As often as Thalia walked along the passage that lay between the garden of Lansdowne House and that of Devonshire House, she invariably found herself thinking of highwaymen.

The Prince of Wales and the Duke of York, when they were very young men, were once driving in a Hackney carriage down Hay Hill when they were stopped and robbed by a group of highwaymen.

Those thieves were never caught and another time a highwayman escaping from Piccadilly rode down Lansdowne Passage, rode his horse over the steps at the Curzon Street end and galloped away.

It always seemed to Thalia a reckless and exciting escapade and she invariably found herself wondering if she, had she been in the same position, would have been so clever.

Hannah disliked talking when they were hurrying home and Thalia therefore continued with her own thoughts without interruption.

The gentleman who had given her the guinea in Mademoiselle Genevieve’s room this morning had the look, she thought, of a highwayman, or perhaps a buccaneer.

He was exactly the type of man she liked to watch either riding in Rotten Row or walking down Bond Street.

She had not until now had the chance of speaking with who she imagined was one of the beaux and his cynical rather mocking voice was just the way she had anticipated he would speak.

Now that they were in Curzon Street, Hannah seemed to move even more quickly and a few minutes later they had turned left under an archway that led them into Shepherd’s Market.

Here again Thalia’s imagination made her people the place with the Fair that she had read about in books and had been described to her by many of the older inhabitants of the Market.

Shepherd’s Market was still a little village with its own independent life, but in the past the Fair that had been held there for two weeks every year had been one of the sights of London.

It had started as an annual market, but in the surrounding fields and streets there had been booths for jugglers and prize fighters, wild beasts and mountebanks.

A merry-go-round, swings, fire-eaters and rope dancers had drawn the gaping crowds who had found the pig-faced women, monstrosities and cannibal chiefs an irresistible entertainment.

But it had not always been fun, Thalia remembered. There had been tragedies too.

Over a hundred years ago there had been a tightrope dancer known as ‘Lady Mary’, who was said to be the daughter of a foreign Nobleman.

She had eloped with a showman who taught her how to dance on a tightrope and her performance was immensely popular as she had both grace and skill.

She had continued with her act after she became pregnant and one day she overbalanced and fell. She gave birth to a stillborn child and died almost at once.

Thalia would often think of Lady Mary because, although it was a sad story, it was a very romantic one.