“Just what are you looking for?”
“I want to find out something about Karr’s San Francisco personality.”
“You think he’s had this place as Carr Luceman?”
“I think so. Notice the fact that Luceman’s first name is pronounced exactly the same as Karr’s last name, although it’s spelled differently. Notice that this place apparently hasn’t been lived in except for short periods of time. Evidently, Karr is a marked man, probably in connection with some of his Chinese arms-smuggling ventures, or it may be because of that old partnership feud which dates back to 1921. When he came to San Francisco, he didn’t want to stay at a hotel. Naturally, a person of his description is rather easy to spot.”
“And that trouble with his legs?” Della Street asked. “The wheelchair?”
Mason said, “Figure it out for yourself. He had a bullet hole through one leg. Naturally, he didn’t dare go to any doctor in Los Angeles, because a gunshot wound has to be satisfactorily explained. If Karr had given them his Los Angeles address and then the disappearance of Hocksley and his housekeeper had been duly noted...”
“I see,” Della Street interrupted. “He had this identity already established in San Francisco. No one was missing from this place, so he could come here and invent that story of the accident. But who shot him?”
Mason grinned. “He shot himself. His cat knocked the gun off the table when he was...”
Della Street made a little grimace. “Save it for your brother the Lieutenant,” she said.
Mason said, “We’ll look this place over before we start speculating. There are better places to talk.”