She stood up suddenly, turning round, and he at once bent toward the ground she’d been looking at, saying, “What is that?” though he personally saw nothing but dirt and a lot of radish tops.

“It’s a dung beetle,” she said, looking at him closely. “Very good for the soil. They roll up small balls of ordure and trundle them away.”

“What do they do with them? The, um, balls of ordure, I mean.”

“Eat them,” she said, with a slight shrug. “They bury the balls for safekeeping, and then eat them as need requires—or sometimes they breed inside the larger ones.”

“How … cozy. Have you had any breakfast?” William asked, raising one brow.

“No, it isn’t ready yet.”

“Neither have I,” he said, getting to his feet. “Though I’m not quite as hungry as I was before you told me that.” He glanced down at his waistcoat. “Have I any dung beetles in this noble assemblage?”

That made her laugh.

“No, you haven’t,” she said. “Not nearly colorful enough.”

Amaranthus was suddenly standing quite close to him, though he was sure he hadn’t seen her move. She had the odd trick of seeming to appear suddenly out of thin air; it was disconcerting, but rather intriguing.

“That bright-green one,” she said, pointing a long, delicate finger at his middle, “is a Dogbane Leaf Beetle, Chrysosuchus auratus.”

“Is it, really?”

“Yes, and this lovely creature with the long nose is a billbug.”

“A pillbug?” William squinted down his chest.

“No, a billbug,” she said, tapping the bug in question. “It’s a sort of weevil, but it eats cattails. And young corn.”

“Rather a varied diet.”

“Well, unless you’re a dung beetle, you do have some choice in what you eat,” she said, smiling. She touched another of the beetles, and William felt a faint but noticeable jolt at the base of his spine. “Now here,” she said, with small, distinct taps of her finger, “we have Ash Borer, a Festive Tiger Beetle, and the False Potato Beetle.”

“What does a true potato beetle look like?”

“Very much the same. This one’s called a False Potato Beetle because while it will eat potatoes in a pinch, it really prefers horse nettles.”

“Ah.” He thought he should express interest in the rest of the little red-eyed things ornamenting his waistcoat, partially to repay her kindness in embroidering them but more in hopes that she’d go on tapping them. He was opening his mouth to inquire about a large cream-colored thing with horns when she stepped back in order to look up into his face.

“I heard my father-in-law talking to Lord John about you,” she said.

“Oh? Good. I hope they’d a fine day for it,” he said, not really caring.

“Speaking of False Potato Beetles, I mean,” she said. He closed his eyes briefly, then opened one and looked at her. She was perfectly solid, not wavering in the slightest.