Katheryn sat there trying to remember her mother’s face. It was horrible knowing that she would never see it again. She might never again play with her boisterous brothers in the field that lay between Lady Hall and the church at Moreton. Her head was full of memories: the Christmas gatherings at Lambeth, receiving a cloth doll made by Mother at New Year, getting her brothers to carry her pig-a-back and Father reprimanding them for being too rough with her, and her nurse grumbling because there was no money for new clothes. But her most cherished memories were those of her mother. Mother sewing by the fire, or making cordial in the still room, Mother teaching her how to make daisy chains, Mother kissing her good night, her gentle hand stroking her hair. Tears welled.

‘You’ve not met your Culpeper kinsfolk, have you, sweeting?’ Isabel said. ‘They are my family too. Our mother was a Culpeper before she married. Aunt Margaret is her sister. You will come to love her, I am sure.’

They jolted through Epping Forest, passing through the villages of Chipping Ongar and Kelvedon Hatch. Presently, Katheryn fell asleep, and only woke up when Isabel shook her shoulder at Tilbury. Here they were to catch the ferry across the Thames to Gravesend. Down by the jetty there was a man selling hot pies, and Isabel bought three, one each for her and Katheryn and one for the groom, and some hot spiced ale.

It was a short journey by boat to the Kent coast. Isabel folded Katheryn in her cloak as they stood on deck and watched Gravesend looming near.

‘Is it far to Oxon Hoath?’ Katheryn asked as the vessel rocked on the tide.

‘About sixteen miles. We’ll break our journey and stay overnight at Meopham. That’s about five miles from Gravesend.’

But they found nowhere suitable to stay at Meopham and had to ride on a further six miles until they arrived, exhausted, at the Bull Inn at Wrotham, which looked inviting. Isabel paid for a private chamber and asked for food to be brought up to them. They had the daily ordinary, a bowl of rich beef stew and slices of apple pie. Then Isabel put Katheryn to bed and sat sewing in a chair by the fire. It all seemed so strange, after the known and the familiar, and Katheryn started crying into her pillow. Instantly, Isabel was there, holding her in her arms.

‘I know, I know, sweeting. She was my mother too and I miss her dreadfully.’ Clutching each other, they wept together until Katheryn fell asleep.

Aunt Margaret Cotton was waiting for them at the door of a big old house with uneven walls and stout timbers. She was a plump matron in her forties with ruddy cheeks and a brisk manner, but Katheryn could see warmth and sympathy in her eyes.