The bookshelf was dusty, from decades of disinterest.
The curiousity-shop, down the way, offered fateful clues and fragments of information.
A china doll here, and a prayer book there. Mr Punch surveyed the scene, and
decided all was as it should be. His face smiled out from the glassy sheen of a
handpainted slide. Somewhere a magic lantern was expected to
illuminate his grotesque features.