A more interesting question I think is why it would stop you from getting a screen full of garbage if it's at the second-to-last byte? If it were at the second

A more interesting question I think is why it would stop you from getting a screen full of garbage if it's at the second-to-last byte? If it were at the second byte, or if one read files from the end to the beginning then OK, but I doubt that's the case.