‘Tell me, Simon,’ she says quietly as they promenade the room arm in arm. ‘What happened to Mamma? I do not recall that.’

There are ladies like Mamma here: stout and red in the face with slightly protruding eyes. They gossip, obliviously blocking the path of the wheelchairs. Old men lean on crutches for their gouty legs; someone complains of feeling bilious.

Simon hangs his head. ‘Your mother … saw everything. From the window in the parlour. She saw Cedric … The shock was too great for her heart.’

Agnes winces. ‘I expected as much.’ She cannot decide who had it worst: Mamma forced to watch those she loved hurtle towards oblivion or herself; left to imagine the brutal scenes.

And what an imagination she owns. She recalls the conversations, the marks of affection; how she even conjured up Cedric in his torn and trampled clothing. She would not have believed her mind capable of such deceit, but Simon does.

‘I have told you before that the brain is a powerful and delicate organ. That was why I wished for you to refrain from activities that might interfere with its natural workings, such as Mesmerism. You must view it from this perspective, Miss Darken: that what happened to you is not so very different from what befell poor Miss Meers. Your subconscious persuaded itself into seeing objects and people that were not there.’

His argument carries the benefit of logic, but Simon does not know what she and Pearl witnessed in their upstairs room at Walcot Street. Ghosts do exist.

She would rather believe that Mamma and Cedric were not hallucinations, but visitors. Her love called them up from beyond the grave. Did not Miss West say that the Gift often came after a long illness? It did feel like a gift: her short reunion with those she loved best.

But she must never confess her theory to Simon. He would not understand.

An orchestra tunes their instruments, ready to amuse the drinkers.

‘Do you think my equilibrium will be restored, Simon?’ She looks up at him, unsure of what she wants his answer to be. ‘Will I be as I was, before the pneumonia?’

His smile does not waver. ‘I am certain of it.’

He is so certain that over the course of the next week, he pays the two shillings for her to use the private baths. The famed healing springs are very different from the cold clutches of the River Avon. She descends into a cloud of fragrant steam, her shift billowing around her ankles, and when she is finally immersed the warm liquid feels like an embrace. She paddles her hands, watching her swollen fingers soften and flex. The mist makes her think of Pearl.