Perhaps it is the marriage with Norfolk; perhaps he has come to think that a queen of royal blood, a queen anointed by God, cannot be kept forever under house arrest. Or perhaps my lord is right and Cecil is losing ground in the counsels of Queen Elizabeth. His star, which has been rising for so long, may be in eclipse. Perhaps all the other lords who have resented his influence will have their way, and my old friend Cecil will have to bow to their authority again, just as he did when we were both young and on the rise. My son Henry, serving at court in the Dudley household, writes to me that he thinks this is the case. He says that twice recently Cecil clashed with a nobleman and came off worse both times. The scandal of the Spanish gold has hurt him badly; even the queen acknowledges that he was mistaken and we will have to repay to the Spanish the bullion that Cecil stole.

“Even so, retain your friendship with him, as I will,” I write cautiously to Henry in reply. “Cecil plays a long game and the queen loves those who protected her as princess.”

My whole household is to move to my husband’s great palace at Wingfield with the Scots queen, and she is radiant at the chance of getting away from Tutbury. Nothing is too much trouble for her: she arranges her own household’s packing into wagons; her own goods, clothes, and jewels are ready to go at dawn. Her pet birds are in their boxes; she swears her dog will sit on anyone’s saddlebow. She will ride ahead with my husband, the earl; as usual, I am to follow with the household goods. I shall trail behind them like their servant. I shall ride in the mud churned up by the hooves of their horses.

It is a beautiful morning when they set off, and the spring birds are singing, larks rising into the warm air as they go over the moor. It starts to rain by the time I have the baggage train packed and ready to go and I pull my hood up over my head, mount my horse, and lead the way out of the yard and down the muddy hill.