They come for miles for their Friday fish, and that brings out all the other traders too. Fisherrow harbour is lined with stalls and barrels and crates, filled with loaves and autumn harvests of apples and pears and carrots and parsnips, along with the lobsters and salmon.

After a busy hour of selling our fish, I leave Ma and Joan and take a walk up the harbour, which sings with the cries of gulls and traders. A wind comes off from the Forth, a fresh wind, and I sit on the wall and feel it. I would take off my bonnet and sense it whip my hair, were it not for the fact that I am far too grown-up for such frolics. This is what it is to be alive. To feel the weather and to blink at the sun’s harsh glint off the waves. To look at the sea, full of Navy ships and pirates, and wonder where the world ends. To feel as small as anything.

Before the hanging, I barely noticed any of it. I was too busy studying maps and daydreaming.

I get up and walk over to the harbourmaster’s office. I do not like smartly dressed men, but I have come to learn how to talk to them and make a case for myself. I knock sharply on the door, and a deep voice calls at me to come in.

The harbourmaster sits at a large desk, smothered with papers and cups and quills, and he is plainly puzzled to see a woman walk into his office. He is not a Fisherrow man – I can tell by his rakish frame and his well-cut vowels.

‘Can I assist you?’ He frowns, as though he fears I am here to report a theft or drunkenness, or the usual trouble the Friday market brings.

‘I am Mistress Maggie Dickson,’ I tell him. ‘Of Fisherrow.’

The penny drops, but he is too much of a gentleman to gawp.

‘Are you the – ahem – the hanged woman? Ah yes, I see you are; there was a likeness of you in the Courant.’ He looks me up and down, then blushes as if I were naked.

‘They call me Half-Hanged Maggie,’ I say. ‘But I’m not fond of that name.’

We wait for his blushes to cool a little.

‘I would not be fond of a name like that, either. They call me Harbourman Jim, which is not quite as bad, but I don’t like it. My name is James Munroe,’ he tells me.

He is trying to be decent, so I take the plunge. ‘I should like to ply a trade at the market,’ I say. ‘My own folks have a fish stall, but they don’t need the extra pair of hands, as my sister works with them now.’