Summary

When Dunston Ramsay shows no aptitude for his father’s business of printing, he works at the library as an under-librarian. There, he is able to read to his heart’s content, and he begins to study magic and conjuring, with the intention of becoming a professional magician. Dunston meets Paul Dempster there, and teaches him to work with coins and cards. Reverend Amasa Dempster finds out about this, and exiles Ramsay from the house. Not only has Ramsay taught Paul gambling and thieving ways, but he has been telling him stories out of a Catholic book of saints, and Reverend Amasa Dempster accuses him of indoctrinating Paul in Popish ways. Reverend Amasa Dempster threatens to give Dunston Ramsay a beating, or to tell Ramsay’s parents, but Ramsay calls his bluff, and does not take a beating. Neither does Reverend Amasa Dempster call...