I rise up. I so want to tell her that it is all right, that we can be as we were, something like sisters, something like friends, but we have to wait until the chamber door is shut. It must be secret.

‘I am honoured by your invitation, Your Grace,’ I say solemnly. ‘And I am very glad to share the Christmas feast with you and your husband, His Majesty the king, God bless him.’

She gives a little uncertain laugh and then, when I look promptingly at her, she glances at her uncle and replies: ‘We are delighted to have you at our court. My husband the king embraces you as his sister and so do I.’

Then she steps towards me, as clearly she has been told to do only it had flown out of her head the moment she saw me, and offers me her royal cheek to kiss.

The duke observes this and announces: ‘His Majesty the king tells me that he will dine here with you two ladies this evening.’

‘Then we must make him welcome,’ Katherine says. She turns to Lady Rochford and says: ‘The duchess and I will sit in my privy chamber while the room is being readied for dinner. We will sit alone,’ and then she sails towards my—her—privy chamber as if she had owned it all her life and I find myself following in her wake.

As soon as the door is shut behind us she rounds on me. ‘I think that was all right, wasn’t it?’ she demands. ‘Your curtsey was lovely, thank you.’

I smile. ‘I think it was all right.’

‘Sit down, sit down,’ she urges me. ‘You can sit in your chair, you’ll feel more at home.’

I hesitate. ‘No,’ I say. ‘It is not right so. You sit in the chair and I will sit beside you. In case someone comes in.’

‘What if they do?’

‘We will always be watched,’ I say, finding the words. ‘You will always be watched. You have to take care. All the time.’

She shakes her head. ‘You don’t know what he is like with me,’ she assures me. ‘You have never seen him like this. I can ask for anything, I can have anything I want. Anything in the world I think I could ask for and have. He will allow me anything, he will forgive me anything.’

‘Good,’ I say, smiling at her.

But her little face is not radiant as it was when she was playing with the kitten.

‘I know it is good,’ she says hesitantly. ‘I should be the happiest woman in the world. Like Jane Seymour, you know? Her motto was: “the most happy”.’

‘You will have to become accustomed to life as a wife and Queen of England,’ I say firmly. I really do not want to hear Katherine Howard’s regrets.

‘I will,’ she says earnestly. She is such a child, she still tries to please anyone who scolds her. ‘I really do try, Your Gr—er, Anne.’