After 2 days of agonising, Gove

she was quitting. She said nothing. Ms Mordaunt’s position looked less tenable after Mrs May firmly ruled out her call for a free vote on the Brexit terms.

It was claimed that the remaining Cabinet Brexiteers — Mr Gove, Liam Fox, Chris Grayling, Ms Mordaunt and Andrea Leadsom — had all agreed to stay and work “to get this in a better place”.

The pound steadied after its biggest one-day drop in more than two years yesterday. But investors were braced for more turbulence amid speculation of a confidence vote. When asked if 48 letters of no confidence had been sent, European Research Group chairman Jacob Rees-Mogg, who yesterday urged Mrs May to go, raised his eyebrows as he left his Westminster home and said: “We’ll see.”

However, some Right-wingers were urging colleagues not to send letters, fearing that Mrs May would easily win a confidence vote and could use the victory to claim a renewed mandate.

Three new letters were sent calling for a vote of confidence in the Prime Minister’s leadership, though the deluge some had predicted had not materialised this morning.

Mark Francois, a former senior whip and leading Brexiteer, told the Evening Standard that Mrs May’s withdrawal deal was a betrayal of the 2016 referendum. “We gave our word to the British people that we would honour the referendum result,” he said. “If we do not, the backlash will be unstoppable.” In his letter of no confidence, Mr Francois, vice chairman of the ERG, branded Mrs May’s proposed deal as “truly awful”. He claimed Leave voters would be “betrayed” because Britain would “effectively” remain in the EU.

He a c c u s e d M rs May o f h av i n g “appallingly treated and now alienated” the Conservatives’ “strategic allies”, the Democratic Unionist Party.

He added: “It seems to me that not only will the DUP resist Chequers but they have effectively now lost all faith in the Prime Minister.

“This means that it will be practically impossible for us to continue to rely on them to prop up the Government while solution and try and get the best possible outcome.”

Whitehall sources, meanwhile, said reports that Mr Gove supported the deal in Cabinet were wrong, and that he had made clear he needed assurances on a string of issues, mainly around the Irish border backstop.

Mr Gove’s wife, the journalist Sarah Vine, predicted Mrs May to stay in her job. “She will win a no-confidence [vote],” she tweeted.

Allies of Ms Mordaunt said she was still weighing up her decision.

Asked during an LBC radio phone in