We all have our own ideas, but my belief is that if someone as volatile as Barrett believed for one second that the diary was something other than the modern fake he knew it to be, he never would have transferred its ownership to Robert Smith for a one-pound note. No way.
This is the same bloke who couldn't help brag about the diary on his train ride home from London (which is what allowed Brough to trace him) and who is said to have waved his first royalty check in the air down the boozer. It is well-known that he blew his profits like a drunken sailor. If Barrett didn't know the diary was a fake, and didn't fear getting sent to the slammer, he would have tried to sell it at Sotheby's for a lot more than Johnson tried to sell the watch to Robert E. Davis. Albert Johnson might have been an innocent dupe--I can't say---but Barret surely wasn't. That Barrett sought to have the diary published--which is far more of a gray area legally--instead of selling it outright is significant in itself.
This is the same bloke who couldn't help brag about the diary on his train ride home from London (which is what allowed Brough to trace him) and who is said to have waved his first royalty check in the air down the boozer. It is well-known that he blew his profits like a drunken sailor. If Barrett didn't know the diary was a fake, and didn't fear getting sent to the slammer, he would have tried to sell it at Sotheby's for a lot more than Johnson tried to sell the watch to Robert E. Davis. Albert Johnson might have been an innocent dupe--I can't say---but Barret surely wasn't. That Barrett sought to have the diary published--which is far more of a gray area legally--instead of selling it outright is significant in itself.
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