‘My apologies.’ Simon grimaces, sips at his tea and grimaces again. ‘That was not intended for your ears.’

It is endearing how he still thinks to protect her. She saw things at the séance in Walcot Street that would make his hair stand up on end.

Death is not the conclusion, but the alternative she saw is hardly comforting. If Hargreaves is still drowning, and Ned is still cold, she dare not think how this other man, who died feasting on phosphorous, will linger through eternity.

‘I am not so very fragile, Simon. I do encounter sad stories in my work, too. In fact, I lately met a woman who worked in a match factory.’ She pauses, conscious she must not reveal the full circumstances of the meeting. ‘She worked there with her stepfather, and he suffered terribly from the chemicals, even without ingesting them.’

‘Ah. The jaw, was it?’

‘Yes. What is the cure for that? Is there anything a physician can do for him?’

‘Not a physician, but a surgeon.’ He mimics with his index finger and thumb. ‘Removing the mandible – the lower jawbone – is the only way to give the poor fellow a fighting chance. One must cut out the rot before it can contaminate the entire body.’

‘Have you ever performed that operation, Simon?’

‘I have,’ he replies on a downward note, closing the topic. As with Edinburgh, as with the lady sent to the asylum, Simon does not speak of his surgical days. Sometimes Agnes wonders if that is why he has become so plump in recent years: he is swelling with all the words unsaid.

Feeling uncomfortable, she picks up her cup. The tea looks pale and insipid. Come to think of it, that is what has always troubled her about the atmosphere of this room and its dull decoration: it is like a cup of weak tea.

She pours some into a saucer and offers it to Morpheus, who laps it up without hesitation. His forebears would have been warier. Of course, there was no proof that Constance poisoned them …

It will be better if she does not mention Constance at all today.

‘Simon,’ she says, crafting his name carefully. ‘I know you try your best to shield me from all delicate matters. But you see, I can talk to you quite composedly about a suicide and a jawbone extraction, so I hope you will realise there is no danger in being candid with me today. We must face a topic we have long been avoiding.’ She draws in a breath. ‘We must speak about Cedric.’

He blanches, reaches for a paper on his desk. ‘This is not the best time to—’