A Second Daniel

by Neal Roberts

  Jonathan still enjoys the blissful ignorance of sleep. Reluctant as Noah is to disturb him, he braces himself and does so. “Jonathan, please wake up.”

  Jonathan squirms and sits up. “What is it now?”

  “I’m afraid I have some bad news.”

  “Oh?” Jonathan squints, his eyes adjusting to the light.

  “Very bad news. I’m afraid Goodman Graves has passed.”

  Jonathan wilts like a flower in the snow. “Oh, God. How?” His eyes open wide. “How? Did that dirty bastard kill him? That piece of filth? Did he?”

  Noah is unsure how to respond.

  Jonathan leaps out of bed. “He did! Didn’t he? Tell me, Noah! What happened?”

  Noah says quietly, “Heart failure. According to Doctor Lopez, it may have been brought about by poison.”

  “Poisoned by that filthy piece of dung? He was unable to drown him or shoot him, so he poisoned him?” Jonathan starts to giggle. “Was it arsenic? Foxglove, perhaps?”

  Noah is bewildered, his mouth agape. Jonathan’s conjectures about the type of poison must be some sort of madcap joke. But, surely Jonathan could not be so callous as to jest upon hearing such news as this! “The doctor does not know yet. His assistant is testing for the presence of common poisons. Calm down, Jonathan. Tell me about him, so that I may pay my respects. I know very little about him.” It’s a poor feint at conversation in light of the emotions erupting in Jonathan, but Noah is trying to allay his excitement.

  “Why didn’t the dunghill just toss him in the Thames, where he ordered us both drowned last night? Perhaps then the judges would have perceived some connection between the blackguard and his crime! But no, no, I’m sure not! What is wrong with this kingdom, Noah? Hah? Surely, it is sick. Sick!” Jonathan begins breathing heavily, much deeper and faster than normally. Noah has heard of grief like this, but he’s never encountered it before, and has no idea what to do.

  Jonathan rips the front of his linen smock apart with both hands. “Maybe they’ll kill me now, too! Come and kill me!” He laughs. “Come down here. Fill me up with poison, and throw me in the deep. You piece of shite!”

  Noah is at a complete loss, for Jonathan is no longer addressing him, but rather someone who’s not there. Jonathan’s eyes are rapidly growing wild and red, and his respiration continues to accelerate.

  “Come on! Come get me, too! You demon! You MISCREANT FILTH!” Jonathan looks at his fingers in evident amazement. Noah has heard that, when one breathes too deeply for too long, the fingers tingle.

  Arden enters, alarmed.

  “Jon! Jonny! It’s me, Arthur! Please, Jon! Calm down!” He runs to Jonathan, who stares and points into thin air. Arthur hugs him firmly. “Please, Jon!”

  “See?” says Jonathan, pointing at no one. “You see him there? He’s there, Arthur. Look!”

  Arthur’s eyes are red, and tears stream down his face. He looks where Jonathan is pointing. “Who is it, Jon? I see no one there. Who is there, Jon?”

  Jonathan shoves him away with a force that would have toppled a smaller man. “Look! Look there!” His breathing accelerates still further. “It’s Graves! Oh, God. LOOK!” His eyes agog, he plops down on the edge of the bed, quaking in terror.

  Lopez enters in determined fashion, and stands before Jonathan, whose eyes still focus on some faraway point.

  “Jonathan, I am Doctor Lopez. Please look at me!” Jonathan’s expression is unreadable, unchanging. “Jonathan, do you remember me from last evening? Do you know who I am?” Lopez points to Arthur. “Jonathan, do you know who this is?” Still, no change. Jonathan just stares unblinkingly at the same vacant point, cringing in terror.

  Henry somberly appears at the door holding a wooden cup filled with fluid, which Lopez accepts and hands to Arthur. “You must get Jonathan to drink this draught down. Can you do this?”

  At first, Arthur himself is transfixed, staring at Jonathan. But he snaps out of it and looks to the doctor. “I don’t know if I can. Give it to me, and I will try.” Slowly, he approaches Jonathan, who remains seated, an occasional whimper of fear escaping him. “Jonathan, drink this down, will you?” But Jonathan makes no response. Lopez motions for Arthur to bring the draught up to Jonathan’s lips, and spill it into his mouth. Arthur follows the wordless instructions, and is amazed to see Jonathan swallow the draught thirstily until the cup is empty. He hands the cup back to Lopez, his hand shaking.

