Sir George wrote early in April suggesting that, if Colonel Washington could spare an escort, Campion should visit Oxford in May. There were doctors and lawyers available, a church court convened, and Campion could annul her marriage to Samuel Scammell. She was embarrassed at the need to prove her virginity, but she would do it.

April, apart from Atheldene’s raid, was a good month. The rain was soft, the land green and the air was warming. Campion taught herself to ride side-saddle, though Colonel Washington refused to allow her out of sight of the castle, insisting that officers escort her, and she explored the lower valley or rode on to the nearer hills where the lambs were already growing fat. There were days when the sky was almost clear, when only a few white clouds were piled high in the blue and a fresh breeze promised to clear them away and bring her the seamless blue sky of which she dreamed. The river of her life was keeping her in this calm pool, like the one in which she had swum at Werlatton, where Toby had watched her through the rushes, and sometimes she would think of that and laugh. Sometimes she would look at the seal about her neck, a jewel now so familiar that she often forgot that it was also a mystery. When the war was over, Lady Margaret said, when the King returned in triumph to London and Sir Grenville Cony was among the defeated, then, and only then Lady Margaret said, would they force the secret from him.

The end of the war seemed a long way off. The Scots were stirring in the north, turning the King’s eyes from London and Campion accepted that she must wait for the unravelling of the seal’s meaning.

Then, as a quiet stream can be disturbed by the melting of winter’s snows, by a torrent of cold, harsh water that floods the banks, scours the pools and muddies the tranquility, so the war came with appalling suddenness.

It was presaged, on April 20, the day before Easter, by a great clatter of hooves in the castle yard, by shouts, and by boots echoing on the stairs of the New House. The long gallery door was flung open.

Campion and Lady Margaret turned. A tall figure stood in the doorway, a figure in leather and armor. Campion spoke first. “Toby!”

There would be no doctors, midwives and lawyer in Oxford. There would be no marriage for the moment. The King had dissolved his Parliament and his army had gone to face the Scots, but that was not the news that had brought Sir George and Toby hastening back to Dorset. Parliament, the London Parliament, had decreed that the great food-bearing counties were to be scoured of Royalists, that London must be supplied with wheat this year, with beef, mutton, fruit and ale, and they had sent orders for their armies to concentrate and clear the west. One of the spies who swarmed on either side had sent word to the King, and his news was hard on Sir George. Lazen Castle was to be taken, the siege to begin at Easter, and Sir George and Toby had ridden desperately, bringing what reinforcements they could, so they could reach the castle before their enemies closed the ring.