"Perfectly sure. I'll swear to it."

"Good. Now stand still. Come here, Groener. Reach out your arms as if you
were going to choke this young man. Don't be afraid, he won't hurt you. No,
no, the other arm! I want you to put your _left_ hand, on his neck with the
nails of your thumb and fingers exactly on these marks. I said exactly.
There is the thumb--right! Now the first finger--good! Now the third! And
now the little finger! Don't cramp it up, reach it out. Ah!"

With breathless interest Coquenil watched the test, and, as the long little
finger slowly extended to its full length, he felt a sudden mad desire to
shout or leap in the pure joy of victory, for the nails of the prisoner's
left hand corresponded exactly with the nail marks on the shrimp
photographer's neck!

CHAPTER XXIV

THIRTY IMPORTANT WORDS

"Now, Groener," resumed the magistrate after the shrimp had withdrawn, "why
were you walking along this hotel balcony on the night of July 4th?"

"I wasn't," answered the prisoner coolly.

"The photographer positively identifies you."

"He's mistaken, I wasn't there."

"Ah," smiled Hauteville, with irritating affability. "You'll need a better
defense than that."

"Whatever I need I shall have," came the sharp retort.

"Have you anything to say about those finger-nail marks?"

"Nothing."

"There's a peculiarity about those marks, Groener. The little finger of the
hand that made them is abnormally, extraordinarily long. Experts say that
in a hundred thousand hands you will not find one with so long a little
finger, perhaps not one in a million. It happens that _you_ have such a
hand and such a little finger. Strange, is it not?"

"Call it strange, if you like," shrugged the prisoner.

"Well, _isn't_ it strange? Just think, if all the men in Paris should try
to fit their fingers in those finger marks, there would be only two or
three who could reach the extraordinary span of that little finger."

"Nonsense! There might be fifty, there might be five hundred."

"Even so, only one of those fifty or five hundred would be positively
identified as the man who choked the photographer _and that one is
yourself_. There is the point; we have against you the evidence of Godin
who _saw_ you that night and _remembers_ you, and the evidence of your own
hand."

So clearly was the charge made that, for the first time, the prisoner
dropped his scoffing manner and listened seriously.

"Admit, for the sak