S frankly answers all of the questions of the two demonstrators without pause. Admittedly the questions are not very personal to S, and they do not reveal any information that he would have any reason to conceal, but evidently S has decided he must trust these two men, since there isn’t much else he can do. This is most of the extent of Ship of Theseus on this page-simply continuing the action of the previous page as S moves towards the reason he’s in the city.

The footnote and the margin notes are much more significant.

Eric shows that he cares about Jen by offering advice to her- “You should tell your profs (+Ilsa) something about why you were gone,” (80) to which she responds that she has all but given up hope for her professors or the disciplinary committee trusting her since she has already gotten in trouble multiple times. Eric is clearly frustrated with her position, writing:
“You’re right. I just wish I could do something.“ (80) He underlines “something” twice, showing how strongly he feels about the situation, and thus how strongly he feels about Jen.

In the footnote, VMS notes and that most of the candidates for Straka did not get married. “It is as if the reading body-politic shares, across cultures, an aversion to believing that men could produce works…without cutting themselves off from spouses, children, and intimate friends.” (80) VMS expresses disdain for this idea, which could show that VMS may have had interest in Straka as an intimate friend or more.

Jen and Eric notice something interesting in the footnote-there is an abundance of the letter “s,” including one point in which FXC misspells a word by including an extra s. After careful analysis, Jen realizes:

“If you take the letters on either side of each S. you get ARPIS BOUCHARD IS HW.”

This breakthrough in the code of the footnotes is very significant-it marks progress in Jen and Eric’s analysis of the book, but it also tells them:

“VMS was in real danger.”