“Miriam,” I said, “you all but put your request in writing.”

She opened her mouth to sting me with some cruel retort but stopped herself, remaining motionless for what seemed an interminable amount of time. I listened to the sound of my own breath and the sound of rolling carriages outside the window as though they were the most interesting things in the world.

“You are right,” she said in a whisper, now so soft I could not even be sure she had said what I thought. “You are right, and I am sorry… I must go,” she added abruptly and moved toward the door.

I darted out of my seat and grabbed her arm. Not hard, you understand, but I would not have her going. Not now. Not yet.

“Why are you running? You don’t want to run, so why do you?”

She shook her head while looking down. It was clear she would not stay, so I let go of her.

“I run,” she said at last, “because I don’t want to run.” She took a breath. “Benjamin, when was the last time someone tried to kill you?”

I had not expected this question, and I nearly laughed. “Only two weeks ago,” I said, for a thief I had been tracking had turned on me with a knife. Had I not been alert, I should have been hardly cut- or worse.

“There are so many things I want for myself that you would give me,” she told me. “I know you would not treat me as a thing, an object, an upper servant. I know what kind of a man you are, Benjamin. But you hurt and you kill and you are at risk of being hurt and killed.”

She stopped but I had nothing to say in my defense, and we sat in silence for some long minutes.

“I can’t live that kind of life,” she said at last. “I can’t live with a husband who might at any moment be murdered or hanged or transported. You want to marry me? To have children? A wife must have her husband. Children need a father, Benjamin. I cannot live so.”

I could offer her no argument to make her believe she should.

Three weeks later, she sent me a note asking me to call on her at her home off Anne’s Court.