“This man didn’t look?”
“No.”
Leeds shrugged his shoulders, and said, “I’m not trying to tell you your business, Mason. You’re a lawyer. I’m not.”
Mason said, “If you hadn’t lied to me at the start, I might have thought so, too. But I don’t think we can put that across with a jury now.”
Leeds accepted the statement philosophically. “Too bad,” he observed.
Mason nodded. “Isn’t it?”
There was a moment of silence. Then Mason said, “The warden up at San Quentin doesn’t care particularly about capital punishment. He carries out a death sentence when he has to, as part of his duties of office. He claims that new gas chamber is worse than the rope.”
Leeds turned cold, frosty eyes on the lawyer.
“Are you,” he asked, “by any chance trying to frighten me with the idea of death?”
Mason, meeting his glance, said simply, “Yes.”