SWEENEY: Yes, sir.
FLINT: Will you kindly read it to the jury?
SWEENEY: [Reading] “If any future historian wants to record my last advice to humanity, I’ll say that I found only two enjoyable things on this earth whose every door was open to me: My whip over the world and Karen Andre. To those who can use it, the advice is worth what it has cost mankind. Bjorn Faulkner.”
FLINT: [Handing letter to CLERK] Submitted as evidence.
JUDGE HEATH: Accepted as Exhibit A.
FLINT: Did you question Miss Andre about this letter?
SWEENEY: I did. She said that Faulkner wrote the letter and left it there, on the table, and ordered her not to touch it, then went out to the roof garden. She struggled with him, when she saw what he was going to do, but she couldn’t stop him.
FLINT: Did you ask her who had been with them that night?
SWEENEY: I did. She said two gentlemen had: they were friends of Mr. Faulkner and she had never seen them before. He picked them up in a night club, that evening, and brought them along. She said their names were “Jerry White” and “Dick Saunders.”
FLINT: Did you try to find any gentlemen by these names among Mr. Faulkner’s acquaintances?
SWEENEY: We did. We found that no one had ever heard of them.
FLINT: And Miss Andre told you, as she did at the inquest, that she had never seen these two men before?
SWEENEY: Yes, sir.
FLINT: Was she very emphatic about that?
SWEENEY: Yes, sir. Very.
FLINT: That is all, Inspector.
STEVENS: Miss Andre told you that she had struggled with Faulkner to prevent his suicide. Did you notice any evidence of a struggle in her clothes?
SWEENEY: Yes, sir. Her dress was torn. It had diamond shoulder straps, and one of them was broken, so that she had to hold the dress up with one hand.
STEVENS: What did you think of that?
SWEENEY: [Embarrassed] Do I have to answer?
STEVENS: You certainly do.
SWEENEY: Well . . . I wished he had broken the other strap, too.
STEVENS: I meant, did you think that the dress looked as though it had been torn in a struggle?
SWEENEY: It looked like it, yes, sir.
STEVENS: Now, can you tell us why on earth you turned the shower on in the bathroom?
SWEENEY: [Embarrassed] Well, you see, we heard Faulkner had wine instead of water in it.
STEVENS: [Laughing] You mustn’t believe all the legends you hear about Bjorn Faulkner . . . That’s all, Inspector.
[SWEENEY leaves the stand and exits]
FLINT: Magda Svenson!
CLERK: Magda Svenson!
[MAGDA SVENSON enters and waddles toward the witness stand. She is fat, middle-aged, with tight, drawn lips, suspicious eyes, an air of offended righteousness. Her clothes are plain, old-fashioned, meticulously neat]
You solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you God?
MAGDA: [Speaks with a pronounced Swedish accent] I swear. [She takes the Bible, raises it slowly to her lips, kisses it solemnly, and hands it back, taking the whole ceremony with a profound religious seriousness]
FLINT: What is your name?
MAGDA: You know it. You just call me.
FLINT: Kindly answer my questions without argument. State your name.
MAGDA: Magda Svenson.
FLINT: What is your occupation?
MAGDA: I am housekeeper.
FLINT: By whom were you employed last?
MAGDA: By Herr Bjorn Faulkner and before that his father.
FLINT: How long have you been employed by them?
MAGDA: I been in the family thirty-eight years. I remember Herr Bjorn since he was little child.
FLINT: When did you come to America?
MAGDA: I been here five years.
FLINT: What were the duties Mr. Faulkner assigned to you?
MAGDA: I keep penthouse for him. He visit here every year or so. I stay even after he go, when he get married. But I never employed by this one.
[She points at KAREN with undisguised hatred]
FLINT: Now, Mrs. Svenson, what —
MAGDA: [Offended] Miss Svenson.
FLINT: I beg your pardon, Miss Svenson. What do you know about Miss Andre’s relations with Mr. Faulkner?
MAGDA: [With forceful indignation] Decent woman like me shouldn’t know about such things. But sin is shameless in this world.
FLINT: Tell us about it, Miss Svenson.