  In a few seconds, the elixir begins to have an effect. Jonathan’s breathing returns to normal, and his eyes resume their blinking, first as though trying to clear his vision, and then torpidly. Finally, he lies back on his bed staring at the ceiling, and then mercifully closes his eyes.

  Arthur weeps into his hands. “Oh, dear God! My friend’s mind is overthrown!” He turns to Lopez. “Is he gone to madness?”

  Lopez puts a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “No, Master Arden. Your friend is not mad. He will sleep now, and will be much better when he awakens.”

  Arden looks impatiently at Lopez. “How do you know?”

  “Because I am a physician of forty years’ experience. Believe me, this is not how madness begins. At least, not in people so young as Jonathan. You will see. His mind will be fine. He will be sad, as anyone would be under like circumstances, but that is to be expected. Sometimes, grief starts off very badly like this. But it passes.”

  Arden seems to take only small comfort from Lopez’s words. “Will he continue to see people that aren’t there?”

  Lopez shakes his head emphatically. “No, he will not. Let us put him to bed, so that he sleeps comfortably.”

  Together, Arden and Lopez turn Jonathan, placing his head on the pillow facing sideways and his feet at the base of the bed.

  “Do you truly wish to help him?” Lopez asks Arden.

  “Of course I do!”

  “Then, sit in this chair for the next four hours, and make sure that he does not vomit. I expect he will not, but, if he does, you must come and get me right away. I will be up in Master Ames’ room for a short while, and then right next door at Mountjoy’s.”

  The door swings full open, and the other three young men appear. “We’ll take shifts, Arthur,” says Salazar. “You take an hour, then each of us will take an hour’s turn.” He turns to Lopez. “Will that be satisfactory, Doctor?”

  Lopez smiles to see such good friendship. “Quite satisfactory.” He turns to Henry. “Come, Master Neville, let us see to your foot. I might as well finish our business now, so I needn’t return later.” He walks up the stairs ahead of Noah and Henry, who appears surprised that he has no real trouble climbing.

  Noah watches as Henry sits up in the bed in his side room, with Lopez examining his naked foot using a magnifying lens of some kind.

  Lopez peers carefully at the top of Henry’s foot. “Laudanum is very addictive,” he says. “You should avoid telling Hawking or anyone else that there was something medicinal in the draught I gave him. In my experience, people do not seek out more of something they never learn they have taken.”

  Lopez snaps the lens shut, and sits on a wooden chair beside the bed, staring impassively at Henry’s face.

  “Well?” demands Henry. “Don’t just sit there. The suspense is killing me.”

  Lopez looks down and shakes his head. “You already know you have gout. It is not suspense that is killing you, Master Neville.”

  “Well, whatever is killing me, can ye stop it? And stop this damned pain, as well?”

  Lopez smiles sagely. “I can stop both with the same treatment.”

  Henry looks pleased. “You can?”

  “Yes, but I warn you. It will take some effort on your part.”

  “Just tell me, and I’ll do it.”

  “All right, there are a few things you must do. The first is, you must stop drinking spirits.”

  “By ‘spirits,’ you mean … ?”

  “I mean spirits, in all its forms. All wines, whether they be red, white, or any other color, inc
luding ports, sherries, brandies, cognacs, liqueurs, mead. Also sack, of which we all know you are exceedingly fond. No whisky, no ale, no beer.”

  “Even weak beer? I shall die of dysentery! You can’t expect me to drink unpurified water.”

  “Weak beer is acceptable. Boiled water would be better, however.”

  Henry’s face goes white. “God, man! You take my life when you take my reasons for living.” He pouts, and adjusts the sheet. “What else?”

  “You must cut down your consumption of food to a bare minimum, so that you lose nearly half your weight.”

  Now Henry is downright flustered. “How about breathing? May I breathe?”

  “As much as you like.”

  “And women?”

  “But you are married, Master Neville.”

  Henry scowls. “Oh, don’t make me repeat the question, you little prig.”

  “Women may pass you other diseases, but they will not aggravate this one, unless … ”

  “Unless … ?”

  “Unless they give you spirits or overfeed you.”

  “Do you have anything in that little black bag that will put me out of my misery permanently, like an old warhorse?”

  Lopez laughs, and shakes his head. “Strictly forbidden.”

  “Oh, yes. I recall something about that in the Hippocratic Oath: ‘I will never give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it.’ What about that stuff you gave me before? That seemed to work.”

  For a moment, Lopez seems bone weary and lost in thought. He sighs. “Are you telling me that you will not follow my prescribed course of treatment?”

  Henry looks to Noah. “What do you think, Ames?”

