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Ferdy Shilton smiled and said, ‘I fear the boy brings me nothing but trouble.’

‘How can that be when he’s such a delight? You’ve noticed how everyone loves him and how he cheers us up. And such a beautiful child, too.’ She paused, then added with her joyful, infectious laugh, ‘Who looks just like you.’

‘Exactly! That’s the main source of my problems.’ They were both amused as Mr Shilton looked sideways at Madeleine and added, ‘Can you tell me, Miss Rose, if you’re the heroine in your own story?’

Madeleine felt a rush of blood to her cheeks and replied in a fierce whisper, ‘You’re the only person I’ve told about my writing and I’m shy at admitting anything so personal.’

He seemed chagrined. ‘I’m sorry if you think I’m prying. I’m aware of the honour of being taken into your confidence and will always keep such private information to myself.’

Madeleine surprised herself by suddenly confiding, ‘I’ve called my heroine Jane and made her rather plain in her looks. I fear she is quite like me.’

Ferdinand Shilton was aghast. ‘Plain Jane cannot be you! Not the remarkable Miss Rose, the redoubtable Miss Rose, the…’ He paused, thinking of another alliterative word then smiled. ‘The irresistible Miss Rose!’

Madeleine frowned in mock disapproval. ‘You cannot have that, it begins with i.’

‘Indeed it does, but the stress is on the r, so it sounds sympathetic with the rest.’

‘Well then, you cannot have it because it isn’t true!’

Mr Shilton was about to explain how it was in fact true when a short, self-important-looking man in a dark coat and pantaloons walked into the room. He was Mr Hadley, the Principal, and Mr Shilton introduced Miss Rose as his cousin. They were led towards the famous chapel with the organ, donated by the great composer George Frideric Handel himself, when Ferdy said in a mild voice, ‘I would very much like to see the accommodation for the babies and young children.’

This was obviously not what the Principal hoped to show prospective patrons of the charity; the reception rooms were so much more impressive. But he led them towards the west wing of the building and, as they approached, they could hear the wailing of infants. Madeleine spontaneously grasped Ferdy’s sleeve and he gave her a warning frown.

They entered a light, lofty room with two fires burning in capacious fireplaces along the wall. Serried rows of cots filled the space, the occupants of various ages, many crying, some raising their arms up to be lifted and held, others curled in foetal positions, silent and withdrawn. The air made them gasp, so filled was it with the sharp stench of ammonia. Mr Hadley said hurriedly, ‘We send our youngest foundlings to the country to be fostered until they are four years old. These’ – he indicated the teeming room – ‘are awaiting places with wet nurses or foster mothers. It is unusual to have so many still here.’

Madeleine looked with horror on the scene, where two women scurried to deal with the infants and their needs and demands. One boy, about the same age as Billy, in the cot nearest them cried out, his eyes beseeching, and Madeleine, unable to ignore him, picked him up. He gurgled and tried to grab the ribbons on her bonnet. She noticed he was clean and the clout pinned to his bottom half was just damp, not yet sopping wet; he seemed to have been quite recently attended to.

‘No, no, Miss Rose. We cannot let them get used to being held whenever they ask. We just do not have the staff.’ Mr Hadley was agitated.

With great reluctance, Madeleine placed the unknown child back in his cot, denuded of toys or anything to occupy him. She had nothing safe in her reticule to give him and felt a wave of grief and frustration that she was unable to make the slightest difference to even this one child’s life.

Madeleine looked up into Mr Shilton’s face, which was serious and pale. ‘We have to do something to help,’ she said under her breath.

Mr Hadley was keen to take them to see the more acceptable face of their charity. ‘Follow me, Sir, to the schoolroom, where the children who return to us learn to read and do their numbers.’ He led them into another airy room with rows of benches and narrow tables where small boys in grey serge trousers and jackets sat over their books while one male teacher wrote on a board, and another walked up and down the rows carrying a short switch, explaining to the students, or punishing mistakes or aberrant behaviour. ‘This is the boys’ wing. We ready our young foundlings for apprenticeships in trade or the army and navy. The young ladies are prepared to enter houses of the gentry as servants, or some are trained as seamstresses. It’s all very satisfactory.’

They turned to leave and as Mr Hadley accompanied them back to their carriage, Mr Shilton promised to get his bank to send the Foundling Hospital charity a draft of one hundred pounds towards improving conditions for the youngest in their care.

Mr Hadley bowed deep. ‘We are extremely grateful for such generosity, Sir. Your money will be put to good use, I assure you.’

Madeleine and Dot sat opposite Mr Shilton in the carriage. No one said a word until they had passed the entrance gates. Madeleine breathed out in a sigh. ‘Well, Billy just cannot go there, Mr Shilton.’

‘I’m afraid I agree.’

Madeleine was so shocked by what she had seen, she said in an impassioned voice, ‘If ever I have any money, I would hope to open a home for abandoned children. But in the country.’ She gazed out of the window, watching the green fields and woods disappear under the new building of terraced houses and roads. A thought came to her and she turned back to Mr Shilton and asked ingenuously, ‘I wonder if your dower house at Nonsuch House is currently uninhabited.’

Ferdy Shilton gave a surprised laugh. ‘It happens to be, but I’m not about to fill it with a tribe of young Yahoos. Not every abandoned child is as fetching as Billy, you know.’

‘But those are exactly the children who most need help. Being beautiful and charming, like Billy, is such an advantage, even when you are very poor. In the world’s mind, beauty is the equivalence of goodness. It is the less obviously attractive who most need our help.’

His eyes were watching Madeleine intently. ‘You never fail to surprise me, Miss Rose. So, you are on a crusade to save the ugly and unloved? And you would like to appropriate my property to do so.’

Madeleine blushed at her temerity in even asking about the Nonsuch dower house, but she protested, ‘I wouldn’t characterise it quite like that.’

Mr Shilton’s expression was once more relaxed and amused. ‘Well, luckily you don’t have any fortune of your own, so my dower house is safe, and my immediate concern will be what to do with the one infant in my care.’

‘You do promise he won’t be going to the Foundling Hospital?’

‘I do indeed. And I have a trump card. My dearest friends Alick and Corinna Wolfe and their family are due back in Town this week and, of anyone, they will know what best to do. Corinna, particularly, is a veritable goddess of maternal kindness and good sense.’