She bowed her head. For a moment she had an odd sentimental thought that by accepting Tradescant’s loveless proposal she was cutting herself off from all the other possibilities which might have unfurled before her. Surely there would have been men, or even just one man, who might have loved her for herself, and not because she was good with his children and reliable with his business? Surely there might have been just one man who might have proposed and waited for her answer with his heart pounding? Surely there might have been just one man who might have put her hand to his lips so that she felt not a polite kiss but the sudden warm intake of breath which reveals desire?

She gave a small unnoticed shrug. No such man had yet appeared and she was nearing thirty. The agreement with John Tradescant was the best she had ever been offered in a country where success was measured in terms of intimacy with the court. The king’s gardener and a favourite of the queen was a good catch, even for a spinster with a dowry of two hundred pounds.

‘I have no preference in men,’ she said, as coolly as he. ‘I will marry you, John.’

He hesitated. ‘No-one ever calls me John,’ he said. ‘I’ve always been J. It was my father who was John.’

Hester nodded. ‘I know that. But your father is dead now, and you are the head of the household and a son no longer. I shall call you John. You are the head of the household, you are John Tradescant.’

‘I suppose I am …’

‘Sometimes it is hard when your father or mother dies,’ she said. ‘It’s not just their death which causes you grief, but the fact that you are no longer someone’s little child. It’s the final stage of growing up, of becoming a man or a woman. My mother used to call me a pet-name, and I have never heard that name since she died. I never will hear it again. I am a grown woman now and no-one calls me anything but Hester Pooks.’

‘You are saying that I must take my manhood.’

‘You are the head of the household now. And I will be your wife.’

‘We will have the banns called at once then,’ he said. ‘At St Mary’s.’

She shook her head at the thought of him walking to his wedding past the headstone of his only beloved wife. ‘I am a resident of St Bride’s in the City,’ she said. ‘I will go home and get the banns called there. Shall we marry at once?’

He looked indifferent. ‘It would be more convenient for me,’ he said politely. ‘But you perhaps have clothes to order? Or things you want to do?’

‘A few things. We can be married in October.’