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along the corridor, hair wrapped in a starched white cap.
    Not the cellar! Mercy’s heart seemed about to leap out of her chest. She felt as if she’d fall down if she moved, but she turned and forced herself to walk towards the huge woman who was bearing down on her.
    Miss O’Donnell stopped with a swish of skirts and apron and gaped at the girl. Mercy’s nose had stopped bleeding, but it felt dry and caked up with blood and she was still dabbing at it with Mr Paget’s hanky. She lowered her head and closed her eyes tight, waiting.
    ‘Lord above, we can’t have you looking like that – look at all those stains!’ Mercy opened her eyes cautiously to find Miss O’Donnell bent over and staring right into her face. She could see the enormous bready pores in the woman’s nose. ‘Come on, girl, quickly now, off with that frock and we’ll find something presentable to put on. It’s a blessing they sent you home or we shouldn’t stand a chance.’
    Matron was hustling her along towards the staircase, prodding her in the back every few steps as if she were a work-shy donkey. Mercy was more astonished than she had ever been before in her life. She’d done the worst thing she could do and Miss O’Donnell not only wasn’t punishing her, she was being nice!
    ‘Skin a rabbit!’ Matron’s bosom veered alarmingly upwards as she pulled Mercy’s blood-spattered dress over her head as if she were a five-year-old. ‘Now then, let’s get you cleaned up.’ She looked the girl over, pulled the edge of her vest to see if there were bruises on her torso. Fortunately she seemed clear, although her elbow was scabbed.
    ‘You, Mercy, are going to start a new life today,’ she explained, kneeling in front of the child and vigorously washing her face.
    ‘A lady is going to take you away from here to board out with her. She has no children, so she’s giving you a great opportunity which you are to make the most of, d’you understand? She has a very respectable house in Handsworth.’ Rather bare and sober, Miss Rowney had reported. Perhaps this was some austere religious way of living? But respectable enough, and the woman seemed very keen.
    ‘You’d better behave yourself, Mercy,’ Miss O’Donnell threatened suddenly. She was buttoning Mercy into a plain grey tunic several sizes too big for her. Mercy smelt her bitter breath as she hissed, ‘If you play this Mrs Gaskin up and make her send you back here, I can promise you, I’ll make sure your life isn’t worth living.’

    ‘Well, what a pretty little girl!’
    After getting cleaned up Mercy had been given a thin piece of bread and butter and a cup of milk which almost made her forget the sore throat. Now she stood feeling very small and bewildered on the holey rug in Miss Rowney’s office while the three of them stared at her.
    Miss Rowney and Miss O’Donnell were beaming away at her as if their hearts were going to explode with love and pride. And that Mrs Gaskin was smiling for all she was worth too.
    ‘You’ll find she’s an intelligent child,’ Miss Rowney was saying. ‘Doing so well at school. Of course, all our children attend St Philip’s Elementary School across the way, and Mercy’s progressed so very well – learned to read in record time, I gather.’
    ‘Oh well, that’s very good,’ Mrs Gaskin said, sounding as if her mind was on other things completely. ‘She must be a credit to you. Bit small though, ain’t – isn’t she?’
    There was something funny about the way this Mrs Gaskin was talking, Mercy thought. It was like the way Dorothy and Miss Eagle talked but sort of poshified.
    ‘Small perhaps, but very strong and wiry. Come and shake hands, Mercy,’ Miss Rowney instructed her. ‘Mrs Gaskin has very kindly offered to take you in and she will in effect be your new mother, so you have to be a very good girl for her.’
    Mercy stepped forward and shook Mrs Gaskin’s cold, fat hand. The woman had black hair which was taken up under a