Motherhood. I never said as much to anyone, but the word left me cold. I did not want to end up with a babe hanging from me. In fishing folk, the women are not long in their confinement. A week or two perhaps, or longer if they are older and have other bairns to deal with. Then it’s back to work, but with double the toil. Feeding and changing and fussing. Nights of no sleep and days of colicky cries. Or worrying over a sick babe and, worse, mourning ones who did not survive. I wanted none of it. Some would call me selfish for that. Unwomanly. Perhaps I was.

So it came as a huge relief when Spencer brought me a physic preparation on the morning after our wedding night. I’d never seen anything like it. Not in all the tinctures Ma and Da had taken over the years for headaches and knee aches and poxes. The packet was in the shape of a neat square and there was writing on the front, two words that I could not decipher, even though I had some limited knowledge of written words; and a sketch of a fine lady with a secretive-looking smile on her face.

‘The writing says Women’s Tonic,’ Spencer explained. ‘Except it’s written in Swedish. It’s the most popular one in Gothenburg. All the courtesans use it, so I have heard. Take one dose every morning stirred into fresh water. Just like this.’ He emptied the packet into a cup of water and stirred it with a spoon, then offered it to me. It fizzed for a moment or two and, when it had settled, he beckoned me to drink it. I sipped it gingerly. I didn’t like the salty taste. I didn’t like his easy use of the word courtesan.

‘Every morning? How will I ever get used to that?’

‘Drink up,’ he said. ‘You’ll get used to it soon enough. It’s the only way to stop a baby, for if we carry on like we did last night, a baby will come soon enough.’

That was enough to frighten me. I swallowed the drink. I did not ask Spencer how he knew so much about the habits of the courtesans.