If we had gone to the police and told our tale, the
news would have spread, and would certainly have reached the Chinaman's
ears. We knew well enough that if we were to get our property back the
thief must not be alarmed--there must be nothing in the newspapers next
morning. The Chinaman must not know that the real owners of the diamond
and the bank-notes suspected him--he must not know that information about
his booty was likely to be given to the police. He must be left to
believe--for some hours at any rate--that what he had possessed himself of
was the property of a dead man who could not tell anything. But there
was my book in that dead man's parlour! It was impossible to go back and
fetch it. It was equally impossible that it should not attract attention.
Daniel Multenius's granddaughter, whom I believed to be a very sharp young
woman, would notice it, and would know that it had come into the place
during her absence. I thought hard over that problem--and finally I
drafted an advertisement and sent it off to an agency with instructions to
insert it in every morning newspaper in London next day.
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