her. We did nothing to disabuse anybody of the notion; both I and my
friend had money in Hong Kong, and we took it up and went off to
Singapore. As for our Chinaman, Chuh, he said farewell to us and
vanished as soon as we got back to Hong-Kong, and we never set eyes on
him again until very recently, when I ran across him in a Chinese
eating-house in Poplar."

"From that meeting, I suppose, the more recent chapters of your story
begin?" I suggested. "Or do they begin somewhat earlier?"

"A bit earlier," he said. "My friend and I came back to England a
little before that--with money in our pockets--we'd been very lucky in
the East--and with a friend of ours, a Chinese gentleman, mind you, we
decided to go in for a little profitable work of another sort, and to
start out by lifting my concealed belongings up here. So we bought
this craft in Hull--then ran her down to the Thames--then, as I say, I
came across Lo Chuh Fen and got his services and those of two other
compatriots of his, then in London, and--here we are! You see how
candid I am--do you know why?"

"It would be interesting to know, Mr. Baxter," said Miss Raven.
"Please tell us."

"Well," he said, with a queer deliberation. "Some men in my position
would have thought nothing about putting bullets through both of you
when we met this afternoon--you hit on our secret. But I'm not that
sort--I treat you as what you are, a gentlewoman and a gentleman, and
no harm whatever shall come to you. Therefore, I feel certain that all
I've said and am saying to you will be treated as it ought to be--by
you. I daresay you think I'm an awful scoundrel, but I told you I was
an Ishmael--and I certainly haven't got the slightest compunction
about appropriating the stuff in those chests on deck--one of the
Forestburnes stole it from the monks--why shouldn't I steal it from
his successor? It's as much mine as his--perhaps more so, for one of
my ancestors, a certain Geoffrey de Knaytheville, was at one time Lord
Abbot of the very house that the Forestburnes stole that stuff from!
I reckon I've a prior claim, Middlebrook?"

"I should imagine," I answered, guardedly, "that it would be very
difficult for anybody to substantiate a claim to ecclesiastical
property--of that particular nature--which disappeared in the
sixteenth century. What is certain, however, is that you've got it.
Take my advice--hand it over to the authorities!"

He looked at me in blank astonishment for a moment