“Here’s another curious point, Patsy.”
“Namely?”
“The two women, if their shoes have any significance, were of a decidedly opposite class,” said Nick. “One wore a narrow, high-heeled shoe, denoting a woman of fashion and means. The heels of the other were broad, both badly worn, and there was a patch on one of the soles. The patch has left its mark in some of these imprints, and the run-down condition of both heels appears in the indentations left by them.”
“I see,” said Patsy. “It’s as plain as twice two.”
“This woman must be of an opposite class, then, from the other. She wears patched shoes, with the heels half gone, indicating that she cannot afford new ones.”
“That’s a sane-and-safe deduction, chief, surely.”
“Here is evidence warranting still another.”
“How so?”
“Note that all the imprints of the high-heeled shoes overlap and partly obliterate those of the cheaper ones,” Nick pointed out. “Plainly, then, the wearer of the former was here later than the other. They were not here together, moreover, or their tracks would not be so intermingled.”
“I see the point, chief.”