Dunkle, "I wish you'd told me you wanted that manuscript back. For, do you know, I've burnt it. I'm awfully sorry, but we burnt the other, you'll remember, and I suppose I acted from force of habit. I was rather brain-weary after a fortnight's almost uninterrupted copying, and I suppose I didn't quite realise what I was doing. Why ever didn't you tell me you wanted the thing back? I shall never forgive myself for this."
The Archdeacon smiled indulgently. "Well, well," he said, "no matter. If it's burnt, it's burnt, and there's an end of it. But it's of no consequence, and you mustn't distress yourself, my dear boy. The thing would have come in rather handily, of course, in the event of your declining to keep your promise to admit my authorship of 'Trixie' and this new book, for I could have produced it
