midnight
So much for the facts ; as for the construction he wished us to put on them , I felt sure it was absolutely false . He wished to give us the impression that the buried treasure itself was at the root of any mystery we might have scented . I do not know if the reader fully appreciated that astute suggestion -- the hint that secrecy as to results was necessary owing both to the great sum at stake and the flaw in the title , which he had been careful to inform us had passed through British hands . What he meant to imply was , ` Do n't be surprised if you have midnight visitors ; Englishmen prowling along this coast are suspected of being Lloyd 's agents . ' An ingenious insinuation , which , at the time it was made , had caused me to contemplate a new and much more commonplace solution of our enigma than had ever occurred to us ; but it was only a passing doubt , and I dismissed it altogether now . The fact was , it either explained everything or nothing . As long as we held to our fundamental assumption -- that Davies had been decoyed into a death-trap in September -- it explained nothing .