you should not linger around here where she died.”
“I know. Just can’t bring myself to go home.”
“Where is your room?” Dragan asked.
Jack glared at him. “Above a public house. I can’t take her there.”
“Just from the outside,” Dragan said firmly. “I’d like to know which windows look where. And we’d probably quite like to speak to the patrons of the public house.”
Jack’s gaze flickered to Griz, then, muttering something unintelligible under his breath, he strode off to the right of the theatre, not left in the direction Griz had followed Nancy on the night she died. In fact, he led them away from the theatre altogether.
“Do you know who did it?” he burst out. “Do you suspect?”
“No. We have several suspicions but no proof. No theories that even make sense. Do you?”
He shook his head. “I hadn’t seen her for so long. She kept my letter, though. Mrs. Barrow gave me it. I’m glad she kept it.”
Griz nodded. There was nothing more to say.
The window of Jack’s rented room faced away from the theatre. Even from the front of the building, no one could have witnessed Nancy’s murder.
“You should go home, Jack,” Griz advised. “To Sussex.”
“I know. I’m doing no one any good here.” His bowed head lifted. He glanced from Griz to Dragan. “But if you like, I can listen, even ask questions in the alehouses round about. I’ve heard mention of the murder before, but I couldn’t listen.”
“You shouldn’t have to,” Griz said stoutly.
“If you can, I can.”
“Jack—”
Her protest was cut short by Dragan. “That would be very helpful. Thank you.”
Griz closed her mouth, frowning at him. If he saw her disapproval, he gave no sign, merely adding, “Let us know what you learn.”
“I will,” Jack said, almost eagerly.
Dragan offered his hand, which seemed to stun Jack into shaking it. Then Jack bowed jerkily to Griz, and Dragan urged her away.
“He would be better at home,” she said at last as they made their way through the market once more.
“Probably.”
She frowned at him. “I didn’t think you would even trust him.”
“I don’t. If he brings us information, well and good. Either way, it’s a test. If he actually asks the questions, he’s less likely to be guilty.”
“He is not guilty,” Griz insisted. “I have known him all my life, and he would not hurt a fly, let alone the girl he loved.”
“Love does strange things to people.”
“I suppose you speak from experience!”
“I suppose I do, though, in all honesty, it has never inspired me to murder.”
They were walking up the side of the theatre, where carriages had lined the street on the night Nancy died.
“He didn’t do it,” Griz said firmly.
He cast her a quizzical glance. “He was not your stable boy, was he?”
“He is a farmer,” she replied with dignity.
Her stomach was beginning to roil now that she turned up the back street, even though it looked different in the daylight. Two women with baskets walked toward them, deep in gossip. A boy with an empty barrow was hurrying toward the market. Two of the windows in the building opposite were open to allow a man and a woman to make conversation.
Griz said, “There never was a stable boy. I made him up.”
“I know.”
She didn’t know why, perhaps to distract herself from the memory of what she had found the last time she had turned into Mudd Lane, but the words tumbled out. “There was an army officer. He teased me and flattered me. He made me laugh. I liked him until he…frightened me.”
Dragan halted, frowning down at her. “How did he do that?”
“He pulled me into a dark room and tried to kiss me. When I pushed him away, he wouldn’t go.”
Dragan’s lips tightened, although his eyes gave nothing away. “Did he do anything else?”
“No. That is, he might have, but I hit him with a candlestick.”
His eyes lightened with what might have been admiration. “Good for you. Did you make good your escape?”
“I did, and I never spoke to him again.” She considered. “To be fair, he never spoke to me either. He must have spent the rest of the evening with a shocking headache.”
She began to walk on, but he caught her arm. “I kissed you, too.”
Blood surged up into her face. “I let you.” She had more than let him. She had kissed him back. Until now, she had never even thought of their kiss as the same act.
His lips quirked as his hand slid down her arm to her fingers, which he