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wildly and the Apothecary realised that he was going to have to be careful with her; that she was young and vulnerable and ready to fall in love. He put on his serious face.
    “I saw Mr. Sebastian this morning.”
    Lucinda went pale. “What did he say?”
    “That you were a boy. That he knew nothing of any girl at his school. That he claimed you back.”
    She looked positively ill. “Are you going to send me away?”
    “No, you are of an age now.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “That you are old enough to choose what you want to do regarding certain things. The age of consent is twelve, you are sixteen. But for all that you do not come of legal age until you are twenty-one. Therefore if your mother wanted you to return to school, she could force you to do so, though I truly believe that Mr. Sebastian on his own could not demand it.”
    “My mother will let sleeping dogs lie,” Lucinda answered firmly.
    “How do you know that?”
    “Because I will fight,” said his new servant with sudden fire. “I shall threaten that if I am sent back I will make the fact of my birth public, that I will go to the newspapers. I will not return to that evil school, I will not.”
    John took the glass of sherry from the tray and sipped it. “I am delighted to hear it. But now I must prepare. I am dining with Mr. Fielding. Thank you, Lucinda.”
    She hovered in the doorway. “Before I leave can I just say thank you. You have rescued me from a life of hell.”
    “And will you tell your mother that if she should call?”
    “She will not call,” answered Lucinda with certainty, and left the room.

    “So,” said the Blind Beak, “it’s damsels in distress now, is it?”
    “I’m afraid so. Do you think I will be accused of abduction?”
    “Technically you could be. But if what the girl says is true - and from what you have told me there seems no reason to disbelieve her - the school is too rum to court publicity and the mother sounds the usual hard-faced harpy that the upper eschelons of society are so very good at breeding.”
    John was silent, looking round Mr. Fielding’s dining room, enjoying the cosiness of the autumn evening, of the rich red curtains, admiring the Magistrate’s new acquisition, a mahogany sideboard with an inlay of satinwood, designed by Robert Adam. The flames were reflected in its dark gleaming wood, giving a glow and harmony to the room that the Apothecary found enormously relaxing. Worries about malevolent headmasters and uncaring mothers suddenly seemed a million miles away.
    “Another port?” said Mr. Fielding and, as ever, poured with the dexterity of a sighted man.
    John sighed with contentment. It had been a marvellous meal, just the two men together, the ladies having gone to the playhouse to see David Garrick as Shylock in The Merchant of Venice. The Apothecary presumed, though he had not actually asked, that the woman he had once loved with all his heart, the actress Coralie Clive, would be taking the part of Portia.
    “I miss the theatre,” said the Magistrate, slowly lighting a pipe.
    “Could you not go and listen?”
    John Fielding shook his head. “It isn’t worth it. The difficulties of getting in and out of my seat are too great to justify the few hours of pleasure involved. Occasionally, though, as Garrick and I have been friends for years, he will bring some of his players here and I have a performance all to myself.”
    “Does Coralie come?” John asked before he could control the words.
    “Yes, now and then.”
    “How is she?”
    “Still beautiful, that is according to my wife and Mary Ann. Climbing high in the theatre since her sister’s retirement last March. And with a string of admirers into the bargain,” Mr. Fielding added, answering John’s unasked question.
    “I suppose she will finally marry into the aristocracy.”
    “I dare say,” answered the Magistrate comfortably.
    “Talking of the aristocracy, I thought it most kind of Miss Chudleigh to invite us