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unanswered. In a nearby inn John sought out Lord Wootton’s gardener, who merely laughed at him and said there was a trick to it but John would have to join Lord Wootton’s service if he wanted to learn it.
    “D’you plant them in the orangery?” John guessed. “D’you have an earth bed inside?”
    The man laughed. “The great John Tradescant asking me for advice!” he mocked. “Come to Canterbury, Mr. Tradescant, and you shall learn my secrets.”
    John shook his head. “I’d rather serve the greatest lord in the greatest gardens in England,” he said loftily.
    “Not the greatest for long,” the gardener warned him.
    “Why? What d’you mean?”
    The gardener drew a little closer. “There are those who are saying that he has signed his own letter of resignation from service,” he said. “Now that Spain is at peace with England, who can doubt that the lords who stayed with the true faith through all the troubles will come back to court? They’ll find their places at court again.”
    “Catholics at court?” John demanded. “With a king like ours? He’d never bear it.”
    The man shrugged. “King James is not the old queen. He likes differences of opinion. He likes to dispute with them. Queen Anne herself takes the Mass. My own lord takes the Mass when he is abroad and avoids the English church whenever he can. And if he is high in the king’s favor, giving him melons and the like, then the tide is turning. And stout old defenders of the faith like your lord may find their time has gone.”
    John nodded, bought the man another ale, and left the tavern to find Cecil.
    His master was in one of the courtyards at Whitehall, about to board his barge to take him upriver to Theobalds.
    “Ah, John,” he said. “Will you come home with me by water or travel back with the wagon?”
    “I’ll come with you, if I may, my lord,” John said.
    “Get your bag then, for we leave at once; I want to catch the tide.”
    John hurried to fetch his things and came back as the barge was preparing to cast off. The rowers stood at salute, their oars raised. The Cecil pennant flew at bow and stern. Robert Cecil was seated amidships, a canopy over his head and a rug at his side to ward off the evening chill. John leaped nimbly aboard and sat at the rear of the boat behind the golden chair.
    The boatmaster cast off and the rowers started the regular beat, beat of their rowing, the oars splashing in the water and the boat pulling forward and then resting, pulling and then resting. It was a soporific, lulling movement, but John kept his eyes on his master.
    He saw the head flecked with premature gray hair nod and then sink. The man was exhausted after months of painstaking negotiation and unending civility, mostly conducted in a foreign language. John drew a little closer and watched over his master’s sleep as the sun went down before them and painted the sky gold and peach, and turned the river into a shining path which took them slowly and steadily back to their garden.
    When the sky grew darker blue and the first stars came out, John reached for his lord and gathered the blanket around his crooked shoulders. The man, the greatest statesman in the land, probably the greatest in Europe, was as light as a girl. His head lolled to John’s shoulder and rested there. John gathered his lord to him and guarded his rest as the boat went quietly on the inward-flowing tide all the way up the river.

    Just before the Theobalds landing stage Cecil awoke. He smiled to find John’s arms around him.
    “A warm pillow you’ve been to me this evening,” he said pleasantly.
    “I did not want to disturb you,” John replied. “You looked weary.”
    “Weary as a dog after a whipping,” Cecil yawned. “But I can rest now for a few days. The Spanish are gone; the king will return to Royston for the hunting. We can prune our orange trees back into shape, eh John?”
    “There’s one thing, my lord,” John said cautiously. “A thing