He took Hester on long cold walks down to the bottom of the orchard, showed her every single tree and named it for her. In the blustery wet days of March he stayed in the orangery before a potting table with a barrel of sieved earth at his side and taught Hester how to set seeds. He showed her the tender plants which lived in the orangery from autumn to spring to protect them from winter frosts, and he showed her the winter jobs: the cleaning of the big tub planters, the washing of the pots, and airing them, ready for the fever of spring planting. One lad spent all the winter sieving earth for the seed beds and for the pots. Another brewed up a fearful barrel of water fortified with horse and cow manure and a nettle soup of John’s own devising, which would be sprinkled on every precious seedling.

They passed a quiet few weeks. A sailor, fresh into port, had a sealed parcel of seeds for John and a letter from Virginia.

‘He says he will be home by April,’ John read. ‘He says he is writing this before going out into the woods for a week. He has an Indian guide who leads him around and shows him plants and brings him safe in.’ He paused and looked into the embers of the fire. ‘I wish he would come home,’ he said fretfully. ‘I am impatient for him to be here and everything settled.’

‘He will come in good time,’ Hester said soothingly. There was a single disloyal thought in her head that they were managing very well without him, John busy and contented, the museum taking a small but steady flow of money, and the children taught by her every morning and kissed goodnight by her every night.

‘He should be already on his way,’ John said. ‘This letter is eight weeks old. He may be at sea now.’

‘God keep him safe,’ Hester said, glancing out of the window at the dark March skies.

‘Amen,’ John said.

Towards the end of the month John fell ill again. He ached in every bone and complained of the cold. But he was adamant that nothing ailed him, he was well enough. ‘Just tired,’ he said, smiling at Hester. ‘Just old bones.’ She did not press him to rise from his bed, nor to eat. She thought he looked as if he had reached the end of a long and arduous road.

‘I think I should write a letter for J,’ he announced quietly one morning as she sat at the foot of his bed, sewing an apron for Frances.

At once she put her sewing to one side. ‘He will not get it if he left the colony as he planned. He should be at sea now.’

‘Not a letter to send. A letter for him to read here. If I am not here to speak to him.’