They milled and shouted, and in the middle was some kind of wretched thing that they were dragging by a collar.

There were men holding torches, but also women. Then a crowd came tearing around the corner of the street up ahead. Voices could be heard and lights, growing stronger, coming nearer. Only a single flickering lantern hung over a tiny cobbler’s shop. She was in a wide street, but there were no cross streets nearby. All of Nell’s stories had two common elements: They were all about women out alone.Ī cry came from up ahead, and Silence’s steps faltered. The woman who had gone out to buy a meat pie for her four children and simply disappeared, her shoe found the next day in an alley. The woman who’d been dragged into an alley and savagely attacked by three drunken men. The woman who’d been strangled by a lover. She was trying very hard not to think of some of the awful tales she heard from Nell-an inveterate teller of horror stories. Silence pulled her light woolen cloak more securely about her shoulders and eyed a dark doorway as she passed it.

Although her own children were now weaned, Polly assured Silence that she had enough milk for the orphaned infant.Ī good day’s work, but an exhausting one, and the reason she was now caught out after dark. The new wet nurse, Polly, had been employed in the past by the home and had always given satisfactory service. And in the end, Silence had been very satisfied with the placement. She’d hurried there as fast as she could walk with the babe in her arms. She’d known of another possible wet nurse for the baby, but the second woman lived nearly a mile away from the first, and in the opposite direction of the home. The nursling was only a month or so old-a fragile age for a baby. No matter how sorry she might feel for the wet nurse-a widow with a child of her own-Silence couldn’t risk the well-being of such a tiny baby. That had led to recriminations, protests, and a rather awful scene before she’d finally walked out with the orphaned infant. But the moment she’d entered the woman’s apartment, she’d immediately caught the astringent scent of gin.

She’d meant to take only a quick trip to visit one of the home’s wet nurses and her tiny charge. SILENCE HURRIED HOME, through the darkened streets of St.

Notorious pleasures