‘And you give her la langue?’

‘No. Servants are too unwashed. We masturbate each other and I leave. It is very innocent. We barely speak – only the unspoken whisperings of women and their needs. But I believe she loves me. Her name is Ellen.’

‘The world loves you, Julietta! You are the most irresistible being I have ever known.’

‘And I …’ said Julietta, taking Jane’s hand in hers, ‘I do believe I love you more than all the others. If it were not for Marco, I can imagine that I could leave Ashton to live with you, as man and wife, and we could be wild and wicked every night.’

Jane turned away and stared into the fire. The phrase ‘man and wife’ captured in that instant for her a vision of how happy a life with Julietta would make her and reaffirmed that the future she had chosen with Valentine Ross was a mistaken one. She knew now that she loved women, Julietta above all, but perhaps other women, too, if she knew how to ask for that love.

She felt that never in her life had she been more certain of anything: Tall Jane, the Angel of the Baths, was a lover of women and she would always be that. To submit to marriage with Ross would be to plunge them both into a lifetime of misery.

At this moment, Ellen came in with the claret and placed the jug and glasses at Julietta’s elbow. Julietta reached out and touched the maid’s shoulder and said, ‘Ellen, I have been telling Miss Adeane what you and I do sometimes in the night, and she thinks it very touching and sweet.’

A bright blush spread across the girl’s features. She opened her mouth to speak, but could find no words.

This seemed to amuse Julietta and she went on: ‘Miss Adeane understands that this is very normal and innocent behaviour among uninhibited women and nothing to be ashamed of. Men take advantage of their pretty servants all the time and may often hurt them or get them with child. But we do not hurt each other, do we, Ellen?’

‘No, Ma’am,’ said Ellen. ‘Not at all.’

‘And I have never forced you into anything you don’t wish to do?’

‘No, Mrs Sims. For I do wish to do it.’

‘There you are, then. All is well. You may go now.’

Ellen bobbed another curtsey and went out. Jane saw that the blush had spread round to that little bit of her neck just visible beneath her white cap and she found this captivating. The honesty and daring openness with which Julietta lived her life made her gasp; wherever she went, she found and took whatever she needed and refused to feel abashed by any of it. And Jane’s own life, she knew, was not lived like this. It had been a constrained and dedicated life, the life of a virgin spinster, and only too late had she discovered an erotic world, with all its possibilities and joys. She felt, at that moment, that she wanted to howl.