I sat next to Abigail as we filed into the pews till the chapel felt like it was bursting. There was an artist’s easel with a cloth covering it and a funny little vestibule with a ruched purple curtain encircling it. A platform had been hastily erected behind the pulpit and on it, upright as Bishops, sat a dozen or so people in black uniforms, somewhere between a subaltern’s tunic and a Sally Army rig. But it wasn’t at their duds that everyone was a-gawping. These was some of the bonniest boys and girls I’d ever clapped optics on. Not a hair was out of place, nor a chiselled cheekbone blemished. They was some of the finest physical specimens on God’s Green Earth – and they knew it (as that type always do).

Beauty is a weapon – and don’t let anyone tell you different.

These was Mrs Gillyflower’s ‘Pilgrims’ – or ’Grims as I came to know them.

At last, the congregation fell silent and a woman stepped out and began to climb the little steps to the pulpit. Mrs Gillyflower was of some age – perhaps seventy-odd – and had clearly once been a great beauty herself. But there was not a scrap of powder or paint on her pale face and her eyes gleamed at us with a strange force somewhere between malice and appetite. She adjusted her black bonnet and then leant her clawed hands on the edge of the pulpit.

‘Bradford!’ she cried, and the word rang through the hall like an accusation. ‘The gaudy fleshpots and gin-palaces of Bradford! Bradford.’ Her voice dropped low, as though in sorrow. ‘That Babylon for the Moderns! With its crystal light and its glitter, all a-swarm with the wretched ruins of humanity. Men and women crushed by the Devil’s juggernaut! Sinking ever further into a great wen of depravity and ordure! And moral turpitude can destroy the most delicate of lives. Believe me, I know.’ Her voice dropped again. ‘I know.’

She gave a little nod and one of the Pilgrims pulled on a tasselled cord. The curtain surrounding the little vestibule slid back with a sort of gentle ‘shush’ and revealed there was a young woman. A very lovely young woman in a pale cream dress, sitting on a chair next to a potted Aspidistra like some sort of tableau. There was a strong resemblance to Mrs G herself – the high cheekbones and the rosebud mouth – but this unfortunate creature, well …

‘My own daughter … ’ sighed Mrs Gillyflower.

The girl turned – and the congregation let out a gasp. A ragged and livid scar ran right over the poor creature’s face.

‘… blinded by my late husband in a drunken rage! Her once-beautiful eyes pale and white as mistletoe berries.’

There were cries of ‘Shame!’