Heyton could not speak; his tongue seemed to cleave to the roof of his mouth; he felt as if his spine were giving way, as if all his strength of mind and body were ebbing from him. "It's--it's ridiculous!" he stammered. "No, my lord, it's quite simple, quite elementary. There were the finger-prints, on the safe, on the walls, on the poker. I could read them quite easily with a magnifying glass; and they never lie. 'Pon my word, Lord Heyton!" he broke off musingly, his mouth twisting into a smile, "I'm inclined to think they're the only things in this world one can rely on. Now, you'll see why I upset the ink over your hand." He took the two sheets of paper from his pocket and laid them on the table; and beside them he placed a silver print of the finger-prints in the room. Heyton stared at them as if they were live things that could sting him. "Another thing, my lord," said Mr. Jacobs. "I was in the dressing-room just after the Marquess recovered consciousness, and heard him charge you with the robbery. The evidence is quite conclusive. But there is, of course, what we call collateral proof. I found these two keys under the bed in your dressing-room. Of course, you intended throwing them in the lake, when you went down with the jewel-case; but you dropped the keys and didn't find them; there is always a little hitch like that--_it's the hitch in the rope_. I know you took the jewel-case the morning you went down to bathe, because I traced your footprints into the middle of the wood, where you need not have gone, if you had been going merely for a bath. I knew I should find the jewel-case just where you stopped; but I didn't want to discover it. I was waiting for _you_ to go for it, which you would have done presently. Unfortunately for him, another man was in the wood that morning and saw you; and _he_ went for the jewel-case. The Inspector has arrested him, worse luck. I say 'worse luck,' because now we can't hush up the affair--and, you'll have to _go_." Heyton wiped the sweat from his face, his head sank on his breast; he was in a condition of coma; so stupefied, indeed, that it was only by an effort he could follow the detective's next words, "There is only one other person--well, say, two--who suspect you, Lord Heyton. But she will keep her lips shut. She is your wife--fortunately for you." He went to the sideboard, poured out some brandy and pushed the glass towards the wretched man.