A Court Affair (58 page)

“Stop!”
I held up my hand. “Don’t tell me any more. I have always believed that knowledge is power, but pray God I
never
need to know this! Dr Biancospino, I am confident that you are the man I am looking for. There is in my realm a patient, a young woman of seven-and-twenty years, sorely in need of your care. I wish to retain your services for her,
but,
” I stipulated firmly, “under
no
circumstances is she to know this. You are
never
to divulge my identity nor to admit to having ever met me; if she even suspects that you have come from me, you will lose her trust. Say only that your services are the gift of a well-wisher sorely concerned about her welfare amidst this maelstrom of ugly gossip.
Help her,
Dr Biancospino,
heal
her
if you can. Do only what is in the best interests of your patient, and let the rest be damned, and let
no one
interfere, not even the lady’s husband. You
must
be impervious to all rewards and promises. Are you the man I am looking for, Dr Biancospino?”

The black eyes that met mine were firm and unwavering. “Majesty,” he said, “I am that man.”

And I knew he spoke the truth. Here was a man who would do all that was humanly possible to save Amy Dudley, for the sake of battling the dark knight of cancer to try to save the fair maiden; he cared
nothing
for the players and the prizes in this royal game. His holy grail was finding a cure, not aiding Robert’s fool’s quest for a crown he could never have. Like St George slaying the dragon, Dr Kristofer Biancospino wanted to kill the great crab called Cancer who preyed upon, ravaged, and took, more than any one dragon, so many lives.

Cumnor Place, Berkshire, near Oxford
March–September 1560

A
s the days drifted past, day after empty, pain-racked day, I grew weaker. I no longer had any desire to go outside, and there was little out there to tempt me now. This year, summer didn’t seem like summer, it was so cold and wet, the skies more often leaden grey rather than heavenly blue, and the sun seemed rarely to exert itself to vanquish the rain—like me, she seemed to have fallen into lethargy. Some days I passed entirely in pain-shrouded slumber so that at night, while everyone else slept, I was awake and restless, lonely, and feeling the sharp, needle-toothed bite of the pain, when all I wanted to do was sleep, to pull the covers up over my head and hide from the sad reality of my life, to just let my ever-dwindling days float past until Time ran out for me.

Many nights I passed sitting up in bed, sewing partlets and yokes to fill in the low-cut square bodices of my gowns, so no trace of my malady would ever show. Sleepless, by candlelight I embroidered delicate flowers and sometimes even healing herbs upon the fine white linen, like feverfew and chamomile blossoms, but no more hearts—entwined, inflamed, or impaled by Cupid’s dart—or true lovers’ knots; that girl didn’t exist any more.

Sometimes I did indeed pull the covers up over my head, even though I lay tense and wakeful underneath, until dawn, when I at last drifted off to sleep again. I was afraid that, as he often did, the grey friar would step out of the stone walls and come to me, to stand a watchful and alert sentinel beside or at the foot of my bed. Though I knew hiding from him was senseless; cowering beneath the covers wouldn’t keep him away. I was apt to see him at any moment, day or night, and even when I hid, I could still feel his presence in the cold and prickly sensation up and down the nape of my neck and spine. But I was scared that one night he would come to stand at the foot of my bed and lower his hood to reveal what the darkness hid and show me the
true
face of Death.

Often I wondered who he was. Had he perhaps served in the infirmary and tended the monks who were ailing and dying, keeping an alert vigil by their beds, comforting and praying as they breathed their last? Or was he guilty of some heinous sin, some horrible crime that damned his soul and barred the gates of Heaven against him forevermore? Sometimes I wondered if I had gone mad, as I was the only one who could see him. To everyone else the phantom friar was just a legend, just another ghost story to tell while sitting round the fire on a dark night for the thrill a little fright can give. But, to me, he wasn’t just a story; he was
very
real indeed.

