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Page 35
"`But it's simple when one has the cue - it's immensely simple.
We know exactly what happened and the sort of crooks that were
about the business. The barefoot prints show the Continental
group. That's the trick of Southern Europe to go in barefoot
behind a man to kill him.'
"Sir Henry jarred the whole table with his big hand. The surface
of the table was covered with powdered chalk that the baronet had
dusted over it in the hope of developing criminal finger prints.
Now under the drumming of his palm the particles of white dust
whirled like microscopic elfin dancers.
"`The thing's clear as daylight,' he went on: `One of the
professional group brought the accomplice down here to divide the
booty. He broke the door in. They sat down here at this table
with the lighted candle as you see it. And while the stuff was
being sorted out, another of the band slipped in behind the man
and killed him.
"`They started to carry the body out. Millson chanced by. They
got in a funk and rushed the thing. Of course they had a motor
down the road, and equally of course it was no trick to whisk the
body out of the neighborhood.'
"Sir Henry got half up on his feet with his energy in the
solution of the thing. He thrust his spread-out fingers down.
on the table like a man, by that gesture, pressing in an
inevitable, conclusive summing up."
The girl paused. "It was splendid, I thought. I applauded like
an entranced pit!
"But Mr. Meadows didn't say a word. He took up the big glass we
had used about the inspection of the place, and passed it over
the prints Sir Henry was unconsciously making in the dust on the
polished surface of the table. Then he put the glass down and
looked the excited baronet calmly in the face.
"`There,' cried Sir Henry, `the thing's no mystery.'
"For the first time Mr. Meadows opened his mouth. `It's the
profoundest mystery I ever heard of,' he said.
"Sir Henry was astonished. He sat down and looked across the
table at the man. He wasn't able to speak for a moment, then he
got it out: `Why exactly do you say that?'
"Mr. Meadows put his elbows on the table. He twiddled the big
reading glass in his fingers. His face got firm and decided.
"`To begin with,' he said, `the door to this house was never
broken by a professional cracksman. It's the work of a bungling
amateur. A professional never undertakes to break a door at the
lock. Naturally that's the firmest place about a door. The
implement he intends to use as a lever on the door he puts in at
the top or bottom. By that means he has half of the door as a
lever against the resistance of the lock. Besides, a
professional of any criminal group is a skilled workman. He
doesn't waste effort. He doesn't fracture a door around the
lock. This door's all mangled, splintered and broken around the
lock.'"
"He stopped and looked about the room, and out through the window
at the Scotland Yard patrol. The features of his face were
contracted with the problem. One could imagine one saw the man's
mind laboring at the mystery. `And that's not all,' he said.
`Your man Millson is not telling the truth. He didn't see a dead
body lying on the steps of this house; and he didn't see a man
running away.'
"Sir Henry broke in at that. `Impossible,' he said; 'Millson's a
first-class inspector, absolutely reliable. Why do you say that
he didn't see the dead man on the steps or the assassin running
away?'
"Mr. Meadows answered in the same even voice. `Because there was
never any dead man here,' he said, `for anybody to see. And
because Millson's 'description of the man he saw is
scientifically an impossible feat of vision.'
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