I pass over the harrowing details of the double arrest. I am not a policeman, and to me such scenes are intensely repugnant. But we must needs stay until two taxis and four constables had conveyed the prisoners away from the still reeking house to the caravanserai of the law. Then, at last, we went forth with relief into the fresh air and bent our steps towards the station. “I take it,” Miller said reflectively, “that you never suspected Bilsky?” “I did at first. But when Mrs. Manford and the solicitor told their tale I realized that he was the victim and that Manford must be the murderer.” “Let us have the argument,” said I. “It is obvious that I have been a blockhead, but I don’t mind our old friend here knowing it.” “Not a blockhead, Jervis,” he corrected. “You were half asleep that night and wholly uninterested. If you had been attending to the matter, you would have observed several curious and anomalous appearances. For instance, you would have noticed that the body was, in parts, completely charred and brittle. Now we saw the outbreak of the fire and we found it extinguished when we reached the building. Its duration was a matter of minutes; quite insufficient to reduce a body to that state. For, as you know, a human body is an extremely incombustible thing. The appearance suggested the destruction of a body which had been already burnt; and this suggestion was emphasized by the curiously unequal distribution of the charring. The right hand was burnt to a cinder and blown to pieces. The left hand was only scorched. The right foot was utterly destroyed, but the left foot was nearly intact. The face was burned away completely, and yet there were parts of the head where the hair was only singed. “Naturally, with these facts in mind, I scrutinized those remains narrowly. And presently something much more definite and sinister came to light. On the left hand, there was a faint impression of another hand--very indistinct and blurred, but still unmistakably a hand.” “I remember,” said I, “the inspector pointed it out as evidence that the deceased had been standing with his hands clasped before or behind him; and I must admit that it seemed a reasonable inference.” “So it did--because you were both assuming that the man had been alone and that it must therefore have been the impression of his own hand. For that reason, neither of you looked at it critically. If you had, you would have seen at once that it was the impression of a left hand.” “You are quite right,” I confessed ruefully. “As the man was stated to have been alone, the hand impression did not interest me. And it was a mere group of smudges, after all. You are sure that it was a left hand?” “Quite,” he replied. “Blurred as the smudges were, one could make out the relative lengths of the fingers. And there was the thumb mark at the distal end of the palm, but pointing to the outer side of the hand. Try how you may, you can’t get a right hand into that position.