The Apothecary's Daughter (20 page)

The morning passed slowly, so in the afternoon she set off to visit her father to distract herself from the nagging worry
of Henry’s whereabouts. The streets were teeming again. The hard frost had caused the bills of mortality to fall further;
the plague didn’t like the cold, and the cautious confidence of the populace was shown by the number of people in the street
again. Life had to go on.

She made a detour to the Star coffee shop, a favourite haunt of Henry’s. The small window panes were cloudy with condensation
but as she stood there the door opened and two men came out drawing their cloaks close against the bitter wind. A blast of
warm air laden with the rich smell of coffee followed them and Susannah contemplated poking her nose inside to look for Henry.
However coffee shops were not for ladies. Instead, she called to the two men as they went off down the street.

‘Excuse me, but have you seen my husband, Mr Henry Savage?’

They turned to look at her, eyebrows raised and she stared back
boldly, all the while silently cursing Henry for putting her in the humiliating position of having to ask.

‘Savage? I saw him last week but he’s not in the Star this morning. You might try the Harte and Garter.’

‘Thank you, sir, I will.’

Susannah hurried away to the Harte and Garter but it was the same story. Henry hadn’t been seen there for several days. Tight-lipped
with annoyance, she set off to her father’s house.

Susannah heard the twins screaming even before she opened the door to the shop. The household was turned entirely upside down
by the two tiny tyrants who lay head to foot in their cradle exercising their lungs at full volume. Arabella had retired to
bed in hysterics, leaving the nursemaids attempting to placate the infants. Susannah took her new brothers in her arms and
rocked them, kissing their angry little faces before handing them back.

Cornelius was mixing gripe water in the dispensary and hadn’t the energy to do much more than kiss his daughter’s cheek.

‘I wondered if Henry had passed this way?’ she said, dipping her finger into the simmering pan of gripe water and tasting
it. ‘More aniseed.’

‘Who?’ Cornelius tipped another spoonful of aniseeds into the pan.

‘Henry.’

‘Oh. Was he coming here? Haven’t seen him. Do you think I should put more sugar in this?’

‘No, it’s fine.’

‘Colic is a terrible thing. You had it, too. Makes everyone out of sorts. You’ll come to the christening, won’t you? Samuel
and Joshua, we’re calling them. I did want you to be godmother but I’m afraid Arabella …’

‘It’s all right, I understand.’

‘I knew you would. You’re a good girl, Susannah.’ He scratched at his head under his wig. ‘If only they’d sleep through the
night. If it’s not one it’s the other.’

‘Martha says the early weeks can be difficult.’

‘I’d forgotten just how difficult.’

Susannah hugged him. ‘Try to snatch some rest when the babies sleep.’

‘That’s just it. They never do. Anyway, better get on. Send my best wishes to Henry.’

Susannah dawdled her way home in spite of the icy wind and threatening snow and stopped at the Exchange to buy some ribbons
to pass the time. Darkness was falling by the time she opened her front door in the full expectation of finding Henry in his
study. Peg, however, was just lighting the candles and told her that the master still wasn’t at home.

Carrying a light up to the drawing room, Susannah began to feel anxious. Surely their disagreement hadn’t been serious enough
for him to stay away so long? Where could he be? Perhaps he’d gone to stay at his Aunt Agnes’s house. That must be it! If
he hadn’t returned by the morning she’d go and find out for herself.

She sat by the fire and tried to read but she simply wasn’t able to concentrate on the
Faerie Queene
. Staring into the flames, she rehearsed what she would say to Henry when he finally arrived. Resentfully, she decided she
would probably be forced either to eat humble pie or to pretend nothing had happened in the interests of marital peace.

An hour or two later she heard the door knocker sound. Henry! She ran downstairs and saw Peg about to open the door. ‘It’s
all right, Peg. You can go back to the kitchen,’ she said, drawing back the bolts herself. ‘Henry, where have you been? You
really are the most inconsiderate …’ She stopped. The man, swathed in a cloak and with his hat pulled down against the sleet,
stepped out of the shadows. It was William Ambrose.

