Waldemar’s wide, florid brow wrinkled.
“I haven’t thought or dreamed of anything for a month but this infernal bomb explosion.”
“Oh, the Linder case. You’re personally interested?”
“Politically. It makes Linder’s nomination certain. Persecution. Attempted assassination. He becomes a near-martyr. I’m almost ready to believe that he planted a fake bomb himself.”
“And fell out of a third-story window to carry out the idea? That’s pushing realism rather far, isn’t it?”
Waldemar laughed. “There’s the weakness. Unless we suppose that he under-reckoned the charge of explosive.”
“They let the musician go, didn’t they?”
“Yes. There was absolutely no proof against him, except that he was in the street below. Besides, he seemed quite lacking mentally.”
“Mightn’t that have been a sham?”
“Alienists, of good standing examined him. They reported him just a shade better than half-witted. He was like a one-ideaed child, his whole being comprised in his ability, and ambition to play his B-flat trombone.”