. . .

Linus blinks at Tom for a full two seconds. Then a horrified blush spreads across his face as he realizes his error. He head-desks the pile of mittens and kettles. This isn’t really a head-desking but there is no standard English word for dramatically banging your head into a pile of warm woolen mittens and bright copper kettles. There is a German word, of course, drastisch-senken-sieden-koptin-einen-haufen-warmenwollen-faustlinge-undhelle-kupfer-kesseln-expialadocien . . . but that isn’t immediately helpful when you’re dealing with nannies hailing from space.

“That is so embarrassing,” says Linus. Then he frowns. “Hey.”

He straightens. He rubs at the polish on one of the bright copper kettles. The copper smears away revealing only the dark black of a Fan Hoeng kettle-soul below.

“Fake kettles,” says Linus. It is almost a relief to him. It distracts him from his error. Now he gets to be cool.

He gives Maria his best cool, awesome antichrist glare.

“Very cunning,” the antichrist says.

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