There was a murmur of agreement from the men’s side, although I could not see their faces very well, as the lamps were dim.

‘So you have missed your bath, as we were all bathed today’ – the guard had a jarring habit of using ‘we’ – ‘but I will see what I can do, as we do not wish to go to Our Lord unclean. And we will need to find you a clean smock too, for your clothes are filthy and likely flea-ridden.’

She tutted then, as though I was an additional burden she had been forced to take on when she was already at some great capacity, before putting her lantern up in front of her and making her way out.

In the silence that followed, which was only a moment or two, a rodent scuttled from one corner to another and there was a far-off shout of some sort that came from above and reminded me that we were only a few feet away from people living quite ordinary lives.

The men started up a conversation again, two of them, in low tones and it appeared to be something about cock-fighting, as though they were pals in an ale bar. The other woman patted the mat next to her, for me to come and lie down.

‘Have you any gin about you, hen?’ she asked, although she must have known as well as I did that you were searched for liquor and knives and poisons before you were taken to the Iron Room.

‘Mibbie your family will bring some, if you ask,’ I said.

She sniffed. ‘They’ve turned their backs on me,’ she replied. ‘The next time I see them, they’ll be watching me hang, to make sure I’m dead. That’s if they bother to turn up at all. And they will leave my body for the anatomists, for they’ve made no plans to bury me.’

I did not ask why, nor why she was condemned, for I did not want to tell anyone my own shameful conviction. For it was shameful.

But I did not know what I did was such a crime. No one had told me.

It’s not as though my ma had taken me to one side as a lass and told me all the things I must never do. I knew it was a crime to steal or forge a coin or call curses in the street, but I had never known it was a crime simply to not tell anyone I was with child. Or to give her my own farewell. And yes, I’d once considered giving her over to the parish, but I would never have harmed her.