‘If I were under my lord’s protection I would be safe,’ I said with simple confidence.

It cost him a good deal to acknowledge Lord Robert’s power. ‘I suppose so. But please, talk to me before you take a decision. His credit may not be so very good, you know, it is only one act of bravery in a long life of treason.’

I let the criticism go.

‘Can I walk you to your door?’ He offered me his arm and I took it and fell into step beside him. For the first time in months I felt a little of my own darkness lift and dissolve. The queen was with child, Lord Robert was free and honoured for his bravery, England and Spain in alliance had defeated the French army. Surely, things would start coming right for me too.

‘Mother tells me that she saw you in the market place in breeches,’ Daniel remarked.

‘Yes,’ I said carelessly. ‘When there are so many soldiers and rough men and women on the streets I feel safer like that.’

‘Would you come back to my house?’ Daniel asked. ‘I would like to keep you safe. You could keep the shop on.’

‘It’s making no money,’ I conceded honestly. ‘I don’t stay away from you for the sake of the shop. I can’t come back to you, Daniel. I have made up my mind and I will not change it.’

We had reached my door. ‘But if you were in trouble or danger you would send for me,’ he pressed me.

‘Yes.’

‘And you wouldn’t leave for England, or meet with Lord Robert, without telling me?’

I shrugged. ‘I have no plans, except I should like to see the queen again. She must be so happy, I should like to see her now, expecting her child. I should so like to see her in her joy.’

‘Perhaps when the peace treaty is signed,’ he suggested. ‘I could take you to London for a visit and bring you back, if you would like that.’

I looked at him attentively. ‘Daniel, that would be kind indeed.’

‘I would do anything to please you, anything that would make you happy,’ he said gently.

I opened my door. ‘Thank you,’ I said quietly and slipped away from him before I should make the mistake of stepping forward into his arms.

WINTER 1557–58

There were rumours that the defeated French army had turned around and was regrouping on the borders of the English Pale and every stranger who came into Calais for the Christmas market was regarded as a spy. The French must come against Calais in revenge for St Quentin, but the French must know, as we all knew, that the town could not be taken. Everyone was afraid that the ramparts outside the town would be mined, that even now the skilled French miners were burrowing like worms through the very fabric of English earth. Everyone was afraid that the guards would be suborned, that the fort would fall through treachery. But over all of this was a sort of blithe confidence that the French could not succeed. Philip of Spain was a brilliant commander, he had the flower of the English army in the field, what could the French do with an army like ours harassing their own borders, and an impregnable castle like ours behind them?