And then the queen died and Robert was released from prison and I think we all breathed a little easier for a while, for her successor was none other than James, the son of the martyred Queen Mary of Scotland. Though he was a Protestant I think we expected him to have some tolerance of Catholics because of his mother’s faith if nothing else. We hoped for moderation in the new government’s treatment of us, for the right to worship freely according to our consciences, as Thomas had always wanted.

It took only a short while to disabuse us of that hope. The new king banished all Catholic priests and Jesuits and reimposed the recusancy fines. “Thomas is in a fine fury,” Muriel wrote from Rushden. “His new lodge at Lyveden lies unfinished for there is no money to live, let alone to build. I fear it may never be finished.”

I wanted to tell her that if they reined in Francis and Lewis, their feckless sons, it might help conserve some of the family fortunes, but given that the two had been led astray by their cousin Robert since they had been children, I had no leg to stand on. I bit the end of my quill and reported that Ashby’s roof leaked and the chimney smoked, and that Robbie had turned eight in November last and was doing well in mathematics and less well in Latin.

When we had not seen Robert for nearly three months, I sent Byram to try to discover what he was doing. Byram reported that Robert was dividing his time between Oxfordshire and his house in Lambeth. “He spends much time in company with your cousins Wintour and Wright, and one of the Percy brood,” Byram said. “They drink and practice swordplay and I doubt they are up to any good.”

“Can you not discover for me what it is they plan?” I asked, but Byram shook his head. “I have no money for bribes and am well-known as your servant,” he said bluntly. “There is a limit to how close I can get.”

It was the same message the following year.

“Robert admits more of his family and acquaintance to his close circle,” Byram said when, dry throated and dusty from the road, he reached me from London that August. “He plans something, madam, and soon, though I know not what.”

It would be another rebellion, I thought, or some foolish plot to get close to the king and kill him, and it would end the same way in defeat and imprisonment, fines and disgrace. I watched Robbie out on the lawn with his skittles. He had a very accurate eye. He bowled the ball and they all fell, one after another, knocking into each other until the last one tumbled. In that moment I had a vivid memory of his father doing the same. Twenty odd years before; Robert, out in the gardens with William, his excited cries reaching my ears as I watched them from an upstairs window. The recollection was so vivid I could almost hear their voices though both were lost to me now in their different ways. There was only Robbie; he was the center of my world.