Agnes stares, confused. She cannot recall him weeping like this, even when his family died. But she must not feel pity: this display in itself could be a manipulation.

‘You did it, to scare me,’ she asserts. ‘To put me in your power. You wanted me to have no other choice but to marry you.’

He chokes. ‘No! Miss Darken, I would never harm another soul—’ Dropping the paint set, he starts forward, but stops when he sees her flinch back in the chair. ‘I tried so hard to protect you.’

‘From whom?’ She concentrates on Ned’s silhouette and the spots of blood that mark it; she cannot trust herself to look at her friend’s face. ‘I wonder you did not burn this. It is not like you to be sloppy, Simon. But I suppose you had your hands full.’

‘You said it was your best work …’ He breaks off, runs a hand across his sweating forehead. When he recommences, he sounds calmer, resigned. ‘No, you are right. I should have burnt it. I should have dissolved the bodies, too, rather than hiding them, but I thought their families deserved something to bury. I did not have time to think it through … It all started to happen so quickly.’

She should feel frightened of him, but she is strangely numb. ‘What did?’

He puts out his hands like he is trying to placate a rabid dog. ‘Do not worry, Miss Darken. We will find help. We will stop these spells of disassociation … I was wrong to attempt to handle them alone. My emotions got the better of me. I have a friend …’ He takes a step closer. ‘It is not your fault. You were not in control. After the pneumonia … there were times you were not yourself. You were more like …’ Another step. ‘I thought that if I got you away from Bath, to Switzerland, it might stop.’ His face seems to collapse. ‘We were so close to being happy. I could have made you well.’

‘Me?’ she disputes. ‘Do not try your trickery, Simon; do not try to turn this around on me, you are the one who has lied—’

‘It must be in the blood,’ he mutters to himself. He is so near now that she can smell the birthing chamber on him. ‘A taint. I never thought you and your sister anything alike, but when it comes over you, I see her again …’

Agnes scuffs her chair further away. ‘Stop there. Right there.’ She snatches up the letters and brandishes them at him. ‘I am wise to your game. Now I know of your guilt, you will try to send me away, pretend that I am mad.’

‘What have you …’ For the first time he seems to understand what the letters are. His eyes slide across the desk.

Stop on the scissors.

A chill runs over her skin. She remembers how Ned and Mr Boyle died: a single laceration to the throat.