The Apothecary's Daughter (35 page)

‘You must go into your house now,’ said William to the weeping couple. ‘Do you have family who can feed you?’

‘Feed us? Do you think we can eat while our son is on his way to the plague pit?’ said Francis Quick.

Jane moaned and buried her face in her husband’s shoulder.

‘Do you have family nearby?’ persisted William. ‘Is there someone I can fetch for you?’

Quick shook his head. ‘Our family is all in Leicestershire. We only came to London a year back.’

‘I must go with Edwin,’ wailed Jane. ‘I must know where they are taking him.’

She pulled away from her husband and made to run off after the cart but a heavily built man carrying a halberd stepped forward
from the dissipating crowd and barred her way. ‘Back in the house, mistress,’ he said. ‘You’ve to be quarantined.’

‘But I must go …’

‘You cannot.’ He grasped her with beefy hands and pushed her towards the open front door. ‘And you, sir. Now.’

Defeated, the Quicks went inside.

White-faced, William moved to take hold of Susannah’s arm but thought better of it. ‘I must cleanse myself for fear of infection.
Let me take you home.’

‘William, I know them! I met Jane Quick and little Edwin a few weeks ago,’ wept Susannah. ‘Edwin fell over in a puddle and
Jane scolded him. One minute he was a mischievous little boy and now he’s about to be thrown into the pit and covered in quicklime
like a piece of rotten horse meat!’

‘Don’t think of that. Remember he’s gone to a better place.’

‘Look! Oh, William, must they?’

The watchman had begun to nail shut the door to Jane Quick’s house, each hammer blow making Susannah wince.

Inside the house Jane Quick began to scream again.

Black depression settled over the household like a sea-coal fog. Susannah sat on the chapel window seat for hour after hour
watching the house on the other side of the street, haunted by the memory of poor little Edwin’s body. There was a red cross
painted on the door now and passers-by gave it a wide margin. The watchman slouched on the doorstep picking his teeth with
a knife and in the evenings he was replaced by another guard for the night shift.

William visited the Quicks every day, calling up to them through the upstairs window. He reported that the couple remained
free of plague symptoms but suffered greatly from a sickness of the spirits.

A great pall of smoke rose up over the rooftops as Edwin’s bed and all the household blankets and linen were thrown onto a
bonfire in the back yard. Once it was apparent that his parents had not been immediately stricken down, Agnes gave Susannah
leave to turn out the linen closet and to take a set of sheets and a blanket to the house over the street. Susannah fetched
cleansing herbs from her father’s shop for the Quicks to smoke away the pestilence and made up a basket of provisions for
them.

Francis Quick lowered a rope from the window to haul up the basket. ‘Thank you, Mistress Savage. The food we had has all spoiled
and a month is a long time to go without.’

‘I’ll come by again,’ said Susannah. ‘How is poor Jane?’

‘She lies on her bed weeping and is grown very thin.’

‘Tell her I am thinking of her.’

That evening William sighed and put down his knife. ‘Don’t keep watching me like that, Susannah! It puts me off my supper.’

‘I want to be sure you haven’t caught the infection from the Quicks.’

‘Do you think I would stay here to endanger you all if I thought I was sickening? Eat your dinner and try not to worry.’

‘But we do! What if—’

Agnes held up her hand to Susannah. ‘William is a great deal more sensible than Henry,’ she said.

‘Good God, I should hope so!’ said William, his expression aghast.

In the silence that followed Susannah found herself thinking that, however sensible William appeared, he was the one who had
fathered a child by a slave woman.

William cut himself another slice of bread. ‘It is interesting, and maybe I shall write a paper on it later on, but I can’t
help noticing that where there is overcrowding and poverty and filth, that’s where the worst of the sickness lies. In the
richer sort of households it’s common for there to be only one or two victims, however much the patient sneezes. And not everyone
who sickens dies.’

‘So …’ Susannah hesitated while she considered this new idea. ‘So you don’t think the pestilence is spread by sneezes and
evil humours from the smog or the river?’

‘I believe that either the good Lord is watching over me or that the infection cannot be spread by the means you describe.
There may even be different sorts of the pestilence.’ He leaned forward. ‘If only we could rid the city of the rat-infested
tenements and clean the filth from the alleys and drains I’m sure we could bring the plague under control.’

‘There is always plague in the city,’ said Agnes. ‘It’s been there for as long as I can remember, gathering strength every
now and again and lying in wait for us.’

‘There must be more we can do!’ said Susannah. ‘If only I’d
been born a man I could have been an apothecary. Or even a doctor.’

William gave a tight little smile. ‘But the world is a richer place for your feminine graces.’

Agnes cackled. ‘It’s a long time since I’ve heard you pay a woman a pretty compliment, William.’

‘I am merely stating a truth,’ he said.

Susannah was gratified to note that the tips of his ears had turned as pink as her cheeks. ‘That’s all very well,’ she replied,
‘but I serve no useful purpose any more and it irks me.’

‘You
are
fulfilling a useful purpose in giving lessons to young Joseph. And I understand you are teaching Emmanuel too. I found him
spelling out the words from my newspaper the other day.’

Agnes pushed her plate away. ‘What purpose is there in teaching a slave to read and write, especially if he is strong and
could be put to better use in the fields?’

‘Every reason,’ said William. ‘A slave, a woman or a child from the poorest hovel,
everyone
should have the opportunity of an education. Who knows what treasures are hidden behind the most unlikely façades?’

