Free The Case of the Velvet Claws by Erle Stanley Gardner

one talk with you, or else you'd better get your story licked into shape. Now you either heard a motor or you didn't hear one. Did you, or didn't you?"
    "Yes," she said, defiantly, "I heard one."
    "Okay," he said. "That's better. Now, how many people are in the house?"
    "What do you mean?"
    "Servants and everybody," he said. "Just who's there. I want to know everybody that's in that house."
    "Well," she said, "there's Digley, the butler."
    "Yes," said Mason, "I met him. I know all about him. Who else? Who is the housekeeper?"
    "A Mrs. Veitch," she said, "and she has her daughter staying with her now. The daughter is there for a few days."
    "All right, how about the men? Let's check up on the men. Just Digley, the butler?"
    "No," she said, "there's Carl Griffin."
    "Griffin, eh?"
    She flushed. "Yes."
    "That accounts for the fact that you used the name 'Griffin' when you came to call on me the first time?"
    "No, it doesn't. I just used the first name that came into my mind. Don't say anything like that."
    He grinned. "I didn't say anything like that. You're the one that said it."
    She rushed into rapid conversation.
    "Carl Griffin is my husband's nephew. He's very seldom home at night. He's pretty wild, I guess. He leads a pretty gay life. They say he comes in drunk a good deal of the time. I don't know about that. But I know that he's very close to my husband. George comes as near having affection for Carl as he does for any living mortal. You must know that my husband is a queer man. He doesn't really love any one. He wants to own and possess, to dominate and crush, but he can't love. He hasn't any close friends and he's completely self-sufficient."
    "Yes," said Mason, "I know all that stuff. It isn't your husband's character that I'm interested in. Tell me some more about this Carl Griffin. Was he there tonight?"
    "No," she said, "he went out early in the evening. In fact, I don't think he was there for dinner. It seems to me that he went out to the golf club and played golf this afternoon. When did it start to rain?"
    "Around six o'clock, I think," said Mason. "Why?"
    "Yes," she said, "that's the way I remember it. It was pleasant this afternoon, and Carl was playing golf. Then I think George said that he had telephoned he was going to stay out at the golf club for dinner and wouldn't be in until late."
    "You're sure he hadn't come in?" asked Mason.
    "Certain."
    "You're sure that it wasn't his voice that you heard up there in the room?"
    She hesitated for a moment.
    "No," she said, "it was yours."
    Mason muttered an exclamation of annoyance.
    "That is," she said hastily, "it sounded like yours. It was a man who talked just like you. He had that same quiet way of dominating a conversation. He could raise his voice, and yet make it seem quiet and controlled, just like you, but I'll never mention that to any one, never in the world! They could torture me, but I wouldn't mention your name."
    She widened her blue eyes by an effort, and stared full into his face with that look of studied innocence.
    Perry Mason stared at her, then shrugged his shoulders. "All right," he said, "we'll talk about that later. In the meantime you've got to get yourself together. Now were your husband and this other man quarreling about you?"
    "Oh, I don't know. I don't know!" she said. "Can't you understand that I don't know what they were talking about? I only know that I must go back there. What will happen if somebody else should discover the body and I should be gone?"
    Mason said, "That's all right, but you've waited this long, and a minute or two isn't going to make any great difference now. There's one thing I want to know before we go."
    "What is it?"
    He reached over and took her face and turned it until the light from the globe in the top of the car was shining full on her face. Then he said, slowly, "Was it Harrison Burke that was up in the room with him when that shot was fired?"
    She gasped. "My God, no!"
    "Was Harrison Burke out there