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“Yes, you can. When was the last time you went out?”

“A few days ago when I walked to town when you shooed me out of the breakfast room so you could read to Lady Harcourt.”

“When was the last time you went out before that?”

She didn’t answer, which he hoped meant he was making headway. “Have you been to a party lately?”

She retracted her arm again.

“Or to shop for ribbons?”

She threw, but the plate fell well short of the wall. It didn’t even break.

He regrouped. “Do you not think it ought to be against the law to wager the fate of human beings in card games?”

She went dead still, and he feared he had gone too far. But after a moment that felt as if it lasted an eternity, she stooped, picked up another plate, and retracted her arm again.

Smash!

The plate broke, but only into three pieces. The potter in town was quite talented. He made hearty crockery.

“Huzzah!” Still, Simon felt she could do better. “Why, when a couple is discovered in a compromising scenario, is the lady’s reputation ruined for all time, while the gentleman will shake off the stink?” He had used her phrase—shake off the stink—intentionally.

She picked up another plate and hurled it at the wall. It broke into many more pieces.

“Yes!” They were getting somewhere.

She picked up another plate and turned to him, as if she were waiting for another prompt.

All right. He kept thinking he was going too far, but it seemed he was not. Or perhaps “too far” was what was indicated. “Why do we live in a world in which a gentleman can force a lady to marry him?”

That did it. The next plate she threw shattered into dozens—nay, hundreds—of pieces.

She picked up another plate and hurtled it at the wall.

And another.

And then, to his absolute shock, she answered his question. “Because he knows something that will hurt people the lady loves if he tells.”

“Pardon?”

She wasn’t listening to him anymore, though; she was hurling plates against the wall.

He was frozen. He didn’t want to stop her. She was doing what he’d brought her here to do, but he needed to know more about what she was describing, which to his ears sounded like blackmail.

“What in Heaven’s name is happening here?”

Diantha joined Simon in his frozen state, but the plate she had last released hit the wall a second later, shattering dramatically.

“It is time to dine.” The voice was Olive’s.

Simon turned.

“Cook has prepared quite a feast for our final night together, and I volunteered to come find you two.”

Explaining his way out of this scenario was not possible, so Simon merely said, “Thank you. We shall be right along.”

“I shall come with you right now,” Diantha, unfrozen, said to Olive.