Chapter EighteenWe parked the carriage in an alleyway—one with an entrance and an exit this time—near Mrs Dugdale’s home and had an invigorating argument about whether we would do better to approach the house under cover or darkness or to wait until morning so we could be more easily lost in a crowd.
‘Because we’re so inconspicuous?’ Matilda said, throwing up her hands. ‘A Chinese girl, a woman who vents steam from her back, a famous bushranger, a highly peculiar carriage, and an apparent native?’
Patrick conceded the point, but I was distracted by her description of herself.
‘You’re an “apparent” native?’ I said. ‘Do you mean you’re not a native?’
She looked suddenly guilty. ‘More or less.’
‘Which is it?’ I said, knowing I’d missed something important. ‘More, or less?’
‘Depends who’
