But it was not that either. Pontefract was strong and well provisioned. We too could withstand a siege of a major army.

Yet there was something that stirred the atmosphere.

Philippa had become sprightly, displaying an artificial high spirits unlike her usual solemnity, as if she were attempting to obliterate some image too noxious to contemplate. It was as if, in my presence at least, she had set herself to charm and entertain. It had an air of a jester’s role about it.

‘Is something troubling you?’ I asked, finding her cheerfulness unnerving.

‘Not a thing,’ she pronounced. ‘Why?’

‘I just thought…’ I did not know what I thought.

Her eye did not quite meet mine. ‘I am in excellent health,’ she announced.

‘It’s not the prospects for your future marriage?’

‘Certainly not!’

I let the exchange die a natural death, unconvinced.

As for the Duke’s officials, Sir William Fincheden, the steward, obeyed my every order with efficiency and a face of stone, while the Constable was encouraging with brisk goodwill and frequent exhortations that all would turn out well, just wait and see.

Agnes had developed a habit of watching me, eyes fluid.

‘What’s wrong?’ I demanded.

Denials showered me from all sides.

It was as if there has been a death in the family, a death of which I was not aware, and they were keeping the bad news from me. At least the children were the same boisterous quartet that they ever were, Joan shadowing me with her poppet, the two older boys pestering the soldiers with demands for tales of gore, and Thomas beginning to crawl with lightning speed.

I tried to pin it down, when had it exactly begun? Since a party of benighted travellers, heading south from Richmond, had asked for hospitality and been given food and overnight lodging. I had not seen them, leaving the good offices to the steward since Thomas was letting his sufferings be loudly known as a tooth began to appear, but perhaps their visit had lit the smouldering embers of unease. Some hideous violence discovered on their route, perhaps.

At the hour for Compline the household joined with me to kneel in the chapel to hear the priest say prayers for our comfort in troubled times. To ask for succour and peace of mind. For holy protection. He addressed the Almighty with assurance.

Then his voice wavered.

‘We pray for Lord John, Duke of Lancaster. That he might have strength to uphold what is right under the pressure of this day. Grant him acceptance of his sins, O God, and Your blessing on his desire to do what is right and good.’

‘Amen,’ we intoned.

I frowned behind my closed eyes. Acceptance of his sins?

‘Grant him, Almighty God, your succour in his courageous battle against the evil that has pervaded his life.’

‘Amen.’

To my left, Agnes sighed heavily.

‘We pray, Almighty God, that You will grant him comfort for his soul in these dark days.’

Evil? Comfort for his soul?

‘Amen.’

‘We pray that he will make recompense for all the offences he has committed, whether privately or publicaly, against King Richard and the realm of England. We pray that Lord John might mend his reputation.’ I heard the priest draw in a breath, and swallow heavily. ‘We pray that he will no longer be blinded by earthly desire.’

‘Amen.’

What was this? My eyes snapped open but could not look at the priest. I dared not. I felt Philippa’s glance slide across to me, alighting on me with heavy concern. Over by the wall, Steward Fincheden, spine rigid, stared ahead as if carved of wood.

Was the Duke dead! Was that it? For that single moment I could not breathe, but then I immediately thrust it aside, taking myself to task for such foolish imaginings. If he was dead, brutally done to death in Edinburgh, or on the road south, we would be holding a requiem Mass, not the evening service of Compline. This was merely the product of too many long days of no news and too many fears.

If he was dead, would I not know? I could not imagine his passing from this world without my awareness.

But the priest’s words had the cutting edge of a newly honed dagger. Sin. Evil. Succour during dark days. The priest continued, voice stronger into the final blessing, but when I turned my head at last to look at her, Philippa was flushed, her expression anguished before she schooled her features.

I stood abruptly.

‘Come with me,’ I said without preamble and strode out.

She did not demur, although I thought that she might have liked to. Agnes took it upon herself to accompany us to my chamber.

‘Close the door,’ I ordered Agnes who was hovering. I faced them, keeping my voice light and steady despite the lively fear.

‘What is it? What is troubling you that you are not telling me? And why are you not telling me? Why did we have a need to pray for the Duke’s strength in destroying the evil in his life? I am not aware of there being any evil in his life.’ I felt a worm of hysteria curling in my belly. ‘Tell me what you know, Philippa.’

