're telling me the things that are on your mind, and you're feeling better already."

She shook her head in quick negation. "No," she said. "I can't tell you all. No matter how sympathetic you might be. After all, what I wanted to find out was about the legality of my marriage to Carl. I can stand anything if that marriage is only legal; but if he can walk away and leave me, or if his father can take him from me, it will break my heart."

"If," Mason said slowly, "he's the type who would walk away and leave you, don't you think you're wasting your affection on him?"

"That's just what I've been trying to make clear," she said. "It's because he is that type that he needs me and that makes me love him. He's weak, I love him and perhaps one reason is because he's weak. I've had enough of strong, purposeful, magnetic men who sweep me off my feet. I don't want to be swept off my feet. Perhaps it's a starved mother complex, perhaps it's just being goofy – I don't know. I can't explain it. It's the way I feel. You can't explain your feelings – you can only recognize them."

"What," asked Perry Mason, "is it you're keeping from me?"

"Something horrible," she told him.

"You're going to tell me?"

"No."

"Wouldn't you have told me if I'd been more sympathetic when you called at my office?"

"Good heavens, no!" she exclaimed. "I never intended to tell you this much. I thought you'd fall for that line about the friend who wanted the legal information. I'd rehearsed it in front of a mirror. I'd gone over it hundreds of times. I knew just what I was going to say and just what you were going to say. And then you saw that I was lying, and I was afraid. I was never so afraid in my life as I was when I left your office. I was so afraid, that I went down in the elevator and walked for half a block before I realized that I'd left my purse behind. That was a terrible shock. Then I didn't dare to go back after it. I started back, but I couldn't bear the thought of facing you. I decided to let it wait until afterwards."

"Until after what?" Mason inquired.

"Until after I'd found some way out of the mess."

There was sympathy in the eyes of the lawyer. He said simply, "I wish you wouldn't look at me that way. Your husband disappeared. You married in good faith, after you thought he was dead. You can't be blamed. You can go ahead and get a divorce from him and re-marry Carl Montaine."

She blinked tears from her eyes, but her lips were firm. "You don't understand Carl," she said. "If this marriage isn't good, I could never get a divorce and then re-marry Carl."

"Not even if you took a chance on a Mexican divorce?" Mason asked.

"Not even then." There was a moment of silence.

"Are you going to confide in me?" the lawyer asked. She shook her head. "Promise me one thing, then," he told her.

"What?"

"That you'll come to my office first thing in the morning. Sleep on it and see if you don't feel differently tomorrow."

"But," she said, "you don't understand. You don't…" A look of decision stamped itself upon her face. A cunning glint appeared in her eyes.

"Very well," she said, "I'll make you that promise."

"And now," Mason told her, "you can drive me back to my office."

"No," she objected, "I can't. I've got to get back to my husband. He'll be expecting me. I was simply furious when I learned that you had gone to see Gregory. I didn't know what might happen. I came tearing out here to try and locate you. Now I've got to get back."