Hastings holds out his hand.

‘There’ll be no one hanged here,’ he says.

The vintenar is surprised.

‘You’ll take responsibility?’

Hastings nods, but he is anxious. To countermand the Earl of Warwick is no small thing.

‘I will,’ he says. ‘I will.’

Thomas feels his heart beat again.

The crowd is disappointed.

‘Piss off, all of you,’ Walter snarls.

The vintenar nods to his men. The one with the rope pulls it down again and folds it into a sack. It is difficult to read his face: is he disappointed or relieved? The others mount their horses.

‘I don’t suppose this is the last we’ve heard of this,’ Hastings tells them. ‘But keep an eye on the boy and don’t let him wander off again.’

Walter nods.

‘Thank you, sir,’ he says.

‘I’d better find old Warwick before he finds me,’ Hastings says. His gaze lingers on Katherine, who will still not speak, and whose expression has hardly changed. ‘A handsome lad, you are, Kit, if only you’d fill out a bit, but you’ll never do that if you’re hanging by your neck from a tree.’

Again there is nothing from Katherine and with one last nod to Thomas and Walter, Hastings parts the crowd and strides off back the way he has come.

Walter exhales.

‘Christ on His cross, Girly. Christ on His cross!’

A single tear slides down Katherine’s cheek.

‘Don’t do that again, d’you hear?’ Walter barks. ‘If you do, then we’ll all bloody well hang, and I am not hanging for a strip like you. Understand?’

Katherine nods.

‘Thomas,’ Walter says. ‘You keep an eye on him. Find out why the bloody hell he ran and make sure he doesn’t do it again. Understand?’

They sit together on the bank under the branches where the clothes are still drying.

‘Why?’ Thomas asks. ‘After all we’ve been through. When you are so close to Canterbury?’

She shakes her head.

‘I will tell you,’ she says, ‘but first I must sleep. I am so tired I can hardly lift my head.’

She has been watching over Richard for more than a week with no proper sleep, he supposes, and relief at escaping the rope must have diminished her too, and so now she lies on the bank and sleeps so soundly that even the men packing up and taking their still damp clothes from the branches above do not wake her. Thomas fetches her blanket and drapes it over her. He sits by her and stares at her and tears well in his eyes when he thinks how nearly he lost her.

Later Sir John appears. He looks fretful and is leaning heavily on Geoffrey’s arm, in great pain. Geoffrey too looks anxious. They have come from Warwick’s tent and the news is not good.