The foot had slipped, however, and it was difficult to estimate the size of the shoe, and impossible to distinguish the pattern of the nails.
'The whole robbery,' concluded the Doctor, 'step by step, has been reconstituted.

Inductive science can no further go.' 'It is wonderful,' said his wife.

'You should indeed have been a detective, Henri.

I had no idea of your talents.' 'My dear,' replied Desprez, condescendingly, 'a man of scientific imagination combines the lesser faculties; he is a detective just as he is a publicist or a general; these are but local applications of his special talent.

But now,' he continued, 'would you have me go further?
Would you have me lay my finger on the culprits--or rather, for I cannot promise quite so much, point out to you the very house where they consort?
It may be a satisfaction, at least it is all we are likely to get, since we are denied the remedy of law.