When eventually it all came out, it was said that the old duchess had been very short-sighted — as indeed she was, tapping away with her white stick. But that’s not what they meant. They meant that she had failed to see what kind of behaviour was going on in her very own house, beneath her very own pointy aristocratic nose.

With Master Manham, it began like this. I went, as usual, to the closet for my lute lesson. Now, for a well-born young lady to be all alone with a man, even a servant of a rank lower than her own, everyone knows that it should not happen.

But at Trumpton that’s how all of us girls had our individual music lessons, with Master Manham, in the little painted closet upstairs. And everyone knows too that closets are rooms where secrets should be kept safe. One secret that had somehow slipped out of this particular closet during the course of someone’s lesson was Master Manham’s Christian name, and we all learned that it was Francis. A scratched “F” appeared on the diamondshaped pane of one of the windows of the maidens’ chamber, with a raggedy heart drawn around it.

One day I was in the closet at my lute lesson with Trumpton Hall’s most popular teacher, and we were playing the song “Oh, My Love.” I have not got a beautiful clear singing voice like Anne’s, but most of the teachers at Trumpton had by now told me that I am quick-witted. This was news. Our more formal lessons seemed easy to me, but I’d assumed that was because I had already covered many of their topics with my father. Anyway, it seemed to me simple stuff to write a tune down upon my page, and then to play it, my fingers moving almost mechanically up and down the lute’s board.

“Oh, my love,” I warbled, sounding more than a little like a mewling cat. I never attempted to sing well in my lessons. I’m afraid that if I cannot excel, I am often guilty of not attempting a task at all. In fact, I usually succeeded in yowling so badly that Master Manham laughed and begged me to stop, and then I would distract him from the lesson with chat instead.

“Oh, my beauty,” I continued, as the song dictated. At that, Master Ginger, the household’s orange tom, suddenly put his face around the door, for all the world as if I had summoned him in cat language.

Master Manham and I both burst out laughing at the same time. Master Ginger, with his ears raggedy from fighting, was the very opposite of beautiful.

“Oh dear, he took my singing for that of a lady cat!”

This started Master Manham off once more, and I had to join in, a little ruefully. As our giggles subsided, Master Manham stepped close to me. “Never mind,” he said more seriously. “You may not have a beautiful voice, but you have a gift for musical composition. As does the king himself.”

He did not ask me to play on. I wondered what he was waiting for.

When he spoke next, it was in much quieter tones. “And you have such pretty dimples too!” he said.

I felt myself blushing and hung my head to hide it. He said this kind of thing quite often, to many of the girls. But then his smile faded. Dipping his own head to meet my averted gaze and looking at me intently, he placed his hand over my fingers as if to reposition them on the lute. “Oh, my beauty,” he said, looking into my eyes.

I stared back, transfixed. His eyes were a warm brown and lay beneath an adorable curl of auburn hair that sprang from his forehead. I felt, as I had often done before, an absurd desire to smooth it flat with my hand. One of the reasons I liked him was that his hair, although darker, was so close to the colour of my own. But I sat quite still, and my insides suddenly turned to a jelly junket. He seemed close, far too close to me. I lowered my eyes. The room had grown very hot and still.

All too soon, the moment had passed. Master Ginger slipped out with a parting flick of his tail, and Master Manham quickly struck up the song again, proceeding with the lesson quite as usual.

But something had changed. That night at supper I felt myself sparkling a little more brightly than usual, and I made Anne laugh so much that most unusually the duchess herself had to tell the meek Sweet to behave in a more maidenly manner.

All this had taken place a few weeks before I overheard Katherine and Juliana talking about me in the maidens’ chamber.

And that very same evening, I had it triumphantly confirmed that, despite what Katherine had said, Francis Manham had special feelings for me.

After dinner the whole household went outside. It was a balmy evening, and the big round moon hung low over the lavender bushes. All the girls took a little paper lantern, and we laughingly performed the rather fancy dance that Monsieur Bleu called “The Nine Muses.” We ourselves usually called it “The Nine Elephants” after the beasts of the forest with their long drooping noses, as we had to bow right down with an arm extended to touch the very floor. But I think that all of us, that night, for the first time appreciated the symmetry and grace of the dance. So we swayed and bowed and swung our lanterns high and low in the evening dusk.

The duchess’s gentlemen and gentlewomen and all the other masters and mistresses burst out clapping, and we ran, our spirits high, out into the woods. It was a glorious hour, one of my best ever times at Trumpton.

In the woods I myself began to perform a silly dance I’d made up. “I tremble, I tremble!” I sang, “I fawn, I fawn!” Matching my actions to my words, I bowed down before the fallen trunk where Katherine Howard sat. All the girls were laughing, and even she cracked a smile.

“Oh, King Henry, King Henry,” I continued, “without you I’m forlorn. Do place your royal foot upon my gentle fawnish neck and . . . crush me.” It was delightful to have everyone applauding my clowning, and the goddess-like Katherine herself playfully pretended to wring my head from my neck.

Then the other members of the household followed us through the trees, and it was no longer safe to poke fun at Old Trembles. We all went on together, but the path was too narrow for the whole group. It split and split again. Soon I was walking along with Master Manham just an arm’s length away from my side, and I was surprised and pleased to find that we were a little apart from the rest of the company. We pressed on through the glimmering woodland, following the laughing voices ahead of us. Occasionally, he lifted a trail of ivy or a bramble out of my path, bowing nonsensically low as I went by.

Then suddenly we passed from moonlight into a dark place, and I stumbled a little. Immediately, his hands were round my waist and — amazing sensation — his warm lips were nuzzling against mine.

I felt that all the blood in my veins had turned into quicksilver.

Only a moment later, though, Alice and the rest came running back in our direction. We heard the call to return to the hall and trooped back indoors. The spell was snapped.

That night, our room was full of laughter and gossip until the early hours. But one voice — mine — was completely silent. I was full to the brim with happiness, and I felt that life at Trumpton held nothing but pleasure and promise.

We had talked so often of love in the maidens’ chamber that I had no doubt that I was experiencing it for myself. I began to imagine the life that I’d lead with Francis as my husband, thinking of new ways to make him happy every day, all the children we’d have . . .

There was only one tiny lurking worry in my mind. If I were to marry a music teacher, how could I save Stoneton from ruin?