Josiah Hurte had to stand the charge of paying for his own lecturer in his own chapel, and also had to pay his parish dues to a church he never entered, and tithes to a vicar he despised for Roman practices. Meanwhile the price of goods soared, there were pirates openly operating up and down the English Channel, there were rumours of a rebellion in Ireland, and the king was said to spend more on his collection of pictures than he did on the Navy.

Jane, as the wife and daughter-in-law of a man in the employ of the court, had been pestered for scandalous details and had suffered from association. ‘Nothing good will come from this king,’ her father had said. ‘You may think your husband is high in his favour but nothing good can come from him because he is a king halfway to damnation already. And if you do not beware, he will drag you all down with him. Now that your father-in-law and husband have a fair house in Lambeth, why can they not bide there?’

Useless to try to explain to Josiah that if this king issued a command you could be hanged for treason if you said ‘no’. ‘The king himself ordered it,’ Jane said. ‘How could we refuse?’

‘By simply refusing,’ her father said stoutly.

‘And do you refuse to pay your taxes? Do you refuse to pay ship money? Other men do.’

‘And they lie in prison,’ Josiah said. ‘And shame the rest of us who are less staunch. No, I do as I am ordered.’

‘And so does my husband,’ Jane insisted, defending the Tradescants despite herself. ‘The king and court take our skills and service just as they take your money. This king takes whatever he desires and nothing can stop him.’

‘You must be glad to be home,’ J said in bed that night. He put his arm around her and she rested her head against his shoulder.

‘I’m so tired,’ she said fretfully.

‘Then rest,’ he said. He turned her face towards him and kissed her lips but she moved away.

‘The room stinks of honeysuckle,’ she cried suddenly. ‘You’ve brought cuttings into the bedroom again, John! I won’t have it.’

‘No,’ he said. He could feel a small niggle of fear, as small as a seedling, in his heart. ‘There’s nothing in the room. Does the air smell sweet to you, Jane?’

She suddenly realised what she had said, and what he was thinking, and she clapped her hand over her mouth as if she would hide her words, and stop her breath from reaching him. ‘Oh God, no,’ she said. ‘Not that.’

‘Was it in the city?’ John asked urgently.

‘It’s always in the city,’ she said bitterly. ‘But I spoke to no-one knowingly.’

‘Not the servants, not the apprentice boys?’

‘Would I take the risk? Would I have come home if I had thought I was carrying it?’