The Case of the Howling Dog

Perry Mason smiled.

"Did you ever run for a political office?" he asked.

"No, of course not," said the young man.

"If you had," said Perry Mason, "you'd realize what a fickle thing the mass mind is."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Simply that there's no loyalty in it; no consistency in it," said Perry Mason. "And a jury is a manifestation of a mass mind."

"I don't see what you're driving at," the clerk said.

"On the other hand," said Perry Mason, "you've doubtless been to a good show."

"Why, yes, of course."

"You've been to shows where there's been some strong emotional scene; where there's been something that's brought tears to your eyes, a lump to your throat?"

"Yes," said Everly dubiously, "I have, but I don't see what that's got to do with it."

"Try and remember back to the last show you went to that was like that," Perry Mason said, watching the smoke curl upward from the end of his cigarette.

"Yes, I saw one just a few nights ago," Everly said.

"Now, then, can you remember the most dramatic part of the show — the place where the lump in your throat was biggest — where your eyes felt moist?"

"Certainly, I doubt if I'll ever forget it. It was a scene where the woman…"

"Never mind that right now," interrupted Perry Mason. "But let me ask you: what were you doing three minutes after that emotional scene?"

Everly looked at him in surprise.

"Why, sitting right there in the theater, of course."

"No, I don't mean that," Perry Mason said. "What was your emotion?"

"Why," said Everly, "I was just watching the play and…" Abruptly he smiled.

"Now," said Perry Mason, "I think you're getting my point. What were you doing?"

"I was laughing," said Everly.

"Exactly," Perry Mason said, as though that disposed of the matter.

Everly watched him in puzzled bewilderment for a few moments.

"But," he said, "I don't see what that's got to do with the jury in this case."

"It has everything to do with it," Perry Mason said. "A jury is an audience. It's a small audience, but it's an audience just the same. Now, the playwrights who are successful with plays have to know human nature. They recognize the fickleness of the mass mind. They know that it's incapable of loyalty; that it's incapable of holding any emotion for any great period of time. If there hadn't been a chance to laugh after that dramatic scene in the play you saw, the play would have been a flop.

"That audience was fickle, just like all audiences are fickle. They had gone through an emotional strain of sympathizing with the heroine in her darkest hour. They felt for her. That feeling was sincere. They would have died to have saved her. They would have killed the villain, could they have laid hands on him. They felt honestly, sincerely and wholeheartedly. But they couldn't have held the emotion for more than three minutes, to have saved their lives. It wasn't their trouble; it was the heroine's trouble. Having felt for her deeply and sincerely, they wanted to even the emotional scales by laughing. The wise playwright knew that. He gave them an excuse to laugh. And, if you'd studied psychology, you'd have noticed how eagerly the audience grasped at that opportunity to laugh."

Everly's eyes lit up.

"All right," he said, "now tell me just how that applies to the jury. I'm commencing to think I see."

"This case," Perry Mason said, "is going to be short, snappy and dramatic. The policy of the district attorney is to emphasize the horror of a murder case; to emphasize the fact that it's not a battle of wits between counsel, but the bringing to justice of a human fiend who has killed. Ordinarily, the defense attorney tries to keep that impression of horror from creeping into the case. He jumps to his feet with objections to photographs. He waves his arms and shouts arguments. He crouches in front of the witnesses and points his finger in dramatic crossexamination. It has a tendency to break the emotional chain; to soften the horror of the situation, and to draw the jurors back to the courtroom drama, instead of letting their minds revert to the horror of the murder."

"Well," said Frank Everly, "I should think that would be exactly what you'd want to do in this case."

"No," said Perry Mason slowly, "it always pays to do exactly the opposite of what custom decrees. That is particularly true with Claude Drumm. Claude Drumm is a logical fighter; a dangerous, dogged adversary, but he has no subtlety about him. He has no sense of relative values. He isn't intuitive. He can't 'feel' the mental state of a jury. He's accustomed to putting in all of this stuff after a long battle; after the attorney on the other side has done everything possible to soften the horror of the situation.

"Did you ever see two men in a tug of war, where one man let go suddenly and the other man staggered backwards off balance and fell down?"

"Yes, of course."