Heroes and Villains alike prepare for the Day of our young Heroine

And then suddenly the door to the closet creaked, and Lisa appeared in the doorway. She stood motionless, as if assessing whether she had somehow disturbed the scene she had witnessed. Her gaze slid across the floor, lingered on the shelf by the wall, and finally stopped on them - on Delia and Xander. She looked longest at their clasped hands. The expression on her face changed slightly: the corner of her mouth twitched, her eyebrows rose slightly. Not surprise, not displeasure - something third, elusive. But almost immediately everything disappeared behind her usual polite mask.

"Oh, there you are," she said, in the tone one uses when discovering a kitten has escaped under the bed. "I was beginning to think you had abandoned me."

Her voice was soft, too even, too amiable. It expressed neither joy nor anxiety, only a slightly false cheerfulness, as if she were reminding him of herself delicately but with a certain purpose. Her intonation suggested the kind of politeness that often conceals annoyance. She stepped inside, unhurriedly, looking about the little room like a proprietor, as if wondering if there was anything inappropriate there.

"Excuse me," she added, "I confess I didn't expect to find you here. I just came to say it was time to go out. Fresh air is the best doctor, especially after... After worries."

The words were careful, but they conveyed the idea that everything said was essentially not subject to discussion.

Delia, who had been standing almost with her back to the door the whole time, did not shrink back, did not hide behind Xander. She only slowly unclenched her fingers, releasing his hand. She did it deliberately, so that Lisa could see it. Then she turned around and nodded, as if nothing special had happened. Not her tears a minute ago, not the stranger's hand, tightly clenched in hers.

"I'm ready," she said calmly.

Lisa looked a little more closely than was necessary. As if searching for a tremor in her voice, for the former submissiveness to slip through. But Delia stood straight, looking without embarrassment. Her face was still pale, her eyes were reddened, but there was no confusion in them.

Lisa, noticing the change, said nothing. She just pulled the corners of her lips up a little more in a smile - a long, impenetrable smile, like that of people who are not used to admitting defeat even in a glance.

"Very well," she said, almost cheerfully. "Then I'll wait for you in the hallway."

And, turning around, she left. Her steps faded into the depths of the corridor.

Xander still stood rooted to the spot. He looked at Delia as if for the first time. Something had changed in her, and this change frightened him and at the same time pulled him along, like something important that was impossible to resist.

She looked at him, wiped her nose with the back of her hand and smiled - truly, not for someone else, not through force.

"Come on," she said. "We can go out into the yard, right?"

Xander nodded. He didn't know what to say. He only knew that he would walk beside her, as long as it took. They passed the walls, shadows gliding across the floor, and a minute later the door leading to the garden slammed softly behind them.

And Lisa Roselli stood by the window, her back straight, almost solemnly, as if her very pose were meant to confirm her right to observe. Beyond the glass, in the uneven sunlight, Delia and Xander were descending the steps into the courtyard. The girl walked a little ahead, the boy a half-step behind, as if guarding, but without pretension. Their silhouettes, outlined by the glare, were quieter than the silence itself, and for some reason this silence irritated Lisa more than if they had been making noise, laughing, or running away.

She pressed her finger to the glass, tracing the outline of their figures with the tip of her nail, and thought: how easy it all had been. Almost effortless, without delays, without resistance. One letter from the right person, two conversations with Hastings, and she was already here, in a house that smelled of baked goods, where there was no dust on the carpets, and where, most importantly, the object was located. All it took was a little politeness, good English, and the right accent.

The secret police first became interested in the girl in February, before she fell ill. It all started not even with her, but with Sergei Zazyrin, a student, harmless in appearance, with a careless gait and a hunched back, but with dangerous connections. Delia was just passing by, with her governess, with a book under her arm. But then there was that incident, on Nevsky, near a shop where the display case glittered with French novels, and he, passing by, picked up her handkerchief. The simplicity of the girl's reaction, "thank you, mister," seemed suspicious to someone then. Simply because there was no fear or embarrassment in her. Too free, too confident.

Then there was more - a bakery, a park, inconspicuous glances, a couple of phrases. Someone reported that the girl laughed. For Earl Knight, who began to suspect after every breakfast, this was enough. And when the governess Josephine suddenly died - from a "heart attack", as it was written - the solution came instantly. He had to put in his own. Hastings had a choice - and they slipped Lisa to him. He had no idea. He praised her, repeating: "She is reliable. American. And she does not wear corsets - a sign of freedom of spirit." How convenient it is to be needed by a person who does not understand people.

And now she's here. In the house. At the table. By the window.

The girl was walking across the yard. The boy's hand touched her elbow for a second, and Delia did not pull away. Lisa narrowed her eyes. Something in this childish gait was different than before. The plasticity of the body was different. No absentmindedness, no confusion. Concentration - that's what alarmed her. As if in this house, in this girl, something unaccounted for was happening.