‘And what happens when you have educated every last serving wench?’ Agnes banged her fist on the table. ‘Who then will empty
the slops?’

Susannah’s sleep continued to be disturbed by nightmares and she woke early one morning all tangled up in the sheet and with
her heart racing. She’d dreamed again of her mother’s terrible struggle to give birth and of the baby’s barbaric death. Her
mother’s anguish seemed so real that every time she dreamed of it, Susannah carried the pain in her breast the following day:
an aching, empty feeling that made her fear afresh for the loss of her own child.

Heavy-hearted, she dressed and went downstairs.

Peg was busy banking up the fire, while Phoebe shined the pewter.

‘You’re up early,’ said Mistress Oliver as she slid the bread into the oven and banged the door shut behind it. ‘Couldn’t
you sleep?’

‘Bad dreams again.’

‘Perhaps you’d better keep off the cheese at supper?’

Phoebe gave her a long, hard-eyed stare and turned back to the polishing.

Susannah glanced back over her shoulder as she left and could have sworn she saw a smile on the other woman’s lips.

Agnes woke up in a disagreeable mood.

Susannah attempted to cajole her out of it, only to have her head nearly bitten off for her pains. She helped her to dress
but the old woman was tetchy and difficult to please, changing her clothes twice.

‘Bring me my looking-glass,’ Agnes said. She scrutinised her reflection for some time. Then she sighed. ‘I never was a beauty,
like my sister, but old age has cruelly stolen away what looks I had.’

‘What you lack in youth is made up for in strength of character,’ said Susannah.

‘Why don’t you simply say you think I am a cantankerous old biddy?’

‘Because it isn’t true. Not always, anyway,’ she muttered, only half under her breath.

Agnes hooted with laughter. ‘Fetch my rouge pot, miss, and I’ll have no more of your impudence!’

Agnes eventually decided she was ready to face the world and, leaning heavily upon her stick, hobbled her way to the chapel.

Nothing pleased her that morning. Susannah offered to read to her but Agnes was in no mind to listen. They set up the chessboard
but Agnes lost interest almost immediately. Emmanuel and Joseph’s chatter gave her a headache and she sent them down to the
kitchen. Peg brought in her dinner on a tray but Agnes barely tasted the rabbit fricassee or the salad of herbs.

Susannah, quite out of temper with it all, passed a miserable day undertaking her duties with less than usual care. Agnes
drove her to distraction with her constant ruminating upon their probable fate if the plague drifted on the air towards the
Captain’s House. Added to
this, Susannah had sharp pains in her hips and although she knew this was only because the ligaments were loosening to help
the baby’s passage, the discomfort made her quite as bad-tempered as Agnes.

Once they had finished supper, Susannah escaped into the cloisters where William discovered her weeping into her handkerchief.
He carried a large parcel which he hastily put on the ground before sitting down on the bench beside her. ‘Susannah, what
is it?’

‘Everything!’ She sniffed and dabbed at her eyes.

‘Why don’t you tell me about it?’ He touched her hand, stroking it softly with his forefinger in a way that made her want
to lean her head against his broad chest.

‘Agnes was cross with me all day and I lost my patience with her.’

He gave a wry smile. ‘She’s very difficult to please when the mood is on her.’

‘And I’ve been having such frighteningly vivid dreams. I see my mother on her childbed, crying out for help while the doctor
looms over her, laughing and sharpening his knife. ‘

‘That’s very unpleasant but it was only a dream, Susannah.’

‘William, I’m so scared about the future!’ Anxiety tightened her chest. ‘I can’t stay in this house for ever. Where will my
baby and I go?’ Tears began to flow again and she blew her nose noisily into her handkerchief.

‘There’s no question of you having to go anywhere else.’

‘And I have heartburn all the time and my back aches and I’ve begun to waddle like a duck.’

William stared at her and then gave a shout of laughter. ‘Come here!’ He put his arm round her and pulled her against his
chest. ‘It’s true that pregnant women are subject to peculiar dreams and strange fancies …’

‘But I …’

‘Shh!’ He put his finger over her mouth. ‘But this is the strangest fancy I ever heard.’

‘What, worrying about what will become of me?’ She closed her eyes, breathing in the smell of him, clean linen and warm skin,
and revelling in the strength of his encircling arm, wishing the moment could last for ever.

‘No. The duck. You could never, by any stretch of the imagination, be considered to move as gracelessly as a duck.’ William
took the soggy handkerchief from her and with infinite care wiped her tears away.

His face was so close to hers that Susannah could see the flecking of dark stubble on his jaw.

She moistened her lips and her heart began to do somersaults.

Slowly, William cupped her chin in both his hands and studied her face in minute detail. ‘You are so very lovely,’ he whispered.

‘William?’ she breathed.

He groaned and his mouth came down on hers.

Susannah slid her arms round his neck and drowned in the warmth of his kiss. Gentle and yet passionate, she could feel that
he held himself back, which made her all the more eager for him. Loose-limbed and yielding, she wanted the moment never to
end. She knew she would never forget that kiss, not if she lived to be seventy.

At last he released her and tipped her chin so that he could look deep into her eyes.

She felt a blush creep up her cheeks. ‘The other day, in the garden …’

‘I nearly kissed you then.’

‘I thought so. But …’

‘But what?’

‘I wondered if I repulsed you.’

‘How could you?’