McNair took out his handkerchief and this time wiped off the sweat. He said quietly, “Good God, I’m not clever. I’m the most complete fool that was ever born. I’ve ruined my whole life.” His shoulder twitched again. “It wouldn’t do any good to tell the police what you know, Mr. Wolfe. I didn’t poison that candy.”
Wolfe said, “Go on.”
McNair nodded. “I’ll go on. I don’t blame Helen for telling you about it, after the way you trapped her yesterday morning. I can imagine what she was up against here today, but I don’t hold that against you either. I’ve got beyond all the ordinary resentments, they don’t mean anything. You notice I’m not even trying to find out what Helen told you. I know if she told you anything she told you the truth.”
He lifted his head to get Wolfe straighter in the eye. “I didn’t poison the candy. When I went upstairs to my office about twelve o’clock that day, to get away from the crowd for a few minutes, the box was there on my desk. I opened it and looked in it, but didn’t take any because I had a devil of a headache. When Helen came in a little later I offered her some, but thank God she didn’t take any either, because there were no caramels in it. When I went back downstairs I left it on my desk, and Molly must have seen it there later, and took it. She... liked to play pranks.”
He stopped and wiped his brow again. Wolfe asked:
“What did you do with the paper and twine the box was wrapped with?”
“There wasn’t any. It wasn’t wrapped.”
“Who put it on your desk?”
“I don’t know. Twenty-five or thirty people had been in and out of there before 11:30, looking at some Crenuit models I didn’t want to show publicly.”
“Who do you think put it there?”