everyone
else he would be just morose and dull; but when he was alone with me in
his office, or anywhere where we would be working together, if the least
little thing went wrong, by George! he would fly off the handle to beat
the Dutch. In this library here I have seen him open a letter with
something that didn't just suit him in it, and he would rip around and
carry on like an Indian, saying he wished he had the man that wrote it
here, he wouldn't do a thing to him, and so on, till it was just
pitiful. I never saw such a change. And here's another thing. For a week
before he died Manderson neglected his work, for the first time in my
experience. He wouldn't answer a letter or a cable, though things looked
like going all to pieces over there. I supposed that this anxiety of
his, whatever it was, had got onto his nerves till they were worn out.
Once I advised him to see a doctor, and he told me to go to hell. But
nobody saw this side of him but me. If he was having one of these rages
in the library here, for example, and Mrs. Manderson would come into the
room, he would be all calm and cold again in an instant."

"And you put this down to some secret anxiety, a fear that somebody had
designs on his life?" asked Trent.

The American nodded.

"I suppose," Trent resumed, "you had considered the idea of there being
something wrong with his mind--a break-down from overstrain, say. That
is the first thought that your account suggests to me. Besides, it is
what is always happening to your big business men in America, isn't it?
That is the impression one gets from the newspapers."

"Don't let them slip you any of that bunk," said Mr. Bunner earnestly.
"It's only the ones who have got rich too quick, and can't make good,
who go crazy. Think of all our really big men--the men anywhere near
Manderson's size: did you ever hear of any one of them losing his
senses? They don't do it--believe _me_. I know they say every man has
his loco point," Mr. Bunner added reflectively, "but that doesn't mean
genuine, sure-enough craziness; it just means some personal eccentricity
in a man ... like hating cats ... or my own weakness of not being able
to touch any kind of fish-food."

"Well, what was Manderson's?"

"He was full of them--the old man. There was his objection to all the
unnecessary fuss and luxury that wealthy people don't kick at much, as a
general rule. He didn't have any use for expensive trifles and
ornaments. He wouldn't