John went to the bedside and took the man’s hand. ‘I have been living with the Powhatan and I dress like them and hunt with them,’ he said. ‘They treat me as a friend. I saw you in the woods the other day, and I thought you might be in need. I have brought you some meat and I can bring you more. They have medicines as well which would make you well. I would have come sooner if I had known you were in need, Bertram.’

The man’s red-rimmed eyes wandered over John’s face. ‘A savage,’ he said, bewildered.

‘I am indeed John Tradescant,’ John said. ‘But I could not live alone in the forest. Thank God I fell among the Powhatan and they have treated me kindly.’

Sarah Hobert came to her husband’s bedside with a delicate pot filled with gravy. John recognised at once the work of the People: the perfectly smooth walls of one of their dainty black pots.

‘That’s Powhatan-made,’ he said.

She gave him a swift disapproving glance. ‘We used to trade with them, but they became too demanding and dishonest,’ she said. ‘Now my husband will not have them near his land.’ She turned to the wreck of the man in the bed. ‘Will you taste, Bertram?’

Eagerly he sat up and reached for the pot, eagerly he sucked at it and gulped until the pot was empty.

‘Rest now,’ John said, remembering his horrors of illness after he had eaten too richly on a starved belly. ‘You can have more later, and I will bring you other food, corn and berries and nuts.’

Sarah reached out and caught his hand. ‘Praise God for bringing you back to us,’ she said. ‘For that which was lost is found.’

John hesitated. ‘I must be a visitor only,’ he said.

Her face was shining with relief and happiness, deaf to his reluctance. ‘Praise God for returning you to your true people,’ she said.

It was out of the question for John to leave that night, or even the next day. He slept in the attic on the same side of the makeshift screen as the Negro Francis. In the morning Hobert was in a fever, groaning and counting aloud, counting the sums of money he must save to buy headrights in the new land, counting the percentage of profit he might hope to make, counting the wages he must pay to get his land cleared and tobacco planted.

‘Is he mad?’ John asked Sarah.

She shook her head. ‘It’s the fever again,’ she said. ‘When it comes on him he acts like a madman but then the fever breaks and he is cool-headed again. Francis has to tie him up sometimes.’

‘This is impossible,’ John said. ‘You will have to go back to Jamestown. You cannot stay here with only a sick man and a slave.’