VIII

to ask whether Catherine might come into the garden to meet me. In the meantime, I loiter in a squally corner among the spiky bare branches of fruit trees. I lean on a wall, pushing the gravel about irritably with my foot.
    I’m there for some time. It occurs to me that, in this weather, she may prefer to say she is indisposed.
    But at last a side gate opens and Catherine emerges, attended by her duenna, with Compton following. I push myself off the wall and she sees me, and threads her way towards me on the pathways. She’s wearing black still, but after so long with my mind filled by pale mournful figures what strikes me is how robust, how capable she looks, with her healthy blooming cheeks and the stripe of glossy apricot hair showing beneath her hood.
    When we’ve wished one another good morning, Catherine says, “My sorrow at the news of the Queen’s death could not have been deeper. She was a lady of such wisdom and generosity. She was always kind to me.” Her eyes are bright with sympathy.
    I manage to grunt some thanks, ducking my head (sympathy right now is unendurable), and try to steer her away from her duenna.
    Catherine sees the target of my glances. She says, “You can speak freely. Doña Elvira understands no French.”
    “All right, then.” I can’t do this elegantly, I’m too ragged to be capable of it. I know how I’m going to seem to her: twitchy, confrontational, demanding. I say, “Don’t go back to Spain. Stay here and marry me.”
    She stares. “But you’re…”
    “What? What am I?”
    “Where do I start? Too young.”
    “To get married? Or too young for you?” I don’t wait for a reply. “We can contract the marriage now – it just won’t be binding until I turn fourteen. And you’re only six years older than me – that’s not much… She said we should.”
    “Who did?”
    “My mother. Oh, and don’t worry about the fact that we’re related. The Pope will give us a dispensation, apparently.”
    There’s a silence, in which I’m vaguely aware of Compton trying to engage the duenna in conversation some distance away. Catherine’s not answering. She looks pained – and sorry for me.
    She touches me lightly on the arm. “Let’s walk.”
    As we crunch along the gravel, the clouds begin to clear. Patches of sunlight make the yellow flowers on shrubs of witch hazel and wintersweet glow gold. The air is crisp; shouts from the river carry to us on a thin breeze.
    Catherine talks about the gardens in Spain and the castles – the Moorish palace at Granada, the fortresses of Aragon and Castile. She still hasn’t said whether she’ll marry me. But why wouldn’t she want to? She told me she’d grown up expecting to be queen of England.
    We pause by a fountain, where water cascades down two tiers of fantastical carved beasts into a sunken square pond at our feet. The beasts of each tier support a great dish on their shoulders, gripping it with claws that protrude from batlike wings. Jets of water gush from their mouths, the pipes hidden between fangs.
    In the sunlight each stone face is covered with a bright sheen of water; at the point of each beastly chin, stray droplets collect, cling and fall. I watch them. And without planning to, I find myself saying, “I heard a prophecy once. It said I would be king.”
    Beside me Catherine says, “Where did you hear it? When?”
    “Oh, years ago. Long before Arthur died.”
    “That gives me the shivers.”
    I shrug; that’s just how it is. I say, “But I didn’t have Arthur poisoned or anything – to make it come true – if that’s what you’re thinking.”
    “No. Of course not.”
    “The prophecy said I’ll be… not just any old king. God has chosen me for greatness. My glory will live down the ages.”
    “Oh!” She’s smiling. “That’s nice!”
    “Yes, go on – have a good laugh,” I say savagely. I turn, swipe at a bush and come away with a handful of leaves. “You think I’m useless, just like my father does.”
    “No, I don’t. Sorry, Hal. Look, I’m not laughing. I believe you.”
    “Doesn’t matter if you do or not. It’s true.”
    There’s a silence. I open my hand and the leaves scatter in the wind.
    Catherine says quietly, “I really am sorry about your mother, you know.”
    Another silence.
    I say, “I want to… grieve .” I bare my teeth, pushing the word out as if it has a foul taste. “But I can’t. Because it’s my fault she’s dead.”
    “That’s crazy. Don’t say