Part 16 (1/2)
Harren turned white.
”Not that I doubt that _you_ can see it,” pursued the Tracer calmly. ”I simply repeat that I see absolutely nothing on this paper except a part of a curtain, a window pane, and--and--”
”What! for G.o.d's sake!” cried Harren hoa.r.s.ely.
”I don't know yet. Wait; let me study it.”
”Can you not see her face, her eyes? _Don't_ you see that exquisite slim figure standing there by the curtain?” demanded Harren, laying his shaking finger on the photograph. ”Why, man, it is as clear, as clean cut, as distinct as though the picture had been taken in sunlight! Do you mean to say that there is nothing there--that I am crazy?”
”No. Wait.”
”Wait! How can I wait when you sit staring at her picture and telling me that you can't see it, but that it is doubtless there? Are you deceiving me, Mr. Keen? Are you trying to humor me, trying to be kind to me, knowing all the while that I'm crazy--”
”Wait, man! You are no more crazy than I am. I tell you that I can see something on the window pane--”
He suddenly sprang up and walked to the window, leaning close and examining the gla.s.s. Harren followed and laid his hand lightly over the pane.
”Do you see any marks on the gla.s.s?” demanded Keen.
Harren shook his head.
”Have you a magnifying gla.s.s?” asked the Tracer.
Harren pointed back to the table, and they returned to the photograph, the Tracer bending over it and examining it through the gla.s.s.
”All I see,” he said, still studying the photograph, ”is a corner of a curtain and a window on which certain figures seem to have been cut.
. . . Look, Captain Harren, can you see them?”
”I see some marks--some squares.”
”You can't see anything written on that pane--as though cut by a diamond?”
”Nothing distinct.”
”But you see _her_?”
”Perfectly.”
”In minute detail?”
”Yes.”
The Tracer thought a moment: ”Does she wear a ring?”
”Yes; can't you see?”
”Draw it for me.”
They seated themselves side by side, and Harren drew a rough sketch of the ring which he insisted was so plainly visible on her hand:
[Ill.u.s.tration: Ring with an X]