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A most careful search had failed to discover it in the room.

Therefore it must have been taken from it.

But neither the Colonel nor the Colonel's wife could have taken it.

That was perfectly clear.

Therefore a third person must have entered the room.

And that third person could only have come in through the window.

It seemed to me that a careful examination of the room and the lawn might possibly reveal some traces of this mysterious individual.

You know my methods, Watson.

There was not one of them which I did not apply to the inquiry.

And it ended by my discovering traces, but very different ones from those which I had expected.

There had been a man in the room, and he had crossed the lawn coming from the road.

I was able to obtain five very clear impressions of his foot-marks: one in the roadway itself, at the point where he had climbed the low wall, two on the lawn, and two very faint ones upon the stained boards near the window where he had entered.

He had apparently rushed across the lawn, for his toe-marks were much deeper than his heels.

But it was not the man who surprised me.

It was his companion."

"His companion!"

Holmes pulled a large sheet of tissue-paper out of his pocket and carefully unfolded it upon his knee.

"What do you make of that?" he asked.

The paper was covered with he tracings of the foot-marks of some small animal. It had five well-marked foot-pads, an indication of long nails, and the whole print might be nearly as large as a dessert-spoon.

"It's a dog," said I.

"Did you ever hear of a dog running up a curtain? I found distinct traces that this creature had done so."

"A monkey, then?"

"But it is not the print of a monkey."

"What can it be, then?"

"Neither dog nor cat nor monkey nor any creature that we are familiar with.

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