And then
he
came to me, as though he had been blown in by the March winds, the only one who
might
have been able to save me—Dr Kristofer Biancospino. At first I was sorely afraid of him; he was a foreigner, born of an Italian father and an Arab woman, olive-skinned with piercing, deep-set, obsidian black eyes, and raven-wing hair, sleek and swooping over his brow, and a sharp nose and chin. My mind always wanted to picture him in a jewelled and feathered turban, resplendent in oriental robes of jewel-coloured silk and damask—ruby, emerald, sapphire, amethyst, and topaz—with golden pointy-toed slippers that turned up at the tips, though I never saw him in anything but plain, elegant, but severe black. He looked, at first glance, dangerous and harsh, a haughty patrician medical man with a long list of impressive credentials who could never conceive of caring being a part of the physician’s art. At first, he reminded me of a more exotic version of Sir Richard Verney; they had the same dark hair and eyes and the same sharpness of features, noses as sharp as knives when seen from the side. But I was wrong,
so
very
wrong
. He never babbled or blundered, flushed or fidgeted, or stammered trying to find the right words, nor was he hard-hearted or brutally blunt but matter-of-fact; his honesty never faltered or hid like a bitter almond inside a coating of coloured sugar. His fingers never fumbled with embarrassment or incompetence when he examined and tended me. Nor did he use humour and jests to try to cajole and distract me and make the truth seem less grim. There was no nonsense about him; he was, in all ways, confident and steady, efficient and brisk. And yet … there was comfort in those hands, the way they moved over my body, so
sure
what to do, never hesitating. And instead of disdain, arrogance, or self-importance, I saw in his dark eyes deep wells of kindness. He was not at all the frightening and sinister man I took him for at first glance.

The first time he examined me, when I bared my breast to his scrutiny, I turned my face away, tears filling my eyes, and clutched a perfumed handkerchief to my nose, humiliated and angered by the stink of the vile, disgusting discharge oozing out to stain the linen dressing that covered it. It wasn’t fair! People were supposed to rot
after
they died, whilst I had been condemned to have my flesh decay even as I still lived, and to smell always this foul, rotting rancidness that no perfume could ever fully conceal; it was
always
there, like a whiff of manure beneath the roses.

Gently, he peeled the dressing away and, taking a bottle from his bag, tipped it over a folded square of linen and began to cleanse my breast with a sharp-scented liquid that felt strangely good even as it tingled and stung. “A cleansing wash, an astringent,” he explained. “I shall write out the recipe before I leave. Have your maid do this for you every morning and night, each time the dressing is changed, and apply a hot towel for half an hour afterwards.”

“Yes, Doctor,” I nodded and said softly, still avoiding his eyes.

He paused then and took my face gently between his hands and turned it so I had no choice but to look at him.

“Do not be afraid or ashamed,” he said. “Do not turn away from me, or away from yourself.” As he resumed his examination, he continued speaking as his fingers gently prodded the swollen, distorted lump, feeling it move like a rotting fruit trapped beneath my skin. “You are
still
beautiful. Do not be alarmed, I tell all my patients this—you are
more
than
this.
” He cupped my breast carefully in his hand. “
Much
more!
I have seen this malady
many
times, many,
many, many
times, afflicting women everywhere—rich and poor, young and old, slim and stout, virgins, wives, and whores, godless and devout—and I can say, with
complete
confidence, it is
nothing
you have done that has drawn this disease to you. Many women despair and in the throes of their suffering think that it is somehow their fault and search their lives for some sin or transgression to account for it, when there is in truth none. Some even look to point the finger of blame at their vanity, the low-cut dresses, or the carnal pleasures they enjoyed, but, in truth, it is none of that. I have seen virgin spinsters who spent their whole lives modestly covered in high-necked gowns and never knew the touch of a man succumb to it. It is a disease that strikes down some and spares others; it has no respect for beauty, wealth, titles, and prestige, nor piety and good works either. It is not like a man who prefers a certain type of woman; this cancer is random and without mercy. In France and Italy it is called ‘The Nun’s Disease’—though no one knows why, it is seen tragically often in convents. When I was a young man studying medicine in Italy, and also when I was in France, I attended many such cases. I have charted its course from its first appearance to the agony and devastation of its final stage. We are old adversaries—cancer and I.”

“Did they …” The word
die
stuck in my throat, and I could not say it, so instead I asked, “Were you able to cure them?”

