What the official said was true. Under the magic of the gray powder a mixture of thumb prints appeared on the magazine of the rifle which Jimmy had prized so highly. Some of the thumb prints were long and narrow. Those were the marks of Jimmy’s hands. Overlapping them in some cases, and in one or two instances, standing out alone, could be seen larger, coarser finger prints. Where a man would place his thumb in the process of aiming the rifle, were two exceptionally clear prints.
In each of them appeared the tiny flaws in the configuration of the strange lines of the skin, lines which scientists have been at a loss to explain, unless, in some mysterious way, they aid the sense of touch. The flaws caused a slight interruption of the flowing, parallel lines, almost in the center of the thumb.
“Can you convict on evidence like that?” asked Bertram.
“Finger-print evidence is absolute. Some Frenchman has figured up the chances of error, and he had to get into fractional atoms before he arrived at a result.”
“How about the chances of some one else having a scar like this one.”
“There again you’ll get into the atomic fractions. Some other person might have a scar made by a blade, or a deep, jagged scar, made by a barbwire fence or something of that sort which tears instead of cuts; or there might be another person with a single small scar on the thumb, but for any one to have a double scar like this would be so nearly impossible, that you might as well throw the fractions away and say that the thing couldn’t be.”
The Texan looked thoughtfully at the comparative evidence on the table. “How are you going ahead, now that you’ve got this far, Woods?” he asked. The district attorney looked troubled. “I know I can be frank with you,” he replied. “I can’t see that I’m much better off than when I started. Right now is where I need the strongest kind of help from the sheriff, and this is just the time I can’t call on him. He’s been indifferent, right from the start.”
“Indifference is what he was put in there to show,” responded the Texan. “He’s simply delivering the goods to those who have hired him.”
“Well, whatever the reason, I’m brought up against a blank wall. I’ve thought that I could enlist a little force of my own, a few men like yourself and Archie Beam. I don’t want to make the mistake of getting those who are too deeply interested on the rustler side of this war, or they’d be dragging in some of their personal enemies, just to square their own accounts.”
“Well, you know you can count on me,” said Bertram, “but I don’t reckon it will be necessary to have a whole posse in on this thing.”