Guy smiled sadly. ‘I remember when I was at the monastery at Malton, we had a steward such as that. But he was a fine fellow. Just brought up to believe he must never be presumptuous with his superiors.’

‘How are things at St Bartholomew’s?’ I asked. The old hospital, one of the few for the poor in London, had been closed when the King dissolved the monasteries, but a few volunteers had reopened it, to provide at least some service. Guy was one of the volunteers there. I recalled guiltily that when my friend Roger Elliard had died three years ago I promised his widow to continue his work to open a new hospital. But then the war came, everyone suffering from the taxes and fall in the value of money, which had continued ever since, and no one was willing to donate.

He spread his hands. ‘One does what one can, though Jesu knows it is little enough. There is talk of the city authorities taking it over, with a grant of money from the King, but nothing ever seems to happen.’

‘I see more driven into poverty in the city every day.’

‘Poverty and illness both.’

We were silent a moment. Then, to raise our mood, I said, ‘I have some good news. Tamasin is pregnant again. The baby is due in January.’

He smiled broadly, a flash of good white teeth. ‘Thanks be to God. Tell her I shall be delighted to attend her during her pregnancy again.’

‘We are both invited to a celebration on George’s first birthday. The twenty-seventh.’

‘I shall be glad to go.’ He looked at me. ‘A week on Tuesday. And this coming Monday will be – ’ he hesitated – ‘the anniversary of . . .’

‘The day the Mary Rose went down. When all those men died, and I so nearly with them.’ I lowered my head, shook it sadly. ‘It seems a peace treaty has been signed. At last.’

‘Yes. They say the King will get to keep Boulogne, or what is left of it, for ten years.’

‘Not much to show for all the lives lost, or the ruination of the coinage to pay for it.’

‘I know,’ Guy agreed. ‘But what of you? Do you ever get that feeling of the ground shifting beneath you, that you had after the ship went down?’

I hesitated, remembering that moment at the burning. ‘Very seldom now.’ He looked at me sharply for a moment, then said, more cheerfully, ‘Young George is a merry little imp. Having a new brother or sister may put his nose out of joint.’