“O, what have I done?” exclaimed Miss Tollicks. “What is the matter?”
“Nothing, nothing,” said Septimus, looking in a dreary, bewildered way at Matt. “It’s of no use; it’s my usual ill luck, and it’s of no use to fight against it.”
“I never saw such a thing in my life!” cried Matt, bringing his fist down upon the table so that the glasses jumped again. “Put it in a book, and no one would believe it: and yet there it is. I wouldn’t have believed it myself if I had not seen it with my own eyes.”
“But where is the piece you tore it from?” exclaimed Septimus, trembling still.
“To be sure!” cried Matt exultingly. “But I was right—I did see it, and she bought it, and Ikey brought it here, and it’ll all come right yet.—Where’s the piece you tore it from, ma’am?” and he again greatly endangered Miss Tollicks’ glasses by thumping the table.
Miss Tollicks hastily produced the other half of the square of paper; but on one side the list of names was continued, while upon the other there was the tail of a flourish, the tops of a few letters, and the rest was blank.
“Have you any more of these sheets—these book-leaves?” exclaimed Septimus; when Miss Tollicks hastily took up the little heap on the chair by the door, the same that had excited Matt’s curiosity, and into which he had been quietly peering.
“Those are not the same,” said Septimus despondently; “this is thicker.”
“Yes,” said Miss Tollicks dolefully, as she examined the few remaining squares upon the counter; “these are all different, too, and I don’t know how that scrap came to be left. I used all that thick paper first, because it weighed well, and I used it for screws.”
“But,” stammered Septimus, “it is a part of the very man’s books—the very man who lived here, and about whom we came to ask you.”