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remarkable thing about him. I glanced at his collar, remembering the cross-shaped scar that I had seen when we first met. Its shape and depth was that of a deliberate injury, and yet the location of the cut was quite unusual. Self-inflicted gashes are usually closer to an artery or a vein, to ensure maximum blood loss, while neck wounds from an attacker are typically located near the jawline, a straight slash beneath the chin made while seizing the victim’s head. This one was different; it was its own story, a crimson brand, his tiny, livid secret. He saw my puzzled look and followed the direction of my eyes. His cheeks flushed scarlet, one hand traveled halfway to his collar as if by instinct. I quickly turned my head and focused on the window, but he had already risen and walked away from me. “Good day, Miss Joyce,” he told me shortly. “I trust your cousin will forgive you for this last infraction.”
    I grabbed my purse and joined him by the door. “I slipped away when she was out.”
    “Well, then you’d best be going now, before she realizes that you’re missing. Otherwise you won’t be able to come back tomorrow.”
    “Tomorrow! But—”
    “At half past two. Mr. Porter will be out.”
    “But—I—”
    “Oh, and if, by chance, I haven’t yet returned,” he added with a little smile, “please try to wait for me in the study, on the sofa, like a normal girl. Not beneath my bed, or inside the chimney, or hanging like a kitten from the curtains. Please .”

 
    A DELAIDE WAS NOT at home when I returned, and so I was able to greet her innocently at dinner. Cook had let me in the servants’ entrance and had stared pointedly at my muddy boots before nodding me upstairs. Though she knew that my three-hour absence and my dirty boots were not the result of a “little stroll” across the street as I had claimed, I knew about the “extras” that the cook purchased every week, bits of candle, fat, and sugar that she later sold in secret by the tradesmen’s door. Cook would never reveal my secrets out of fear that I would respond in kind.
    Adelaide and I had a peaceful dinner with no further mention of my returning home, which I hoped meant that the subject would remain closed. Even so, I was no longer certain about my role in London or in this investigation. Cartwright and Porter would be taking over now; they were at Hartfield Hall already. Perhaps they would solve the case that very day, and I would hear about it in a letter, or through my cousin. Who was I that they should include me in their adventure? I was a child who made startling observations, who occasionally terrified her relatives and frequently flouted every decent rule. But most importantly, I was a girl .
    And yet—he had asked me to come back. Perhaps that meant something after all.
    I retired early that night, but I found that I could not sleep, for our final conversation played over and again in my imagination. Why had he asked me to come back— again ? What exactly did he want of me? Did he wish to see me because I stimulated him, because I challenged him? I had always thought that young men hated that quality in a lady. I edged over to the dresser mirror and studied my reflection in the glass. Surely it had to be my mind that had charmed him, and nothing else. I was so slight and simple, after all, my cheeks so thin and pale. If I smiled just right, there was a sweet, coy glitter in my eyes, and if I held my breath, my figure rounded out a little—almost like a woman’s, but not quite. And that hair, the wayward coiling curls, that mass of fog around my forehead—my hair did not improve the picture. I pulled the covers around my shoulders and sank back into my pillow. It had to be my mind, I decided finally. There could be no other explanation.
    I ought to have been proud of the distinction, of being recognized for my intelligence. That was what I’d worked for all this time. I wanted to be proud, to fall easily asleep with this