“Last time you came back, as you had promised,” she reminded him shyly.

“Last time I was ordered to come back. Next time, I will come back a free man. I will come back for you.”

“I don’t think that can ever be.”

“It will. I will be freed of my vows. I will go and see my parents, I will buy back our house in Yorkshire, and I will come for you.”

Her hands twisted in his and she tried to pull away. “You know—”

“No, listen to me. I can confess my sins and be released from the priesthood.” He tightened his grip as she shook her head. “That is my choice. It is what I want.”

“But you were risking your life for your faith! You told me that it came before everything.”

“I did. But that was before Newport. My love, I failed in my mission and I lost my faith. I lost my faith in everything: king and God. I will leave the priesthood whatever happens, and I will never again come to England as a spy. I will not serve the king again—God bless him and may he have better servants than I. I have failed him and I cannot bear to fail again. That part of my life is over.”

“Even so . . .”

“Alinor, I won’t change my mind. I have lost my faith, I have lost everything. I can’t tell you, but there is a darkness where once there was a burning light. The only thing I care about now is you.”

“Oh, my love,” she whispered. “That’s not how to choose a wife.”

“But the thing that you don’t know and that I have just learned—it is good news—you will be free of your husband. I will never say that I saw him. Robert must be silent, too. I’ve told Walter. In six years, if nobody sees him, and nobody tells the parish that they saw him, then your marriage is dissolved as if it never was. He passes for dead and you are a single woman.”

She had not known this. She raised her eyes, clouded with doubt. “Is this true? Really? Can it be true? Six years and I am free?”

“It’s seven years by law, and the first year has nearly passed.”

“This is the law?”

“It is. Sir William told me himself. You will be free, Alinor, I swear it. You will be free to marry me. And I will be free to marry you.”

“We only have to wait six years?”

“Will you wait?” he demanded.

“I’d wait sixty!” She pressed herself against him. “I’d wait six hundred years. But you should not . . .”

He wrapped himself around her, he pressed her back against the rick and, with his mouth on hers for silence, he made her moan with pleasure until his head dropped into the crook of her neck and she heard him gasp: “I swear. I swear it.”

Alys and Alinor rose early, at first light. Alys was determined to look as smart and as clean as a town girl, and the two women took a jug of soapwort tincture, and some lavender oil, and walked up to Ferry-house before sunrise. Red, the dog, bounced to the door to greet them and sniffed the jug.

“You’re up early,” Ned remarked, seated at his kitchen table, a loaf of bread beside him and a mug of ale to hand.

“We’ve come to wash. We’re visiting the Stoneys,” Alinor explained. “Before we go to Chichester market.”

“And why do they deserve a wash?” Ned glanced, smiling, at Alys and saw her deep blush. “Oh, I see. I’ll get the copper out.”

He rose to his feet and went to the scullery for the big iron pot for the Ferry-house monthly laundry. He slid the worn pole through the two carry loops at the top of the pot and he and Alys lifted it onto the kitchen hearth, while Alinor took two buckets and went to the well at the back door. When they’d set it on the little fire she poured bucket after bucket of water into it, going back for more.

“Will you have some breakfast while it heats up?” Ned offered, cutting two slices of bread.

“I couldn’t eat a thing!” Alys said, though she took a slice and ate it while watching the water.

Ned raised an eyebrow at his sister. “Greensickness,” she whispered. “Please God we can agree on a dowry. She’s set her heart on him.”

He nodded. “He’s walked her to the ferry every evening since harvest home. They sit on the pier, talking and talking like there was any news here. He doesn’t go till I tell her it’s the last crossing of the day.”

“It’s hot enough,” Alys interrupted. “Surely that’s hot enough!”

Alinor and Ned threaded the carry pole through the loops again, took the heavy pot out to the scullery, and set it down on the brick floor.

“I’ll see you later,” Ned remarked. “You can leave the water in the copper for me. I can’t recall when I last had a proper wash, and your water is always so sweet.”

He closed the door on the two of them and they both stripped naked, washed each other’s hair, and then took it in turns to pour jug after jug of water over each other. The tincture of soapwort made the water as cloudy and as slick as soap, and the oil of lavender scented the whole room. They were both shivering when they dried themselves, standing on the cold brick floor, and then they toweled their heads, dressed themselves in their clean linen and brushed gowns, and went out through the kitchen with their damp hair tumbled down over their shoulders.

Ned was on the bench outside the door, smoking his pipe and watching the bright water lapping at the pier. The tide was coming in fast, washing over the cobblestones of the wadeway, foaming in the rife against the outflowing river water. “Going to be a nice day,” he remarked. “You two look as fresh as daisies.”

Alys and Alinor, holding their skirts bunched up so that not a speck of mud should mark the hems, walked gingerly back along the bank and down the steps to the cottage. Their linen caps were dry and pressed smooth on top of the earthenware fire cover. They plaited each other’s damp hair and then pinned the caps on top.

“How do I look?” Alys asked, turning towards her mother.

Alinor looked at her daughter, the perfect skin of a girl tinged with a rising blush, her golden hair hidden by the white cap, her wide blue eyes and her mischievous smile. “You look beautiful,” she said. “I don’t think anyone could resist you.”

“It’s his mother I’m worried about. His father’s very kind to me; but she’s hard-hearted. Ma, we’re going to have to talk her round. Can’t you take a potion, or something?”

“A love potion?” Alinor laughed at her daughter. “You know I don’t do such things.”

“She has to agree we can marry,” Alys said again. “She has to.”

“He’s an only son: they’re bound to want the best for him. But everyone says he can wrap them round his little finger. Will he have told them that we’re visiting today?”

“Yes, and he’ll have told them why. He said they’ll give us breakfast. We can’t be late.”

“We don’t want to arrive at dawn. We don’t want to look too eager.”

“I am eager!” Alys insisted.

Alinor had a sudden flash of memory of James’s touch, and the taste of his mouth, the thudding of his heart as he pressed her against the hayrick. “I understand eagerness,” she said, turning away. “I do. But first we’ve got to put out the herbs and the oil, and feed the hens and cover the fire.”