‘Why are you sorry, lass?’ mumbled Janet, her head heavy. ‘This isn’t your doing. This all rests with one person and those too weak to stop him.’

Sorcha met Janet’s good eye and they both nodded. They weren’t going to say his name, lest by uttering it he be made manifest.

‘God will make him pay,’ said Jenny.

‘Rather the devil does that,’ wheezed Janet.

‘Sooner the better,’ added Nettie, wiping Janet’s nose again.

Distant shouts and the tramp of boots made Sorcha look up. Nearby doors were hammered upon; dogs barked and whined, bairns wailed.

‘They’re coming closer,’ whimpered Jenny.

‘Go. Go,’ said Janet weakly. ‘All of you. I don’t want you here when they come lest they turn on you as well.’

‘Where will we go?’ asked Mimi Foster, a cousin of Nicolas and Jenny.

‘Now’s not the time to run away,’ said Nettie, rising to her feet. She rested her fingers lightly upon Janet’s shoulder.

Sorcha stood as well. ‘Only by standing up to this, saying it can’t go on, will it stop.’ She took in the frightened faces, the looks of uncertainty that were exchanged. ‘But Janet’s right, you don’t have to do this. This isn’t your fight. You’ve not been accused. Those men out there, they’ve lost all reason. I will stay. I will remain with Janet —’

‘Me too,’ said Nettie.

‘Nae —’ gasped Janet.

Sorcha reached for her hand and nursed it. ‘You’re in no condition to argue.’

‘Sorcha’s correct.’ Jenny returned to Janet’s side. ‘This isn’t your fight,’ she said to the other women. ‘But it’s my sister there at the Tolbooth, this is her house, and it’s my friends those bastards have hurt.’

‘I’m not going anywhere,’ said Mimi, swinging away from the window, fists on hips. ‘You’re my family and friends too. The Weem is my home. I’ll not be turned from it by a frothing tumult. You’re wrong, Sorcha McIntyre. This is our fight.’

The women looked at each other with shining eyes and grim smiles.

Sorcha wanted to cheer. How proud of them Nicolas and Beatrix would be. How proud was she? Was Nettie?

‘Very well,’ she said, praying they couldn’t hear her racing heart. ‘Then we’ll face the mob together and, like the men who are seeking to defuse this, we’ll try and appeal to common sense.’

‘They have none,’ whispered Janet.

‘Then we’ll appeal to their purses instead,’ said Nettie and continued bandaging Janet. ‘If Edinburgh finds out about this, how folk sought to take the law into their own hands, punish someone without a trial, then not only will the authorities seek to bring the perpetrators to account, but the entire town will be fined and it will be hefty. Who’s going to want to pay that?’

The women gazed at her in admiration.