“Maudie, what happened?” said Robin. “Tell us everything.” Everything. Maud bit her lip. What was she supposed to say? She was now the supposed mistress of the Baron Hawthorn, a shameless trollop, and still half-suspected of being a jewel thief. She’d recruited three people to the cause. She’d had a chance at an inheritance, and lost it, and might have been offered part of another. She’d learned to say fuck, and to perform the verb; and to have it performed upon her, thoroughly, by a music-hall magician with a hundred smiles and one high-walled heart.
