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“But I’m proof of something shameful. I’m the living evidence of adultery. No matter what I do, I’ll never be respectable.”
“Jay-sus,” June exclaimed in a low voice. “I only asked if you ever had a knock with someone.”
“I’ve never met a man I could trust that far. What about you?”
“I did,” June said readily. “Back in Nether Wallop, I kept company with a village lad who managed his father’s sheep farm. Gil Pardy, his name was. Dull as a brick, but he had the prettiest golden hair you ever saw. As for the humpin’ . . . it was over before it even started. Not worth the trouble of climbing a ladder to the hayloft, believe you me.”
“How disappointing.”
“It was.” June paused reflectively. “Did like being courted, though. Having someone walk me to the village fair, and all the flirting and such. That part was lovely.”
“Did he ever bring up marriage?”
“Not to me, he didn’t. Gil went to the vicar; said he’d dishonored me and was after making it right. The two of them had it all arranged and decided. They left it to Ma to tell me I was going to wed in a fortnight.”
“He never even proposed to you?”
“No! The two-faced weasel destroyed my reputation on purpose, thinking I’d have no choice but to marry him. Everyone in Nether Wallop took his side, and not a soul took mine. Not even Ma! She told me I had to marry Gil ’cause I wasn’t a virgin no more and was ruint.”
“Ruined for what?” Reina asked.
“Exactly. So that was when I wrote to you about coming to find work in London.”
“I’ll always take your side.”
“I know,” June said. “You’re a sister to me, even with no blood between us. Just remember that whenever you start fretting over being a nutmeggy fiddler, or whatever you call it.”
“Nullius filius.” It was the first time Reina had ever smiled while saying the words.
Duke Street was chaos with vehicles, horses, and foolhardy pedestrians trying to cross without being mown down. Hills of rubbish had been nudged to the sides of the thoroughfare—clots of food, cigar ends and tobacco plugs, a torn shoe sole, straw, paper scraps, and animal dung.
Grimacing, Reina and June hiked up their skirts to keep the hems out of the filth until they reached the footpath. It was something middle- and lower-class women did as a matter of course, while upper-class ladies stayed in their carriages and waited for footmen and shopgirls to bring out samples to their vehicles.
They came to an entrance set back from the footpath.
June grasped a brass handle marked “pull” and gave it a decisive tug. They heard a corresponding bell inside. In a moment, the door unlocked with a heavy clack and eased open.
A middle-aged woman bent a wary glance around the edge. “Yes?”
“Good morning,” Reina said pleasantly, flipping back a sodden plume of her hat as it drooped over her eyes. “We’ve come for an appointment.”
The woman’s face changed. “Miss Martin?”
“Yes. And my companion, Miss June Rummage.”
“Welcome,” the woman exclaimed. “Do come in!”
In the next moment, both Reina and June were seized and pulled inside, and the door closed with an urgency that suggested the need to prevent escape.
The agency was handsomely appointed with paneled wainscoting and attached wooden benches. Immoderate heat pumped from brass grille insets on the floor. Reina immediately began to steam beneath the waterproof gutta-percha lining of her cloak. She removed the garment, feeling like a freshly unmolded Christmas pudding.
Wordlessly, June took it from her and went to set the umbrella in a carved mahogany rack in the corner.
“I’m Mrs. Baverstock, the manager,” the woman said to Reina. She had the gaze of a street pigeon approaching someone holding a seed cone. “Welcome to the Second Chance Employment Agency, funded by the London Ladies’ Society for the Assistance of Discharged Prisoners and Those Who Have Seen Better Days.”
“That’s all one name?” Reina asked blankly.
Mrs. Baverstock nodded. “We were going to shorten it, but the secretary had already ordered the club badges, and the cost of redoing them was prohibitive.” She showed them the elaborate gilded metal and enamel badge pinned to her bodice.
