I am not aware of how old I was when I was taken from my mother. I have struggled to recall anything meaningful about her. My strongest memory is of her warm, strong hands and I remember darkness, too, but I do not know if it is my mother’s colouring or her shadowy skirts where I buried my face.

I did not go gently when they came for me. I remember that I clung to those skirts, put up a fight. Kicked. But I was taken away and made to stand on a wooden board. My clothes were stripped off me, my face put under a water butt, my shivering body pummelled and soaped and rubbed and rasped and kneaded until I wailed like the child I was.

I was trussed up in undergarments and leggings and a dress, with a white pinafore pulled over my head. My hair was brushed and plaited, boots strapped onto my feet, and I was taken by the hand and led away. Still snivelling. Still whimpering. Still damp behind the knees.

Outside, in the street, the evening was drawing to a close and the gas lamps were being lit. I wanted to pause, to watch how the man on the ladder created his magic, but there was no time. I was lifted into a carriage and shoved far back onto the cold leather so that my legs were off the ground and stuck out like rolling pins in front of me. It was cavernous and gloomy inside. A man all in black sat across from me. His arms were spread out, his angled legs flung before him like some gigantic spider. He grunted at me. He had a large head, black bristly eyebrows and vast hands that seemed to have a life of their own. One took out a shiny pocket watch, large as was everything else about him. He checked the time, then tapped his stick on the roof of the carriage. We lurched forward and the horses’ hooves went clip-clop clippity-clop on the cobblestones. The man slid the watch away. He bit the side of his great forefinger…

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