‘Ha, you can see to mine all right. Come here.’

‘Naw. I ain’t doing nowt with you. I – I just want to carry out whatever you called for a maid to do, and that’s all.’

‘Ah, but I want more doing, now it is you who has come to me, Betsy.’

He walked towards her.

‘Naw. Naw, don’t touch me, please . . .’

‘You’re begging for it, you know as you are. I can feel it. I’m not daft. Now stop resisting and let’s get on with it. I have a lot to give you, Betsy. It’s you I think of, when I’m trying to satisfy that cold fish of a wife of mine. God, she’s hard work – gives nothing and takes all. Now you, Betsy, I can see you’re a giver. And I can see that you want to give what you have to me.’

Affronted at how he’d spoken of Mags, Betsy couldn’t understand how he was still having such an effect on her. He was close to her now. She could smell him – the lovely smell of his cologne, something she’d thought strange for a man to splash on himself, but had known the allure of whenever she’d caught a whiff of it. As it hit her senses, she felt herself coming alive. Every part of her wanted this man. Wanted to know what it would be like to be kissed by him, fondled . . . entered. Oh God, she could hardly breathe.

His lips felt smooth as she met them, and yet they tingled sensations through her that she’d long forgotten could be so strong. Her arms went around him and she clung to him, not caring that he was moving them towards the bed, taking in his tongue and thrusting her own into his mouth. All thoughts of hurting Mags were forgotten as she drowned in this release of all her troubles – this exquisite wrongdoing, which was making her gasp for breath and had her longing for more.

When she took Harold into her, she cried out with ecstasy as her whole body betrayed her, and the ache within her flowed into a river of wondrous relief of all her pent-up womanhood.

Harold’s cries joined hers, his hollers telling her he was climaxing, and inside her, but she didn’t care: she wanted him, wanted to drink in all of him – she loved him in an animalistic way that she had no control of. And she knew in that moment that she would go to the ends of the world to couple with him as often as she could, no matter the consequences.

As he rolled off her, reality hit Betsy. Oh God, what have I done? What have I done?

‘Come on – off the bed and pull your knickers up. I know you enjoyed it, but you’re to go back to your duties now, as if nothing has happened . . . Here.’

The sound of the coins jingling as he threw them onto the bed aroused disgust in Betsy. She was the lowest of the low. How had she sunk to this? She couldn’t blame Bill’s inadequacy, as she knew it was possible that would soon come to an end. I should have waited – I should! What kind of a person can I be, to use the shock of the news I had about Ma as a need for comfort? What I’ve done was vile . . . vile!