MAGDA: From very first day this woman appeared, she was sleeping with Herr Faulkner. It isn’t good thing when a man forgets line between his bed and his desk. And she put her claws tight on both. Sometimes, they talked loans and dividends in bed; other times, the door to his office was locked and, under the window shades that was pulled down, I seen her lace pants on the window sill.
STEVENS: [Jumping up] Your Honor! We object!
FLINT: I think Miss Andre should have objected many years ago!
STEVENS: Such line of testimony is outrageous!
FLINT: These are facts pertaining to the vital question of their relationship and —
JUDGE HEATH: [Rapping his gavel] Silence, gentlemen! I shall ask the witness to word her testimony more carefully.
MAGDA: Sin is sin any name you call it, Judge.
FLINT: Miss Svenson, do you know of any instance when Miss Andre’s conduct was detrimental to Mr. Faulkner in other ways than moral?
MAGDA: I do so. You try count up all money he waste on that woman.
FLINT: Can you tell us an instance of Mr. Faulkner’s extravagance?
MAGDA: I tell you. He had a platinum gown made for her. Yes, I said platinum. Fine mesh, fine and soft as silk. She wore it on her naked body. He would make a fire in the fireplace and he would heat the dress and then put it on her. It cooled and you could see her body in silver sheen, and it been more decent if she had been naked. And she ask to put it on as hot as she can stand, and if it burned her shameless skin, she laughed like the pagan she is, and he kissed the burn, wild like tiger!
STEVENS: Your Honor! We object! This testimony is irrelevant and only tends to prejudice the jury against Miss Andre!
KAREN: [Very calmly] Let her talk, Stevens.
[She looks at the jury and for a swift moment we see a smile, mischievous, tempting, radiant, a surprise in this cold business woman, revealing an entirely different type of femininity]
Perhaps it may prejudice the jury in my favor.
[Commotion in the courtroom. STEVENS stares at KAREN. JUDGE HEATH strikes his gavel]
FLINT: Mr. Stevens has my sympathy. His client is not an easy one to handle.
JUDGE HEATH: Silence! Objection overruled.
FLINT: Did you observe Mr. Faulkner’s attitude toward his marriage?
MAGDA: He was happy for first time in his life. He was happy like decent man what found right road.
FLINT: Did you know of anything that made him worry in those days, that could bring him to suicide eventually?
MAGDA: No. Nothing.
FLINT: Now, tell us, Miss Svenson, did you observe Miss Andre’s attitude toward Mr. Faulkner’s marriage?
MAGDA: She silent, like stone statue. She —
[There is a commotion in the courtroom. NANCY LEE FAULKNER appears at the spectators’ door at left. NANCY LEE FAULKNER is twenty-two, blonde, slender, delicate, perfect as a costly porcelain statuette. Her exquisite white skin is a contrast to the somber, unrelieved black of her clothes; they are clothes of mourning, severe and in perfect taste. EVERYONE in the courtroom stares at her. KAREN turns toward her slowly. But NANCY LEE does not look at KAREN. FLINT cannot restrain an exclamation of astonishment]
FLINT: Mrs. Faulkner!
NANCY LEE: [She speaks in a soft, slow voice] I understand you wanted to call me as a witness, Mr. Flint?
FLINT: I did, Mrs. Faulkner, but I thought you were in California.
NANCY LEE: I was. I escaped.
FLINT: You escaped?
NANCY LEE: Father was concerned over my health. He wouldn’t allow me to come back. But I want to do my duty toward the memory of . . . [Her voice trembles a little] my husband. I’m at your disposal, Mr. Flint.
FLINT: I can only express my deepest appreciation, Mrs. Faulkner. If you will kindly take a seat, we will be ready for you in just a little while.
NANCY LEE: Thank you.
[She takes one of the spectators’ chairs at the wall, at right]
FLINT: [To MAGDA] You were telling us about Miss Andre’s attitude toward Mr. Faulkner’s marriage, Miss Svenson.
MAGDA: I said she keep silent. But I hear her crying one night, after marriage. Crying, sobbing — and that the first and only time in her life.
FLINT: Did she seem to . . . suffer much?
MAGDA: Suffer? No. Not her. One man more or less make no much difference to her. I seen her unfaithful to Herr Faulkner on the night of his wedding.
[Reaction in the courtroom. Even KAREN takes notice, a little startled]