The king shows me the old moats that have been dug in the past to defend London from invaders.

‘No men come now?’ I ask him.

‘There is no trusting any man,’ he says grimly. ‘The men would come from the North and the East if they had not felt the hammer of my anger already; and the Scots would come if they thought they could. But my nephew King James fears me, as well he should, and the Yorkshire rabble have been taught a lesson they will not forget. Half of them are in mourning for the other half who are dead.’

I say no more for fear of spoiling his happy mood, and Katherine’s horse stumbles and she gives a little gasp and clutches the horse’s mane, and the king laughs at her and calls her a coward. Their talk leaves me free to look about me.

Beyond the city walls are bigger houses set back from the road with little gardens before them or close-planted little fields. Everyone has a pig in their field, and some people have cows or goats as well as hens in their gardens. It is a rich country, I can see it in the faces of the people who have the shining round cheeks and the smiles of the well fed. Another mile from the city and we come into countryside of open fields and little hedgerows and neat farms and sometimes little villages and hamlets. At every crossroads there is a shrine that has been destroyed, sometimes a statue of the mother of Christ stands with her head casually knocked off and still a little fresh posy of flowers at her feet; not all the English are convinced by the changes in the law. In every other village a small monastery or abbey is being remodelled or broken down. It is extraordinary to see the change that this king has made to the face of his country in a matter of years. It is as if oak trees had been suddenly banned and every great sheltering and beautiful tree had been savagely felled overnight. The king has plucked the heart out of his country and it is too soon to see how it will live and breathe without the holy houses and the holy life that have guided it forever.

The king breaks off from his conversation with Katherine Howard and says to me: ‘I have a great country.’

I am not such a fool to comment that he has destroyed or stolen one of its greatest treasures.

‘Good farms,’ I say, ‘and . . .’ I stop for I do not know the English word for the beasts. I point to them.

‘Sheep,’ he says. ‘This is the wealth of this country. We supply the wool to the world. There is not a coat made in Christendom that is not woven with English wool.’

This is not quite true, for in Cleves we shear our own sheep and weave our own wool, but I know that the English wool trade is very great, and besides, I don’t want to correct him.