The Apothecary's Daughter (6 page)

The shop bell jingled; Susannah glanced up and caught her breath to see a tall figure shrouded in a black cloak and hat standing
in the doorway. He carried a long staff, painted red, and wore a white mask shaped like the beak of some fearsome bird of
prey. She stood wide-eyed, staring at him, until he spoke.

‘Miss Leyton.’ He came inside and rested his staff against the counter.

‘Dr Ambrose? Is it you? You startled me.’ Relief – she supposed it was relief – made her heart flutter in a way that surprised
her.

He reached behind his ears and released the strings which held the mask in place. ‘It is not my intention to frighten people.
I merely wear this mask as a precaution against infection when I visit the sick.’ He turned the mask over and removed a small
muslin bag filled with charcoal and herbs. ‘This is to filter the air I breathe and I wear high boots and swaddle myself in
this thick cloak to protect myself.’

‘You must be near dying of heatstroke! And you look so terrifying I’m sure anyone who comes across you in the streets will
turn and run away faster than quicksilver.’

‘Is your father here?’

‘He’s tending to my stepmother. May I help?’

‘It’s not a medical affair.’

She repressed a smile, pleased that he now seemed to take it for granted that she was knowledgeable about such matters.

Dr Ambrose shifted from foot to foot and Susannah wondered what made him look so ill at ease.

‘My cousin Henry has arrived from Barbados,’ he said. ‘He has the intention of starting his own importing business and has
asked that I introduce him to people who may be interested in his venture. He hopes to sell sugar, rum and tobacco directly
from his father’s plantation. I know you stock those items.’

‘Shall I tell Father that you will bring your cousin with you next time you visit? If his prices are keen I’m sure my father
will be happy to discuss business with him. Meanwhile,’ she said, ‘perhaps you will advise me?’

‘I am at your service.’

‘The children refuse to drink the infusion I have made to ward off the pestilence. They say it is too bitter and no amount
of reasoning with them will make them swallow it.’

Dr Ambrose’s face lightened with amusement and Susannah
thought how different he looked when he shook off his usual dour and sombre expression.

‘The answer is right in front of you,’ he said. He pointed to the cone of sugar on the counter. ‘I have always found that
children will swallow the nastiest medicine if it is well sweetened.’

‘That’s such an obvious answer that I feel cross with myself for not thinking of it before!’

‘There is another remedy that I find successful. Take some toasted bread and spread it thickly with treacle or honey and sprinkle
over chopped leaves of rue. I promise you that it is irresistible to children and will disappear in the shake of a cow’s tail.’

‘I may try that myself. It is difficult to face wormwood before breakfast, don’t you think?’

Dr Ambrose allowed the smallest of smiles to flit across his face.

‘And I shall ask Father to make a note of the recipe in the journals that he keeps.’

The doctor had barely disappeared down the street when Susannah heard her father and Arabella on the stairs. Both their faces
were wreathed in smiles and she wasn’t sure if she was happy or not to see that they were linked arm in arm.

‘Susannah, my dear, Arabella is recovered sufficiently to join us for dinner.’

It was quite clear to Susannah as they ate their mutton pie and boiled carrots that her stepmother had succeeded in attaining
her latest heart’s desire. Cornelius had conceded that he would not wish his friends to think he was a miser and that the
yellow silk dress Arabella craved was entirely necessary to her well-being and to his reputation. Her megrim disappeared upon
the instant and her terror of contracting the plague did not deter her from making a visit to her dressmaker that very afternoon.
That evening she returned to Cornelius’s bed and, once more, Susannah had to sleep with the pillow over her head.

Arabella’s sunny mood persisted over the next week and Cornelius lost the strained expression that had haunted him. Although
it made
Susannah uncomfortable to see him fondling Arabella with a foolish smile upon his lips, she was pleased he was happy again.
For herself, all she desired was to keep busy, well away from her stepmother’s presence.

