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"Hello, my dear What have you done now?"

"Be so kind as to leave off insulting me, and see to Ivy and Tunstell, would you, please? They ar Oh, and keep an eye on Madaeneral demeanor and expression, the earl did not question her dictates

"I take it the body is that of your maid?"

"How did you know?" Lady Maccon was understandably peeved After all, she had only just figured this all out How dare her own husband be a step ahead of her?

"She shot me, remember?" he replied with a sniff

"Yes, well, I had better check"

"Are we hoping for dead or alive?"

Lady Maccon sucked her teeth "Mmm, dead would make for less paperwork But alive would make for fewer questions"

He waved a hand flippantly "Carry on, my dear"

"Oh, really, Conall As if it were your idea," said his wife, annoyed but already trotting out the door

"And I chose to marry that one," coned affection

"I heard that," Lady Maccon said without pausing

She etting her exercise today She picked her way through the still-sluers and out the front door She took the opportunity to check the mummy, which was no er e used up its supply She would have to see about a tune-up, as she had already used much of its complement of weaponry She closed it with a snap and took it with her around the side of the castle to where the crureen

Lady Maccon poked at her with the tip of the parasol from some distance When that elicited no reaction, she bent to exaelique’s was not a condition that could be cured through the application of vinegar The French girl’s head listed far to one side, her neck broken by the fall

Lady Maccon sighed, stood, and was just about to poodle off, when the air all about the body shivered, as heat will ripple the air about a fire

Alexia had never before witnessed an unbirth As with norenerally considered a little crass and unmentionable in polite society, but there was no doubt about as happening to Angelique For there before Lady Maccon appeared the faint shiht have survived Countess Nadasdy’s bite in the end"

The ghost looked at her For a longto her new state of existence--or nonexistence as it were She sielique’s soul

"I always knew I could have been soelique "But you had to stop ht it was because zey feared you, feared what you were and what you could produce But now I realized zey feared who you are az well Your lack of soul, it haz affected your character You are not only preternatural, you also think differently az a result"

"I suppose I ht," replied Alexia "But it is hard foronly ever experiencedjust over her body For some time she would be tethered close, unable to stretch her lian to erode away Only then, doomed to deterioration as the connection to the body became weaker and weaker, would she be able to venture farther away, at the saeis and madness It was not a nice way to enter the afterlife

The Frenchwo o mad, or will you exorcise me now?"

"Choices, choices," said Lady Maccon rather harshly "Which would you prefer?"

The ghost did not hesitate "I should like to go now BUR will persuade ainst either my hive or my country And I could not stand to run mad"

"So, you do have soh the specter s solid; one scientific hypothesis was that they were the physical representation of the mind’s memory of itself "More zan you will ever know," said Forive me in return?" Alexia, preternatural, wanted to know

Fors hich to sigh or air hich to ehosts ain I will answer you ten questions az honest az I am able Zen, you will set me to die"

"Why did you do all of this?" Lady Maccon asked immediately, and without hesitation: the easiest and elique held up ten ghostly fingers and ticked one down "Because ze comtesse offered me ze bite Who does not want eternal life?" A pause "Aside fro to killto kill you I waz always after Genevieve I waz not very good at it Ze fall, in ze air, and ze shootings, zat was for her You were an inconvenience; she iz ze danger"

"And the poison?"

Forers bent "Zat was not , my lady, zat someone else wants you dead And your fourth question?"

"Do you believe it is Mada to kill me?"

"I think not, but it iz hard to tell with Genevieve She iz, how do you say? Ze smart one But should she want you dead, it would be your body lying there, not mine"

"So why do you wish our little inventor dead?"