I debated whether to tell her why I’d gone to the Hospital. I wanted to shelter my daughter from the nastiness of the world, but on the other hand, I did not want her to be ignorant about danger.

“I do not like to distress you,” I said in a low voice. “But Mr. McAdam asked me to look into the fact that a few children might have gone missing. They might not be at all, and we are worried for nothing. But you must not say a word about it. I do not wish to raise an alarm until we know for certain what has happened.”

Grace’s brow puckered, but she looked sympathetic rather than upset. “That would explain Mrs. Shaw’s worry. If she is to look after children there, and something happened to them . . . Mr. McAdam was right to ask you about it, Mum. You’ll find them.”

At that moment—while I did not share her confidence in my skills—I knew that I had made the correct choice to keep Grace with me after she’d been born. My daughter could now sit across from me, daintily chewing bread, never realizing how close she’d come to being one of those children in the gray uniforms she now felt pity for.

It had never occurred to her that I’d have given her up, that she’d be anything but cared for, sitting in a tiny tea shop on a blustery day with the mother who loved her.

I reached across the table and clasped her hand. “You are a sweet girl, my Grace.”

Grace smiled in surprised delight. “I love you too, Mum. Now, let us talk of something more pleasant to cheer you up. How is Lady Cynthia? And Lady Bobby? Do they wear trousers every day?”

I relaxed and fell into the gossipy chatter I shared with Grace on my day out. I described Cynthia’s beautiful gown at her aunt’s supper ball and Miss Townsend coming down to the kitchen to sketch us.

“How funny that she wants to paint cooks and maids,” Grace said, as amazed as Tess and I had been at the notion. “But you’ll be beautiful in the picture, Mum.”

“You are very flattering, my darling. She won’t be painting me, exactly, but domestics in general. I admit I do not understand it myself.”

“She should paint Lady Cynthia then. She is so very pretty.”

Grace spoke in all seriousness, and my heart warmed again. I did not know if all mothers were as proud and boastful of their own children, but I certainly was of mine and ever would be.

*   *   *

Grace and I returned to the Millburns’, full of tea and bread, but not too full to partake of Joanna’s treat of cakes and scones, and more tea, hot and laced with cream.