In the second carriage was the Protestant princess, but the cheers for her were nothing compared to the roar that greeted the diminutive queen every time her chariot rounded a corner. With Princess Elizabeth rode Henry’s neglected queen, Anne of Cleves, fatter than ever, with a ready smile for the crowd, the knowing gleam, I thought, of one survivor to another. And behind that chariot came forty-six ladies of the court and country, on foot and dressed in their best, and flagging a little by the time we had processed from Whitehall to the Tower.

Behind them, in the procession of officers of the court, came all the minor gentry and officials, me amongst them. Ever since I had come to England I had known myself to be a stranger, a refugee from a terror that I had to pretend I did not fear. But when I walked in the queen’s coronation procession with Will Somers, the witty fool, beside me, and my yellow cap on my head and my fool’s bell on a stick in my hand, I had a sense of coming into my own. I was the queen’s fool, my destiny had led me to be there with her from the first moment of her betrayal, through her flight and to her courageous proclamation. She had earned her throne and I had earned my place at her side.

I did not care that I was named as a fool. I was the holy fool, known to have the Sight, known to have predicted this day when the queen would come to her own. Some even crossed themselves as I went by, acknowledging the power that was vested in me. So I marched with my head up and I did not fear that all those eyes upon me would see my olive skin and my dark hair and name me for a Spaniard or worse. I thought myself an Englishwoman that day, and a loyal Englishwoman at that, with a proven love for my queen and for my adopted country; and I was glad to be one.

We slept that night in the Tower and the next day Lady Mary was crowned Queen of England, with her sister Elizabeth carrying her train, and the first to kneel to her and to swear allegiance. I could hardly see the two of them, I was crammed at the back of the Abbey, peering around a gentleman of the court, and in any case, my sight was blinded with tears at the knowledge that my Lady Mary had come to her throne, her sister beside her, and her lifelong battle for recognition and justice was over at last. God (whatever His name might be) had finally blessed her; she had won.

* * *

However united the queen and her sister had appeared when Elizabeth had kneeled before her, the Lady Elizabeth continued to carry her brother’s prayer book on a little chain at her waist, was never seen except in the soberest of gowns, and rarely appeared at Mass. She could not have shown the world more plainly that she was the Protestant alternative to the queen to whom she had just sworn lifelong loyalty. As ever, with Elizabeth, there was nothing that the queen could specifically criticise, it was the very air of her: the way she always set herself slightly apart, the way she always seemed to carry herself as if she, regretfully, could not wholly agree.