shelf. In that instant you secured your booty without rising.
Silence! Do you remember when I helped you on with your overcoat
the other night? I was particular about fitting your arm in.
While doing so I measured your arm with a spring tape measure, from
the shoulder to the cuff. A later visit to your tailor confirmed
that measurement. It proved to be THE EXACT DISTANCE BETWEEN YOUR
CHAIR AND THAT DRAWER!"

I sat stunned.

"The rest are mere corroborative details! You were again tampering
with the drawer when I discovered you doing so! Do not start! The
stranger that blundered into the room with a muffler on--was
myself! More, I had placed a little soap on the drawer handles
when I purposely left you alone. The soap was on your hand when I
shook it at parting. I softly felt your pockets, when you were
asleep, for further developments. I embraced you when you left--
that I might feel if you had the cigar case or any other articles
hidden on your body. This confirmed me in the belief that you had
already disposed of it in the manner and for the purpose I have
shown you. As I still believed you capable of remorse and
confession, I twice allowed you to see I was on your track: once in
the garb of an itinerant negro minstrel, and the second time as a
workman looking in the window of the pawnshop where you pledged
your booty."

"But," I burst out, "if you had asked the pawnbroker, you would
have seen how unjust"--

"Fool!" he hissed, "that was one of YOUR suggestions--to search the