"Will you say it for the record, please?"
"Yes."
"That is to say, you are now testifying that you followed Mr.
Ellingbery on each of eight or nine occasions prior to July 15, and
each time with your partner at your side?"
"Yes."
"And always at Mrs. Ellingbery's request?"
"Yes." That was a nasty question, but it had to be answered yes.
"Were you here in court yesterday?"
"No, sir." I would have said, "No, your majesty," if it would have
helped.
"You didn't hear Mrs. Ellingbery testify that her suspicions were first
aroused when somebody reported to her that on July the Fourth Tom
Ellingbery was riding the roller coaster with another girl?"
I wish I could have jumped into the Brain-Finder and gone back about
two weeks. I would have walked through the sidewalk while the coal was
being poured.
"No," I said finally.
The young fellow looked triumphantly at Mr. Youngquist, who looked as
if he would like to be buried in ashes up to his ears.
"That's all."
Mr. Youngquist rallied and put Slim back on the stand. Then there was a
recess. Mr. Youngquist and Mr. Rubicam and Slim and Mrs. Ellingbery and
I went into a big huddle out in the hall. "That's what comes of messing
around with imbecilic things like this Brain-Finder," Mr. Youngquist
moaned. "Why didn't we stick to straight law?"
"Because we couldn't win that way," Mr. Rubicam reminded him. "We
didn't have any real evidence."
Well, they decided the only chance to win the case was to have Slim
tell about and demonstrate the Brain-Finder. Slim didn't like to do
that; but we needed those five G's. That afternoon he told. The next
morning we lugged it into court and set it on a table with the screen
facing the judge.
* * * * *
There was a crowd in court that morning, thanks to a news story in the
morning _Herald_. Slim groaned; crowds aren't good for private
investigators. I pricked up my ears when in marched Mr. Swanberg,
our landlord, as austere as striped trousers could possibly make him,
but with a beauteous blonde in a pink dress, clinging as if she was
afraid he'd get away. That opened my eyes. Maybe the old iceberg was
human after all, to rate that kind of devotion. Maybe he did have an
occasional moment of abandonment when he would lick the butter from
his knife. If we ever got through this mess I was going to find out.
"That's Mrs. Swanberg," Youngquist said to Slim.
I looked his wife over in my best professional style. I thought I'd
seen her some place, and a detective is supposed to remember faces, but
I couldn't quite place her. Anyway, there were now three blondes mixed
in with that court-room--and that's a lot of blondes. Mr. and Mrs.
Swanberg sat down at one side opposite the jury-box where they could
see the screen of the Brain-Finder as well as the judge. I suppose
Swanberg had read the story and wanted to see what we were up to in his
building. Mrs. Ellingbery sat across the counsel table from me. She was
a winner if there ever was one.
Slim went on the stand. He demonstrated the Brain-Finder very
feebly--that is, innocuously. It was obvious that Youngquist was scared
to death of what might happen.
And again Tom Ellingbery's lawyers passed up cross examination of Slim.
I knew they were waiting for me.
They were. "Do you understand this machine?" one asked me scornfully.
"No, sir."
"You know how to work it, don't you?"
"Yes. I think so."
"Do you mean to tell this court that you can adjust the dials and
gadgets on this thing and see what I was doing last week or the week
before?"