She looked at me. ‘You look unwell, Miss Sarah,’ she said. ‘Shall I fetch you a posset? Should you like a rest?’

I paused for a moment, looking at the bed with the clean white sheets. The girl I had been could walk all day behind a wagon and then ride horses for a living all evening. Now I was tired in my body and weary deep into my very soul.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Undo the buttons at the back here, and I’ll take a nap, I’m not promised anywhere until this evening.’

I climbed between the cool sheets and sat up and sipped the posset she brought me. I slept at once but jerked awake when she came to stoke my fire.

‘It’s five o’clock, Miss Sarah,’ she said. ‘Her ladyship has come in and changed and gone out again. She said you and Lord Peregrine could follow her in the second carriage. I told her you were lying down.’

I nodded. I pushed back the sheets but they seemed heavy, my arms were weak. I put my feet down to the floorboards and the very wood seemed to sway beneath me.

‘I have a fever, Sewell,’ I said stupidly. ‘I’m not well enough to go. Ask Lord Peregrine to take my apologies. I shall stay in bed tonight and be well tomorrow.’

My eyelids were hot. I fell back against the pillows.

‘Will you dine up here?’ she asked indifferently.

‘No,’ I said. Poor little hungry wretch that I had been. I felt now that I never wanted to eat again. ‘No. Bring me some lemonade and then leave me to sleep please.’

I heard her rattle the fire irons in the grate and then I heard the floorboard creak as she crossed the room for the door. I dimly heard her voice speaking to Perry and then the sound came and went in my ears like the sound of the sea, like the sounds of the waves that last day at Selsey.