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without question back into the lighted prop room where they stood for a moment before bursting into a<br />
sort of muffled laughter.<br />
“That was Konstantin,” Emma said at last, wiping the nervous tears from her face.<br />
“Truly? Your dance master? He seems uniquely qualified for his post.”<br />
“Don’t you dare make a joke of this,” she said. Her heart was pounding and her face was hot.<br />
She had never had cause to study a man, fully naked, except perhaps in statuary, and somehow none<br />
of it was arranged quite as she had imagined. “How will I ever be able to dance with him again after<br />
witnessing such a thing?”<br />
“And who was the lovely lady?”<br />
“I have no idea. Was she lovely?”<br />
“Oh, I assure you.”<br />
“At least Mrs. Kirby wasn’t with us, which would have been the only thing that could have<br />
made the situation more appalling.” Emma shuddered at the thought. “She has already declared that<br />
Konstantin is up to no good. Come, we must find her and waylay her long enough to let them escape,<br />
for if she even suspects-”<br />
“She will what?” Tom said, taking Emma’s arm and leading her from the performance rooms<br />
back toward the staircase. “Mrs. Kirby has no authority over the dancers or indeed anything that<br />
happens in the palace. We must not let her haughty manner bamboozle us all into thinking she holds<br />
more sway than she does.” But as they moved closer to the well-lit staircase, the look on Emma’s<br />
face softened his tone. “I suppose you’re right. There’s no reason to give her aging eyes this<br />
particular shock, so we will intercept her, at least long enough to allow our lovers to escape.”<br />
They hurried down the staircase, Emma still flushed and Tom still chuckling, then across the<br />
broad ballroom floor to the door where they had entered. But Mrs. Kirby was not in the hallway<br />
beyond, nor in the next one they tried, nor the next. Finally they returned to the ballroom and stood in<br />
the center of the floor, slowly circling, looking at all the entrances.<br />
“Strange,” said Tom. “She was insistent that we talk in private.”<br />
“See that rope,” Emma suddenly said. “Was it there before?”<br />
“I don’t know,” Tom said. “But it’s some sort of prop. Meant to look like part of the ship’s<br />
rigging, is it not? See, they have the shape of a hull beneath it.”
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