‘I know. I would not ask it of you.’

‘Thank you,’ he murmured, his lips against mine.

‘For what?’ My heart thundered against my ribs. Surely he would hear it, or feel the vibration of it as he cupped my face and placed a succession of soft kisses on my lips.

‘For not asking. I can see the question circling in your head.’

‘There is only one for which I need an answer. And which I will not ask.’

‘You do not need to ask it. You know the answer. The answer is no. It is too late for that. Far too late. Do we not both know it?’

No, I did not have to ask it after all. I held tightly to his hand, raising his palm to press a reciprocal salute there.

‘Will you stay here?’ he asked.

‘Where else would I go?’

I doubted I would be welcome with Constanza. How could she turn a politic blind eye, now that the whole country knew of the depth of sin between her husband and his daughters’ governess? What had been a brave tolerance could no longer be preserved under the condemning eye of every man and woman in England. My role in the Lancaster household was at an end.

‘And you?’ I asked, thinking that he would tell me which port he would make for.

Instead: ‘Constanza and I are estranged.’

That was all he would say. Such a momentous step explained in so few words. I imagined the blow to his pride, and to hers, but I made no comment. He never would discuss her with me and I honoured him for it.

‘I will pray for you,’ I promised.

He kissed me. ‘God keep you.’

He walked to the door, then returned, surprising me by lifting my rosary from my prie-dieu before coming to kneel beside the bed.

‘Did I not promise that I would protect you? I swear that I will. I will never again allow you to suffer from the choice you made to join your life with mine.’ He sighed, an infinitesimal exhalation that I noted because I knew him so well as he pressed the crucifix to his lips, then folded the coral and jet and silver into my hand. ‘Remember me. And God keep you.’

And I carried it to my own lips in acknowledgement of his vow.

Bundled into a chamber gown, my hair roughly braided and lightly veiled, I was watching the Duke ride out when Philippa came to join me, in no better mood than on previous days.

‘Where is he going?’

‘To The Savoy and then Southampton.’

‘So he has left you,’ she observed with a cruel complacency.

I was fretful. Whatever the Duke might say to reassure me, I knew that Walsingham’s attack could do nothing but harm to John’s already unstable reputation. Parliament would take every opportunity to sharpen its claws since Walsingham had accused me of being the cause of the Duke’s failure to accompany his fleet. The Duke of Lancaster had been so weak as to allow me to seduce him from his duty. I knew it was all lies. He did not sail with them because he was commandeering extra ships, but there were many who would give credence to Walsingham.

‘He has left me because he must,’ I replied, swallowing my anxieties in front of Philippa. ‘I do not hold him back from going to war.’

‘I did not mean that.’

‘I know you didn’t. But I felt that it needed saying. It was an unfair assertion, on both of us.’ My eye remained fixed on the distant Lancaster colours until the last possible moment when distance enclosed him. Walsingham had had the temerity to accuse the Duke of cowardice in not sailing with his men.

‘I meant,’ Philippa persisted, ‘that he has cast you off. Has he given you an annuity for past services and wished you well for the future?’

Since the Duke was out of sight, I turned to look at her.

‘Sometimes I wish there was more charity in your soul, Philippa.’

‘What have I said that is not the truth? He did not even kiss you when he left.’

I would say no more. I did not have to. All our kisses had been exchanged in private. And the question that I had not asked, and had not, in the end, needed to:

‘Do we part for ever, to put you and England right with God?’

And his answer: ‘No. It is too late for that.’

The Duke had not left me. He had not cast me off. How could we be parted, when our love was indestructible, resilient enough to withstand the brutality of Walsingham’s particular brand of warfare. Our love could never be denied.

Eyes narrowed as if I might still catch a final glimpse of Lancaster banners, I recalled comparing my long-ago existence to a line of plainchant, predictably moving along familiar paths, without highs or lows. How different was this love with which we had been blessed. This love, breathtaking, unsettling, held the complex interweaving of the glorious polyphony from St Stephen’s Chapel at Westminster. Unpredictable, extreme in its ability to move to joy or tears, superbly glorious, the power of this music of our hearts overwhelmed us both.

Whenever the Duke came home, from war, from Parliamentary debate, from negotiation, he would come to me because I was at the very centre of the intricate harmony of his life, as he was of mine. I would stand at the last before God’s throne and proclaim my love for him. As I knew he would for me.




Chapter Thirteen

‘No it’s not,’ I replied firmly to his back.