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‘Only about an inch, miss, but there’s no accounting for heads; they bleed like stuck pigs!’

‘Do you have a cloth I can use to wash my face and hands?’

Polly handed over another linen towel and Eliza dipped it into the jug of water. ‘Oh, what a relief to get this dirt off my skin.’ She was just trying to clean the soot from the front of her hair when there was a knock at the door.

Polly opened it to find Gibbons with a tray and a plate of bread and ham and a couple of sweet pastries. ‘I thought the young lady might be hungry,’ he said as he handed it over. Eliza could have wept with gratitude.

Polly was sleepy and stifled a yawn. ‘I think your head is now as cleaned of blood and dirt as possible, miss. Do you need help undressing?’

‘Thank you, Polly, for all your care. I’m sure it’s time for you to return to bed. I can manage to undress myself.’ Eliza had never had the luxury of a maid and seldom wore stays as she was often in the loosest of clothes. For performing she wore pantaloons or tights, and bound her breasts beneath her tight jackets so she could execute her riding feats unimpeded by her costume. Polly looked relieved and bade goodnight, turning towards the stairs to the maids’ quarters at the top of the house.

Having eaten every morsel of food offered to her, Eliza carefully hung up her dress and chemise, washed her stockings in the remains of the water and hung them to dry on the windowsill. She only had one other set of clean clothes which she unfolded from her portmanteau, ready for the morrow. Slipping into a simple calico nightgown, she placed Mr Fox on the bedside table as a talisman to watch over her as she clambered into the high bed and fell into an immediate dreamless sleep.

Just after dawn, the house in Brook Street began to come alive. Servants cleaned out the grates, swept the hearths and straightened cushions while others prepared breakfast. As it became more truly morning, pitchers of hot water were carried upstairs to the family rooms, and one for the mysterious guest who had arrived in the middle of the night, her head cracked open by some ruffian – so went below-stairs gossip.

Alick Wolfe had been lying awake since seven in the morning, reluctant to rouse his sleeping wife curled beside him, a hand casually flung over his arm. He gazed down on her face, amazed still by her beauty and his good fortune in being loved by her. Her long russet hair lay in a loose plait behind her, her skin slightly flushed from the warmth of their bed. Her fingers were stained in places by the pigments she used for painting the portraits that were beginning to bring her fame. He felt an irresistible urge to kiss her.

As he bent his head, her eyes opened and met his. ‘Good morning, Mr Wolfe, I hope you slept well?’

He pulled her close and tucked his arm round her back. ‘I slept very well until dear Rav came calling at three in the morning.’

‘Good heavens! Why on earth? He has his own home to go to. Was he too foxed to notice he’d come to the wrong door?’ She laughed.

‘No, my darling Cory, by the time I saw him he’d sobered up. But I’m afraid we have a house guest.’ Alick looked rueful.

Corinna struggled to sit up and said, a note of urgency in her voice, ‘You mean your American cousin has arrived early?’

‘No, this is a stranger to us both. A young woman run over by his lordship last night, travelling too fast and in his cups. As you can imagine, Taz was most put out.’

‘Poor girl! Is she injured? Who is she?’

‘Well, that’s the mystery. Her name is Eliza but she cannot remember anything else. Rav, of course, has called her Miss Mysterious, which amuses him greatly.’

‘I suppose he couldn’t take her home without a chaperone, to protect them both,’ Corinna mused. ‘Is she hurt, Alick?’

‘She had a crack on the head but it had stopped bleeding by the time she arrived at our door.’

‘Goodness! Perhaps that accounts for the lost memory. I’d better get up and see to her.’

Alick Wolfe’s arm around Corinna’s shoulders tightened as he folded her close to his chest. ‘Not yet, my darling Mrs Wolfe.’ He smiled down at her, his eyes intense with desire. ‘You’re so warm and soft, and smell as sweet as hay, and I cannot resist you. Thank ye gods I no longer have to!’ They both laughed and slipped lower under the embroidered quilt.

