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Constantinople.
    Katherine, totally happy, cuddled Jacquot under her arm. The chapel was almost deserted. Suddenly from the shadowed apse a voice arose, almost inhuman in its purity, joined by another, crisp as a tenor reed, followed by the fauxbourdon of deeper voices weaving a skein of praise.

    Magnificat anima mea Dominum
    Et exultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo …

    King Charles’s singing-boys, thanking God for his sustained deliverance. Isabelle shivered under memory. At Windsor before that ill-starred Irish expedition, she and Richard had heard Mass together. The voices coiled and soared, a fount of pain and beauty. Adieu, Madame! Adieu, until we meet again!
    She bent her head and wept, while a single treble wound upwards, seeking the apogee of glory. Again, memory racked her. Master Maudelyn, the chaplain who had so resembled Richard (some said he was a bastard son of the House), had been brought to her in the midst of her grief, dressed like Richard, a spur for a doomed rebellion. He had stood, his back to a sunlit window and she had run to him, finding a counterfeit Richard, strange flesh, an alien scent. Perhaps poor Mathe had been likewise confused when he embraced the murderer.
    Weeping, she went to where the candles burned. She took the largest of the unlit candles and dipped it in the flame of another and set it burning with the rest. She knelt and Katherine pressed against her. From a stall behind, Charles of Orléans watched them. Disobedient, he had followed, now suffered and could not keep silent. Quietly he came to kneel beside Isabelle.
    He said with difficulty: ‘There is still love, Madame.’
    ‘Is there?’ she whispered violently. ‘Do you love me, Charles of Orléans? Or do you merely follow your father’s grand design, that step nearer the throne of France?’
    She had hurt him desperately, but he answered calmly enough. ‘If you only knew. My heart could swallow yours up.’ He caught her hand, holding it hard on his velvet doublet. ‘Feel it beat! For your peace I would have that heart brought bleeding from my body and laid before you.’
    He had his arm about Katherine and the dog was licking his hand. Isabelle said suddenly: ‘Charles … I’m in your father’s debt.’ She looked at Katherine. ‘Louis of Orléans, for all his faults, saved my sister’s life.’
    ‘He’s loyal to you.’
    She smiled bitterly ‘Did you know that he is with my mother again at Tours?’
    He bowed his head, and she rose, drying her cheeks. ‘Come, Kéti. I cannot pray today.’
    ‘Is there hope?’ he said desperately, following her down the nave. She was encircled by the rosy light and he thought: I would pursue her to the earth’s end, even if it were not my father’s wish. For her I would give up all hope of heaven save that of being with her. He felt the male pride of his own flesh, little dreaming that that same flesh had power to wound and kill the most beloved. He looked at her sleek unbound maiden’s hair, and secretly praised King Richard’s death.
    ‘Come, Katherine,’ said Isabelle. ‘Bring Jacquot. He’s thirsty.’
    ‘Oh, Belle!’ said Katherine suddenly ‘I love you!’ Isabelle bent to hold her close.
    ‘Then love me, little one. For love is the only candle in this dark old world.’
    She glanced up at Charles, who stood silent, daring to hope, while behind them the sunlit window made an endless permutation of colour, the blood-red, the garnet and the gold, and the sobbing anthem rose to find an end in peace.

    Isabeau, at Tours, was uneasy. During the past two years her court had been much depleted; her finest hangings, plate and jewels had been removed to Paris at the King’s command. Even Colard de Laon’s paintings were now closely guarded in the Louvre, and the little artist had, most disloyally she thought, attached himself to the household of Jean sans Peur, and lived there in great estate.
    Two of her adherents, however, were unfaltering. Louis of