The Devlin Diary (6 page)

“Isaac?” Claire repeated.

“Newton, of course,” she replied as if everyone was, or should be, on a first-name basis with the father of modern physics. “He was a Trinity fellow for thirty-three years, and there’s no record that anyone ever attended his lectures. Apparently he just spoke to the walls.” She paused thoughtfully. “Although I doubt that Science and Religion in Early Modern Italy is ever going to have the same impact as the theory of gravity or the invention of calculus.”

“No, I suppose it wouldn’t,” Claire said.

The woman removed her reading glasses, folded the earpieces carefully before setting them on top of the journal, and fixed her bright hazel eyes on Claire. “Have any of the students put your bicycle in a tree yet?”

“No,” Claire answered. She hadn’t even bothered getting a bicycle. She had discovered that the area which encompassed the old colleges and Cambridge’s pedestrian-and-bikes-only town center was relatively small, and she could easily go everywhere she needed to go on foot.

“Oh.” The woman sounded disappointed. “Well, there’s still time,” she added reassuringly. Her eyes narrowed slightly. “You don’t remember me, do you?”

“I’m so sorry. There were so many people—”

“No need to apologize. No one ever remembers what happens during those dinners. The fellows can drink enough wine in one night to launch a battleship.” She held out her hand. “Elizabeth Bennet, social history, Britain, nineteenth century.”

“Elizabeth Bennet?” Claire repeated. Elizabeth Bennet as in
Pride and Prejudice
? she wanted to ask but didn’t, suddenly intuiting that this was an obvious and stupid question. Unfortunately it had already been implied in her tone. She could see that at once by the look of annoyance on Elizabeth Bennet’s face.

The fellow sighed and fiddled a bit with her glasses. “Yes. Elizabeth
Bennet as in
Pride and Prejudice
. If you say she’s your favorite character from literature, I’ll scream.” She shook her head. “The Jane Austen revival of the past fifteen years has made my life a misery.”

Claire had no idea how to respond. In less than five minutes, she felt as though she had managed to put not one but both feet in her mouth.

“So tell me,” Elizabeth said, “which was she: proud or prejudiced?”

“Prejudiced. Darcy was proud.”

“Well done.”

A man breezed into the lounge and walked over to join them. “Lizzie, I was wondering if you’d received my note. So who’s this we have here?” he said with an inquisitive glance at Claire.

“She’s the new lecturer,” Elizabeth replied. A sour expression crossed her face as she put her glasses back on and opened the
English Historical Review
once more. “She’s filling in for Emily Scott while she’s on maternity leave. If you had been at the dinner you would know this.”

He turned to Claire. “My deepest apologies. If I’d known that someone as pretty as you was going to be there, I never would have missed it. Derek Goodman,” he said, offering his hand.

He didn’t add his title or field of study, as he probably knew there was no need. He was Derek Goodman, Claire marveled, the renowned author of
Reform and Revolution: The Roots of British Democracy
and
Heads Will Roll: Capital Punishment during the Reign of the Tudor and Stuart Kings
. Derek Goodman, one of the leading lights of the Cambridge history faculty, a reputed genius and a former wunderkind who’d received his PhD at twenty-five. Ever since, he’d been writing books and articles on British history at an extraordinary rate, and he was published in all the best journals and invited to all the best conferences.

Claire introduced herself, unable to conceal her admiration. As she shook Dr. Goodman’s hand, he looked her up and down in a way that was discreet enough but was also unambiguously sexual, something that most men would know better than to attempt. She suspected that Derek Goodman was accustomed to getting away with it, for not only was he brilliant, he was handsome. Movie-star handsome. Short, curly black hair that contrasted dramatically with his startling, mesmeriz
ing blue eyes. Confident, charming, of above-average height and way-above-average sexiness. His book jacket photos, while stunning, didn’t do him justice. The images Claire recalled must have been taken some years earlier. He now looked to be three or four years short of forty, and a face that had once been a bit too pretty had taken on a craggy masculinity that was accentuated by his two-day-old beard and the striped wool scarf wound around his neck, one end thrown rakishly back over the shoulder of his navy blue blazer. Under that he wore a white Oxford cloth button-down shirt and a pair of well-worn but well-fitting jeans.

“You’re American,” he said with delight. “A gorgeous American in our midst. Whatever shall we do with you?” His blue eyes twinkled mischievously. Damn if she didn’t feel a bit weak in the knees.

