‘I know that,’ she said gently. ‘It is the gift of the Holy Spirit, which blows where it lists, I don’t expect you to be my astrologer. I want you to be my little maid, my little friend. Will you be that?’

‘Yes, Your Grace, I should like that,’ I said, and felt the touch of her hand on my head.

She was silent for a moment, her hand resting gently as I knelt before her. ‘It is very rare to find one that I can trust,’ she said quietly. ‘I know that you came into my household paid by my enemies; but I think your gift comes from God, and I believe that you came to me from God. And you love me now, don’t you, Hannah?’

‘Yes, Your Grace,’ I said simply. ‘I don’t think anyone could serve you and not come to love you.’

She smiled a little sadly. ‘Oh, it is possible,’ she said, and I knew she was thinking of the women who had been employed in the royal nursery and paid to love the Princess Elizabeth and to humiliate the older child. She took her hand from my head and I felt her step away, and I looked up to see her going towards the window to look out at the garden. ‘You can come with me now, and bear me company,’ she said quietly. ‘I have to talk with my sister.’

I followed her as she walked through her private rooms to the gallery which ran looking out over the river. The fields were all shaven bare and yellow. But it had not been a good harvest. It had rained at harvest time, and if they could not dry the wheat then the grains would rot and there would not be enough to last through the winter, and there would be hunger in the land. And after hunger came illness. To be a good queen in England under these wet skies you had to command the weather itself; and not even Lady Mary, on her knees to her God for hours every day, could manage that.

There was a rustle of a silk underskirt and I peeped around and saw the Lady Elizabeth had entered the gallery from the other end. The young woman took in my presence and she gave me her mischievous smile, as if we were somehow allies. I felt like one of a pair of schoolmates summoned before a severe teacher and I found that I was smiling back at her. Elizabeth could always do that; she could enlist your friendship with a turn of her head. Then she directed her attention to her sister.

‘Your Grace is well?’

Lady Mary nodded and then spoke coolly. ‘You asked to see me.’

At once the beautiful pale face became sober and grave. Lady Elizabeth dropped to her knees, her mane of copper hair tumbled around her shoulders as she dropped her head forward. ‘Sister, I am afraid you are displeased with me.’