He may, if he be shrewd enough, anticipate the serving of the owner’s claim and secure himself against a possible loss by selling back for a consideration the goods in question to the one from whom he bought them.  But this cannot be done after the claim is presented; besides, this proceeding must not render it impossible for the owner to recover his property; and he must be notified as to the whereabouts of said property.  This manoeuvre works injustice unto no one.  The owner stands in the same relation to his property as formerly; the subsequent holder assumes an obligation that was always his, to refund the goods or their value, with recourse against the antecedent seller.

The moment a person shirks the responsibility of refunding the possessions, by him legitimately acquired, but belonging rightfully to another, that person becomes a possessor in bad faith and stands towards the rightful owner in the position of a thief.  Not in a thousand years will he be able to prescribe a just title to the goods.  The burden of restitution will forever remain on him; if the goods perish, no matter how, he must make good the loss to the owner.  He must also disburse the sum total of profits gathered from the illegal use of said goods.  If values fluctuate during the interval of criminal possession, he must compute the amount of his debt according to the values that prevailed at the time the lawful owner would have disposed of his goods, had he retained possession.

Finally, there may be a doubt as to whether the object I possess is rightfully mine or not.  I must do my best to solve that doubt and dear the title to ownership.  If I fail, I may consider the object mine and may use it as such.  If the owner turn up after the prescribed time, so much the worse for the owner.  An uncertainty may exist, not as to my proprietorship, but as to whom the thing does belong.  If my possession began in good faith and I am unable to determine the ownership, I may consider myself the owner until further developments shed more light on the matter.

It is different when the object was originally acquired in bad faith.  In such a case, first, the ill-gotten goods can never be mine; then, there is no sanction in reason, conscience or law for the conduct of those who run immediately to the first charitable institution and leave there their conscience money; or who have masses said for the repose of the souls of those who have been defrauded, before they are dead at all perhaps.  My first care must be to locate the victim; or, if he be certainly deceased or evidently beyond reach, the heirs of the victim of my fraud.  When all means fail and I am unable to find either the owner or his heirs, then, and not till then, may I dispose of the goods in question.  I must assume in such a contingency as this, that the will of the owner would be to expend the sum on the most worthy cause; and that is charity.  The only choice then that remains with me is, what hospital, asylum or other enterprise of charity is to profit by my sins, since I myself cannot be a gainer in the premises.