“What!” replied De l’Escalopier; “you a mechanician, and ask how? Come, come, my friend; can you not devise some mechanical means for apprehending a thief?”
Houdin thought a minute, and said quietly: “I’ll see what I can do for you.” Setting to work feverishly, he invented the apparatus, and aided by his two workmen, who remained with him the whole of the night, he had it ready at eight o’clock the next morning. To the nobleman’s house Houdin went. The Count under various pretexts had sent all his servants away, so that no one should be aware of the mechanician’s visit.
While Houdin was placing his apparatus in position, the Count frequently expressed his wonderment at the heavy padded glove which the conjurer wore on his right hand.
“All in good time, my dear Count,” said Houdin. When everything was arranged, the mechanician began his explanation of the working of the secret detective apparatus. “You see, it is like this,” he remarked. “The thief unlocks the desk, but no sooner does he raise the lid, ever so little, than this claw-like piece of mechanism, attached to a light rod, and impelled by a spring, comes sharply down on the back of the hand which holds the key, and at the same time the report of a pistol is heard. The noise is to alarm the household, and——”
“But the glove you wear!” interrupted the nobleman.
“The glove is to protect me from the operation of the steel claw which tattooes the word Robber on the back of the criminal’s hand.”
“How is that accomplished?” said De l’Escalopier.
“Simplest thing in the world,” replied Houdin. “The claw consists of a number of very short but sharp points, so fixed as to form the word: and these points are shoved through a pad soaked with nitrate of silver, a portion of which is forced by the blow into the punctures, thereby making the scars indelible for life. A fleur de lys stamped by an executioner with a red-hot iron could not be more effective.”
“But, M. Houdin,” said the Count, horror-stricken at the idea. “I have no right to anticipate Justice in this way. To brand a fellow-being in such a fashion would forever close the doors of society against him. I could not think of such a thing. Besides, suppose some member of my family through carelessness or forgetfulness were to fall a victim to this dreadful apparatus.”