My thanks to the good Doctor for his timely comments on my recent memorandum, and his admirable addition to our hoax for officialdom, already well stocked with lies and half-truths by my own efforts but now positively overflowing with deceit and casuistical trickery. Herewith some few comments of my own.

As to what's wrong with me, I will already and indeed have already claimed to be ill. I can claim to have underplayed the severity. Naturally I would have wanted to find some place on the train a little less public to have a major seizure, and I apologize if anyone thought I had jumped (really the only person who would have seen this was that one lady, as the undertaker wasn't paying attention, annd she can be said to have been made hysterical when the catch on the door went. Ladies do that), but it was really as simple as that. Though I hadn't anticipated it would be quite this bad.

Quite, although the matter of the good Doctor's disappearance is a matter for concern. As far as I remember, he reappeared in the train some time after vanishing; does anyone have a plausible-sounding explanation for his being overlooked for such a long period?

One further question: why did we purchase such a vast quantity of vinegar and iron filings? For this one I have no answer, but if there is an investigation, this is sure to turn up. Any suggestions?

Some as of yet undisclosed crackpot scheme may account for such bizarre behaviour; certainly, the iron filings can be blamed on Science. Let us surmise that Persicue overhears comments of mine concerning the jolly interesting experiments one can do with iron filings and a magnet. Having partaken more than is perhaps wise, he is fired with enthusiasm for this idea, and promptly tells one of us (whichever of us actually bought the iron filings) to go and buy *vast quantities of iron filings*. (Imagine, if you will, Persicue's voice saying this exact phrase; you will, I hope, admit it is characteristic of his normal pronouncements.) Note that this explanation does not require us to have a magnet, not even a particularly large one; the lack of a magnet may have been discovered only later, after the filings were already ordered.

I have no idea about the vinegar, however; perhaps one of you has knowledge of a jovial party trick that can be performed with vinegar?

Another, disturbing thought, occurs to me though: iron filings may be discovered near the burnt-out ruins of the church, despite our efforts to conceal them, and despite the likely churning up of the nearby ground by hordes of relatives and investigators flocking to the scene. Suggestions?

Charles

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