Free The Case of the Sleepwalker's Niece by Erle Stanley Gardner Page A

we're going to get anywhere this way. We'd better talk with these people one at a time and we'll want the servants as well. Will you please have everyone leave the room but remain available for questioning?"
    Sergeant Holcomb nodded importantly. "The patio," he announced, "is the proper place. You folks all go out in the patio and don't start talking among yourselves… Hadn't we better finish with Perry Mason and keep him away from the rest? He's representing Kent. We might find out a lot more if we get through with Mason first."
    Blaine said, "Good idea. What do you know about this, Mason?"
    Mason waited until the shuffling confusion of moving feet had ceased, then said, "I was negotiating an agreement between Kent and Maddox. For certain reasons, which I won't bother to discuss at present, it became advisable to postpone the negotiations. I remained here last night. I slept in a room in the upper floor with Dr. Kelton. This morning Peter Kent left on a business trip. I may say that that trip was taken at my suggestion. I have no intention of disclosing his destination. After he left, Miss Hammer called my attention to the fact that the carving knife was missing from the sideboard. I happened to know that Peter Kent had previously walked in his sleep. I believe it is a matter of record that he picked up a carving knife on that occasion."
    "Where's the record?" Blaine interrupted.
    "In a divorce case filed against him by his wife, Doris Sully Kent."
    "Where?"
    "In Santa Barbara."
    "Go on. What did you do?"
    "I went with Miss Hammer to Mr. Kent's bedroom. I raised the pillow on his bed and found the knife under his pillow."
    "Under his pillow!" Blaine exclaimed.
    Mason nodded coolly. "The knife was, and is now, under the pillow of Peter Kent's bed. I didn't touch it. But as soon as I saw it, I suspected what had happened. Therefore, I aroused Dr. Kelton, and, in company with Miss Hammer, we made a round of the guests. We found Mr. Rease lying in bed, the covers up around his neck. Apparently he had been stabbed through the covers. I didn't make a close investigation. As soon as I found the body I left the room and telephoned police headquarters."
    "Why the devil didn't you tell Sergeant Holcomb about this before?"
    "He wouldn't let me. He was in examining the body. I tried to go in and he told me to stay out."
    Blaine said to Sergeant Holcomb, "Send a couple of men up to look under that pillow. Don't let anyone touch that knife until we have a fingerprint man go over the handle… How long have you been here, Sergeant?"
    "About ten minutes before I telephoned you," Holcomb answered.
    "And I got here in ten or fifteen minutes," Blaine said. "That makes less than half an hour… What's this lawyer's name… oh, yes, Duncan, I'll get him and take a look at that coffee table."
    Blaine walked out toward the patio. Sergeant Holcomb called two men and ran up the stairs to Kent's bedroom. Mason followed Blaine, saw him speak to Duncan. They walked toward the center of the patio. Duncan paused uncertainly, went to one of the coffee tables, shook his head, moved over to the one under which Edna Hammer had placed the coffee cup and saucer. "This the table?" Blaine asked.
    "I believe it is."
    "You said the top came up?"
    "It seemed to. He raised what looked like the top and then let it drop back with a bang."
    Blaine looked the table over and said, "There seems to be an oblong receptacle under this table top… Wait a minute, here's a catch."
    He shot the catch and raised the top of the table.
    "Nothing in here," he said, "except a cup and saucer."
    "Nevertheless, this is the place," Duncan insisted.
    Edna Hammer said very casually, "I'll take the cup and saucer back to the kitchen."
    She reached for it, but Blaine grabbed her wrist. "Wait a minute," he said, "we'll find out a little more about that cup and saucer before we take it anywhere. There may be fingerprints on it."
    "But what difference does that make?" she asked.
    The voice of