“Keep your dogs in the kennel, Derek,” Elizabeth said without glancing up. “She hasn’t been here long enough to know that you’re the most unscrupulous man in Cambridge.”

“I love you too, Dr. Bennet,” he said sarcastically, though he seemed completely unfazed by her criticism. He went on speaking to Claire as if Elizabeth hadn’t said a word. “It must have been you I saw moving in last week. G staircase in New Court?” At Claire’s nod, he looked at her with an even warmer enthusiasm. “My set is right across from yours.”

“You might want to keep your door locked,” Elizabeth remarked, moistening a fingertip and flipping a page.

“Don’t mind her,” Derek said. “We had a fling years ago and she’s never gotten over me.”

“Don’t you wish.”

“Has anyone taken you on a pub crawl yet?” he asked Claire.

“No.”

“Then allow me. After dinner in hall tonight. We’ll start out at the Rat and Weasel and make the circuit all the way ’round to the Mad Cow.” In spite of the unpleasant associations that rats, weasels, and mad cows brought to mind, Derek Goodman made the prospect of going on a tour of Cambridge pubs seem immensely enjoyable.

“You’ve come in too late in the game on this one, Dr. Goodman,” Elizabeth said. “I believe she’s already spoken for.”

“Is this true?” he asked Claire.

“I’m not quite sure what she—,” Claire began.

“Didn’t Andrew Kent hire you?” Elizabeth asked, peering up at her.

“Yes.”

“He’s bent over backward to make sure that you’ve got everything you could possibly wish for.”

Claire felt her face flush. Andrew Kent bent over backward for her? But he’d hardly even talked to her; they’d had only one conversation since she’d arrived. What in the world did Dr. Bennet mean? And why was she so snide about it, as if there was something inherently wrong with being hired by him?

Perhaps, Claire realized with a sudden, sinking feeling in her stomach, Andrew Kent was known for hiring women in whom he had a personal interest. It occurred to her that she could be the most recent in a long line of research assistants and junior fellows, an appalling thought. One thing was certain: she was already the subject of speculation and gossip. Perhaps it was unavoidable when you were the new fish in the pond. Pond? Ha. More like goldfish bowl.

“But I hardly know Dr. Kent.” Claire shook her head. “It’s not like that at all.”

“So sorry,” Elizabeth said in a way that didn’t sound even remotely apologetic. “I guess I’d got completely the wrong idea.”

“So you’re available tonight after all?” Derek asked.

“No, not tonight. I have an, um, appointment,” she stammered.

“An appointment?” he said skeptically.

“Yes, an appointment.” Claire set her cup and saucer on the counter. “Goodness, look at the time! I’ve got a supervision back at my set in fifteen minutes.”

She backed out of the lounge, smiling and offering a few words about how pleased she was to meet them, and made a rapid retreat down the stairs. An appointment. What a lame excuse. Of course she didn’t have an appointment that evening.

She had a date with Andrew Kent.

4 November 1672

H
ANNAH WALKS THROUGH
Louise de Keroualle’s suite until she spies Lord Arlington and Madame Severin taking wine in a small sitting room. How is she going to explain the mademoiselle’s illness? She knows of no delicate way to phrase it; perhaps she should remind them that the news could well be worse. At least she is a physician who understands the difference between the clap, as it is known in England, and its more virulent cousin, syphilis, commonly called the pox. Hannah has seen patients with both complaints and knows that a misdiagnosis can easily be made, even by experienced doctors. This misunderstanding sadly increases the sufferer’s anguish, as the treatments for the pox and the clap are quite different, and one does nothing to dispel the miseries and sad consequences of the other disease. Woe especially to he who has gonorrhea, or running of the reins (for it is believed that the unwholesome urethral discharge comes from the kidneys), and is recommended by some quack doctor to a course of treatment for the pox, which consists almost exclusively of preparations containing mercury: mercury lotions, mercury pills, mercury enemas, mercury steam baths. The metallic chemical has shown some efficacy in arresting the development of the pox, but its effects are loathsome: excessive salivation, nausea,
fluxing, blackening of the gums, loosened teeth, hair loss, melancholia, frenzy, even mental derangement. And of course it does nothing to cure the clap, which, left untreated, can cause barrenness in women and, in men, strangury, an inflammation of the prostate—occasioning a discomfort even greater than that which was experienced at the beginning. The lengthy, expensive cures for the pox are often taken at private spas or baths on the outskirts of London, because in spite of the fact that the diseases of Venus are rampant in all classes of society, they are socially stigmatizing.