On the day that Arabella went to collect her new dress the children were left in Susannah’s care again. Jennet had been to
market early and brought home a large pike, it being a Friday, and herbs from the countryside in Islington together with some
new eggs to make a custard. Since Jennet was busy preparing the dinner, Susannah carried the washtub into the yard and filled
it with water, stripped Mathew and John of their clothes and encouraged them to jump up and down on the soaking laundry.

‘It’s not decent!’ said Jennet, shocked. ‘In the light of day too, as naked as savages. Better not let the mistress catch
you!’

The little savages screamed with delight at the cool water on their hot skin and Susannah had every hope that their energetic
enjoyment would have the extra benefit of saving Jennet and herself from one of their most tedious chores.

Harriet, considering herself too old to join in her brothers’ fun, attached herself to Susannah yet again, like a shadow.

Susannah vacillated between being irritated by and sorry for the little girl. Her residence in Susannah’s bed was a constant
annoyance and each bruise upon her person from the night-time kicks was a manifestation of the invasion of her privacy.

Susannah had work to do in the dispensary so she gave the child some pills to count and package while she busied herself with
the pestle and mortar, grinding sugar and dried rue. Dr Ambrose’s suggestion to make the wormwood infusion palatable to children
had been most successful and since then she had boiled up copious quantities of the syrup. She called it Leyton’s Plague Prevention
Cordial and anxious mothers bought it as quickly as if it were hot cakes.

Susannah set the pan on the fire and stirred the powdered sugar into the water.

‘I don’t want to do this any more,’ said Harriet, flicking a pill across the room. ‘It’s tiresome.’

‘It’s a job that needs to be done. When you’ve finished you can help me to stir the pan while the sugar dissolves.’

‘Don’t want to! I hate it here. Why can’t we go to the country like Mama says?’

‘Because we are needed here.’

‘But there’s nothing to do!’

‘Of course there is. There’s never enough time to do everything. If you don’t want to help me you can go and assist Jennet
in the kitchen.’

‘I’m not a servant!’

‘Stop whining, Harriet! We all have to work.’

‘Mama doesn’t.’

Susannah barely trusted herself to speak. ‘Finish packaging those pills and then you can go and sit in the parlour and learn
your catechism. I shall examine you after supper.’

‘Shan’t!’

‘You will do as I say, miss!’

Harriet narrowed her eyes and then, with deliberate intent, swept her arm across the counter and scattered several hundred
Leyton’s Popular Pills onto the floor.

Susannah gasped. Never had she seen such a display of insolence. She grasped Harriet’s wrist, ready to give her a good shaking,
but the child screeched so loudly that Susannah started, dropping her hand as quickly as if it were a hot coal. Harriet ran
from the dispensary into the shop, still shrieking with rage.

Susannah didn’t have red hair for nothing. Temper blazing, she sprinted after her.

Ned watched them, his eyes wide, as she chased Harriet round the counter in the shop.

Glancing over her shoulder at Susannah as she ran, Harriet snatched a gallypot off the shelf and dashed it to the ground,
quickly followed by another. Powdered liquorice flew up into the air and then Susannah lost her balance as her feet slid through
a puddle of oil of turpentine. Still screeching, Harriet ran to the door as Susannah fell headlong, banging her head on the
corner of the counter.

She wasn’t sure what happened then. The next thing she knew was that she was lying on the floor, the pungent scent of sal
volatile was making her nose run and she had a thunderous pain in her head.

‘You’ve had a fall.’ Strong arms pulled her to a sitting position.

‘My head hurts!’ She raised her fingers to her forehead and was shocked to feel the stickiness of blood.

When she saw her stained hands she at once became faint again. Ever since her mother died she hadn’t been able to abide the
sight of blood.

‘Miss Leyton!’

Taking a steadying breath, she opened her eyes and saw that it was Dr Ambrose who had come to her assistance. She struggled
to stand but was firmly pushed down.

‘Rest still,’ he said.

He supported her as they sat together on the floor while he pressed a cloth to her forehead.

