Trent's Last Case by E. C. Bentley Page A

although Manderson was as careful about his clothes as any man I ever knew, and his shoes—well, sir, the amount of money he spent on shoes was sinful—in spite of that, I tell you, he never had a valet. He never liked to have anybody touch him. All his life nobody ever shaved him.'
    'I've heard something of that,' Trent remarked. 'Why was it, do you think?'
    'Well,' Mr. Bunner answered slowly, 'it was the Manderson habit of mind, I guess; a sort of temper of general suspicion and jealousy. They say his father and grandfather were just the same . . . . Like a dog with a bone, you know, acting as if all the rest of creation was laying for a chance to steal it. He didn't really think the barber would start in to saw his head off; he just felt there was a possibility that he might, and he was taking no risks. Then again in business he was always convinced that somebody else was after his bone—which was true enough a good deal of the time; but not all the time. The consequence of that was that the old man was the most cautious and secret worker in the world of finance; and that had a lot to do with his success, too . . . . But that doesn't amount to being a lunatic, Mr. Trent; not by a long way. You ask me if Manderson was losing his mind before he died. I say I believe he was just worn out with worrying over something, and was losing his nerve.'
    Trent smoked thoughtfully. He wondered how much Mr. Bunner knew of the domestic difficulty in his chief's household, and decided to put out a feeler. 'I understood that he had trouble with his wife.'
    'Sure,' replied Mr. Bunner. 'But do you suppose a thing like that was going to upset Sig Manderson that way? No, sir! He was a sight too big a man to be all broken up by any worry of that kind.'
    Trent looked half-incredulously into the eyes of the young man. But behind all their shrewdness and intensity he saw a massive innocence. Mr. Bunner really believed a serious breach between husband and wife to be a minor source of trouble for a big man.
    'What was the trouble between them, anyhow?' Trent enquired.
    'You can search me,' Mr. Bunner replied briefly. He puffed at his cigar. 'Marlowe and I have often talked about it, and we could never make out a solution. I had a notion at first,' said Mr. Bunner in a lower voice, leaning forward, 'that the old man was disappointed and vexed because he had expected a child; but Marlowe told me that the disappointment on that score was the other way around, likely as not. His idea was all right, I guess; he gathered it from something said by Mrs. Manderson's French maid.'
    Trent looked up at him quickly. 'Celestine!' he said; and his thought was, 'So that was what she was getting at!'
    Mr. Bunner misunderstood his glance. 'Don't you think I'm giving a man away, Mr. Trent,' he said. 'Marlowe isn't that kind. Celestine just took a fancy to him because he talks French like a native, and she would always be holding him up for a gossip. French servants are quite unlike English that way. And servant or no servant,' added Mr. Bunner with emphasis, 'I don't see how a woman could mention such a subject to a man. But the French beat me.' He shook his head slowly.
    'But to come back to what you were telling me just now,' Trent said. 'You believe that Manderson was going in terror of his life for some time. Who should threaten it? I am quite in the dark.'
    'Terror—I don't know,' replied Mr. Bunner meditatively. 'Anxiety, if you like. Or suspense—that's rather my idea of it. The old man was hard to terrify, anyway; and more than that, he wasn't taking any precautions—he was actually avoiding them. It looked more like he was asking for a quick finish—supposing there's any truth in my idea. Why, he would sit in that library window, nights, looking out into the dark, with his white shirt just a target for anybody's gun. As for who should threaten his life well, sir,' said Mr. Bunner with a faint smile, 'it's certain you have not lived in the States. To take