I rounded a corner in the road between hedgerows, our pace now slowed to a steady trot, when the horse almost stumbled over a flock of sheep being driven in the direction of Oxford by an old man with a misshapen crook in his hand.

"Sir, could you tell me where I might find the manor house of Hazeley Court? Am I on the right road?" I called.

The drover looked up, suspicious. "What you say?"

I took a deep breath and repeated my question, in the clearest English I could manage.

He pointed back in the direction he had come. "Another half mile or so-you'll see two large oaks on the left and between them a cart track. Follow that to the manor house. What business have you there?" he asked, eyeing me curiously.

"Official business," I said, since this had served me well before.

"They are all papists there, you know," he muttered, as my horse picked his way between the sheep. I thanked him for the warning and, as soon as we were free of the flock, kicked the horse to pick up his pace. My back and legs were aching brutally now and the reins were chafing at my burned hand, but I was heartened to learn that the house was nearby. Perhaps there I would find the answers I was looking for.

The cart track sloped gently downhill and eventually widened into a long carriage drive approaching the front of the great manor house. From the crest of the hill, through the thin mist that hung above the trees, all shadowed in the grey light, I glimpsed tall red-brick chimneys, turrets, and crenellations. The house was surrounded by woodland on three sides, a steep and densely wooded slope rising behind it. Under cover of the trees it would be possible to approach very near to the manor itself, but gaining access would be another matter. For now I could only go forward. Against his better judgment, I nudged the horse off the cart track and into the woodland, where I dismounted in a clearing and fastened his harness to a low-hanging branch, so that he could at least reach his head down to the grass underfoot. Patting him soundly and reassuring him that I would be back soon, I crept away as silently as I could, down the slope toward the grounds of Hazeley Court.

At the edge of the woodland where it opened out into lawn, I crouched in the shadows of the trees and gazed across at the building opposite. The mist was thinner here and I had a clear view of the house in the half-light. It had evidently been built to withstand assault, though its fortifications seemed part of its character, elegant rather than forbidding. It had been built in a square formation around a central courtyard, the entrance guarded by a magnificent turreted gatehouse of two octagonal towers at least a hundred feet high, twice the height of the walls and topped with battlements. All these splendidly decorative fortifications had not saved their owner from prison, I reflected. If the Crown was short of revenues, then to seize the houses and lands of Catholic families who resisted the religious edicts must seem an easy source of profit. If missionary priests should be found within these walls, all this estate would be forfeit and this beautiful house given to whichever of the queen's favourites proved most deserving on the given day-fortunes snatched away and parcelled out to others whose loyalty needed to be bought, under cover of defending the faith. I shivered and pulled the cloak tighter around me. I was risking my life here, I knew, and who would profit from it, if I was right? Would I? Would Walsingham? Some other courtier whose advancement depended on the fall of the people within those handsome walls? But I was now convinced that Sophia was in there, and that the people she was trusting to help her were the very people who would do her the most harm.

A chill had arrived with the dawn and I realised my legs were still trembling from the bareback ride. I eased myself back to standing, stretched my aching limbs, and crouched again by the thick trunk of an old oak. The facade was adorned with elaborate carved window bays, though the windows on the sides I could see were all shrouded in darkness. There would be no getting through that gatehouse; a manor house this size would be well staffed with servants even if the master was in prison, and the front of the house was too exposed. My best hope, I decided, was to keep to the edge of the woodland and make my way around to the rear where I might find a postern or servants' entrance that would be easier to breach. I fingered Humphrey's old kitchen knife at my belt, reflecting that a judicious use of it might be my best hope of persuading the servants to answer my questions.

Still bent low, I began to stalk along the fringe of the trees, watching the house closely for any sign of movement or light in the windows, when suddenly I heard a twig snap behind me. I wheeled around, drawing the knife, but could see no movement in the depths of the wood, the trunks and undergrowth still shrouded in bluish mist. My breath quickened, gathering in small clouds around my face as I moved sideways, trying to keep my head turned in the direction from which the noise had come. The need to keep my own movements as silent as possible seemed less urgent than the need to move quickly; I strained to hear any further sounds beyond the crackling of sticks and leaves under my own feet, but though I heard nothing, I had the distinct sense that I was not alone in the wood.

At that moment I caught the soft crunch of a horse's hooves over gravel and paused in the shadow of a thick oak to peer out. Below me, a small high-sided cart pulled by a hunched pony was making its way up the carriage drive toward the gatehouse tower, a man perched at the front bent over the reins. I watched as it rounded the side of the house, when suddenly a hooded figure broke from the cover of the trees, tearing across the sloping lawn toward the little cart, now on the point of disappearing around the back of the house. I moved as fast as I could through the trees, trying to keep them both in sight, careless of my own cover; as the figure in the cloak reached the cart, he hurled himself at the unsuspecting driver, pulling him from his seat and wrestling him to the ground. The pony, which looked as if it would struggle to reach the end of the carriage drive again, barely registered the activity, its head sagging. I charged out of the trees and ran toward them, my legs still protesting, and reached them just as I saw the man in the cloak, who had one hand clamped over the other's mouth and was kneeling on one of his arms, pull out a blade.

I threw myself at him, knocking him sideways and gripping the hand that held the blade; with a cry of fury, the hooded figure turned to me and I saw, with a stab of shock, that it was Thomas Allen. His face also froze in an expression of bewilderment.

"You?" he said. "But-"

The fallen driver tried to back away from the scrummage; he was perhaps in his fifties, plump-faced and plainly terrified, shaking his head and whimpering while he implored me with bulging eyes.

"Who is this?" I whispered urgently to Thomas. "Why do you fly at him with a knife?"

He frowned at me; I glanced at his hand where I still had him hard by the wrist and realised that it was not a knife he held after all, but an open razor.

"He is come for Sophia," Thomas said, through gritted teeth. "He is charged with helping her escape. But she must not go with him-it is a trap."

"Then she is here?" I looked from Thomas to the driver, feeling a great wash of mingled relief and fear; if I had guessed that correctly, then the danger was not over.

The fellow nodded, looking from one to the other of us, his eyes terrorstruck.

"Wait-I know this man," Thomas said, gripping his razor again and peering closely at the terrified driver. "He serves the Napper household. He cannot be allowed to return-he will raise the alarm."