“All right, go ahead,” the lawyer told her. “Never mind the verbal embellishments. He gets drunk. So what?”
“He gets drunk,” she said, “periodically. That’s why I know it’s a subconscious rebellion against a routine environment which...” She checked herself as she saw the lawyer’s upraised hand, and hurried on to say, “Anyway, what I’m getting at is that he’ll be perfectly steady for several months at a time. Then something will happen and he’ll go on one of his benders. Poor Uncle George, he’s so methodical in everything that he’s even methodical about that. When he feels one of these spells coming on, he carefully locks up everything in the office vault, to which my aunt has the combination. Then he takes the ignition keys out of his car, puts them in a stamped envelope, addresses them to himself, puts the keys in the mail and then goes ahead and gets drunk. While he’s drinking, he gambles. Three days to a week later, he’ll show up, completely broke, his eyes bloodshot, usually he’s unshaven, and his clothes are a sight.”
“Then what does your aunt do?” Mason asked, with interest.
“Aunt Sarah takes it right in her stride,” she said. “There’s never a word of remonstrance. She bundles him off to a Turkish bath, takes his clothes, has them cleaned and pressed, sends another suit to the Turkish bath, and, when he’s thoroughly sobered and quite respectable, lets him go back to his office. In the meantime, Aunt Sarah has the combination to the vault. She gets out the stones the men are to work on, and sees that they keep busy.”
“Rather a nice arrangement all around, I’d say,” Mason observed. “They make a nice team.”
“Yes,” she said, “but you don’t realize what all of this is doing to Aunt Sarah. The strain on her nervous system must be terrific. All the more so, because she never gives any external evidences of it.’
“Bosh!” Mason said. “Your Aunt Sarah is a woman who’s looked the world in the face and isn’t afraid of it. She knows her way around, and doesn’t quarrel with life. I venture to say she doesn’t have a nerve in her body.”
“She gives one that impression,” Virginia Trent said austerely, “but I feel quite certain, Mr. Mason, that if we are to account for this peculiar shoplifting complex, we will find that it’s due to a reflex subconscious disturbance.”
“Perhaps,” Mason said. “How long’s this shoplifting been going on?”
“Today was the first intimation I’ve had.”