‘So I smell as sweet as hay, sir! You make me sound like one of your favourite hunters.’ Corinna’s giggle ended in a sigh. ‘Oh, Alick! I can’t be long. I want to welcome this young woman to breakfast. And our little Emma will soon be scampering in, having escaped from Nurse.’ She lifted her arms from the warmth of their bed to slip around his neck, murmuring, ‘But it’s very nice to be woken up like this…’

Eliza too was awoken early, but by the solitary tolling of a church bell, and a tide of powerfully mixed emotions washed over her. Most insistent was a sense of dismay; this passing stranger had imposed her upon his friends in such a high-handed manner that she felt ashamed. She was also in awe of her surroundings. Since she was seven, she had only had a dream of home. Found by Mrs Prebble, wandering, lost and crying, on the streets of Bath, she had been taken to live at Prebbles Flying Circus. There was no settled home for her even then, for the troupe moved from town to town, staying in lodgings or sometimes making do as best they could in the woods and the fields. Gazing round this beautiful room, Eliza wondered if this was what having a home meant. But in the morning light it seemed more like a palace and she, an imposter princess.

She tried to take it all in, knowing it would only be hers for a day; she would have to go and find work and make her new life as best she could. She gazed at the two large windows and the prettiest hand-painted wallpaper that transported her into a garden. The bed was hung with what looked like silk, embroidered with green willows and small figures with colourful parasols. She wriggled into the depths of the warm, soft bed just as there was a knock at the door and Polly entered, carrying a steaming pitcher of water. ‘Morning, miss, I hope you slept well.’

Eliza sat up and stretched. She gazed at her calico dress hanging in the morning light, her spirit suspended between the insecurity of her past and hopes for a future, as yet completely unknown. As she slipped into her plain gown, she felt how incongruous it was with this grandly elegant room. She attempted to examine her wound, probing gently with her fingers. It didn’t seem to be oozing and so with care she combed out her long fair hair, so pale it was almost translucent in the light. When she was performing she wore it loose as an essential embellishment to her persona as the Winged Venus, but for the rest of the time she braided it into two long plaits and coiled them round her head. She peered into the looking glass, meeting with an anxious frown the reflected gaze of her unusual eyes, one lilac-grey, the other greeny-gold.

She left the room, her heart unsteady, readying herself to meet the strangers who had taken her in, under duress she feared. The staircase and hall looked much more friendly as early sunlight spilled in through the large east window. Ancestral portraits no longer appeared to be following her with suspicious eyes and she could hear a child’s voice somewhere, and the clink of china. These domestic sounds of a great house come awake settled her nerves.

Eliza was drawn to an open door and peeped in. There sat a woman, her russet hair in a loose bun, her head bent over a book of accounts with a cup of coffee by her side, its steam curling lazily. Eliza knocked lightly on the door and the woman looked up, her beautiful hazel-green eyes meeting her own as she rose to her feet. ‘My dear, come in. My name is Corinna Wolfe, I think you met my husband, Mr Wolfe, last night?’

Eliza walked towards her and was not certain if a curtsey was required in greeting. Instead, Corinna grasped her hand and squeezed it. ‘How’s your poor head? May I see?’

Eliza had to remind herself not to slip into the everyday talk used by the circus folk. ‘Mrs Wolfe, I’m very grateful for your and your husband’s care. I won’t impose on your kindness any longer.’ Her voice sounded careful and stilted to her ears.

‘My dear! Of course you’ll stay until you’ve recovered and your memory has returned. There is no way that we could countenance letting you leave until you know who you are and have somewhere to go. Now let me see your wound.’ Corinna led Eliza to a chair by the table and poured her a cup of coffee, then walked behind her to examine the back of her head. Gently parting the hair, she said, ‘Well, you’re lucky it is just your memory you have lost. You must have had quite a bang. It’s still a trifle swollen but looking good. Do you have any headache?’