“What is it?” She hung over Thomas, fear in her face. “The servant said you shouted so loud! Has he had a fit? Is he dead?”

“No.” I took a deep breath and rubbed my damp palms against my skirts. “Your pardon, sister,” I said. “He was so quiet that for a moment I thought he had slipped away from us, but he breathes still.”

She gave me a look full of mistrust. Thomas’s chest rose and fell softly. He looked entirely at peace.

“I will stay with him now,” she said, and it was tantamount to an order to me to leave the room—so I went.

In the parlor, I sat by the window and looked out over the gardens in their autumn splendor. The pleasure grounds were quiet beneath the fading blue of the sky, the waters of the canal catching the falling golden leaves. The raspberries and damask roses were withering in the labyrinth; Thomas’s pilgrimage through life was reaching its end. I thought then of Catherine’s ambitious plans for the garden at Knightstone and the ruthless destruction of them that Robert had wrought in his grief. I felt a tear fall onto my skirts. It surprised me, for I so seldom cried, but here, stalked by death and with the shell of Thomas’s new building at the top of the hill looking down on us, I was run through with despair. What use were Thomas’s grand architectural designs now, when he lay dying? He had claimed they were for the glory of God and I knew that this was in part true, but they were in equal part a testament to his own glory. And now that was all but blown out like a spent candle.

I thought too of Thomas’s words about Robert: “He has taken up the sword I could not wield... He has gunpowder...”

I had known Robert was lost after the death of his family. I could not reach him and I had been content in some ways, if not happy, to see him turn back to the church, because I had thought it might comfort him when I could not. But I had always known that Robert’s way was to fight. He had proved it by joining Essex’s rebellion and now it sounded as though he had other plans afoot. And Thomas was right—Robert would bring down not only himself but also his son’s future. The thought of it made me feel sick with fear.

I jumped up, intending to go to my chamber and start to pack my bags at once so that I might go to London and make some desperate attempt to find my son, but then Muriel came in, her face puffy with exhaustion and her eyes red from crying. “He is gone,” she said. “He went as quietly as a lamb in the end. The priest was with him.” She sat down heavily on the settle, as though her limbs could no longer support her.

“What am I to do, Anne?” She addressed me, though she too had her gaze fixed on the skeleton of the house up on the hill. “Thomas has left us with nothing but grief and debt. How am I to bear it?” And she cried again, her body heaving with sobs, the sound tearing through the silent house.