Around us the court is dancing and flirting, someone is singing, and there is a small group standing around us, watching the play and betting on the outcome. Catherine Brandon is at the king’s elbow. He shows her his cards and asks for her advice, and she smiles and swears she will signal to me so that I have the advantage. Most people bet on the king. He does not like to lose. He does not even like someone betting against him. I see a weak card that he plays and I do not trump it. He roars at my mistake and scoops up the trick.

“Shall you summon Bishop Gardiner home?” I ask as calmly as I can. “Do you agree with him that the emperor should make a war against his own people?”

“For certain they go too far in Germany,” Henry says. “And these German princes have been no help to me at all. I won’t defend them. Why should I? They don’t understand the ways of man, why should they grasp the ways of God?”

I glance up and see Edward Seymour, Thomas’s brother, watching me. I know that he hopes that I will use my influence to persuade the king that the Lutherans in Germany should be spared, and that the new thinking in England should be allowed. But I walk a very careful course with the king. I have heard Nan’s warnings and I am wary of making enemies. I know by now that when the king complains of one side he is often, at the very same time, working against the other. People overestimate my influence when they blame me for reform. I use my influence lightly, and there is a portrait hanging on the wall that denies I even exist.

“Surely it cannot be wrong to think that we should live by the Bible, and that we will go to heaven by faith and the forgiveness of our sins,” I remark.

Henry glances up from his hand of cards. “I see you are no better a theologian than you are a card player,” he says. His twinkle of a smile takes the sting from his words.

“I don’t expect to understand more about religion than you, my lord husband,” I say. “And I certainly never expect to beat you at cards.”

“And what about my girls?” he asks, turning to Princess Mary, who stands at his elbow, while Elizabeth leans against my chair.

“Cards or scholarship?” Elizabeth asks pertly.

Her father laughs. “Which do you prefer?”

“Scholarship,” she says. “Because it is a privilege to be allowed to study, especially with a scholar like the queen; but cards are a pastime for anyone.”