He took off his hat. ‘I believe you expected my cousin?’

‘Please, come in,’ stammered Susannah. ‘Forgive me. I was worried, you see and I thought you were Henry.’

‘Where has he gone?’

‘That’s just it; I don’t know.’

‘Late for his supper?’

‘If it were only that! He’s late for
yesterday’s
supper. Henry didn’t come home last night and I have no idea where he is.’

‘I see now why you called him inconsiderate.’ Ambrose removed his hat. ‘Is he in the habit of absenting himself like this?’

‘I rarely know where he is and he’s often late but he’s never stayed away overnight before. Well, not quite all night, anyway.’
She bit her lip. ‘The thing is … we had a quarrel.’

‘Ah, I see.’

‘He’s sent to Barbados for some slaves and I said I didn’t want them.’

Ambrose’s silver-headed cane slipped from his fingers and clattered to the floor. ‘He did what?’

‘He told me he’d sent for some slaves. I didn’t like the idea and he was angry with me and stormed out of the house.’

Tight-lipped, Ambrose said, ‘I saw him yesterday afternoon.’

‘Where was he?’

Ambrose bent down to pick up his cane. ‘I didn’t speak to him. I was on my way to visit a patient at Bethlehem Hospital.’

‘Bedlam?’ Susannah repressed an expression of distaste. ‘I hear people pay for the amusement of watching the lunatics raving
in their cells.’

‘Hardly amusing but it’s true that the patients are treated with little compassion.’

‘But what was Henry doing there?’

‘I saw him elsewhere – at Moor Fields – when I was on my way to Bishopsgate to visit Bethlehem Hospital. Henry was …’ He
hesitated. ‘He was going into a tavern.’

‘Which one? I shall fetch my cloak and go there at once.’

‘You will not!’

Susannah’s mouth fell open.

‘
I
shall go,’ he said.

‘But …’

‘Henry is my cousin. Besides, it’s not safe for you to go out on your own in the dark.’

‘Then I shall come with you.’

‘Out of the question! You will stay here and wait in case Henry returns. He will have left the tavern long ago but I can ask
if anyone knows of his whereabouts.’

It irked her but Susannah knew that what Ambrose suggested made good sense.

‘I’ll come back to let you know what I find out.’ Dr Ambrose put on his hat and gloves. ‘Oh, I forgot the reason for my visit.’
He pulled out a folio from underneath his cloak. ‘I thought you might like to borrow this. It’s Jonson’s
Volpone
. I remembered that you said you enjoyed seeing the play in Drury Lane. Perhaps it will help you to pass the time until Henry
and I return?’

Before she could answer, Ambrose had gone out into the night.

She had fallen asleep over
Volpone
and the drawing-room fire had crumbled into ashes when the door knocker sounded. Stiff-limbed from the cold, she stumbled
to the door but when she opened it William Ambrose was alone. Her hopeful smile faded. ‘You didn’t find him, then?’

‘May I come in? It’s freezing.’

‘Of course.’ Susannah led the way back to the drawing room and stirred the embers with the poker, anxiety tightening its hold
on her chest.

Ambrose poured coal from the scuttle into the grate, and then took the poker from her. ‘Have you any brandy?’ he asked, once
the fire was burning brightly again.

‘Only rum.’

‘That’ll do. Fetch some glasses.’

Susannah did as she was bid and they sat each side of the fire warming their toes. ‘Did no one at the tavern know where he
went?’ she asked.

‘Drink your rum,’ he said.

She sipped the drink and it ran like liquid fire down her throat. ‘
Someone
must have seen him.’

‘They did. Susannah, it’s not good news.’

‘What has happened?’ She could hear the shrill note of anxiety in her voice.

