‘We’ve got it already,’ Dandy said proudly. ‘You know Merry’s got her own horse. We’re doing better than you think. We’ve got ten guineas between the two of us, and some shillings for spending money. You’re straight out of the poorhouse, you don’t understand what it’s like for us with our own act. You’ve never seen Merry work the horses. She can earn a lot of money. We’re only staying with Robert Gower this year. Next year we could go anywhere. Anyway, I’ve got a guinea all right. And it’s yours if you keep your hands off Jack.’

‘Dandy,’ I said in an urgent undertone.

But it was too late. The poorhouse whore spat into her dirty palm and Dandy shook quickly, before she could change her mind. Dandy got up and went to the mirror and pulled at the string bow which was tying her hair. ‘I’ll know if you cheat, mind,’ she said to her reflection.

Katie slumped back on her pallet. ‘I won’t cheat,’ she said disdainfully. ‘You can keep your Jack. I have lovers I don’t have to buy. I wish you good luck with him.’

Dandy turned away from the mirror. I thought she would be angry at the gibe but her face was serene. ‘I have to get around his father yet,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘Buying you off is just the start of it.’

She pulled her gown out of the clothes chest and slipped it on over her shift. She brushed out her hair and pinned it on top of her head. There was a very faint tide mark of grime at her bare neck and she rubbed at it with a damp forefinger and then put a clean white collar atop.

I sat on my bed and said nothing. Katie got to her feet and pulled on her poorhouse skirt as a replacement for her working breeches. She looked from Dandy to me and then went down the stairs to the stables below in silence.

‘One guinea,’ I said grimly.

Dandy turned from the mirror and put out her hands to me. ‘Don’t look like that, Merry,’ she said. ‘If I pull Jack and marry him then we won’t need your little ten guineas, we’ll have this house and the whole show.’

‘If you so much as try then my little ten guineas is all we’ll have,’ I said miserably. ‘Robert warned you, Dandy, and he warned Jack in front of us, and neither of you said so much as a whisper. He’ll put us out, both of us. And then where will we be? All we’ll have is a sixteen-hand hunter trained to nothing, you a trapeze artist without a trapeze, and me a rosinback rider without a horse.’