noon
`` Telling him no more of the story than was necessary to insure his co-operation in the plan I had formed to discover the author of this fraud , I extracted the bank-notes from the letter I had written , and put in their place stiff pieces of manilla paper . Taking the envelope so filled to the hotel already alluded to , I placed it at the opening chapters of Isaiah in the Bible as described . There was no one in either of the rooms when I went in , and I encountered only a bell-boy as I came out ; but at the door I ran against a young man whom I strictly forbore to recognize , but whom I knew to be my improvised detective coming to take his stand in some place where he could watch the parlor , and note who went into it . `` At noon I returned to the hotel , passed immediately to the small parlor , and looked into the Bible . The letter was gone . Coming out of the room , I was at once joined by my detective . '' ` Has the letter been taken ? '