‘I knew you would want to know as soon as I did,’ he said. The family were so anxious for news that they greeted him in the hall, as soon as he came through the door, Johnnie at the forefront. ‘They were marching on London but they have turned to the west. They’re probably hoping to raise recruits from Wales before they face Lambert.’

‘And where is Lambert?’

‘On a forced march behind them,’ Alexander replied. ‘There is no other general in the world who could move his men at the speed he does. He’ll catch the Scots army, without a doubt. And he’ll be the one that chooses the ground.’

‘Is he south of York?’ Johnnie demanded.

Alexander looked past him to Hester’s anguished face. ‘I am sorry, Hester,’ was all he said.

Johnnie sprang up the stairs, running for his campaign bundle, shouting for Joseph to tell the stable lad to get his horse ready. John turned to his wife and she buried her face against his shoulder.

‘Stop him,’ she whispered. ‘Stop him.’

John shook his head. ‘No power on earth can stop him,’ he said. He looked at Alexander. ‘Can they win?’

Alexander had drawn Frances to his side. ‘These are the fortunes of war,’ he said. ‘You know as well as I do that anything can happen, it can always go either way. But Cromwell and Lambert defeated this army before, and on their own ground. The northern militia will turn out now that the Scots have invaded England, and the northern men hate the Scots worse than anything else. There’ll be strong feelings against the king now that he has an army moving through England – no-one has forgotten the last war. It’s one thing to mourn the death of a dead king; it’s quite another to turn the country upside down again for the claims of a live one. I think they’ll lose. But I can’t be sure. No-one can be sure.’

‘Who cares?’ Hester said, her face still hidden, her voice agonised. ‘Who cares if they lose or win? Johnnie could be killed, couldn’t he? Whether they win or lose?’

John tightened his grip around her. ‘We’ll have to pray,’ he said, and it was a sign of his own desperation. ‘That’s all we can do now.’