“The dress,” Luca said, showing all of his teeth in a smile. “You will look wonderful in—”

“No!” she snapped. Whatever he had gained, he had just lost by bringing this up again. Clarine had made the dress Luca wanted her to wear, in silk more crimson than his cloak. It was her opinion that the color was to hide blood; if Thom’s hand slipped.

“But, Nana, beauty in danger is a great draw.” Luca’s voice crooned as if whispering sweetness in her ear. “You will have every eye on you, every heart pounding for your beauty and courage.”

“If you like it so much,” she said firmly, “you wear it.” Aside from the color, she was not about to show that much bosom in public, whether or not Clarine thought it was proper. She had seen Latelle’s performing dress, all black spangles, with a high neck to her chin. She could wear something like . . . What was she thinking? She had no intention of actually going through with this. She had only agreed to this practice to stop Luca scratching at the wagon door every night to try convincing her.

The man was nothing if not deft at knowing when to change the subject. “What happened here?” he asked, suddenly all smooth solicitude.

She flinched as he touched her puffy eye. It was his bad luck to choose that. He would have done better to continue trying to stuff her into that red dress. “I did not like the way it looked at me in the mirror this morning, so I bit it.”

Her flat tone and bared teeth made Luca snatch his hand back. From the wary gleam in his dark eyes, he suspected she might bite again. Thom was stroking his mustaches furiously, red in the face from the effort of not laughing. He knew what had happened, of course. He would. And as soon as she left, he would no doubt regale Luca with his version of events. Men could not avoid gossiping; it was in them at birth, and nothing women could do ever got it out of them.

The daylight was dimmer than she had thought. The sun sat red on the treetops to the west. “If you ever try this again without better light . . .” she growled, shaking a fist at Thom. “It’s almost dusk!”

“I suppose,” the man said, bushy eyebrow lifting, “this means you want to leave out the bit where I am blindfolded?” He was joking, of course. He had to be joking. “As you wish, Nana. From now on, only in the most perfect light.”

It was not until she stalked away, swishing her skirts angrily, that she realized that she had agreed to actually do this fool thing. By implication, at least. They would try to hold her to it, as surely as the sun would set tonight. Fool, fool, fool woman!