WE ALL LOOKED AT HER. She spoke quietly. ‘Last winter, it seemed the King was moving in the direction of reform. He had made Parliament pass the bill that gave him control of the chantries; another bastion of popish ceremony had fallen. I had published my Prayers and Meditations that summer, and felt the time was safe for me to write another book, a declaration to the world of my beliefs, as Marguerite of Navarre has done. And so I wrote my little volume. I knew it might be – controversial – so I composed it in secret, in my bedroom. A confession – of my life; my sins, my salvation, my beliefs.’ She looked at me intently; the light of conviction shone in her eyes now. ‘It is called the Lamentation of a Sinner. I speak in it of how, when I was young, I was mired in superstition, full of vanity for the things of this world; of how God spoke to me but I denied His voice, until eventually I accepted His saving grace.’ Her voice had risen with passion; she looked at Lord Parr and the Archbishop, but they had cast their eyes down. She continued, more quietly. ‘It was God who brought me to realize it was my destiny to marry the King.’ She cast her own head down, and I wondered if she was thinking of her old love for Thomas Seymour. ‘In my Lamentation I speak in the most plain terms of my belief that salvation comes through faith and study of the Bible, not vain ceremonies.’ I closed my eyes. I knew of books like this, confessions by radical Protestants of their sinfulness and salvation. Some had been seized by the authorities. The Queen had been foolish to write such a thing in these faction-ridden times, even in secret. She must have known it; but for once her emotions had overridden her political sense. And her hope that the times were shifting in favour of reform had again proved disastrously wrong.

‘Who has seen the book, your majesty?’ I asked quietly.

‘Only my Lord Archbishop. I finished it in February, but then in March the trouble with Gardiner began. And so I hid it in my private coffer, telling nobody.’ She added bitterly, ‘You see, Matthew, I can still be sensible sometimes.’ I saw that she was torn between conflicting emotions: her desire to spread her beliefs amongst the people, her acute awareness of the political dangers of doing so, and her fear for her own life. ‘The book stayed locked in my coffer until last month, when I resolved to ask the Archbishop for his opinion. He came to me, here, and read it one evening with me.’ She looked at Cranmer, smiling wistfully. ‘We have spoken much on matters of faith, these last three years. Few know how much.’