The writer wrinkled his nose as 3 people came forth not getting the items they bid on
"Most dissapointing", he said, "Well I do have some good news, bad news and worse news".
"The good news is that I got the item I bid on. The bad news is that the item was a complete dud (though this might be good news if the other stolen items were also duds). The worse news is I anticipated someone might try to steal from the minimum bidders, so I bid 117 dollars on my pile of nothing, leaving 888 dollars in bids unnacounted for, meaning that unless other people did the same as I did, there are multiple people who decided to bid when they agreed not to."