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that’s all it was. I’d goaded him and he fell prey to my taunts. Nothing more.
    Except now they were all hiding smirks.
    Enough!
    Pushed to my limit, I waved my hand at Georgie. “I suggest you ask Miss Fitzwilliam about the morning’s events. She was there. She saw everything. Or quiz Miss Wyndham here.” I pulled Seraphina forward. “Given the fact that she has perfect recall, I’m certain she can give you a complete accounting of anything she may have seen or heard. And knowing my fellow students”—I glared at the pack of them, even Maya—“they will have seen a great deal from their windows.”
    After all, we attended an establishment for young ladies that trained us to do exactly that, to make detailed observations while pretending we hadn’t seen a thing.
    His attention whipped to Sera. “Perfect recall?”
    I tromped back to the open door and called down the hall. “How is he?”
    The housekeeper pattered across it into the bedroom, carrying a bowl of water and fresh linens tucked under her arm. She returned empty-handed and headed straight for me. “Miss Stranje says you’re to keep a civil tongue in your head when speaking to the justice of the peace’s son, and I’m to close the door.”
    â€œNo! Wait.” I held it open. “You must tell me how he is.”
    She shook her head. “Wish I knew, miss. It don’t look good. That’s all I know.” Then she shut the door with a click that echoed as loudly as the gunshot had earlier that morning.
    I may have thumped my fists against the heavy oak and let out a roar of frustration. I confess, I don’t know for certain. Young ladies are not supposed to do such things. I do remember hearing Tromos from clear across the park let out an answering howl.
    The sound of it preyed even further on my mind. I felt as if I might explode.
    â€œVery well.” I whirled on the justice of the peace’s son. “What is it you would like to know?”
    He offered me a puppyish smile. “You’re injured. Perhaps if you sit down, I might ask you a few simple questions to speed my father’s inquiry along.” He indicated a bench off to the side of the drive.
    I declined his offer and kept pacing. I was too agitated to sit. If I sat down, I felt as if I would slide off and collapse in a puddle.
    â€œAnd, of course, the law requires us to confiscate your weapon.”
    My knife. He wanted my knife. The one with a stranger’s blood all over it. “Help yourself.” I pointed brusquely at the tall grass across the park in Miss Stranje’s back field. “My dagger is out there somewhere. You’ll have to pardon me for not knowing the exact location. They forced a sack over my head.”
    For the first time I became acutely aware of the body lying in the gravel on the other side of the drive. “What happened to that man?”
    I wanted Georgie or Sera to answer, not him, not the interfering Mr. Chadwick. But he responded first. “Your headmistress shot him in an attempt to protect Miss Fitzwilliam and rescue you.” He indicated a spot across the park near Stranje House’s garden door. “From there. Quite a distance. I wouldn’t have expected a spinster schoolteacher to manage a shot like that at a moving target.”
    Hackles raised, Georgie huffed. “What does her being a spinster have to do with anything?”
    Sera interceded with a slightly less quarrelsome approach. “Surely, you are not assuming that Miss Stranje’s aim would be less accurate because she is unmarried? One thing has nothing to do with the other.”
    â€œNot at all.” He raised his hands, warding them off. “You misunderstand me.”
    â€œHmm.” Georgie crossed her arms. “If not, then you must be suggesting a woman cannot fire a gun as accurately as a man. Which is a preposterous