"True. The two statements don't conflict, y' know. The murder was planned—without doubt. But the Major was willing to give his victim a last chance to save his life. My theory is this: The Major, being in a tight financial hole with State prison looming before him, and knowing that his brother had sufficient funds in the safe to save him, plotted the crime, and went to the house that night prepared to commit it. First, however, he told his brother of his predic'ment and asked for the money; and Alvin prob'bly told him to go to the devil. The Major may even have pleaded a bit in order to avoid killing him; but when the liter'ry Alvin turned to reading, he saw the futility of appealing further, and proceeded with the dire business."
Markham smoked a while.
"Granting all you've said," he remarked at length, "I still don't see how you could know, as you asserted this morning, that the Major had planned the murder so as to throw suspicion deliberately on Captain Leacock."
"Just as a sculptor, who thoroughly understands the principles of form and composition, can accurately supply any missing integral part of a statue," Vance explained, "so can the psychologist who understands the human mind, supply any missing factor in a given human action. I might add, parenthetically, that all this blather about the missing arms of the Aphrodite of Melos—the Milo Venus, y' know—is the utt'rest fiddle-faddle. Any competent artist who knew the laws of æsthetic organization could restore the arms exactly as they were originally. Such restorations are merely a mat-
