These things being accomplished, I was free to bend my mind to the question of the restitution of the little Verrocchio; and this I had to work out absolutely alone. I could not even tell Naomi, even under that elastic understanding which is held to entitle married people to share secrets entrusted to either, for although I am no believer in the old saying that no woman can keep a secret, or, rather, do not believe that a woman is less of an oyster in these matters than a man, yet I did not wish to burden her with so good a forbidden mystery. I do not say she would have been embarrassed to retain it; but even the most cautious of us have a way now and then of dressing up a friend's confidence vaguely, with several removes, and so forth, which, though safe enough in some companies, might give everything away to a clever listener who was acquainted with one's circle. Anyway I did not tell her. The only real temptation which I had to break the dead man's injunction, was to tell Lacey. Lacey would not only have been useful, but he would have so enjoyed it. I did not even dare to skirt the subject with him, to get the benefit of his improvisations. Furley, too, what would he not have given to be in a position to "film" me (as he calls it) with the famous picture under my arm on the errand of restitution! I began--as I guess most criminals do, and I was a kind of inverted criminal with all a criminal's desire for secrecy--by inventing elaborate schemes, the cleverest things you ever heard of. But I gave them all up in favour of the most obvious commonplace simplicity. Having decided what to do, I waited three months and then did it. The delay was due to the fear that if I acted at once, two and two might easily be put together, since Carstairs had left all his money--no inconsiderable sum--to the National Art Collections Fund, and a comparison of dates might lead to investigation, and an interview with the Misses Packer or Mrs. Wiles might educe the fact of the locked cupboard, and then perhaps there would be a cross-examination of myself, from which the truth would probably emerge. At least, so I feared. I therefore allowed the parcel to remain among my papers--every night waking up convinced the house was on fire, and never leaving it without expecting to find only ashes on my return--and at the end of three months I chose a moment when everyone was out, and in broad day conveyed the parcel to the cloak-room of that very centre of bustle and incuriosity, the Piccadilly Circus Tube station, where in the thick of passengers and chorus girls, I deposited it and paid my twopence. The boy gave me my ticket without lifting his eyes, and I again merged with the crowd. I had already printed on a piece of plain paper an intimation that if the Director of the National Gallery would send for the parcel concerned, he would not regret the deed, and this I enclosed with the ticket in an envelope, and dropped it into the post.