John scowled at the thought of courtier’s work which was not based on skill and turning of policy, but was grounded on courtship and heartbreak and jealousy; the skills of the bordello, not of the office.

‘It must have been the same for Lord Cecil?’ the steward asked.

John jerked back at the thought of it. ‘No! Nobody loved him for his looks,’ he said with a half-smile. ‘They needed him for his abilities. That was why no-one could supplant him. That was why he was always safe.’

‘Whereas our lord –’ The steward broke off.

‘What’s he doing in Madrid that takes so long?’ John demanded.

‘I hear that the Spanish are playing with him,’ the steward said very quietly. ‘And all the time the feeling against the Spanish is rising in the court, in Parliament and in the streets. He’d do better to come home without the Spanish princess. If he brings her home now he’ll pay for it with his life. They’ll tear him to pieces for arranging a heretical marriage.’

‘Can’t you write and tell him?’ John asked. ‘Warn him?’

William Ward shook his head. ‘I don’t advise him,’ he said quickly. ‘He treads his own path. He said the Spanish marriage was a matter of principle.’

‘Principle?’ John asked. And when the man nodded he turned and went from the room. ‘That’s very bad,’ John said to himself.

Not until July, midsummer in Madrid, during the worst of the hot weather, was Prince Charles finally wearied of waiting, and Buckingham losing his nerve. At last the Spanish completed the marriage contract and Prince Charles put his name to it. He was allowed a brief visit to his bride to promise that she would be Queen of England after a proxy marriage, and that they would next meet as husband and wife at Dover. The King of Spain himself rode out of Madrid with the prince and duke to set them on their way, loaded them with presents and kissed Prince Charles farewell as a son-in-law.

‘How do you think he will be received?’ William Ward asked John. He had gone into the garden to seek John, who was opening the sluice gates and watching the flow of the river into the duke’s new boating lake. It was a cool sheet of water just to the side of the house. John was planting yellow flag irises in the boggy corner where he had first told Buckingham to shut out the cows. ‘He must have some trickery up his sleeve. He must know that if he tries to bring a Spanish bride home they will tear him to pieces?’