“You don’t need to look at it,” Mason told her. “Cullens lives out ‘here. That is, he did live out there.”
“Has he moved?” she asked.
“No,” Mason said, “he was killed.”
“Killed!”
“Yes, shot in the left side with a revolver.”
“What are you leading up to, Mr. Mason? Please tell me.”
Mason said, “Your aunt stepped out on the street right in front of an automobile. The automobile hit her and broke her leg and fractured her skull. There are possible internal injuries. There was blood on her left shoe. That blood didn’t come from any injuries she’d received. Moreover, there was blood on the sole of the shoe, indicating that she’d...” He broke off as the girl swung half around and toppled into a chair, her face white, her lips a pale pink. “Take it easy,” Mason cautioned. She tried to smile. “Any whiskey in this place?” the lawyer asked.
She indicated the desk. Mason jerked open the upper right-hand drawer, and found a bottle half filled with whiskey. He unscrewed the stopper and handed it to Virginia Trent. She drank awkwardly from the bottle, trying to suck the liquid from the container, and spilling some down the front of her dress as she removed the bottle from her lips, making a wry grimace.
Mason said, “You’ll have to learn to drink out of a bottle. Let some air into it. Like this.”
She watched him and smiled wanly. “You do it very expertly,” she said. “Go on, Mr. Mason, I can take it. Tell me the rest of it.”