Everyone on the field ridge froze.
I looked at her.
Here it came.
Patsy sobbed until she could barely catch her breath.
"I was only passing by the river."
"He blocked my way out of nowhere."
"When I wouldn't talk to him, he shoved me into the water."
"He said if he saved me, I'd have no choice but to marry him."
A few of the sent-down girls blew up on the spot.
"Dustin, how can you be so shameless?"
"You wouldn't go in the water just now, was that because you were scared we'd find out?"
"No wonder you kept demanding we witness it. You'd already worked out how to clear yourself!"
Someone had already lunged forward and grabbed me by the collar.
"I said it, the way he dragged his feet and wouldn't save her, he's obviously got something to hide!"
"Patsy's just a girl, and she just came back from the edge of death. Could she really make up a lie like that?"
Juliana's brow drew tight too.
"Dustin, you'd better explain this."
I looked down at the hand fisted in my collar.
In my last life, the militia had pinned me to the ground exactly like this.
Muddy water poured into my mouth, and I couldn't get out a single complete word of explanation.
But this time, I didn't struggle.
And I didn't rush to defend myself.
I only lifted my head and looked at Patsy. "You're saying I pushed you into the river?"
She nodded through her tears.
"It was you."
"I saw it with my own eyes."
I asked again: "You're sure?"
As if my calm enraged her, she cried louder.
"Dustin, you're still trying to deny it?"
"I'm a woman. Would I throw away my own good name just to frame you?"
The eyes on me had changed completely now.
Disgust, contempt, anger.
Exactly the same as my last life.
But this time, I only turned and pointed to the far end of the field ridge.
"Then you'd better explain something."
"I stood right there banging the gong the whole time, from start to finish."
"On the mud by the river, there's only one set of footprints. Yours."
And my footprints stopped at the edge of the ridge, a good thirty feet from the bank.
I watched Patsy's face freeze in an instant, and slowly began:
"Patsy."
"You say I pushed you into the river."
"So tell everyone, then, how did I push you in from thirty feet away?"
