Upon reading Kimberly Henry's post, I thought immediately of
Perry
Mason's (almost) closing words in his first published case,
The Case of
the Velvet Claws (1933). In this case, Gardner made Mason
much more
hardboiled and less the legal demon/detecting attorney he was
to become.
Mason's client, Eva Belter had lied to him, tossed him to the
cops as a
murder suspect and after being released from jail wants to
become
personally involved with Mason.
Eva Belter enters the office and finds Mason and Della Street
kissing in
a tight clinch. Eva's upset and Mason says:
"Della, open the drawers in those filing cabinets...Pull open
a couple
of drawers.
"Do you see those," to Eva Belter.
"All right," said Mason. "Those are cases. Every one of them
is a
case, and all the other drawers are filled with cases just
the same
way. They represent cases that I've handled. Most of them are
murder
cases.
"When I get all done with your case you're going to have a
jacket in
there, just about the same size as all of the other jackets,
and it's
going to be of just about the same importance. Miss Street is
going to
give you a number. Then if anything comes up, and I want to
look back
at the case to find out what was done I'll give her that
number, and
she'll get the jacket with the papers in it."
Eva Belter frowned...
Mason continues, "I'm just telling you where you stand in
this office.
You're a case and nothing but a case. There are hundreds of
cases in
that file, and there are going to be hundreds of other cases.
You've
paid me some money already, and you're going to pay me five
thousand
dollars more...."
Mason continues, "There's lots to be done yet...Those are
some of the
things that have got to be done. I'm just telling you so you
won't
think you can get along without me."
In his early career, this was part of Mason's code, just as
it is part
of Spade's. The case is important, not the client per se.
Clients are
interchangeable; cases are distinguishable.
Bill Harker
wharker@ix.netcom.com
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