“Got all the dope here.” Snitkin crossed to the Sergeant, and held out a long Manila envelope. “There wasn’t no trouble in checking the measurements and cutting the patterns. But they’re not going to be a hell of a lot of good, I’m thinking. There’s ten million guys more or less in this country who coulda made ’em.”
Heath had opened the envelope and drawn forth a thin white cardboard pattern which looked like an inner sole of a shoe.
“It wasn’t no pigmy who made this print,” he remarked.
“That’s the catch in it,” explained Snitkin. “The size don’t mean nothing much, for it ain’t a shoe-track. Those footprints were made by galoshes, and there’s no telling how much bigger they were than the guy’s foot. They mighta been worn over a shoe anywheres from a size eight to a size ten, and with a width anywheres from an A to a D.”
Heath nodded with obvious disappointment.
“You’re sure about ’em being galoshes?” He was reluctant to let what promised to be a valuable clew slip away.
“You can’t get around it. The rubber tread was distinct in several places, and the shallow, scooped heel stood out plain as day. Anyhow, I got Jerym[12] to check up on my findings.”
Snitkin’s gaze wandered idly to the floor of the clothes-closet.
“Those are the kind of things that made the tracks.” He pointed to a pair of high arctics which had been thrown carelessly under a boot-shelf. Then he leaned over and picked up one of them. As his eye rested on it he gave a grunt. “This looks like the size, too.” He took the pattern from the Sergeant’s hand and laid it on the sole of the overshoe. It fitted as perfectly as if the two had been cut simultaneously.
Heath was startled out of his depression.