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hot as to become almost oppressive. I was in my bed by eleven, but the other girls from my dormitory were still downstairs.
    I remembered them all giggling and dancing and kissing. I wriggled between my sheets and opened a book of my mother’s, but I couldn’t get comfortable and my calico nightgown felt harsh against my sensitive skin.
A waste.
That was what I was. A waste of a life and youth, with my foolish memory of the man with blue eyes, my stupid dreams.
    Someone was very quietly opening the door to ourattic room and I sat up quickly. It wasn’t Nell or Betsey but Lady Beatrice’s personal maid, Margaret. Her dark eyes glittered and again I noticed the pale scar on her cheek.
    ‘You’re reading,’ she said. ‘Like books, do you?’
    ‘It belonged to my mother.’ My heart for some reason was thudding.
    She picked it up and her thin lips curled. ‘Poetry. La-di-dah. I’m in need of an extra girl to tidy Her Ladyship’s sitting room. You’ll do.’
    On Lady Beatrice’s last visit, for Lord Edwin’s birthday party, Margaret had asked me if I’d press some of Her Ladyship’s clothes. I’d agreed, because I’d thought at the time I could maybe learn about London ways if I helped Margaret, though I was well aware she was just using me to get rid of her own jobs.
    No doubt that was her aim now. I got up to dress again – we maids were, after all, at the beck and call of our guests and their servants. But as I tugged off my old nightgown I was aware of her watching me. She seemed to be taking note of the slenderness of my figure, and I felt my breasts tingle suddenly under her gaze. Clumsily I pulled on my maid’s gown, and once I was dressed she took my arm to lead me along the corridor and down the back stairs. ‘Lady Beatrice doesn’t believe in letting her life go to waste,’ Margaret said to me. ‘Be prepared.’
    What?
I stumbled on the next step.
    She stopped and looked at me. Her teeth were white and pointy; the tip of her tongue slid a little over her thin lips. ‘You’ve seen her, haven’t you? My mistress? She knows life is for living.’
    ‘But her husband died,’ I whispered.
    ‘And she’s done her mourning. I’m just telling you this so you’re not shocked.’
    I froze. Shocked by what? She cupped my chin with her fingers; my pulse thudded again. ‘You’re pretty. Very pretty. Her ladyship’s noticed you. Not done it with anyone yet, little Sophie? Who are you saving yourself for? Boyfriend lost at the war?’
    I thought of the servants below with their kissing games. I thought of Will, but most of all I thought of Mr Maldon. ‘There… there isn’t anyone.’ My words came out in a foolish rush and I moistened my lips, agitated.
    ‘No one?’ She grinned, and I thought I heard her murmur,
All the better
, but I couldn’t be sure. It was so late, and I was very tired and low in spirits.
    In Lady Beatrice’s sitting room, several lamps were burning, and it looked as though a private party had been held in there, because the side-tables were littered with empty glasses and ashtrays, and the chairs were all out of place. But I remember noting through another door that the bedroom was pristine, the bedcovers unturned.
    ‘We’ve plenty of time to clean up before Her Ladyship returns.’ Margaret was looking around.
    I nodded. ‘Where…’
    I was going to ask where Her Ladyship was, but I broke off in confusion, because I’d heard the other servants say how after the lights went out at these house parties the corridors were full of visitors tiptoeing around to each other’s beds in the dark, then creepingback before dawn. My blood heated with embarrassment again.
    By the time we’d got the room tidied, it was past midnight. I said, ‘I’ll go now. I’ll just take these glasses and ashtrays down to the scullery.’ I was bone-tired.
    Margaret stopped me. ‘Sit a while. Have a drink.’
    Something held me there – despair, I think. In my tiredness, my usual obsession