Margaret, who knew where to lay her hand upon every book in her uncle’s library, made haste to produce the volume. ‘There, did not I tell you?’ said Mr. Erin triumphantly. ‘Look at the _W_, look at the _S_.’ Dennis did look at them very carefully. ‘Yes,’ he admitted, ‘there is no doubt that they are fac-similes.’ ‘Fac-similes!’ exclaimed the old man angrily; ‘why not frankly say that they are by the same hand at once?’ ‘But that is begging the whole question,’ argued Dennis, his honest and implastic nature leading him into the selfsame error into which he had fallen at Charlecote Park. ‘It is surely more likely upon the whole that an autograph purporting to be Shakespeare’s should be a fac-simile than an original.’ ‘Or, in other words,’ answered Mr. Erin, with a burst of indignation, ‘it is more likely that this lad here, poor William Henry’ (the ‘poor’ sounded almost like ‘poor dear’), ‘should have imposed upon us than not.’ ‘Oh no, oh no,’ interposed Margaret earnestly; ‘I am sure that Mr. Dennis never meant to suggest that.’ ‘Then what the deuce did he mean by his fac-simile?’ ejaculated the antiquary, with irritation. ‘Look at the up-strokes; look at the down-strokes.’ ‘You have made an accusation against me, Mr. Erin,’ said Frank Dennis, speaking under strong emotion, ‘which is at once most cruel and undeserved. If I thought myself capable of doing an injury to William Henry, or especially of sowing any suspicion of him in your mind, I—I would go and drown myself in the river yonder.’ Mr. Erin only said, ‘Umph,’ in such a tone that it sounded like ‘Then go and do it.’ ‘How is it possible that in throwing any doubt upon the genuineness of that document,’ continued the other, ‘I should be imputing anything to its finder? Nor, indeed, have I cast any doubt on it. I know nothing about it.’ ‘Then why offer an opinion?’ put in the old man implacably. ‘At all events, sir, I hazarded none as to how the thing came into William Henry’s possession.’ ‘Tut, tut,’ replied the antiquary, once more reverting to the precious document, ‘who cares how he got it? The point is that we have it here; not only Shakespeare’s handwriting, but a most incontestable proof, to such as ever doubted it, of his honour and punctuality in discharge of his just debts. William Henry, I have been mistaken in you, my lad. I will honestly confess that I had built no such hopes upon you. When I lost my poor Samuel [a son that died in infancy], I never thought to be made happy by anything a boy could do again. This is the proudest moment of my life—to have under my own roof, to see with my own eyes, to touch with my own fingers, the actual handwriting of William Shakespeare.’ Then, with a sigh like one who returns to another something he himself fain would keep, as knowing far more how to value it, he folded up the document, and returned it to William Henry.