The Captain paused in throwing up clay targets; perhaps his arm was getting tired. But there was still plenty of ammunition in the bucket they had brought her, and she decided that she was not through trying to impress them.

Although on the whole neither Joachim nor Pieter approved of what they would have called “boasting shots,” they still taught her several when she begged them. She looked at the Captain, fished in her pocket, and pulled out a pfennig. Inwardly, she winced at the waste of even one small coin, but then she reminded herself that if she could get supper out of these people, it would certainly be worth more than a pfennig. She mimed tossing it in the air and handed it to him. His eyes widened, but he nodded, pulled back his fist and flung it as hard as he could.

Of course, she was taking no chances; the sylphs assisted the trajectory of the pfennig as well as that of her bullet.

The Indian had sharper eyes than the rest of them, and strolled over to where it fell. He brought it back and the Captain let out a long, low whistle, when he saw she had punched a hole in it, slightly off of center.

If only I had a mirror, she thought, just a little smugly. I’d make their eyes bulge!

And as if the Indian had actually heard her thoughts, he reached into a bag he had slung over one shoulder and handed her a little ladies’ mirror.

If she had not read Karl May’s books, she would probably have been taken aback that he had such a thing—but she knew that Indians often used mirrors they got in trade for signaling each other at great distances. She took it with a smile and a little nod she hoped he recognized as thanks and turned her back on the target.

The trickiest thing about shooting backward, using a mirror, was setting the shot up and keeping the rifle steady once you had it sighted. When she had shot for Joachim and Pieter she had been scrupulous about not cheating using the sylphs. Now, however, she had no such compunctions.

With the hand holding the mirror firmly on the butt of the stock, and the other on top of the stock with her thumb on the trigger, she set the shot up, and gently squeezed . . .

The butt kicked back into her hand, jarring the mirror and ruining her view of the target. But this time the Captain threw his hat in the air, he was so excited.

I think we made the shot, she thought wryly. With another bow she handed the mirror back to the Indian, who took it with the faintest of smiles.

The Captain all but snatched the carbine out of her hands, and once again, seized her by the wrist. This time he dragged her back to the big tent, intercepting a man who was clearly on his way somewhere else just before they reached it.