He had now got Mr. Sagittarius into a very awkward bit of country
between the letter P. in the rack, under which reposed Miss Partridge's
correspondence, and the newspaper bureau, with the counter immediately
on his rear, and taking advantage of this circumstance, he continued
rapidly:

"May I ask whether you recently received a letter--one
moment!--envelope--crest--I only want to know if you have
received--only--an elephant rampant--swarm of--of bees--"

"I have never received a rampant elephant and a swarm of bees," cried
Mr. Sagittarius with every symptom of unbridled terror. "Help, Frederick
Smith!"

"Right you are, Malkiel the Second!" cried the young librarian, hastily
pocketing the half sovereign and making a feverish lunge at nothing in
particular over the counter. "Right you are!"

"Malkiel the Second!" ejaculated the Prophet. "Then you are the man I
seek."

Malkiel the Second--for it was indeed he--sank back against the counter
in an attitude of abandoned prostration that would have made a fortune
of a comic actor.

"I trusted to Jellybrand's," he said, drawing from his tail pocket a
white handkerchief covered with a pattern of pink storks in flight. "I
trusted to Jellybrand's and Jellybrand's has betrayed me. Oh, Frederick
Smith!"