"My dear Maydew," he said, "might not that have been done on purpose?"
Then I scored off him.
"It is just because it might have been done on purpose," I said, "that I think it was done accidentally."
He nodded.
"Of course, it may be the work of a kid," he admitted. "But, on the other hand, it may be a subterfuge. Besides, no kid would have killed my guinea-pig. Where's the motive?"
"The great thing is that you've got half-a-sovereign and we share pocket-money," I said.
But he attached little importance to this, except to say that the half-sov. wasn't pocket-money, though I might have half.
"Now, examine the paper," he went on.
I did so. It was a sheet of one of our ordinary, lined copybooks, used for dictation, composition, exercises, and such like.
"Evidently torn out of one of the copybooks," I said.