FINAL PROOF

OR

THE VALUE OF EVIDENCE

BY

R. OTTOLENGUI

author of "an artist in crime," "a conflict of evidence,"
"the crime of the century," etc.

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS

NEW YORK AND LONDON

The Knickerbocker Press

1898

Copyright, 1898

BY

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS

Entered at Stationers' Hall, London

The Knickerbocker Press, New York

PREFATORY

The first meeting between Mr. Barnes, the detective, and Robert Leroy Mitchel, the gentleman who imagines himself to be able to outdo detectives in their own line of work, was fully set forth in the narrative entitled An Artist in Crime. Subsequently the two men occupied themselves with the solution of a startling murder mystery, the details of which were recorded in The Crime of the Century. The present volume contains the history of several cases which attracted their attention in the interval between those already given to the world, the first having occured shortly after the termination of the events in An Artist in Crime, and the others in the order here given, so that in a sense these stories are continuous and interdependent.

R. O.

CONTENTS

PAGE

I

The Phœnix of Crime 1

II

The Missing Link 132

III

The Nameless Man 151

IV

The Montezuma Emerald 169

V

A Singular Abduction 189

VI

The Aztec Opal 210

VII

The Duplicate Harlequin 230

VIII

The Pearls of Isis 261

IX

A Promissory Note 294

X

A Novel Forgery 325

XI

A Frosty Morning 341

XII

A Shadow of Proof 365

FINAL PROOF

OR

THE VALUE OF EVIDENCE

FINAL PROOF

I

THE PHŒNIX OF CRIME

I

Mr. Mitchel was still at breakfast one morning, when the card of Mr. Barnes was brought to him by his man Williams.

"Show Mr. Barnes in here," said he. "I imagine that he must be in a hurry to see me, else he would not call so early."

A few minutes later the detective entered, saying:

"It is very kind of you to let me come in without waiting. I hope that I am not intruding."

"Not at all. As to being kind, why I am kind to myself. I knew you must have something interesting on hand to bring you around so early, and I am proportionately curious; at the same time I hate to go without my coffee, and I do not like to drink it too fast, especially good coffee, and this is good, I assure you. Draw up and have a cup, for I observe that you came off in such a hurry this morning that you did not get any."

"Why, thank you, I will take some, but how do you know that I came off in a hurry and had no coffee at home? It seems to me that if you can tell that, you are becoming as clever as the famous Sherlock Holmes."

"Oh, no, indeed! You and I can hardly expect to be as shrewd as the detectives of romance. As to my guessing that you have had no coffee, that is not very troublesome. I notice three drops of milk on your coat, and one on your shoe, from which I deduce, first, that you have had no coffee, for a man who has his coffee in the morning is not apt to drink a glass of milk besides. Second, you must have left home in a hurry, or you would have had that coffee. Third, you took your glass of milk at the ferry-house of the Staten Island boat, probably finding that you had a minute to spare; this is evident because the milk spots on the tails of your frock-coat and on your shoe show that you were standing when you drank, and leaned over to avoid dripping the fluid on your clothes. Had you been seated, the coat tails would have been spread apart, and drippings would have fallen on your trousers. The fact that in spite of