“Packing. We’re going back to Hatfield.”

“I know.”

“Sara’s in a snit because she wanted to see the coronation.”

“Yes, so does Princess Mary.”

“She’s not attending?”

“Already gone!” Franny announced this with some glee.

“How do you know this?”

“You’d be amazed how much gossip one picks up in the scullery. You see, the new king and Princess Mary have had a falling-out.”

“Well, they never really liked each other that much.”

“True, but he is as fanatical a Protestant as she is a Catholic. I heard a horse guardsman say that the Privy Council wants to get Mary as far away from London as possible. She is said to be quite popular in the city and the surrounding countryside. So she has been already sent off to Beaulieu Palace. What do you think of that? Is this a gee-whiz moment, Rose?” Franny had loved it when Rose blurted out those two odd words recently about one of the antics of Jane the Bald.

“Well, yes, it is. Come, let’s go to the kitchen and get something to eat. I’m starving.”

“Me too.”

Sara was not there when they arrived. She must have already taken something to eat upstairs in the room they shared.

They were alone at the table. Franny was fiddling with her bread.

“You going to eat that or you just going to look at it morosely?”

“Morose? How do you spell that?”

“M-O-R-O-S-E. It was on my . . .”

“On your what?”

“On my mind.” That was sort of a lie . . . as she was about to say it was on last week’s vocabulary list for language arts class. Rose could tell that Franny wasn’t quite buying it.

“What does it mean?” Franny asked.

“Morose? It’s just another word for feeling sad, gloomy.”

“Oh, and here it has part of your name in it—Rose.”

“Well, I’m not sad, Franny, but . . .”

“But what?” Franny said, shoving the bread toward Rose.

“But I think something is bothering you. You seem a little sad.” Franny flushed. The color crept up her neck above her ruff until her entire face was quite pink. Franny turned her head away from Rose and rested her chin in the palm of her hand. “Whatever is wrong, Franny?” Rose reached across and touched her hand. “You can tell me. Really. That’s what friends are for.”

“I haven’t been a very good friend, Rose.” Tears had started to slide down her cheeks.

“No, you’ve been the very best of friends I’ve had here.”

Here! The word echoed in Franny’s head. So where else might she have friends? She couldn’t think about that now. “Rose, I think I saw your father,” she blurted out.

“What? Where? When?”

“A while ago. Quite a while ago, actually, at Hatfield.”

“But why didn’t you tell me?”