Boyd reddened. “Oh, don’t josh, sir. What I mean is, here are we with as clear a case as ever there was, and yet there are you, a gentleman who’s no amateur, still searching around and—and trying to make another criminal, so to speak.”
“It’s not a bit of good trying to get me to explain what I’m doing, Boyd, because I don’t know myself. I’m groping—and it’s devilish dark. There is a little light, but I don’t know where it’s coming from—yet. But I will.” He fell silent; then added in a different tone: “Look here: we’ll take it that I’m mad and that the law is sane. But will you help me in my madness? Just one or two little things?”
“As far as I can, sir,” Boyd said solemnly, “of course I will.”
“You’re a good fellow, Boyd,” said Anthony warmly, “and you can start now.” He stopped the car and turned in his seat. “Where’s the Bow—I mean the wood-rasp?”
“At present it’s at the station. Where we’re going. To-morrow it’ll be taken up to the Yard.”
“Can I see it this evening?”
“You can, sir, seeing that you’re an old friend, if I may say so.”
“Excellent man!”
“Look here, sir,” Boyd took a wallet from his pocket; from the wallet some photographs. “You might care to see these. Enlargements of the finger-prints.”
Anthony took the six pieces of thin pasteboard and bent eagerly to examine them. They had been taken, these photographs, from three points of view. They showed that the handle of the rasp had been marked by a thumb and two fingers—all pointing downwards towards the blade.