"Costello and Hammel had to do something," said the Saint. "International Cottons have been very bad for a long time—as you'd have known if you hadn't packed all your stuff away in a gilt-edged sock. On the other hand, Enstone's interest—Cosmopolitan Textiles—were good. Costello and Hammel could have pulled out in two ways: either by a merger, or else by having Enstone commit suicide so that Cosmopolitans would tumble down in the scare and they could buy them in —you'll probably find they've sold a bear in them all through the month, trying to break the price. And if you look at the papers this afternoon you'll see that all Enstone's securities have dropped through the bottom of the market—a bloke in his position can't commit suicide without starting a panic. Costello and Hammel went to dinner to try for the merger, but if Enstone turned it down they were ready for the other thing."
"Well?" said Teal obstinately; but for the first time there seemed to be a tremor in the foundations of his disbelief.
"They only made one big mistake. They didn't arrange for Lew to leave a letter."
"People have shot themselves without leaving letters."
"I know. But not often. That's what started me thinking."
"Well?" said the detective again.
Simon rumpled his hair into more profound disorder, and said: "You see, Claud, in my disreputable line of business you're always thinking'; 'Now, what would A do?—and what would B do?—and what would C do?' You have to be able to get inside people's minds and know what they're going to do and how they're going to do it, so you can always be one jump ahead of 'em. You have to be a practical psychologist —just like the head salesman of a general manufacturer in the Midlands."
Teal's mouth opened, but for some reason which was beyond his conscious comprehension he said nothing. And Simon Templar went on, in the disjointed way that he sometimes fell into when he was trying to express something which he himself had not yet grasped in bare words:
"Sales psychology is just a study of human weaknesses. And that's a funny thing, you know. I remember the manager of one of the biggest novelty manufacturers in the world telling me that the soundest test of any idea for a new toy was whether it would appeal to a middle-aged business man. It's true, of course. It's so true that it's almost stopped being a joke—the father who plays with his little boy's birthday presents so energetically that the little boy has to shove off and smoke papa's pipe. Every middle-aged business man has that strain of childishness in him somewhere, because without it he would never want to spend his life gathering more paper millions than he can ever spend, and building up rickety castles of golden cards that are always ready to topple over and be built up again. It's just a glorified kid's game with a box of bricks. If all the mighty earth-shaking business men weren't like that they could never have built up an economic system in which the fate of nations, all the hunger and happiness and achievement of the world, was locked up in bars of yellow tooth-stopping." Simon raised his eyes suddenly— they were very bright and in some queer fashion sightless, as if his mind was separated from every physical awareness of his surroundings. "Lewis Enstone was just that kind of a man," he said.
"Are you still thinking of that toy you were playing with," Teal asked restlessly.
"That—and other things we heard. And the photographs. Did you notice them ?"
"No."
"One of them was Enstone playing with a clock-work train. In another of them he was under a rug, being a bear. In another he was working a big model merry-go-round. Most of the pictures were like that. The children came into them, of course, but you could see that Enstone was having the swellest time."
Teal, who had been fidgeting with a pencil, shrugged brusquely and sent it clattering across the desk.
"You still haven't shown me a murder," he stated.
"I had to find it myself," said the Saint gently, "You see, it was a kind of professional problem. Enstone was happily married, happy with his family, no more crooked than any other big-time financier, nothing on his conscience, rich and getting richer—how were they to make him commit suicide? If I'd been writing a story with him in it, for instance, how could I have made him commit suicide?"
"You'd have told him he had cancer," said Teal caustically, "and he'd have fallen for it."
Simon shook his head.
"No. If I'd been a doctor—perhaps. But if Costello or Hammel had suggested it, he'd have wanted confirmation. And did he look like a man who'd just been told that he might have cancer?"
"It's your murder," said Mr. Teal, with the beginnings of a drowsy tolerance that was transparently rooted in sheer resignation. "I'll let you solve it."
"There were lots of pieces missing at first," said the Saint. "I only had Enstone's character and weaknesses. And then it came out—Hammel was a psychologist. That was good, because I'm a bit of a psychologist myself, and his mind would work something like mine. And then Costello could invent mechanical gadgets and make them himself. He shouldn't have fetched out that lighter, Claud—it gave me another of the missing pieces. And then there was the box."
"Which box?"
"The cardboard box—on his table, with the brown paper. You know Fowler said that he thought either Hammel or Costello left it. Have you got it here?"
"I expect it's somewhere in the building."
"Could we have it up?"
With the gesture of a blase hangman reaching for the noose, Teal took hold of the telephone on his desk.
"You can have the gun, too, if you like," he said.
"Thanks," said the Saint. "I wanted the gun."
Teal gave the order; and they sat and looked at each other in silence until the exhibits arrived. Teal's silence explained in fifty different ways that the Saint would be refused no facilities for nailing down his coffin in a manner that he would never be allowed to forget; but for some reason his facial register was not wholly convincing. When they were alone again, Simon went to the desk, picked up the gun, and put it in the box. It fitted very well.
"That's what happened, Claud," he said with quiet triumph. "They gave him the gun in the box."
"And he shot himself without knowing what he was doing," Teal said witheringly.
"That's just it," said the Saint, with a blue devil of mockery in his gaze. "He didn't know what he was doing."
Mr. Teal's molars clamped down cruelly on the inoffensive merchandise of the Wrigley Corporation.
"Well, what did he think he was doing—sitting under a rug pretending to be a bear?"
Simon sighed.
"That's what I'm trying to work out."
Teal's chair creaked as his full weight slumped back in it in hopeless exasperation.
"Is that what you've been taking up so much of my time about?" he asked wearily.
"But I've got an idea, Claud," said the Saint, getting up and stretching himself. "Come out and lunch with me, and let's give it a rest. You've been thinking for nearly an hour, and I don't want your brain to overheat. I know a new place— wait, I'll look up the address."
He looked it up in the telephone directory; and Mr. Teal got up and took down his bowler hat from its peg. His baby blue eyes were inscrutably thoughtful, but he followed the Saint without thought. Whatever else the Saint wanted to say, however crazy he felt it must be, it was something he had to hear or else fret over for the rest of his days. They drove in a taxi to Knightsbridge, with Mr. Teal chewing phlegmatically, in a superb affectation of bored unconcern. Presently the taxi stopped, and Simon climbed out. He led the way into an apartment building and into a lift, saying something to the operator which Teal did not catch.
"What is this?" he asked, as they shot upwards. "A new restaurant?"
"It's a new place," said the Saint vaguely.