Part 17

“I propose,” said he, lifting the plates out of their protecting frame, “that we take prints of Macauley’s feet and compare them with the photographs.”

“Yes,” said Platt. “And then there are the finger-prints that we’ve got. We can test those, too.”

“You don’t want finger-prints if you’ve got a set of toe-prints,” objected Miller.

“With regard to those finger-prints,” said Thorndyke. “May I ask if they were obtained from the bottle?”

“They were,” Platt admitted.

“And were there any other finger-prints?”

“No,” replied Platt. “These were the only ones.”

As he spoke he laid on the table a photograph showing the prints of the thumb and fingers of a right hand.

Thorndyke glanced at the photograph and, turning to Miller, said:

“I suggest that those are Dr. Foxton’s finger-prints.”

“Impossible!” exclaimed Platt, and then suddenly fell silent.

“We can soon see,” said Thorndyke, producing from the case a pad of white paper. “If Dr. Foxton will lay the finger-tips of his right hand first on this inked plate and then on the paper, we can compare the prints with the photograph.”

Foxton placed his fingers on the blackened plate and then pressed them on the paper pad, leaving on the latter four beautifully clear, black finger-prints. These Superintendent Platt scrutinized eagerly, and as his glance travelled from the prints to the photographs, he broke into a sheepish grin.

“Sold again!” he muttered. “They are the same prints.”

“Well,” said Miller in a tone of disgust, “you must have been a mug not to have thought of that when you knew that Dr. Foxton had handled the bottle.”

“The fact, however, is important,” said Thorndyke. “The absence of any finger-prints but Dr. Foxton’s not only suggests that the murderer took the precaution to wear gloves, but especially it proves that the bottle was not handled by the deceased during life. A suicide’s hands will usually be pretty moist and would leave conspicuous, if not very clear, impressions.”

“Yes,” agreed Miller, “that is quite true. But with regard to these footprints. We can’t compel this man to let us examine his feet without arresting him. Don’t think, Dr. Thorndyke, that I suspect you of guessing. I’ve known you too long for that. You’ve got your facts all right, I don’t doubt, but you must let us have enough to justify our arrest.”

Thorndyke’s answer was to plunge once more into the inexhaustible green case, from which he now produced two objects wrapped in tissue paper. The paper being removed, there was revealed what looked like a model of an excessively shabby pair of brown shoes.

“These,” said Thorndyke, exhibiting the “models” to Superintendent Miller--who viewed them with an undisguised grin--“are plaster casts of the interiors of a pair of slippers--very old and much too tight--belonging to Mr. Macauley. His name was written inside them. The casts have been waxed and painted with raw umber, which has been lightly rubbed off, thus accentuating the prominences and depressions. You will notice that the impressions of the toes on the soles and of the ‘knuckles’ on the uppers appear as prominences; in fact we have in these casts a sketchy reproduction of the actual feet.

“Now, first as to dimensions. Dr. Jervis’s measurements of the footprints give us ten inches and three-quarters as the extreme length and four inches and five-eighths as the extreme width at the heads of the metatarsus. On these casts, as you see, the extreme length is ten inches and five-eighths--the loss of one-eighth being accounted for by the curve of the sole--and the extreme width is four inches and a quarter--three-eighths being accounted for by the lateral compression of a tight slipper. The agreement of the dimensions is remarkable, considering the unusual size. And now as to the peculiarities of the feet. You notice that each toe has made a perfectly distinct impression on the sole, excepting the little toe, of which there is no trace in either cast. And, turning to the uppers, you notice that the knuckles of the toes appear quite distinct and prominent--again excepting the little toes, which have made no impression at all. Thus it is not a case of retracted little toes, for they would appear as an extra prominence. Then, looking at the feet as a whole, it is evident that the little toes are absent; there is a distinct hollow where there should be a prominence.”

“M’yes,” said Miller dubiously, “it’s all very neat. But isn’t it just a bit speculative?”

“Oh, come, Miller,” protested Thorndyke; “just consider the facts. Here is a suspected murderer known to have feet of an unusual size and presenting a very rare deformity; and here are a pair of feet of that same unusual size and presenting that same rare deformity; and they are the feet of a man who had actually lived in the same house as the murdered woman and who, at the date of the crime, was living only two doors away. What more would you have?”

“Well, there is the question of motive,” objected Miller.

“That hardly belongs to a prima facie case,” said Thorndyke. “But even if it did, is there not ample matter for suspicion? Remember who the murdered woman was, what her husband was, and who this Sierra Leone gentleman is.”

“Yes, yes; that’s true,” said Miller somewhat hastily, either perceiving the drift of Thorndyke’s argument (which I did not), or being unwilling to admit that he was still in the dark. “Yes, we’ll have the fellow in and get his actual footprints.”

He went to the door and, putting his head out, made some sign, which was almost immediately followed by a trampling of feet, and Macauley entered the room, followed by two large plain-clothes policemen. The negro was evidently alarmed, for he looked about him with the wild expression of a hunted animal. But his manner was aggressive and truculent.

“Why am I being interfered with in this impertinent manner?” he demanded in the deep, buzzing voice characteristic of the male negro.

“We want to have a look at your feet, Mr. Macauley,” said Miller. “Will you kindly take off your shoes and socks?”