She would keep her love for Julietta secret, like a precious ruby held in her pocket. And if her yearning became unbearable, she would find some means to meet her. In her mind’s eye, she imagined a wayside inn where, dressed in her man’s clothes, she would meet her ‘wife’ and they would spend the night together. Already, she could see the mullion windows of the room, the candle burning at the bedside, her lover’s soft white body, her hair spread out on the pillow …

But now, she had to try to accept once more the contours of her old home: the narrowness of her bed, the medicinal smell which hung in the air, the invisible presence of Dr Ross. When she thought about him, it surprised her to realise that, notwithstanding the two years they had worked together side by side in perfect harmony, she always pictured him in Mrs Morrissey’s tea room, making his ridiculous proposal of marriage. It was as if that fateful day now obscured everything that had gone before it. Jane knew that this was a contrary way to think about him, but it seemed that her mind could find no other.

To distract herself from contemplating him at all, Jane opened her trunks and began to take out the new clothes she’d acquired in Paris. She caressed them as she hung them up in the narrow wardrobe where her nurse’s uniforms hung like accusing ghosts. Making sure that her door was closed, Jane now unpacked the frock coat bought at Tirard. She held it against her body and pressed her face into the fabric of the shoulders, where a trace of Julietta’s perfume lingered. Prior to their love-making, Julietta had liked to indulge in a little play-acting, pretending that they were husband and wife out for a walk in the Luxembourg Gardens. She had tucked her arm inside Jane’s and they’d perambulated about the spacious hotel room, with Jane wearing her male outfit, and Julietta had remarked on the lilacs coming into bud in the park and the dogs yapping in the spring sunshine and the children at play with their hoops and skipping ropes.

A knock on Jane’s door brought her out of this reverie. She threw the frock coat back into her trunk and closed the lid. Becky came in and announced that Sir William had ordered tea.

‘He asks that you come down to the parlour,’ she said. ‘He told me to be sure to tell you that there are cakes from Mrs Morrissey’s.’

Jane and her father sat at the tea table and both remembered how comfortable they felt in each other’s presence. After a while, Sir William said: ‘I know you have much to tell me, but I expect I will hear about it all over time, and you will show me all your Paris fashions?’

‘I will, Father.’

‘And talk to me about your new friends, the Sims. I know that Kirkwall & Sims have a fine reputation.’