I go down with Mr. Mosley when he goes to fetch them, deep in the night, no shift due for another four hours. I asked to come, so I can change the bandages one last time. Only they don’t need changing. The bleeding’s long stopped. I just want to see him one more time. Thomas. For six days I have nursed him. And got a kiss for my trouble. I know myself he does not like me the same as I like him: it’s there in his eyes when we light the lamp. But it was a good kiss all the same. He squeezes my shoulder when we part, and I wag a finger. Sister and brother then. I can live with it. It’s better than naught.

Before they set off, the others, too, wish to say their good-byes. They line up like they are waiting for service at the grocer’s. We are still in Thomas’s sick chamber, what we so grandly call our Union Hall. I shan’t be taking the lift with them, will stay behind to destroy any trace they was ever here. Mr. Cooper goes first. He steps close to me and shakes my hand. “Thank you,” he says. He even gives a little bow. If he’d kissed my hand on top of it, I would have died laughing. Despite my best attempts, I have grown fond of Mr. Cooper. He is hard to dislike. The trouble though is that he is awfully posh. Well-bred, down to the vowels of his “Thank you.” It’s not his fault, mind, but he can’t open his mouth without it reminding me what he is. And what I am. Not of his class. A servant, a miner’s daughter. Common as sin. He tried to wash his clothes one day, in a bucket, and it was so pathetic I did it for him in the end. But only when Miss Naylor was out. The young milady.

I wouldn’t piss on her if she was on fire.

But she too tries to say good-bye. Tries to pay me, in fact, taking a silver cross off her neck and holding it out on her open palm.

“For your trouble,” she says.

I suppose she’s trying to be gracious. In the dark, I might have taken it and worn it against my breast. But in the beam of the lamp I can see the stiffness of her bearing, those meek, I’m-a-saint-because-I-know-I’m-a-sinner eyes. Like she’s standing portrait for a bust of Jesus.

“Please accept it as a token of our gratitude.”

I hiss my answer.

“Can’t,” I say. “People will see and assume I’m a thief. The justice of the peace will have me flogged.”