I am frightened into wakefulness. I sit bolt upright in my bed, gasping, the king fast asleep in his bedroom next door, the open door between our bedchambers admitting the roaring snore and snuffle and the terrible stench of his leg. It is so dark, it must be long hours from dawn. Wearily, I get out of my bed and go to the table to look at my new clock. The golden pendulum swings backwards and forwards, beautifully balanced, emitting a tiny click like a constant heartbeat. I feel my pounding heart steady to its rhythm. It is half past one, hours yet before I can look for light. I wrap myself in a robe and I sit beside the dying fire. I wonder how I am to get through the night, how I am to get through the next day. Wearily, I get down on my knees and pray again that God will take this passion from me. I did not seek love with Thomas, but I did not resist it. And now I am trapped in desire like a butterfly with its feet in honey, and the more I struggle, the deeper I sink. I think I cannot bear to live my life trying to do my duty to a good man, a gentle and generous husband who cries out for attentive care and a loving heart, while all I do is long for a man who does not need me at all but sets my skin on fire.

And then, though I am trapped in the sin of fear, and a slave to a passion, something very strange happens. Though it is nowhere near dawn, though it is the darkest time of the night, I feel the room lighten, the ashes of the fire grow a little brighter. I raise my head, and my forehead no longer throbs and my fearful sweat has cooled. I feel well, as if I had slept well and I am waking to a bright morning. The smell from the king’s room is diminished and I know once again my deep pity for him in his pain and illness. His rumbling snore has grown quieter and I am glad that he is sleeping well. Hardly believing my own sense of being uplifted, I feel as if I can hear the voice of God, as if He is with me, as if He has come to me in this night of my trial, as if His mercy can look on me, a sinner, a woman who has sinned and has longed for sin, who still longs for sin, and that, even seeing all this, He can forgive me.