He smiled ruefully. ‘I know it. That’s what I’m saying. I have always been able to see both sides at once. But this time – for the first time in my life – the first time, Hester! – I have a cause I can truly believe in. I don’t think that Charles Stuart should come back. I do think that the people of this country should govern themselves without a king or bishops or lords. I do believe – my God, at last I believe – that we are a people who have earned our freedom and deserve to be free. And I want to go and fight for that freedom. Lambert has raised his standard, for freedom, for the good old cause. I want to be there. I want to fight for it. If I have to die for it I will.’

For a moment it looked as if she would cry out against him, then she stepped to one side and opened the stable door. Caesar the war horse stepped out, raising his big hoofs delicately over the threshold, and walked at once to the mounting block and stood still, his neck arched, as if he too wanted to go into battle for the rights of freeborn Englishmen.

John smiled to see the horse and then looked at Hester. ‘Are you angry with me?’

‘No,’ she said unwillingly. ‘I’m proud of you, even though this goes against my own interests. I’m glad to see you at last knowing what you believe and going to fight for it. I shall pray that you win. I have always thought that nothing mattered but that we survived these days and it is a change for me to think, like you, that there is something worth fighting for.’

‘You think it’s worth fighting for?’ he asked. ‘To keep the king out, to keep Parliament free? To get justice for everyone in this country?’

Unwillingly she nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And if any man can do it then Lambert is that man. I know it.’

John took her hand again, kissed it and then caught her to him and held her hard against him. ‘I shall come back!’ he said passionately. ‘Trust me, Hester. I shall come back to you. And God willing we will make this country a place where poor men can be free.’

He came back within a fortnight. All three men who had been so powerful in Hester’s life came back to their separate destinations: John Lambert to the Tower on a charge of high treason, Charles Stuart to Dover and the road to London lined with people crowding to touch his sacred hand, and John, head drooping, home to the Ark.