Susannah was strangely conscious of the doctor’s arm round her back and his warm hand on her forehead. She closed her eyes
and leaned against his muscular chest. His skin smelled of shaving soap and his breath was faintly scented with peppermint.
After a while, she realised that Harriet’s screams had stopped. ‘Where’s Harriet?’ she asked.

‘I have her.’

The voice came from near the door and Susannah turned her head to look. A man a little older than herself, with smiling eyes
set in a handsome face, held Harriet to his chest. The child was scarlet with rage as she sobbed and sniffed and wiped her
nose on her sleeve. The man dabbed gingerly at her face with a lace-trimmed handkerchief.

The shop bell tinkled and Arabella, resplendent in buttercup-yellow silk liberally decorated with lace and rosettes of blue
ribbons, saw her daughter in the arms of a stranger.

‘Mama!’ Harriet kicked her rescuer on the shins, wriggled to the floor and ran to hide her face in her mother’s skirt.

If Susannah’s head hadn’t hurt so much she would have laughed at how quickly Arabella sidestepped to avoid Harriet’s runny
nose being wiped on her lace underskirt.

‘What has happened?’ Arabella’s voice was sharp.

‘Do not alarm yourself, madam.’ The stranger smiled winningly. ‘There has been a slight mishap and your daughter is upset.
She ran out of the door as we arrived and I snatched her up to prevent her from falling into the path of a hackney carriage.’

‘Oh!’ Arabella gathered Harriet to her bosom, carefully turning her daughter’s grimy face away from the precious silk. ‘I
thank you, sir.’

‘May I introduce myself? I am Henry Savage, Dr Ambrose’s cousin.’

‘Arabella Leyton.’ She proffered her fingertips.

Susannah regarded Mr Savage more closely. More unlikely cousins she couldn’t have imagined. Mr Savage’s golden hair, richly
patterned waistcoat and smiling face were full of sunshine, while Doctor Ambrose’s severe but darkly handsome looks carried
something of the night.

Mr Savage bowed to Arabella. ‘I came today hoping to introduce myself to your husband on a matter of business.’

Cautiously, Dr Ambrose lifted the cloth away from Susannah’s head and peered at the wound. He was so close she could feel
his breath warm on her cheek and she looked away, suddenly discomfited by his gaze.

‘The bleeding has stopped,’ he said, helping her to her feet.

Arabella shrieked. ‘Susannah, what have you done? There is blood all over your bodice.’

‘What have
I
done?’ She was indignant. ‘Harriet smashed a gallypot between my feet and I slipped in oil of turpentine.’

Arabella wrinkled her pretty little nose. ‘And what is that terrible smell?’

Susannah sniffed. It wasn’t only the turpentine that smelled unpleasant. Then she remembered. ‘Oh, no! The syrup!’

The pan was burned black and its contents wasted.

‘Your father will be most displeased with your carelessness, Susannah,’ said Arabella, tight-lipped. ‘You know how he hates
waste.’

‘It was hardly my fault!’

At that moment Mathew and John, stark naked and dripping wet, arrived to see what had caused the commotion.

‘What in the name of heaven …? I’m only away from home for a short while and when I return it’s to Bedlam!’ scolded Arabella.

‘If you took the time to look after your children none of this would have happened!’ snapped Susannah. ‘I cannot be left to
do everything while you go out buying new dresses. Harriet is ungovernable.’

Mr Savage stepped forward. ‘Ladies! Come now, nothing too grave has happened. Your new dress is very handsome, madam, and
may I say that only a lady of taste and discernment could have picked the blue ribbons that adorn it to so
perfectly
match the clear blue of your eyes. My cousin will bandage the wound on Miss Leyton’s head and so no real harm has been done.
And we must all be thankful that little Harriet was saved from a terrible and untimely death.’ He pressed a hand to his chest
and raised his eyes heaven-wards. ‘I thank God that I chanced to be here to save her.’

Arabella blanched. ‘Was she really in such danger?’