And as if she were still a child in the school room facing her governess, with head bowed, she replied: ‘Nothing, my lady.’ She could not look at me.

I changed the object of my attack. ‘What prompted the priest to call for God’s strength against evil and sin?’ I demanded of Agnes.

‘Ah…’

Fear grew inordinately, and leaped in my throat. ‘Tell me!’ My voice was no longer light or steady. ‘Am I too weak to carry the weight of it?’

Agnes and Philippa exchanged glances.

‘It is obviously about the Duke. And he’s not dead. Is he in danger?’

Agnes lifted her hands in what could only have been despair. ‘Tell her.’

So Philippa, in her honesty, her clear-sighted affection for me, her inability to lie, did exactly that. Her words were plain and brutally frank.

‘My father has made a public declaration. It was when he heard of the rebellion and the destruction of The Savoy. He has repented of…’ She paused, then rushed on. ‘He has repented of the misdeeds of his evil life. The sin that has forced God to turn his face from him and from England. And he made his repentance in public so there could be no doubt, and no false rumour.’

‘In public? A confession in public? He would not!’

I heard the disbelief shrill in my voice. It was impossible. Risible. The Plantagenet pride would never prompt the Duke to make confession of his sins before an audience. Before a priest, of course. But in some public declaration? Yet here was Philippa, ignoring my dissent.

‘It is said that he wept…That his face was awash with tears as he admitted the…the sins he had committed.’

‘He would not!’ I repeated. ‘Where does this calumny arise?’

‘From the mouth of a traveller who has passed our gates. And those from Richmond,’ Agnes stated, the dismay that I was rejecting lively in her eyes.

‘I have not heard.’

‘You have not spoken to them.’

No, I had not, yet still…and I knew that I had not heard the worst of it.

‘Very well.’ I tried for calm. ‘So the Duke has repented. Do we not all repent?’

They shared glances again.

‘My father has admitted that he is to blame,’ Philippa continued. ‘That God has chastised him, and because of his wickedness, God has chastised England too, by causing bloodshed and rebellion.’ I watched as she bit her lip. ‘He has…’ She looked to Agnes, a look of such anguish that my belly clenched.

‘I think you should sit down, Katherine,’ Agnes said, abandoning all formality, as if she were my nurse once more.

‘I will not.’ By now terror had its cruel hand around my heart.

‘Then hear this. My lord of Lancaster has confessed openly to the sin of lechery,’ Agnes said.

Lechery. Sins of the flesh. Cold hit me, spreading from my belly as realisation hit hard. If he had confessed to such a sin, it could only be with me.

‘Is this true?’ It was no longer a denial, but a plea. ‘The Duke wept that he had a relationship with me?’

‘So it is said.’

I dragged off the padded roll that secured my hair and veil. Suddenly it seemed too heavy to tolerate. Casting the abused material aside, I released my hair from its pins. My head throbbed with pain.

‘I don’t think that I can bear this after all.’

I must have looked shattered. They pulled me to sit down on the bed, one sitting on either side of me. I refused to let them hold my hands, clasping them hard together in my lap instead.

‘Tell me the rest.’

So they did because they must. All the cruel, hurtful details of the Duke’s public repudiation of me, which reduced me to wordless despair.

‘Do I believe this?’ I asked at last, when between them they had destroyed all that made my life worth living. All the joy that had welcomed me on waking to each new day, all the contentment that accompanied me to my bed. The delight in my knowledge of his love for me that had kept me company through the hours of work and family duties. All was laid waste at my feet.

‘It must be true,’ Philippa urged. ‘For your own good you must believe, Katherine. Walsingham has praised my father for turning away the wrath of God so it must be true.’

I was stunned, hardly able to breathe for the solid rock that seemed to have lodged in my chest. ‘Where did all this happen?’

‘In Berwick. But now we think my father has taken refuge in Edinburgh. We are told…’ Philippa paused.

It was Agnes who continued, smoothing a large hand over my disordered hair, as if I were five-year-old Joan. ‘They say that my lord the Duke has summoned the Duchess to travel north to meet him. He wishes to be reconciled with her.’

I think I sobbed.