Every physician in London is all too aware that venereal disease is epidemic, but no one knows how many Londoners die annually from the pox or from complications of the clap. The relatives of the dead often bribe the searchers, elderly women hired by the parish to record the cause of death, to overlook any sign of venereal disease upon the late beloved. In this way, the Bills of Mortality—published each week by the parish-clerks of London, and given in a monthly report to His Majesty the King—have included, along with the usual number of deaths from Fever and Consumption, fatalities of a strange and mysterious nature, such as Timpany, Rising of the Lights, and Vapors in the Head.

Her father’s mentor, Dr. Thomas Sydenham, was one of the first physicians to make clear the distinctions between the two diseases. Charles Briscoe built upon Dr. Sydenham’s illuminating observations of the disease process and, like him, often set aside humoral theory in favor of his empirical findings. Both men believed that illness was caused not by an imbalance of humors but by an outside agent working on the body. The patient’s imbalance was simply another symptom of disease. This departure from traditional Galenic theory was controversial, but it had some impressive results. In the course of his years with the permissive English court, both in France and in England, Dr. Briscoe developed, by popular demand as it were, a special serum and a method of treatment for the clap that enjoyed a reputation for being as sure as it was secret. And Hannah is the only one who knows it.

If she wasn’t so overcome by the manner in which Arlington chose to make off with her, she might have realized sooner why she was suddenly so necessary to him, why he chose her instead of one of the court
doctors. Arlington knew, or at least suspected, what afflicted Louise before he abducted Hannah.

When she enters the sitting room and informs him and Madame Severin of her diagnosis, he does not look surprised.

“It is not the pox, then?” Madame Severin asks.

“No, but there is still cause for concern,” Hannah replies. “She has an extreme exacerbation of the clap such as I have rarely seen. If she survives, she may no longer be able to conceive.”

“
If
she survives?” Madame Severin turns reproachfully on Arlington, speaking angrily in French. “You told me that she had a secret cure, that it was infallible.”

“Madame Severin, you should be aware that Mrs. Devlin is fluent in the French tongue.” The minister’s voice is steady, though Hannah notes a strain of irritation underneath: he does not brook being spoken to in such a way. “Her mother is French and her father raised his family in France during the king’s exile, as any good Royalist, such as her father once was, would have done. I beg you to be more discreet.”

Hannah senses Madame Severin’s cold fury at Arlington’s reprimand, but the mistress of the bedchamber is too experienced a courtier to show her displeasure. And what does the minister mean by that dig at her father: a good Royalist as he
once
was? She knows that her father became disillusioned with the king after the Restoration, but so did many others. What happened between him and Arlington?

“Do you have knowledge of your father’s secret cure or not?” the minister inquires, keeping to the point. He is, as he said, a busy man.

“I do, although I am hesitant to call it a cure. I don’t believe that he ever ministered to a woman as seriously ill as Mademoiselle de Keroualle, so I cannot guarantee its efficacy in all cases. I can only assure you that I will do my best to help her.”

“Your best had better be perfect,” Arlington warns. “Excepting the king, Mademoiselle de Keroualle has no better friends than Madame Severin and I, and we intend that she shall receive the finest care, for her own sake as well as the king’s.”

And for your own sake as well, Hannah adds silently.

“Obviously,” Arlington continues, “we cannot conceal that the
mademoiselle is ill, but we require discretion concerning the nature of her illness. We will put it about that she has a contagious ague and does not want to expose the court doctors and thence the entire court to her infirmity. Do not let it be known that you are your father’s daughter. We will say you are a childhood friend with knowledge of physick, here out of mercy.

“We’ll expect you tomorrow morning,” he says as he escorts Hannah to the door of the mademoiselle’s suite. She is met there by his manservant, who leads her back along Whitehall’s shadowy paths through the privy gardens and to the street, where a carriage awaits: Lord Arlington’s own carriage this time, an ostentatious vehicle of gleaming black lacquer generously trimmed with gold. As the horses break into a canter, Hannah realizes that the poppy syrup has begun its merciful work. The coach bounces over a deep pothole, swerves and lists, and she hardly feels anything. The pain she does feel seems distant, almost as if it is happening to someone else.

She turns her gaze from the window to look across the carriage at Arlington’s man, her unwanted chaperone. What is his name?
Jeremy,
he said,
Jeremy Maitland at your service.
As she intuited earlier, he isn’t a ruffian, he’s too thin and fine featured, but in spite of his appearance he sports a deep cut across the back of his left hand. She hazily wonders how it happened. More important, it’s poorly dressed; the tattered bandage is already blood-soaked.

