Under His Thumb — page 31: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

99 UNDER HIS THUMB. Upon another table, over which a mirror hung, were materials for every conceivable disguise that one might wish to assume. ~ Croly took from his pocket the piece which he had cut from the window-sash in the printing-house counting-room. He unwrapped it carefully, and then studied the bloody thumb-print with eager in- tensity. ~Froma shelf he took down a tattered book, and opened it at amarked page. A single line on the printed page was underlined with blue ink. The line read as follows: “The lines on no two human thumbs are oxaatly -_alike.”’ The detective had read this statement a great many times, but never with such vital interest as the present. ~The book was an old, curious affair, containing many wonders of human research and science. It also contained some exploded sophistries, no longer of value. Whether the curious statement underlined by the detective was true or not, Croly was uncertain. He had carefully studied the subject, vaguely im- pressed that at some time it would prove of value to ~ him. What if the print of a human thumb, and the lines upon the same, should at some time prove to be the only clew to a great crime? Often had this thought passed through the detec- tive’s mind; and like a sagacious prophecy, it now seemed likely to be fulfilled. A crime had been committed—a crime enshrouded in deepest mystery, and the only clew, save those of a most superficial character, was this bloody impres- sion on the window-sash., cComicboo ers