"We knew that he would try to do so, and we did everything in our power to prevent it. We especially relied upon your customs department to search most thoroughly the belongings of every person with whom they were not personally acquainted." "The customs people did their part," said Godfrey with a chuckle. "They have quite upset the country! But the diamonds got in, in spite of them. For, of course, a cabinet imported by a man so well known and so above suspicion as Mr. Vantine was passed without question!" "Yes," agreed M. Pigot, a little bitterly. "It was a most clever plan; and now, no doubt, Crochard can sell the brilliants at his leisure." "Not if you've got a good description of them," protested Grady. "I'll make it a point to warn every dealer in the country; I'll keep my whole force on the job; I'll get Chief Wilkie to lend me some of his men...." "Oh, there is no use taking all that trouble," broke in Godfrey, negligently. "Crochard won't try to sell them." "Won't try to sell them?" echoed Grady. "What's the reason he won't?" "Because he hasn't got them," answered Godfrey, smiling with an evidently deep enjoyment of Grady's dazed countenance. "Oh, come off!" said that worthy disgustedly. "If he hasn't got 'em I'd like to know who has!" "I have," said Godfrey, and cleared my desk with a sweep of his arm. "Spread out your handkerchief, Lester," and as I dazedly obeyed, he picked up the little leather bag, opened it, and poured out its contents in a sparkling flood. "There," he added, turning to Grady, "are the Michaelovitch diamonds." CHAPTER XXVIII CROCHARD WRITES AN EPILOGUE For an instant, we gazed at the glittering heap with dazzled eyes; then Grady, with an inarticulate cry, sprang to his feet and picked up a handful of the diamonds, as though to convince himself of their reality. "But I don't understand!" he gasped. "Have you got Croshar too?" "No such luck," said Godfrey. "Do you mean to say he'd give these up without a fight!" The same thought was in my own mind; if Godfrey had run down Crochard and got the diamonds, without a life-and-death struggle, that engaging rascal must be much less formidable than I had supposed. "My dear Grady," said Godfrey, "I haven't seen Crochard since the minute you took him off the boat. I'd have had him, if you had let Simmonds call me. That's what I had planned. But he was too clever for us. I knew that he would come to-day...." "You knew that he would come to-day?" repeated Grady blankly. "How did you know that--or is it merely hot air?" "I knew that he would come," said Godfrey, curtly, "because he wrote and told me so." M. Pigot laughed a dry little laugh. "That is a favourite device of his," he said; "and he always keeps his word."