Just as she was pulling Aunt Hatt’s skirt back down, she heard sounds coming from the next room, and she dashed back to the chair to secure it with her weight. But the noises stayed in the room, Charles’s voice raised angrily. Though she listened with every fibre of her being she could not make out the words, but their tone was angry. She heard Elsie Barber’s voice, even more indistinct. There were some lesser sounds, thumps as if furniture was being moved. Gradually, it went quiet.

Margaret covered herself with everything she had, the old blanket smelling of moth balls, the coats. If only she might sleep, to pass through this night more quickly. But she was wide awake, every nerve inside her poised for any sound. Her body was like a cauldron of worry and fear. Whatever must Aunt Hatt and Uncle Eb be thinking? Especially when Annie came home and told them who Charles was, as she undoubtedly would have done. And however was she going to get out of here? Her mind kept returning to methods of escape.

Once, she got up and very quietly tried the door, just in case. Was it really locked? But it would not give. She was a prisoner. She imagined running out of here, along the street, to anywhere. She would walk all the way back to Birmingham if she had to . . . Back to . . . home. It felt like home. She sat thinking of Philip Tallis, his face, his arms around her on those precious few occasions when they had managed to snatch time alone, his gentle, reassuring manner.

I know now, she thought. Any doubts in her mind about the future of her life had been wiped away by these past hours. Her father must have told Charles where she was. And his deceitful intentions and her genuine desire for reconciliation had brought her to this. She boiled with rage. She knew who was worthy of her love and trust now, all right!

Time passed, unevenly tagged by the clock. The night took on a deeper silence. She soothed herself with thoughts of Philip. Comforted, she dozed, or thought she did. Each time she woke it was with a terrible pounding of her heart as she was shocked back into realization of where she was, of what she had allowed to happen to her.

The clock had struck two – she thought. One, half past one . . . ? It was hard to keep track. She heard the door open along the passage, the almost, but not quite, silent footsteps. Gripping the blanket round her, both hands fists, she sat absolutely still, her breathing shallow so that there was hardly a part of her that moved.

The key turned in the lock. She leapt up on to her knees, clinging to the back of the chair, forcing her weight down on it with all her strength. The door crashed against the back of the chair.