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DANGEROUS PUDDINGS

Miss Tenlanced up frolad of the distraction She was convinced she wasthe purchase of the three rown foxgloves for decorating a dinner table for six guests? Or is it six foxgloves to kill four fully grown guests?

Unfortunately, what Sophronia sahen she looked up did not fill her with confidence Lady Linette stood at the front of the class wearing an austere expression that clashed with her copious yellow curls and a bonnet covered with drooping silk lilacs She earing a good deal of face paint and a purple-and-jade plaid dress of immense proportions It was neither her expression nor her location at the front of the class that made Sophronia nervous It was the fact that she was present in this class, for this was Sister Mathilde Herschel-Teape’s lesson on doo to Lady Linette after tea, for drawing room music and subversive petit fours

"This decade, Miss Te next to Lady Linette Sophronia’s friend gestured her forith a hand hidden to one side of her skirt Ordinarily, it was Di

Sophronia leapt to her feet "Apologies, Lady Linette I was so very absorbed Foxglove quantities can be ood, Miss Temminnick An excuse couched in terms of academic interest Nevertheless, we must be away"

For most of Sophronia’s six- Acade Ladies of Quality, lessons had never been interrupted Not even when flyway ladies of quality stayed in class in times of strife Certainly no student had been removed from one teacher’s purview by another teacher That was quite rude!

Then over the lastwith the dratted Monique, every one of Sophronia’s fellows had systematically been taken away by Lady Linette in just such a manner They returned traumatized and silent All Sophronia’s skills, many of theuring this out To no avail Even her particular friends, Sidheag and Agatha, wouldn’t explain what had happened when Lady Linette absconded with them

Sister Mattie was unperturbed by the interruption, sitting placidly in her ious attire behind a wide desk surrounded by potted plants and bottles of deadly poison (or tea concentrate, one never knehich) Sister Mattie was a bit of mystery; her preference for a simulated nun’s habit--wide-skirted and to the current fashion, with a wiured like a bonnet--reirls saw her as a nice sort of n teachers, so they mostly respected her eccentric choice of dress

Sophronia’s fellow students were looking on ide eyes Sidheag and Agatha tensed sympathetically Monique and Preshea sat with arht on their faces

Sophronia wended her way though the plush chairs and rolltop writing desks to the front, where she curtsied before Lady Linette It was a perfectly executed curtsy, not too deep, with a slight tilt to her head but not enough to seem obsequious

Sister Mattie said kindly, "I shouldn’t worry, Miss Temminnick I’m certain you’ll do very well"

"Follow me, please, ladies," snapped Lady Linette

"Good luck!" Agatha said quietly Agatha rarely spoke, so it had to be so serious

Sophronia sidled up next to Dih to accoowns side by side Their ether Neither minded the wrinkles as they linked ar Academy was housed in a ether Its corridors twisted and turned in a noodlelike eways led up stairs or out onto balconies Most of the tias lamps that looked like upside-down parasols Whatever attire the corridors had been designed to accommodate, proper lady’s dress was not one of them

Lady Linette led them toward the upper squeak decks These open-air decks sat under the massive balloons that kept the academy afloat and adrift over Dartmoor It was an odd place to be headed at this tihtened

The two girls swung to flatten theate, so a ears instead of the metal masks worn by most ave the impression of busy superciliousness

If the students had been alone, thethem, but Dimity and Sophronia were in the company of Lady Linette All the ernore students in the company of teachers Most of the hallere laid doith a single track upon which the school’sthe myriad ofs a whole stack of doilies, some of them quite deadly, from Sister Mattie to Professor Lefoux In her parents’ country estate, such an important task would never have been entrusted to a mechanical, but here steam-powered staff far outnuht, after six months, that she had most of the school mapped But as they walked from thequarters, to the rear recreation area, they entered a place she’d never seen before While thehall and exercise facilities above the warehouse and propeller engine areas were fa taken farther up

"I didn’t know there were roo hall," said Sophronia to Lady Linette

Lady Linette was not going to play into Sophronia’s hunt for infornored the comment and quickened her pace

Sophronia and Dimity bounced in order to keep up--they had not yet had lessons on rapid walking in full skirts, though both of theliders at a more leisurely pace

This section of the ship smelled of old candle wax, chalk powder, and pickled onions The mechanical track was not oiled properly, and there was dust in the corner grippers The walls were hung with paintings of disapproving elderly females and framed feats of crochet