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these men. Who they see, what their weaknesses are, how they live, anything you can tell me about them, you tell me. You talk to them, you get to know them, you tell me all about them. You getting the picture, girl?’

      ‘Yes, Jolly.’

      ‘You get to keep this apartment, you get to keep Abbey and Hugo but remember they work for me, so do you, don’t you forget that. You step out of line and you go back to Madame Marlene’s. Got that?’

      ‘Yes, Jolly.’

      ‘Now here’s the tricky part, girl. How you gonna do this, hey? Got any ideas?’

      ‘No, Jolly.’

      ‘See, this is why I run the show,’ Jolly observed. ‘I got the brains. That’s just how it is. All right, girl, you’re going to become an actress.’

      ‘An actress?’

      ‘That’s right. It’s all sorted. Ansel Horado is taking you into his company, the Kerrick Company. You’re going to see him tomorrow. You keep him at arm’s distance, you got that? You don’t fool around with a man unless I tell you to fool around with him. You got that?’

      ‘Yes, Jolly.’

      ‘This is costing me money, girl. You’re an investment for me, and I’ll get that money back plus extra. A lot extra. Otherwise, you’ll pay off the money on your back at Madame Marlene’s. You know how much money you cost me, girl?’

      ‘No, Jolly.’

      ‘More than seventeen thousand strada, girl. You wanna pay me back that money from your clients at Madame Marlene’s, or you gonna do it right?’

      ‘I’ll do it right, Jolly.’

      ‘You know what a stage name is, girl?’

      ‘Yes, Jolly.’

      ‘You’re gonna take the stage name of “Angela Ashton”. After your mother died you were in service for two years as a lady’s companion with Mrs Erica Farrar, Mrs Erica Farrar, got that? So you saw that play you were at last week, remember that play I took you to, when I told you to wear that veil, so now you wanna be an actress. That’s how you’re gonna meet all these big-shots. But you keep a distance from them, you play the lady, got it? Any of them look like they wanna get real friendly, you tell me and I’ll let you know which one to choose. You understand everything I’m telling you?’

      ‘Yes, Jolly.’

      ‘What you’ve been don’t exist no more. I’ll take care of that. Don’t worry, anyone who thinks he remembers Hailee from Madame Marlene will learn different, trust me. Now what am I missing, girl?’

      ‘I don’t know, Jolly.’

      Jolly threw back his head and laughed. ‘You’re only forgetting what this is all about for you, girl. How you gonna get paid? Well, what d’ya think?’

      ‘I’m a lady,’ Madeleine said cautiously, ‘so … so what do I do, Jolly?’

      Jolly nodded approvingly to see her turning to him for guidance. ‘They give you gifts, girl. Clothes, jewellery, whatever. That’s before you give them anything of yours, get me? I’ll let you play that yourself. Then you let them have you and they keep on giving you gifts, because they like you so much, see, and you keep on letting them have you and they keep on giving you gifts, that’s how it works, girl. It’s just a different kind of money, that’s all. But those gifts are worth money. You don’t steal anything, girl, you get me? If there’s ten thousand strada in notes lying on the table, you don’t even look at it. You’re a lady. But if they give you gifts worth ten thousand strada, well, that’s yours, girl. You come to me, I’ll see you get a fair price, or you sell them yourself, it’s your choice girl, but you make your own money, get it? I don’t even take a cut, that’s how generous I’m being, I don’t even take a cut because you tell me everything you can about these men. That’s the deal, girl. You gonna take it or what?’

      ‘I’ll take it, Jolly,’ Madeleine had said without hesitation, and the deal was done.

      11:50 AM, Thursday 5 May 1544 A.F.

      Five years had passed and the twenty-two year old Angela Ashton was now on to her fourth client, and there was already a heated competition amongst some of the wealthiest and most dissolute gentlemen of society as to who would be her fifth. The workload was light, the money was good and Angela was pleased with how everything had turned out.

      She was not happy. If there were times in her life when she had known happiness, she did not remember them now, but she was not unhappy. Life was easy and pleasurable and that was the main thing. She never sold a gift until she had moved on to the next client, but with Jolly’s expert help she had converted her gifts into a grand total of ninety-five thousand strada in cold hard cash, and the gifts from her current client, Lord Foxley, were piling up nicely. With further advice from Jolly, she had carefully invested the money she had made and her fortune was growing. It was even possible, Jolly had suggested, that she might end up marrying a man with a title and becoming a grand lady, but for now Angela was content with what she had.

      She enjoyed being an actress. She had taken to playing roles on stage as easily as if she had always done it. Her success as an actress was the foundation of the success of her other role, the role she played off-stage, which was her real line of work. Acting on stage was fun, but acting off-stage was work.

      She enjoyed the feeling of hundreds of hungry eyes feeding on her beauty wherever she went. She liked the power her beauty gave her over the men who sought her attentions. She went through the motions of giving her clients what they wanted, but they never noticed that she was acting even then. She fooled them into believing she received more than passing pleasure from them and so they believed they were worth more to her than the gifts they gave her. They were so wealthy that a necklace worth five thousand strada could be paid for from their pocket change, and Angela was always so delighted with such a girlish delight to receive gifts that they showered her with them just to make her happy and tell them how wonderful they were. She gave her clients what they were so eager to obtain with a personal indifference shrouded by her pretended passion. Their business with her was a material process and nothing more. Angela would later in life remember little of her clients, but every single one of their gifts. Their gifts were her pay and she was a girl who took her pay very seriously.

      Now Jolly had brought her to a room in an inn overlooking a square, telling her little of what was going on. She stood by him, wearing a veil as he had instructed her, and having come here by the devious route he had insisted on. Hugo was waiting for her downstairs. Jolly himself had a scarf wrapped around the lower part of his face. They were looking out of the open window, not hiding the fact they were hiding their faces because that could be for any one of a number of reasons.

      ‘There’s more than one way to fight,’ Jolly said as if thinking aloud.

      Angela knew him well enough to know he wanted to be asked to say more. ‘What’s that mean, Jolly?’ she asked.

      ‘There’s wandfighting,’ Jolly gestured down into the square. Tagalong was standing by a water pump, looking around as he waited. Leopold “Leggit” Gardiner and his five men were walking up and down nearby as they waited in their turn. ‘We’re gonna see that right now. Then there’s what you can do, girl, and that’s a kind of fighting that’s a lot more dangerous than wandfighting. I’m gonna see if he’s as good as they say. Then we’ll see.’

      ‘If who’s as good as they say, Jolly?’ Angela asked, not really that interested but knowing she was there for a reason. Her mind was more taken up with what the value of the emerald-encrusted bracelet Lord Foxley had given her the night before would turn out to be when she sold it. She could almost feel the value of jewellery in her stomach, and she knew that this bracelet was valuable — very valuable — but just how much was it worth in strada?

      ‘Mr Nicholas Raspero, that’s who,’ Jolly said briefly. ‘If Leggit takes him down, you stay out of the picture. If he takes Leggit down, well, we’ll come to that at

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