‘My sympathies on your recent bereavement, madam,’ says Nicholas. ‘I had the honour of serving with your late husband’s company in the Low Countries.’
‘With William? You look far too young, Dr Shelby.’
‘With his successor, madam. With Sir Joshua Wylde. Gelderland – in ’87.’
A sudden wariness comes into Mercy Havington’s pale eyes. ‘You are a friend to my son-in-law?’
‘If you fear partisanship, madam, rest assured. I served under Sir Joshua, it is true. He probably saved my life. In many ways I admire him. But not in the matter of his son. My concern is solely for Samuel; you have my word upon it.’
Mercy Havington regards him in silence for some time while she considers his honesty. Then, giving the merest hint of a nod, she turns her attention to Ned, looking up at him the way she might look up at a mountain peak. ‘And who is this extraordinary edifice of a man?’
‘Master Ned Monkton of Bankside, madam. My friend. You may trust his discretion entirely. As for his manners, I apologize for those in advance.’
Ned makes as much of a bow from the saddle as his huge frame allows. Nicholas is sure he sees a slight buckling in the forelegs of Ned’s mount, though it’s probably just his imagination.
‘Then you are both right welcome, gentlemen,’ Mercy Havington says, her generous mouth creasing with pleasure. She stoops again to shove a squirming piglet back amongst its siblings. ‘And this is Isabel,’ she says, introducing the sow. ‘Say good morrow to Isabel, sirs.’
Nicholas bites his tongue as it occurs to him that Lady Havington has named her sow after her grandson’s stepmother. Perhaps this kindly woman has a sharper side to her than he’d first thought.
Ned eases his huge frame out of the saddle and drops to the ground, groaning at the stiffness in his muscles. He kneels down and fusses over the wriggling piglets. Nicholas smiles. It was only a few months ago that Ned spent his days in the company of the dead, at the mortuary crypt at St Thomas’s. Now he’s like a child let out into the fresh air after a long illness.
Lady Havington summons a servant to take the horses. Then she leads Nicholas and Ned inside. The manor smells of scrubbed stone and dried lavender. A row of stout knee-length leather buskins stands just inside the door, the soles worn at the edges from use. Nicholas assumes Sir William Havington liked his walks in the surrounding hills.
In a pleasant, panelled room overlooking a meadow that slopes down to a winding stream, wine is served. Nicholas comes straight to the point.
‘How fares the boy, Lady Havington? Have you had the opportunity to observe him closely since he was taken to Cleevely?’
‘I fear I’ve detected a growing reluctance from Isabel of late. Indeed, she’s become quite possessive of Samuel since Dr Arcampora arrived.’
‘Perhaps you could tell me when your grandson’s malady first revealed itself?’
‘Shortly after his birth. The week before our daughter Alice’s churching, in fact.’
‘And did she suffer from it, too?’
‘Yes. At first, Alice’s attacks were mild. A few paroxysms, but uncommon sleepiness for the most part. But when she fell with child, the paroxysms grew worse. She died shortly after Samuel’s birth, during a particularly violent episode.’ Her eyes darken. ‘I suppose I should give Joshua credit for the love he bore her. Marrying a maid with such a malady attracted disapproval from many quarters. Yet the physicians assured him it could not be passed to her child. They were wrong.’
‘We often are, madam,’ Nicholas says. The notion that Joshua Wylde could have loved a woman who was not a perfect example of English breeding stock surprises him.
‘This disease is a curse from God, is it not, Dr Shelby?’ Mercy Havington says. ‘A punishment, perhaps.’
‘A curse, certainly. But undeserved, I’m sure. Forgive my bluntness, Lady Havington, but are you also afflicted?’
He’s seen the look she gives him before: it’s the look of a schoolmaster when a student asks a surprisingly perspicacious question.
‘No, sir. I am not,’ she says calmly. ‘God has reserved His displeasure for my daughter and grandson alone. It was the firstborn who died, was it not? Pharaoh was untouched.’
Puzzled, Nicholas asks as gently as he can, ‘Why do you think God would be so displeasured as to visit the falling sickness on your daughter and her son?’
‘It is the physician, not the patient, who is my particular concern, Dr Shelby,’ Lady Havington says, with a tightening of the jaw that tells him to change his line of questioning.
‘Have you spoken to Arcampora about the treatment he proposes?’
‘Yes. It was incomprehensible to me. But to listen to him, you’d think he was the wisest physician who’s ever lived. His bombast is really quite insufferable.’
‘You clearly haven’t attended many gatherings of the College of Physicians,’ Nicholas says.
A little of Lady Havington’s humour returns. Her mouth softens again. ‘My husband was a magistrate as well as a soldier, Dr Shelby. I can imagine.’
‘How was Arcampora engaged? Do you know?’
‘Lady Isabel is somewhat evasive about that. But she is most vocal on his qualifications. Apparently he was trained in theology at the College of St Michael, in Fribourg. William said that was a papist establishment.’
‘Whether it’s practised in London, Rome, Paris or Madrid, madam, physic either works or it doesn’t.’
She smiles, accepting his correction. ‘Of course. I’m just surprised that my son-in-law, who is at this moment fighting in the Low Countries against the heretics, should choose one of their number to treat his son. Perhaps Isabel hasn’t told him.’
It can’t hurt, thinks Nicholas, to let Mercy Havington know the little Robert Cecil has managed to discover about the man who claims he can cure her grandson. ‘Master Robert told me that Arcampora went on from Fribourg to study medicine at the university at Basle, which is Protestant. However, he didn’t finish his doctorate in medicine. After that, there’s almost no trace of him.’
‘I knew he was an imposter!’ Lady Havington says, her jaw tightening. ‘I told William, but he wouldn’t listen.’
Nicholas raises a cautionary hand. ‘The fact that Arcampora left Basle is not in and of itself damning, Lady Havington. There are physicians in England who did not complete their studies where they began them. Not all of them are charlatans.’
Lady Havington crosses her arms over her bodice, as though trying to restrain the doubt in her breast. ‘The question I need you to answer, Dr Shelby, is this: are his skills real? Or pretence? Are they doing Samuel good, or are they harming him?’
‘I don’t make casual diagnoses, madam. I won’t answer your questions until I’ve had a chance to see this paragon of physic for myself. Shall we ride together to Cleevely – say, tomorrow?’
‘We shall, Dr Shelby. I’ve already lost a husband and a daughter. I don’t want to lose a grandson, too.’
When Nicholas rises the next morning his thighs ache so cruelly from the ride that he climbs out of bed like a man who’s survived a racking. He dresses in the unfamiliar surroundings, wincing as he struggles into his slops. He goes downstairs like a greybeard, stretching out tentatively one leg after the other and puffing as the muscles protest.
Ned, who has seldom sat on a horse, can barely walk. He lumbers crab-like into Mercy Havington’s parlour, swearing he’ll have nothing to do with horses again, even if it means walking back to Southwark. But as he’s made the same vow every morning since they left the Jackdaw, Nicholas tells him not to be such an old woman.
Over a simple breakfast they try to make polite conversation with Lady Havington’s brother-in-law, to whom Havington Manor has passed upon Sir William’s death. He’s a sullen, red-faced fellow who seems almost as irritated by Mercy’s presence as he does by theirs. Failing miserably, they endure a lengthy lecture about the faults commonly found in sheep’s wool.