‘I haven’t the leather,’ the man said. ‘They don’t drive the cattle to Smithfield, the tanners can’t get the hides, I can’t get the leather. You’ve been in Virginia too long if you think you can order shoes like the old days.’

Hester took the cobbler by the elbow and there was a brief exchange of words and the clink of a coin.

‘What did you offer him?’ John asked as they emerged from the dark shop into the bright March sunlight.

Hester grimaced and prepared for a quarrel. ‘You won’t like it, John, but I promised to supply the leather from your father’s rarities. It was only some leather painted with a scene of the Madonna and Child. Not very well done, and completely heretical. We would invite the troops upon us if we ever showed it. And the man is right, he can’t get leather for your shoes otherwise.’

For a moment she thought he was going to flare up at her again.

‘So am I to strut around London with Papistical images painted on my boots?’ he asked. ‘Won’t they hang me for a Jesuit in hiding?’

‘Not much of a disguise if you’re going around with the Virgin Mary on your feet,’ Hester pointed out cheerfully. ‘No, the painting is almost worn off, and he’ll use it on the inside.’

‘We are using rare treasures as household goods? What kind of stewardship is this?’

‘We are surviving,’ Hester said grimly. ‘Do you want boots that you can walk in or no?’

He paused. ‘Do you swear that nothing else of any merit is missing from the collection?’ he demanded. ‘That it is safe in hiding as you say?’

‘On my honour, and you can see it all for yourself if you cut down the tree and open the door. But John, you had best wait. It’s not safe yet. They all say the king is defeated but they have said that before. He has his wife working against us in France, and the Irish to call on, and who knows what the Pope might order if the queen promises to hand over the country to Popery? The king cannot be defeated in battle, for all that they fight and fight. Even when he is down to his last man he is not defeated. He is still the king. They cannot defeat him. He has to decide to surrender.’

John nodded and they fell into stride together for the short walk home. ‘I keep thinking. I keep wondering – perhaps I should go to him,’ he said.

She stumbled at the thought of him returning to the court and to danger. ‘Why? Why on earth would you go?’

‘I feel almost that I owe him some service,’ he said.

‘You left the country to escape serving,’ she reminded him.