"Who says they are rusty?"

"Who says it! They _are_ rusty!" shrieked the old man. "You'd like to
get me into a madhouse, you boys would, worrying me! I'll show you
whether they're rusty! I'll show you whether there's a second brace o'
keys or not. I'll show 'em to the head-master! I'll show 'em to the
dean! I'll show 'em again to his lordship the bi--What's gone of the
keys?"

The last sentence was uttered in a different tone and in apparent
perplexity. With shaking hands, excited by passion, Mr. Ketch was
rummaging the knife-box--an old, deep, mahogany tray, dark with age,
divided by a partition--rummaging for the rusty keys. He could not find
them. He searched on this side, he searched on that; he pulled out the
contents, one by one: a black-handled knife, a white-handled fork, a
green-handled knife with a broken point, and a brown-handled fork with
one prong, which comprised his household cutlery; a small whetstone, a
comb and a blacking-brush, a gimlet and a small hammer, some leather
shoe-strings, three or four tallow candles, a match-box and an
extinguisher, the key of his door, the bolt of his casement window, and
a few other miscellanies. He could not come upon the false keys, and,
finally, he made a snatch at the tray, and turned it upside down. The
keys were not there.

When he had fully taken in the fact--it cost him some little time to do
it--he turned his anger upon Bywater.

"You have took 'em, you have! you have turned thief, and stole 'em! I
put 'em here in the knife-box, and they are gone! What have you done