five
o'clock
He took it up , scrutinized it , passed it to his neighbor , he to the next man , and so on until the ingot , going from hand to hand , was transferred to the end of a dark entry ; nor did it return to its place for half an hour . Meanwhile , the cashier had not so much as raised his head . But in the present instance things had not gone so smoothly . The package of notes not being found when five o'clock sounded from the ponderous clock in the `` drawing office , '' the amount was passed to the account of profit and loss . As soon as the robbery was discovered , picked detectives hastened off to Liverpool , Glasgow , Havre , Suez , Brindisi , New York and other ports , inspired by the promised reward of two thousand pounds , and five per cent on the sum that might be recovered . Detectives were also charged with narrowly watching those who arrived at or left London by rail , and a judicial examination was at once entered upon . There were real grounds for supposing , as the Daily Telegraph said , that the thief did not belong to a professional band .