“Thank you.”

“So,” he said as soon as they had their tea, “you still have some questions, Inspector?”

“A few. Have you any idea at all how Humpty might have been planning to raise the value of Spongg shares?”

“I’ve thought about it a great deal since I saw you last,” said Spongg, “but I still can’t figure it out.”

Jack started on a new tack.

“I’ve spoken to Mr. Grundy. He said that Humpty did offer to sell him his share portfolio that night at the Spongg benefit.”

“Did Grundy take up the offer?”

“No.”

“Then why would I want to kill him? If that was Humpty’s plan, then he misjudged his timing badly.”

“Perhaps he wasn’t planning to sell them to Grundy at all. Perhaps he was going to sell them back to… you. ”

Spongg frowned and stared at them both. “For what purpose?”

“To allow you to reclaim the factory for the family.”

Spongg laughed. “If that is so, I must have been planning this for twenty years—that’s how long we’ve been in trouble. Besides, Humpty bought those shares, not me. I don’t have that kind of cash.”

“Mr. Dumpty could have been your front. If you had been buying your own shares back, I daresay City analysts would be asking why—and the price would have increased dramatically.”

Spongg laughed again, but anger was rising beneath his genial exterior.

“If I were a criminal, Inspector, I could have plundered my employees’ pension fund. I and my aged relatives are the sole trustees, so it wouldn’t have been difficult. There is over a hundred million in there, more than enough to put this company back on its feet. But it isn’t mine. It belongs to the workers. I’ve been battling Winsum and Loosum’s for years, not out of my responsibility as an employer or to maintain the Spongg name but because we have a moral imperative to maintain the supply of foot-care products.”

He said it very grandly and without any humor intended.

“The supply of foot-care products has a moral imperative?”

“You may laugh, Inspector, but then you don’t understand chiropody as I do. The Spongg empire is built on four major foot treatments. Without them we are nothing. Anyone can make special scissors, insoles and corn plasters—our selling point is our successful foot preparations. Winsum and Loosum aren’t interested in my factory or distribution. They want my patents. With their sales network and my cures for verrucas, corns, athlete’s foot and bunions, they could wipe the world’s feet free of ailments forever—or not.”

“Not?” inquired Mary.

“Precisely. They may retain our patents but decide to withhold them from the world market. Ointments that soothe but don’t cure is where the real money lies. In contrast, Spongg’s has always been committed to a public service in the foot-care market. If I wanted to play it like Winsum’s, I could be a multibillionaire by now.”

Spongg’s voice had been getting higher and higher as he explained all this. He was obviously quite impassioned by the magnitude of the situation.

“Without competition from us, they could charge what they want. Chiropody would become a gold mine, and that greedy bastard Solomon Grundy wants the lot!”

He had gone a bright shade of red but soon calmed himself, took a sip of tea, apologized to Mary for swearing in her presence and then said, “To think the Jellyman will be shaking hands and honoring Solomon on Saturday is obscene to my mind, Inspector. If the Jellyman understood anything about feet at all, he would not be honoring Grundy but enacting legislation against him.”

“Do you know where Mr. Dumpty had been living this past year?”

“I’m afraid not. Aside from at the charity benefit, I’ve not seen him.”

Jack put down his tea and took the picture of Tom Thomm from his pocket.

“Have you ever seen this man?”

Spongg put on his glasses and stared at the picture.

“Yes, I think with Humpty a couple of times—but not for a while.”

“What about him?” asked Jack, passing him a photo of Winkie.

“No, I’m afraid not.”

“What about Laura Garibaldi?”

“That was tragic, Inspector. Truly tragic. I introduced them, for my sins. Laura and I were on the Reading clay-pigeon shooting team. She was a fine shot and a good woman. I don’t think Humpty really deserved her.”

“You’ve been very kind,” said Jack, “and I’m sorry that my questioning seemed harsh at times.”

“Please think nothing of it,” said Spongg. “Come, I’ll see you out.”

They rose and walked between the faux-ancient-stone ruins as the parrot took flight and flashed its exotic blue tail feathers.

“That’s quite a bird,” murmured Mary.

“Norwegian blue,” said Spongg admiringly. “Beautiful plumage.”