‘So you should have been. And when I saw you last year at Portsmouth, when you had no reason to be there, I had Paget make enquiry, and learned you had visited my wife at Portchester Castle. And that you did lawyer’s work for her. I allowed that, Master Shardlake, for I know that once, before our marriage, you saved her life.’ He nodded slowly. ‘Oh yes, Cranmer told me about that, later.’ His voice had softened momentarily, and I saw that, indeed, he still loved Catherine Parr. And yet he had used her as a tool in his political machinations all these months, had allowed her to go in fear of her life.

His voice hardened again. ‘I do not like my wife receiving visitors unsanctioned by me, so when I returned from Portsmouth I arranged to have you watched.’ He laughed wheezily. ‘Not that I would suspect my Kate of dalliance with an ugly brokebacked thing like you, but these days I watch all those who might take too great an interest in those I love. I have been betrayed by women before,’ he added bitterly. ‘My wife does not know that I watch certain of her male associates. Paget is good at employing discreet men to observe and spy. Eh, Sir William?’ The King half-turned and gave Paget a blow on the arm which made him stagger slightly; he blinked but did not flinch. The movement meanwhile set the King’s whole vast body, uncorseted under the caftan, wobbling and juddering.

I swallowed hard. ‘Your majesty, I hold the Queen in great esteem, but only as her employee, and as a subject admiring of her kindness, her learning—’

‘Her religion?’ the King asked, suddenly and sharply.

I took a deep breath. ‘It is not a matter her majesty and I have discussed at length.’ But I remembered those conversations in the gallery. I was lying, plain and simple, because terrifying as the King was, to reveal the truth might still endanger the Queen. My heart thumped in my chest, and it was hard to keep my voice from shaking as I continued. ‘And when I spoke with her, in London and at Portsmouth – someone was always present, one of the ladies, Mary Odell or another – ’ I was almost stammering, my words tumbling over each other.

Paget looked at me contemptuously and said, ‘Stice’s spies, the lawyer Bealknap and afterwards the steward Brocket, reported no dealings between you and the Queen or her court for a year. But then last month, out of the blue, you were sworn to the Queen’s Learned Council. With the mission, people were told, of finding a missing jewel. But as the steward Brocket overheard you saying to Lord Parr’s man Cecil, it was actually the Lamentation of a Sinner you sought. A search that led you to join Richard Rich in his hunt for Anne Askew’s ravings.’