I send a message to his rooms every morning and they always send back and say that he is on the mend; and then I have a great fear that he is dying, which would not be surprising for he is so terribly old. And if he dies what will happen to me? And do I keep the jewels and the gowns? And am I still queen even if he is dead? So I wait until the end of dinner and I beckon the king’s greatest favourite, Thomas Culpepper, to step up to the top table, and he comes to my side at once, so deferential and graceful, and I say very seriously, ‘You may sit down, Master Culpepper,’ and he takes a stool beside me and I say, ‘Please tell me truly, how is the king?’

He looks at me with his honest blue eyes, he is desperately handsome it has to be said, and he says: ‘The king has a fever, Your Grace, but it is from weariness, it is not the wound on his leg. You need not fear for him. He would be grieved if he caused you a moment’s worry. He is overheated and exhausted, nothing more.’

This is so kind that I feel myself become quite sentimental. ‘I have worried,’ I say a little tearfully. ‘I have been very anxious for him.’

‘You need not be,’ he says gently. ‘I would tell you if there was anything wrong. He will be up and about within days. I promise it.’

‘My position . . .’

‘Your position is impossible,’ he exclaims suddenly. ‘You should be courting your first sweetheart, not trying to rule a court and shape your life to please a man as old as your grandfather.’

This is so unexpected from Thomas Culpepper, the perfect courtier, that I give a little gasp of surprise and I make the mistake of telling the truth, as he has done.

‘Actually, I can only blame myself. I wanted to be queen.’

‘Before you knew what it meant.’

‘Yes.’

There is a silence. I am suddenly aware that we are before the whole of the court and that everyone is looking at us. ‘I may not talk to you like this,’ I say awkwardly. ‘Everyone watches me.’

‘I would serve you in any way I can,’ he says quietly. ‘And the greatest service I can do for you now is to go right away from you. I don’t want to make grist for the gossips.’

‘I shall walk in the gardens at ten tomorrow,’ I say. ‘You could come to me then. In my privy gardens.’

‘Ten,’ he agrees and bows very low and goes back to his table, and I turn and talk to Lady Margaret as if nothing in particular had happened.

She gives me a little smile. ‘He is a handsome young man,’ she says. ‘But nothing compared to your brother Charles.’

I look down the hall to where Charles is dining with his friends. I have never thought of him as handsome, but then I hardly ever saw him until I came to court. He was sent away for his upbringing when he was a boy, and then I was sent to my step-grandmother. ‘What an odd thing to say,’ I remark. ‘You surely cannot like Charles.’