She thought she must learn to stop looking for John, learn to stop waiting for him. She thought she would wait till the summer and then, if there was still no news, find a way to tell Johnnie, who was sometimes still her little boy, and sometimes now a young man, that his father was not coming home, and that he was the only Gardener Tradescant left.

‘Excuse me,’ a voice behind her said politely. ‘I am looking for John Tradescant.’

‘He’s not here,’ Hester said wearily and turned around. ‘I am his wife. Can I help you?’

The man before her was one of the handsomest she had ever seen in her life. He swept off his hat to her and the plumes brushed the ground as he bowed, one long brown suede boot stretched forwards. He was dressed in grey – a sober enough colour which might indicate he was a Parliament man and one of the dreary Presbyterian sort at that; but his thick, curly head of hair, his rich lace collar, and that laughing confidence in his smile, was that of a cavalier.

Hester’s first response was to smile in reply, he was not a man that any woman would find easy to resist. But then she remembered the times they lived in and she glanced towards the house as if she feared a guard of soldiery at his call and a warrant for arrest in his pocket.

‘Can I help you?’ she asked again.

‘I’m looking for tulips,’ he said. ‘Everyone knows that John Tradescant’s is the only garden worth visiting in England, and also these are troubled times to go flower hunting in the Low Countries.’

‘We have tulips,’ Hester said gravely, not taking advantage of the conversational opening to deplore the badness of the times. ‘Was it a special variety you wanted?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘What do you have?’

Hester smiled. The verbal fencing was a typical approach to naming a plant which had, in its heyday, cost the value of a house. ‘We have everything,’ she said with the simple arrogance of a professional at the very top of her profession. ‘You had much better tell me simply what you want. We only ever charge a fair price, Mr –?’

He stepped back slightly as if to re-assess her, as if his view of a plain woman plainly dressed had hidden the strength of her character, and her pride. ‘I’m John Lambert,’ he said. ‘And last year I grew half a dozen tulips at my home, and this year I must have more. I simply must. Do you know what I mean, Mrs Tradescant? Or are they nothing more than a crop to you, like wheat to a farmer?’

‘They’re not my passion,’ Hester said. ‘But nobody could live in this household and not come to love tulips. They are one of the finest flowers.’

‘None finer,’ he said quickly.

‘Roses?’