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shore. I clutched my rosary.
    At my side, Master Brandon also watched the drama unfolding on the riverbank. “There! The boatman has managed to catch hold of something.”
    “And look—help is coming.” A detachment of the king’s yeomen of the guard had appeared, all in their livery and carrying halberds. They pulled the wherry onto the shore. The passenger scrambled out, still waving his arms about in an agitated fashion, but I lost sight of him when the guards surrounded him. A moment later, they were marching him toward the palace.
    Charles Brandon was no longer beside me. He was sprinting down the passageway toward the stairs that led to the king’s apartments, no doubt hoping to be the first to bring news of the stranger’s arrival to the king. No one, I realized, would have been so foolish as to risk life and limb on the swollen river unless he had urgent business at court. The king might well look favorably upon the courtier who gave him advance warning.

    Certain I would eventually learn who the man was—it was difficult to keep secrets at court—I returned to the Lady Mary’s apartments. The warmth of her rooms was welcome after the chill damp of the passageway. Although nothing could successfully ward off winter’s icy grip on Greenwich Palace, woolen tapestries covered the interior walls of the princess’s privy chamber. A fire blazed in the hearth. In addition, two green-glazed ceramic stoves on wheels had been placed close to the half circle of women seated on the floor in front of the Lady Mary. Bay leaves and juniper added to the sea coal made the smoke fragrant, and the heat from these stoves warmed busy fingers as they plied their needles.
    I moved to join the others, but Mother Guildford intercepted me. She seized my arm and pulled me into the relative privacy of a window alcove, out of earshot of the ten-year-old princess and her ladies.
    There was a striking family resemblance between Lady Guildford and her son. Like Harry, his mother had a round face dominated by a large nose and a cleft in the chin. Unlike him, she had a caustic tongue. Her voice was low and stern and as icy as the cobblestones in the courtyard. “What have you been up to, Jane? Your face is most unbecomingly flushed.”
    “I went to look at the river.”
    Her eyebrows shot upward. “And where, pray, did you find a window that overlooks the Thames?”
    “In the passage beneath the king’s lodgings.”
    Servants had closed the green-and-white-striped satin curtains to conserve the heat in the Lady Mary’s chambers, but even curtains lined with buckram could not keep out the bitter, penetrating iciness of a severe frost. The oak flooring was covered with fitted rush mats, making it considerably warmer than stone or tile. But inside my shoes and two pairs of stockings my feet felt like blocksof ice. I glanced with true longing at the thick footcloth on the floor in front of the long, padded bench where the Lady Mary sat. As befit her station, she had the hearth to heat her back and the braziers to warm her front.
    “You should not have been in that wing of the palace,” Mother Guildford said.
    “Why ever not?” I asked, distracted by my desire to move closer to the heat. “We often played there as children.”
    Mother Guildford’s face hardened. Her displeasure was an almost palpable force in the confined space. “We?”
    Suddenly wary, I nodded. “The Lady Margaret and Prince Henry and some of the children of honor.” There had been games of blindman’s buff and shovelboard as well as that memorable race with hoops.
    “Then my son was among them,” Mother Guildford said. “Were you with Harry today?”
    “No, madam.” But I felt heat creep into my face as I remembered the time I had spent with Charles Brandon in the deserted passageway.
    “Harry’s not for you, mistress.” Mother Guildford’s sharp reproof made me jump.
    “And I do not want him!” I replied. Indignant, I drew myself up straighter and