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I was lost in her blue eyes, and it was ame “Pardon?”

“I wanted to thank you For insisting the young ladies being brought into the classroom”

Reginald gave me a sly look

“Happy to oblige,” I said, thrilled that she’d seen fit to seek me out

She gave the slightest of curtsies, about to leave

“Miss Atwater?”

She turned back, looking at me with an expectation I wasn’t prepared for After a et back to the children”

“Would you dome to call on you?” My words came out in a rush

Even so, she sreeable”

—

MY DELIGHT over the prospect of calling on Miss Atwater was tempered by my reluctance to entertain the notion that my cousin was responsible for the theft of the Grey Ghost

Isaac Bell still believed that Reginald had masterminded the theft while he and I were employed at Rolls-Royce Limited

If so, was he also the ineer and brakeman? The embezzleotten in over his head with ga debts—especially after Isaac had found proof that the books had been altered Someone had stolen the ine parts that Mr Rolls and Mr Royce were counting on to finish the half-built Silver Ghost in order to enter it into the Olympia Motor Show instead of the stolen Grey Ghost?

As preposterous as it sounded, I dared notdelicate I tried to put it fro the strange palpitations of ht of her

We ate dinner and took in an operetta, both enjoying ourselves enough that Miss Atwater agreed I could call on her again She lived in the caretaker’s cottage behind the orphanage with her brother and his wife Neither of us wanted the night to end, so I dis to walk her home As we strolled down the sidewalk, I sensed the presence of so but shadows