‘You must prepare yourself.’

‘For what?
Where is Henry?
’

‘Henry was taken ill.’ Dr Ambrose’s voice was gentle. ‘The sickness came upon him very quickly. I am sorry to tell you he
died early this morning.’

‘Died?’ Her heart began to flutter and she turned deathly cold. ‘But … he can’t have! He was here only two days ago. They
must have made a mistake.’

‘There is no mistake. I saw his body.’

The finality in Ambrose’s voice made her gasp. She reared up and, as blackness clouded her vision, she clung, swaying, to
the marble chimneypiece.

‘I’m afraid it is true.’

‘Not Henry! We didn’t have the chance to make up our disagreement.’ She gulped back her tears. ‘I must go to him! We must
bring him back here and prepare him for burial.’

‘You cannot go out. Besides, he is already buried.’

‘But who …’

‘In cases of the plague the authorities take the body away.’

She swayed again, her breath threatening to choke her. ‘Sweet Lord, not that! He was so very frightened of the plague.’

Ambrose spoke gently to her. ‘Susannah, you realise that it’s possible you may be infected, too?’

Cold fingers of dread ran down her spine. ‘I feel well. A little tired of late, perhaps, but nothing more.’

‘Good. But you should still not go abroad until we are sure you are well.’

‘No. I can see that. And you must keep away from me.’ Suddenly she gasped. ‘I visited Father yesterday. I kissed the babies!’

‘Susannah, you show no signs of sickness so I doubt you are infected. Try not to worry too much and I will call every day.’

His kindness caused her tears to overflow. ‘We argued. Oh, William, I wish Henry and I hadn’t quarrelled before he died!’

Afterwards, she blushed to remember how she had clung to him and unconsciously used his Christian name.

Once again Susannah confined herself to her bedchamber, while Peg retreated to the kitchen. Living in fear of plague symptoms
appearing, she examined herself at frequent intervals for buboes or discoloration on her skin. Every tickle in her throat,
each suspicion of a headache or hint of nausea sent her into a flutter of panic. She paced the bedchamber floor, twelve steps
one way and ten the other, until she almost wore holes in the matting.

This time, Susannah would have been delighted to have Henry’s company, however bad-tempered. Unbidden, a hideous vision of
his body tipped unceremoniously into the pit rose up in her mind. She scrubbed her knuckles into her eyes to dispel the image
of his handsome features bloated and distorted by death.

Alone and frightened, she stared out of the window for hours at a time, hoping that her father would visit, even if only for
a moment, so that she could call down to him from her window. But he never came.

She put on her black mourning dress, even though she would see no one. Black suited her mood. Slipping off her wedding band,
she tied it on a black ribbon and hung it round her neck as a sign of her widowhood. Deathly tired, she lay on her bed and
pictured scenarios of Henry’s lonely death, bitterly regretting that now there would
never be an opportunity for their marriage to blossom. Her marriage had been a failure and she would never wed again. Sadness
overwhelmed her and she wept.

Martha called by and handed a basket of bread, some eggs and an apple tart to Peg.

‘She said to send her love,’ Peg said through the keyhole. ‘And that she’ll be praying for you.’

Dr Ambrose, garbed in his heavy cloak and beaked mask, called briefly most days and spoke to her from behind the bedroom door.
‘I visited your Father this morning,’ he said on one of his visits. ‘He sent you a bottle of his Plague Prevention Cordial,
with his love. I shall put it here on the floor for you.’

‘There is no sign of the sickness there?’

‘None.’

‘I’d never forgive myself …’

‘You are still well?’

‘Yes. Only lonely and miserable. I cannot help my mind running on and I see …’ her breath caught on a sob, ‘I see frightening
pictures in my head of Henry’s poor body thrown into the plague pit.’

There was silence for a moment from the other side of the door. ‘I will return tomorrow,’ he said. Then she heard his footsteps
retreating down the stairs.