Chapuys sits down abruptly, slumps forward with his elbows on his knees. His hat sinks lower, till he removes it altogether, and puts it on the table; not without a glance of regret. ‘Thomas, I have heard from Kimbolton. They say the queen cannot keep her food down, she cannot even take water. In six nights she has not slept two hours together.’ Chapuys grinds his fists into his eyes. ‘I fear she cannot live more than a day or two. I do not want her to die alone, without anyone who loves her. I fear the king will not let me go. Will you let me go?’

The man’s grief touches him; it comes from the heart, it is beyond his remit as envoy. ‘We’ll go to Greenwich and ask him,’ he says. ‘This very day. We’ll go now. Put your hat back on.’

On the barge he says, ‘That’s a thaw wind.’ Chapuys seems not to appreciate it. He huddles into himself, wrapped in layers of lambskin.

‘The king intended to joust today,’ he says.

Chapuys sniffs, ‘In the snow?’

‘He can have the field cleared.’

‘No doubt by toiling monks.’

He has to laugh, at the ambassador’s tenacity. ‘We must hope the sport went forward, then Henry will be in a good humour. He has just come from the little princess at Eltham. You must ask after her health. And you must make her a New Year’s gift, have you thought of it?’

The ambassador glowers at him. All he would give Elizabeth is a knock on the head.

‘I am glad we are not iced up. Sometimes we cannot use the river for weeks. Have you seen it when it’s frozen over?’ No reply. ‘Katherine is strong, you know. If there is no more snow and the king permits, you can ride tomorrow. She has been ill before and she has regained her ground. You will find her sitting up in bed and asking why you’ve come.’

‘Why are you chattering?’ Chapuys says gloomily. ‘It is not like you.’

Why indeed? If Katherine dies it will be a great thing for England. Charles may be her fond nephew but he will not keep up a quarrel for a dead woman. The threat of war will vanish. It will be a new era. Only he hopes she does not suffer. There would be no point in that.

They tie up at the king’s landing stage. Chapuys says, ‘Your winters are so long. I wish I was still a young man in Italy.’

The snow is banked up on the quay, the fields are still blanketed. The ambassador received his education in Turin. You don’t get this sort of wind there, shrieking around the towers like a soul in torment. ‘You forget the swamps and the bad air, don’t you?’ he says. ‘I’m like you, I only remember the sunshine.’ He puts a hand under the ambassador’s elbow to steer him on to dry land. Chapuys himself keeps a firm hold on his hat. Its tassels are damp and drooping, and the ambassador himself looks as if he might cry.