“I’m very near to my time,” I whisper urgently to him. “As you know. Very near. Your mother says that I must stay calm, it might hurt the baby if I’m not calm. But I won’t be able to be calm if Teddy is taken from us. Please let him stay with us. I am feeling unhappy.” I take a swift glance at his piercing brown eyes which are scanning my face. “Very unhappy, Henry. I feel distressed. I am troubled. Please tell me that it’ll be all right.”

“Go and lie down in your room,” he says. “I’ll sort this out. You shouldn’t have been troubled. You shouldn’t have been told.”

“I’ll go to my room,” I promise. “But I must have your word that Teddy stays with us. I’ll go, as soon as I know that Teddy can stay here.”

With a sudden sense of dread I see My Lady the King’s Mother step into the room. “I will take you back to your bedchamber,” she offers. Some of her ladies-in-waiting come in behind her. “Come.”

I hesitate. “Go on,” Henry says. “Go with my mother. I’ll settle things here and then come and see you.”

“But Teddy stays with us,” I stipulate.

Henry hesitates and as he does so, his mother steps quietly around me to stand behind me. She wraps me in her arms, holding me close. For a moment I think it is a loving embrace, then I feel the strength in her grip. Two of her ladies-in-waiting come up on either side of her and hold my arms. I am captured, to my absolute amazement, I am held. One of the ladies scoops up Maggie and two of them hold her as the yeomen of the guard lift Teddy bodily and carry him from the room.

“No!” I scream.

Maggie is struggling and kicking, lashing out to get to her brother.

“No! You can’t take Teddy, he’s done nothing! Not the Tower! Not Teddy!”

Henry throws one horrified glance at me, held by his mother, struggling to be free, and then turns and goes out of the room, following his guard.

“Henry!” I scream after him.

My Lady the King’s Mother puts a hard hand over my mouth to silence me and we hear the tramp of the guards’ feet going down the gallery and then down the stairs at the end. Then we hear the outer door bang. When there is silence, My Lady takes her hand from my mouth.

“How dare you! How dare you hold me? Let me go!”

“I will take you to your room,” she says steadily. “You must not be upset.”

“I am upset!” I scream at her. “I am upset! Teddy can’t go to the Tower.”

She does not even answer me but nods at her ladies to follow her and they guide me firmly from the room. Behind me, Maggie has collapsed into tears, and the women who were holding her lower her gently to the ground and wipe her face and whisper to her that everything will be well. My sister Cecily is aghast at the sudden, smooth violence of the scene. I want her to go and fetch our mother, but she is stupid with shock, staring, from me to My Lady, as if the king’s mother had grown fangs and wings and was holding me prisoner.