“Nothing!” Victoria snaps. “Nothing that the rest of us don’t have to put up with. She’s fucking crazy!” Britannica is shouting, screaming in her own language, calling Cressa’s name. Even though none of them understand her words, they know she is begging for help. Victoria grabs Cressa’s arm to stop her responding. “You can’t,” she says. “What are you going to do? Tell them to stop and Felix will pay their money back?”

Dido bursts into tears. “We can’t just leave her. There are two of them in there!”

“Two men?” Amara is appalled.

“She was fighting so much,” Victoria says, not meeting her eye. “The other one went in to hold her down.”

Amara looks desperately at Dido, then Cressa. It seems impossible that none of them are helping, that they are all standing by uselessly, letting her suffer. Britannica’s screaming cuts through her, visceral because it is familiar. It shocks her that she has never shouted her own anguish like that, that she has been silent instead. She presses her hands over her ears, wanting to stop the horror, stop the ear-splitting sound.

“Why can’t she just shut up!” Victoria shouts, suddenly angry. “Why can’t she fucking understand? It gets the men in the wrong mood; they’re going to be violent with all of us soon if she keeps this up. Stupid fucking bitch.”

“They’re hurting her!” Cressa shouts back, distraught. “They need to stop. Not her.”

Britannica’s screaming subsides into sobs. “It’s nearly over then,” Victoria mutters, not wanting to confront Cressa. “She always fights right to the end. So that means they’ve finished. She’ll be alright soon.”

The curtain scrapes back, and the two men step out into the corridor. The women instinctively draw back, clinging together. One man gives them a contemptuous stare, spits on the floor. They swagger off. Cressa breaks from the others and rushes into Amara’s old cell. Britannica is quiet; the only crying they can hear now is from Cressa.

Another man steps into the brothel. His shape, his walk, is familiar to Amara. It is Menander.

The shock sends the blood rushing to her heart. She stares at him, unable to speak.

“I came to see you. Thraso said you were free.”

She says nothing but walks to Dido’s cell, barely waiting for him to follow, then draws the curtain behind them both. She cannot bear to look at him, to see his beautiful face, so she stands gripping the material, her back to the room.

“What do you want?”

“Timarete . . .”

“What service do you want?”

“Service?”

“Yes, you paid for it,” she swings round, torn between rage and heartbreak. “So what service do you want? What fuck did you pay for?”

“I didn’t.”

“Why are you here then?”

“To see you. To talk with you.”