She truly is a dangerous woman, in the end. But he can sense no malice behind her words or her actions, and so takes the jesting for what it is.

“It is a game you would win without a doubt, Miss Magilou, for I would not be so uncouth as to wrest a woman’s secrets from her.”

And a woman, he knows, tends to have far more secrets than any man ever has. He knows that more than anyone else, given the women of his own life.

“But…whatever you might see fit to tell me, I can assure you that I shall guard it with my very life.”