James felt his familiar sense of distaste at the trouble that seemed to follow Alinor even here, among her betters. “Better to leave her alone,” he advised rapidly, “and then she might make a good marriage and change her luck.”

“Oh, aye,” Sir William conceded. “And her brother is an army man and as free with his opinions as a dog with his piss, and times so changeable. It’s not like the old days when you knew where you were. My father would take a tenant’s wife behind the haystack and no one would say a word but ‘Thank you, your lordship!’ ”

“Yes,” James said repressively. “It’s not like the old days at all.”

“Anyway, they say you can’t force her,” Sir William confided. “They say some fool tried to take her against her will, when she was coming home from market, and she whispered something to him that completely unmanned him. He said his cock went limp and his blood froze. He said she ruined him, before he ruined her.”

“Really?”

“Gossip. Sort of gossip that collects around a beautiful woman. Especially a cunning woman. They say she can do all sorts. They called her a cock whisperer after that; said that she could blast a man with ice or harden him like a rock. Must say, I’d like to know.”

James was sickened by the repetition of Alinor’s uncanny skills. “It was probably nothing but that she spoke godly to him and he lost the will,” he said.

“Who knows what she can do?”

“Surely, she just knows the healing herbs,” James insisted.

“Maybe. They believe all sorts of nonsense on this island. Her mother was half witch for sure. But she’s dead and buried in holy ground and nobody actually tried her. Her sister-in-law died in childbed; but of course the brother hushed it all up. Anyway . . . makes no difference to us. The woman, whatever she may be, has obliged us and we’ve paid her. And you know you’re welcome back anytime. You can stay on now, if you wish.”

“I’ll go tomorrow,” James said, glad to change the subject. “I have to go to London, and then I’ll take a ship to France. I will go to my seminary and confess. If they release me, perhaps I will be able to come back to England. Perhaps next time we meet I shall have my old name and my old house back again.”

“I hope you do, by God, I hope that you do. You deserve it,” Sir William said gruffly. “Remember that it wasn’t your fault. His Majesty chose his own path. Pray God that he chose rightly and it gets him to his throne. Pray God that both you and he get safe home.”

Alinor and Alys soaked their best caps and their linen in a bowl of water and urine as soon as they got home from the ferry-house herb garden. They left them to bleach all evening, rinsed them in cold water from the dipping pond, and then pinned them on a string beside the herbs to dry.