“In some cases I bought them more time. I was able to slow the disease’s progress or banish it temporarily, but at
great
cost, and I do not speak of money, but …” He sighed deeply and closed his eyes for a moment. “For some it cost more than the cure was worth, some found the remedy to be worse than the malady, and, for those who survived the cure, the disease took a holiday and came back after a time, sometimes months, sometimes a few years, later; only one was able to live out her life without it ever revisiting her. But, for most of my patients, I could only give a respite from their pain.”

When he had finished speaking, I could only nod. I did not trust myself to speak, and, in truth, I did not know what to say. I had known all along that I was doomed. So I nodded and murmured, “Thank you, Doctor. I understand.”

“Come now, my beautiful patient, it is not time for tears yet.” He reached up and with his own handkerchief wiped my eyes. “I do not give up easily, not without a fight, and neither should you. Now, shall we begin?”

“Yes.” I nodded and added softly, “Thank you, Doctor.”

He prescribed a potent white powder of opium poppies, to be mixed with wine to mask its bitter, burning taste, to help me with the pain, though he cautioned it might bring confusion and strange dreams, both waking and sleeping, and even as it dulled the sharp edge of pain, it would also dull my mind. He also prescribed an elixir for cooling fever, and recommended ginger suckets, which I already knew of and used, to help quell the nausea, both before and after eating. “The weaker you get, the stronger the cancer gets,” he explained. “You
must
think of it as your nemesis, your foe, your enemy, a
very
powerful one who is the emperor of all ailments, and fight it with
everything
you have, armed with what weapons I can give you.” He wrote out recipes and careful instructions for Pirto to follow in a daily regimen of treatment, and, when I thought he was done, paused and added a hot poultice for my ribs and back, when I told him of the sharp pains that now beset me in these parts, and he urged me to leave off my stays. “No more tight lacing,” he admonished. He prescribed a strengthening tonic that I should take daily and forbade me strenuous exercise, absolutely no dancing or horseback riding, even if I felt like it, and if I
must
travel—“and I do not recommend it now,” he said in a grave and serious tone—I must do so only by litter, carried by men at a slow walk, taking the utmost care not to jar me. “I do not wish to alarm you,” he continued, “but you
must
know, as this disease progresses, it can eat into the bones, suck the life out of them, if you will, and leave them brittle and vulnerable to fractures and breaking. I had one patient whose spine snapped as she was walking across her bedchamber, and another who broke a finger opening a letter.”

I gasped and felt dizzy and light-headed at these words, more afraid for myself than ever, trapped in a body that was apt to break all apart even as the cancer did its evil work upon my breast.

Dr Biancospino took my hand. “I know it is frightening, but I would be most remiss if I did not tell you. You are a woman formerly accustomed to leading a busy, vigorous life, taking an active part in the management of a large estate, I am told, and I know you must miss being that woman, but to try to ignore this, to go on as if nothing were wrong, you would risk doing yourself
great
injury.”

I said I understood, thanked him, and promised to do
exactly
as he said. And when I told him of the hemlock pills Robert had given me, and still continued to send, along with other medicines, Dr Biancospino merely shook his head and said, “I think I have something better.”

He took from his bag a mortar and pestle and various powders and asked Pirto to bring him water. While he measured out the powders, he cautioned me not to mix the remedies he prescribed with those recommended by others, even if they meant well and had only the best intentions; combining the wrong ingredients or ingesting too much of any one of them could be
extremely
dangerous or even deadly. “And no more bleeding and purging,” he said firmly. “With this particular malady I think they do more harm than good and only increase weakness and lethargy.” Then, as he added the water and began to stir the mixture, creating a thick white paste, he bade me sit, bare to my waist, on a high stool before him. And from his bag he took a brush, just like an artist might use—I had seen Lavinia Teerlinc wield similar ones, albeit more delicate and smaller—and, with slow, steady, almost sensual strokes, he began to paint my afflicted breast with the white paste. “It may sting a little,” he cautioned, “or even burn—some ladies have more sensitive skin than others—but that is a good thing; that is how we know the medicine is working.” As I watched it harden, hiding the ugly mottled flesh and drying up the seeping discharge beneath a shell that made me feel as if my breast were turning into marble, he explained that it was a mixture of lime, hemlock, and belladonna and said that he would instruct Pirto in its preparation so that she could apply it fresh for me each morning.