‘I shall tell you something, sir,’ I say. ‘I did not spend long in the world beyond ours. I can’t tell you what heaven looks like, for I do not think I truly got there, but I knew, when I was preparing to meet God on that gallows, that I did not have any fears that I had sinned against anyone. They said concealing a pregnancy is a sin, but I held that babe in my arms and loved her. In fact the infant cadaver you speak of is called Susanna.’

He swallows.

‘Mibbie my Susanna will give you and your scholars lots of teaching. But it is truly something to go to the Lord with a clear conscience, and if you do not give me back my Susanna – if you do not let a mother and her daughter be together – let us both be on your conscience until the day of your death, sir. And that is the price you will pay for such teaching.’

He opens his mouth and shuts it again. He hovers and his fingers flit about the bookcase for a moment or two longer, then he nods his head, tells me to wait, turns on his heel and makes his way through another set of doors.

It is a long trudge from the south side of the city back up to the High Street, especially carrying half a dozen bottles of perfume, a heavy bag of coin and Susanna.

The anatomist gent took a while over the task, mibbie even an hour, but eventually came back through the doors with a wooden box.

‘Is she still in a jar?’ I asked, feeling all of a sudden squeamish and horrified.

‘Your Susanna is in a shroud and a small sealed casket now,’ he said. ‘I have placed her there myself. And she looks perfect. Perfectly at peace. Have no troubling thoughts about her at all.’

I liked the man after that. Mibbie he had a babe of his own. He handed her over to me with such gentle respect, I think that he might. It is astonishing what a bit of persuasion can do.

It is a strange feeling to have Susanna back. Like a weight has been lifted, even though the load of carrying her is heavy. Like I have saved her, yet failed her. I talk to her all the way up the road of course, the tears streaming down my face, and folk staring at me as I pass.

I thank her for waiting so patiently for her mama, but say that I had matters to attend to. I tell her what a good babe she has been, and what sights she must have seen in that anatomy museum; and all about what I have seen, and that the first thing I did – in that half-world between life and death – was to search for her. I tried to find you, Susanna, I knew you were there somewhere.