Harri withstood his mother’s scrutiny for several long moments before suddenly remembering his manners, snatching off his soft cap and dropping to his knee to do her honour. His greeting was whispered and I could not hear the words but they inspired a beaming smile from his mother, which transformed her whole appearance and wiped years off her apparent age. Suddenly I recognized the girl I had attended at Pembroke, the girl who had blossomed as she recovered from her widow’s grief and found the energy and zest to take pleasure once more in the world around her and the new life growing within her. With a joyful laugh she bent to grasp Harri’s upper arms and urge him to rise so that she could embrace him properly. Enfolded in that warm embrace Harri’s bright eyes shone with love, and all at once I saw in him a look I had seen in Jasper’s eyes. It seemed that Lady Margaret still had the ability to pull a Tudor male into her web with a single smile.

The banquet had been long and formal but I noticed that Harri and Lady Margaret did manage some private conversation between courses, despite the plethora of entertainments provided. The most interesting and controversial of these was a performance by the bard Lewys Glyn Cothi, who had often sung at Pembroke in praise of Lord Jasper but now, like the cunning creature he was, he had crafted a long poem to Lord Herbert in which he hailed him as the new Y Mab Daragon, the Son of Prophecy, though I noticed he did not mention exactly who he would be saving his people from. This change of allegiance puzzled me and certainly, when word of it spread, Lewys’s defection taking Y Mab Daragon with him, would undoubtedly affect Jasper’s power to stir Welsh followers to the Lancastrian cause. Lord Herbert looked proud and pleased with the homage Lewys paid him and no doubt he rewarded the poet with a handsome purse. However, I wondered how welcome the praise-song would sound to Lady Margaret, who must have last heard the legendary title applied by the very same bard to Lord Edmund, the father of her son.

I was soon to find out. At the end of the banquet the lady herself called me to her side on the dais and informed me that she wished Harri to be moved from the children’s accommodation in the Great Tower into her own chamber off the Grand Stair. ‘Lady Herbert agrees with me that I should enjoy as much of my son’s company as possible for the short period of my stay and that you, who know his daily routine and habits, should place yourself temporarily among my servants as well. I am telling you now so that a bed can be made available for Henry and his belongings moved immediately.’