“I should think so,” he says, pretending to take offense. “Indeed, I expect you. I expect very obedient behavior from my wife.”

“You shall have it,” I promise him. I see one of William Cecil’s men approaching the gate, and I smile at Thomas and slip away. “I have given you my word.”

The first night we sleep undisturbed till dawn in each other’s arms. When his head lies beside mine on the pillow, we are as equals, his broad forehead against my little one, his gentle kiss on my smiling mouth. His long legs stretch down to the bottom of the bed, his feet extend over the edge, and I occupy only the top half of the bed, but side by side, with the curtains drawn around us, we are equals, we are one.

The second night I wake at midnight to hear the Westminster Abbey bell tolling over and over, the low haunting note that says that someone has died.

“Elizabeth,” I whisper in my moment of waking, the wish coming before the words, the wish coming before the thought. I wake to joy as I half dream, half believe that it is the announcement of Elizabeth’s death and my sister will be Queen of England.

Thomas hears the mourning bell too and springs out of bed and ducks to avoid the roof beams. “I must go,” he says, and scrambles into his livery. I get up, too, pulling on my shift.

“Shall I do your laces?” he turns, halfway to the door.

“I’ll manage. You go,” I say briefly. I know that he will be desperate to do his duty, to guard the gate against whatever bad news is coming.

He leaves his room at a run, and I throw a shawl over my head like a poor woman and go down the stairs and across the yard. I think I will get to my rooms unseen, but there, coming out of the ladies’ rooms, is Thomasina. In one glance she takes in my half-dressed state, my tumbling hair. But she has no time for comment.

“It’s for Kat Ashley,” she says over the insistent tolling of the bell. “God bless her. We’ve lost her.”

“Lost her?” I say stupidly.

“She has died. She was failing fast. The queen is heartbroken,” Thomasina says. “She left the dancing and ordered the bells to toll and the court into mourning. She says that Kat was like a mother to her.”

“She was,” I agree solemnly; but I think: and even daughterly devotion didn’t stop Elizabeth arresting Kat and holding her in the Tower.