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  ‘And what of you?’ she asked softly.

  ‘I am finished with him,’ John said. ‘I am finished with his service. I went back into his service to please my father and because I longed to work on the great gardens which are in his gift, and besides, when I was a young man there was almost nowhere else to work but for the king or the court. But I will die in his service if I go on. I am a gardener and he would not give me leave to go and garden. He has to have everyone in the masque, everyone has to carry a standard or a spear. He will never cease with this until we are all dead, or all defeated, or all persuaded that he is the Lord’s Anointed and can do no wrong.’

  Hester quickly looked towards the kitchen door, but it was safely closed and all the household was still asleep.

  ‘I saw my father go out to certain death in the service of the Duke of Buckingham, and I saw him ride home, spared only by the death of his master,’ John continued. ‘I saw his eyes on that day. He never recovered from the death of the Duke. He was never his own man again. The loss of the Duke lay like a shadow over our family, and my father was torn between relief that he had survived and grief that the Duke was dead.

  ‘I swore then that I would never be like that, I swore I would never pledge myself to follow a man until death, and I meant it. I will never be a servant like that. Not even for the king. Especially not for this king, who cannot reward service and never says that he has had enough. He will not stop until every one of his servants is lying dead before him, and then he will expect a miracle from God himself to raise up more foot soldiers for his insatiable theatre. I will have no more of it. I can bear no more of it.’

  ‘You won’t join with Parliament?’ Hester asked, aghast. ‘Oh, John, you won’t fight against the king?’

  He shook his head. ‘I’m not a turncoat. I won’t fight against him. I’ve eaten his bread and he has called me his friend. I’ve seen him weep and I’ve kissed his hand. I won’t betray him. But I won’t play that part in this damned mockery.’

  ‘Will you stay here, quiet at home with us?’ she asked. She had a low sinking feeling in the pit of her belly. She knew that he would not.

  ‘How can I?’ he demanded of her. ‘People know who I am. They will ask me who I serve. I won’t deny him – I’m not a Judas. And he will send for me.’ He nodded. ‘Sooner or later he will realise that I am not at court and he will send for me again.’

  ‘Then what shall we do?’

  ‘We’ll go to Virginia,’ John said with decision. ‘All of us. We’ll take ship as soon as we can get a passage. We’ll take what we can carry and leave the rest. Leave the house and the garden and even the rarities. We’ll get out of this country and leave it to tear itself to pieces. I won’t see it. I won’t be here. I can’t bear it.’

  Hester sat very still and measured the despair in her husband’s voice against her love for him, and her love for their home.

  ‘Will you have a glass of ale?’ she asked.

  He lifted his gaze from the fire, as if he suddenly remembered where he was. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And then let’s go to bed. I have wanted you in my bed for night after long night, Hester. I have missed you, and thought of you here, missing me. I have wanted you and cursed the miles that were between us. And in the morning I shall see my children and we’ll tell them that we are leaving.’

  ‘You have wanted me?’ she asked, very low.

  He put his hand out and turned her face up to him, one gentle finger under her chin. ‘Knowing that you are here has kept me going through one dark night after another,’ he said. ‘Knowing that you are here and that I have someone to come home to. Knowing that you will open your bed to me, and open your arms to me, and that whatever is going wrong all around me, I have somewhere that I can call my home.’

  She could have moved forwards, she could have kneeled before him as he sat in his chair, he would have drawn her to him and on to his lap and he would have kissed her, as he had never yet kissed her, and they could have gone to bed as he wanted to do, and as she had wanted to do from the moment she had first seen him.

  But Hester caught hold of her determination, forced herself to wait, and drew back from him, drew back and sat on her seat on the other side of the fireplace.

  ‘Now wait a minute,’ she said. ‘Not so fast, husband. I cannot leave here.’

  For a moment John did not hear her. He was so conscious of the fall of her nightgown, and of her dark hair only half-hidden by her cap, of the play of the firelight on her neck and the glimpse of her shoulder. ‘What?’

  ‘I cannot leave here,’ she said steadily. ‘This is my home.’

  ‘You don’t understand,’ he said abruptly. ‘I have made up my mind. I have to go. I cannot stay here, I will be torn apart by the two of them – king and Parliament. Parliament will have me out entrenching and drilling for their defence, and the king will summon me to court. I cannot be faithless to them both. I cannot watch the king ride into war as if it were a masqued ball. I cannot stay in England and see him die!’

  ‘And I cannot leave.’ She spoke steadfastly, as if nothing would ever move her.

  ‘You are my wife,’ John reminded her.

  She bowed her head.

  ‘You owe me absolute obedience,’ he said. ‘I am your master before God.’

  ‘As the king is yours,’ she said gently. ‘Isn’t that what this war is all about?’

  He hesitated. ‘I thought you wanted to be my wife?’

  ‘I do. I agreed to be your wife, and to rear your children, and to care for the rarities and the garden and the Ark. How can I do these things in Virginia?’

  ‘You can care for me and the children.’

  Hester shook her head. ‘I won’t take the children there. You know yourself how dangerous it is there. There are wild Indians, and hunger, dreadful disease. I won’t take the children into danger.’ She paused for a moment. ‘And I won’t leave here.’

  ‘This is my home,’ John reminded her. ‘And I am prepared to leave it.’

  ‘It is my home too.’

  They locked gazes like enemies. John remembered his first impression of her as a plain-faced managing woman who had been put in his house without his consent. ‘Hester, I am going to Virginia,’ he said coldly. ‘And it is my wish that you come with me and the children.’

  Her straight gaze never wavered. ‘I am sorry,’ she said evenly. ‘I cannot do that. I will not take the children into danger and I have no wish to leave my home. If you go then I will keep everything safe for your return, and I will welcome you when you return.’

  ‘My father …’ he started.

  ‘Your father trusted me with the care of this house and with the care of the children while you were away,’ she said. ‘I promised him on his deathbed that I would keep it all safe: plants, rarities, and children. I will not leave this house for any wandering battalion to take it over and to chop down his trees for firewood. I won’t leave his chestnut avenue for them to spoil. I won’t leave it unprotected for any vagrants to steal the fruit or pick the flowers. I won’t leave the rarities stored in a warehouse with no idea of when I can return. And I will not take Jane’s children to a country far away where I know they cling to survival against all the odds.’

  ‘Jane’s children!’ he shouted. ‘Jane was my wife! They are my children! She is nothing to you! They are nothing to you!’

  John saw her flinch as if he had slapped her face. But it did not shake her steadiness. ‘You are wrong,’ she said simply. ‘I have long thought of myself as caring for Jane’s children and trying to care for them as she would wish. And sometimes I think that she looks down from heaven and sees them, growing strong and beautiful, and that she is happy for them. But they are my children too, I have loved them without fail for four years and I will not take them from their home because you have decided to leave your master and leave your country and leave your home.’

  ‘I’m not faithless!’ he said, stung.

  Hester gave him a long, level loo