“Have you seen a doctor for that?” Hannah asks.

“This?” He raises his hand as if he hasn’t noticed it before. “It’s only a scratch.”

“People can die from scratches.” The coach rocks and the hood of her cloak settles around her shoulders.

“Not me.” As if he feared he might have been rude, he adds, “I’ve never had much use for doctors. Most of them do more harm than good.”

“Regrettably, that is too often true.
Ars longa, vita brevis,
” she says, then remembers that Maitland is a servant; he will not have any Latin. She translates Hippocrates’ adage: “‘The art of healing is long, and life is short.’ There is much I don’t know, but I can help with that if you like.”

“You’re a doctor?” he inquires as if he does not quite believe it, but is impressed in spite of his stated dislike for the profession. It makes her want to boast a little, even to confide in him, but she remembers Arlington’s strict demand for secrecy and thinks better of touting her expertise.

“I have some knowledge of physick,” she answers cautiously, “and have medicines right here in my case.” The coach shakes and the glass vials jiggle against the wood box as if on cue.

“All right then.” He holds out his hand. She takes it and gingerly unwinds the bloodied bandage. The cut looks new, a few hours old at most. His hand is surprisingly strong and uncalloused. She opens a jar of ointment of yarrow, good for healing wounds and inflammations.

“This may burn a little,” she warns as she dabs it over his injury. To her surprise he makes no outcry and does not jerk his hand away. She looks at his face, expecting to see the hurt registered there, but he is composed. “You weathered that well,” she says, using a linen cloth from her cabinet to bind his hand.

“As I said, it’s only a scratch. I’ve suffered much worse. But you’ve done a fine job, I see,” he says, turning his cleaned, bandaged hand in front of his face. “And now, Doctor, what is my payment to be? What do I owe you for saving my life?”

His questions are innocuous, but there’s an underlying impertinence in Maitland’s manner. Hannah looks away, suddenly self-conscious, aware of the plainness of her wool dress, her simple linen petticoats, her disheveled hair, how tired she must look. There was a time when she would have countered his youthful impudence with a smile and a riposte, but now it only makes her ill at ease.

“I do not charge for such trifles. As you said, it is nothing.”

Her cool, reserved manner is not lost upon him. “Have I offended you? Perhaps you think me too familiar.”

“There is no harm done, Mr. Maitland. But you are quite young to be so bold.”

“I will soon be twenty-one,” he protests.

“And I am just turned twenty-five, and a widow.”

They travel on in awkward silence for a few minutes before the
coach comes to a stop outside her house. “May I see you inside?” he asks.

“It isn’t necessary.” She hears the coach driver jump down to the street. As soon as he opens the carriage door, she pushes her way out. Maitland exits after her. “It is late, Mr. Maitland,” she says. “You should go home and sleep.”

“I don’t sleep.” His eyes search her face. “Neither do you.”

His behavior is so impertinent that it could get him dismissed from Lord Arlington’s service, though he does not seem like the sort who is forward with all women. The young Mr. Maitland appears instead to be naively passionate, sincere, and vulnerable, so she withholds her censure. But it is late; she is tired, although not sleepy; she is feeling the effects of the poppy syrup; and she fears that her impressions are not sound. How did he guess that she does not sleep? It’s unnerving. It creates an unwanted complicity with him, as if they share a secret. But to encourage this intimacy would be unkind, for she has no intention of allowing it to go any further.

“Good night, Mr. Maitland.” She unlocks the front door and lets herself in, waiting there until she hears the sound of the coach fade away. How small and plain her dining room and parlor look now, after Whitehall, after Mademoiselle de Keroualle’s grand apartments. Yet she can’t help breathing a sigh of relief that she is gone from there and is home, if only briefly. These quiet hours of the night are her favorite time: no carriages rattling past, no cries from the water-sellers and the fishmongers and the assorted peddlers of food, drink, and coal who patrol the streets during the day. She has spent many nights alone in her bedroom, reading her medical books and recording her daily observations, listening to the shudders and sighs of the house as it settles. She likes the sensation that the house itself is slumbering, enfolding its inhabitants within its walls. She can tell, just by listening, that they are all in their beds: Mrs. Wills, Lucy and Hester, her mother. She would love to tiptoe up the creaking stairs to her attic room and try to sleep. Instead, she glances out the front window into the empty street, listens for the “All’s well” cry of the night watchman, and picks up her medicine case once more.