  Noah rubs his chin and pretends to weigh matters. “I think you will deviate from this course of treatment before Doctor Lopez leaves the room.”

  Lopez ventures, “Master Ames, perhaps you could help enforce these strictures?”

  “Oh, but I assure you I hold no such influence with Master Neville.” He looks at the ceiling smugly. “I know someone who’d give it a good try, however.”

  Henry glowers. “Ames, if you ever mention this treatment to Mistress Anne, you shall never be invited to my home again.”

  Noah shrugs silently at Lopez, who sighs and relents. “All right, Master Neville. You are too entrenched an adversary for me. I will leave you some tablets. The medicine is called ‘colchicum.’ But you must use it only when you are in terrible pain, and only in the number of tablets I shall write down for you. Are we in agreement?”

  “Now you’re using the good sense that God gave you!” says Henry.

  “They will not always work, at least not always well, but you must not take more than the prescribed amount even if they do not work. This medicine is not a case of the more the merrier, and it can be dangerous if too much is taken. Meantime, if you feel an attack of gout coming on, you should drink clean water, preferably boiled, as much as you reasonably can, as gout is made worse by dehydration.”

  Henry nods. “Good to know. Thank you, Doctor.”

  “Now, if you gentlemen have no further crises requiring my immediate attention, I thought I might have dinner with my family.”

  “Thank you, Doctor Lopez,” they say, and watch him go.

  Once they’re alone, Henry returns to the events of the previous evening. “You were there last night?” he asks.

  “I was.”

  “Then tell me what happened, as best you can recall.”

  Noah recounts the events for Henry, avoiding as well as he can any personal comment or opinion. Henry does not interrupt, and raises an eyebrow only once or twice. At the end of the tale, Noah observes: “It’s difficult to imagine that suppressing news of the beating given this ‘Bob’ person could have been of such importance as to justify the elimination of two witnesses.”

  “I was thinking the same thing. The beating took place in public. No matter how quickly it was over, it was surely seen by other patrons, and it would scarcely have been possible to eliminate them all. Just out of curiosity, did Skeres ever mention that drunkard Bob’s last name?”

  “No.”

  “No matter. I expect I can find out more about Bob from a number of sources. So, that leaves … Tinoco. What did the drunk say to him, exactly?”

  “When Tinoco first entered, the drunk pointed him out to Skeres, referring to him as an ‘old friend’ or something like that, and observed that permitting Tinoco to enter the Boar’s Head was somehow proof that the tavern will admit ‘just anybody.’ Then later, the drunk shouted something about a red … jewel? I think it was ‘jewel.’ And he implied that Tinoco had been searching for someone to earn the jewel by killing another person of Spanish surname … which name escapes me at the moment.”

  “Was it ‘Don’ something? ‘Don Emanuel,’ something like that?”

  “No. It was a single word: Suarez. Cortez, perhaps.”

  “Perez?” suggests Henry.

  Noah recognizes the name immediately. “Perez. That’s it! Do you know of him?”

  “I’ve met him. He came to England after fleeing the Spanish court some months ago. Always has the most peculiar combination of strong odors about him. He’s known by them. Musk and … amber. Yes, that’s it. That’s what they call him behind his back, Old Musk and Amber.”

  “Ah,” says Noah, “now that you mention it, the drunk implied that Perez had a preference for young men. I did not recall it before, as such slurs are commonly hurled by drunkards, regardless of truth or falsity.”

  “In this case,” says Henry, “it is most certainly true. Perez has ‘befriended’ the Bacon brothers, especially Sir Francis, if you take my meaning. Their mother has threatened to cut them both off from the family’s money if Anthony does not keep Perez away from Francis. Perez nearly killed one of Essex’s secretaries with his musk and amber concoction.”

  “Seriously?”

  Henry nods emphatically. “It took the secretary several weeks to recover properly. Perez is a menace when it comes to that sort of thing. He fancies himself a physician, which Lopez can only laugh at.”

  “He is known to Lopez?”

  “Oh, yes, the Spanish community in England is quite close-knit. A lot of Jews and half-Jews. One never knows what they’re plotting, as they speak a language only they understand. And Lopez has a way of placing himself at the center of it all, in pursuit of his own profit. He himself is a Jew by birth, although he’s converted.”

  Noah scratches his head. “Having watched the good doctor practice his profession,” he says, “I find it difficult to imagine him at the center of anything but a hospital.”

  “Indeed, he once was at the center of Saint Bartholomew’s here in London, but found international intrigue far more to his liking. Eventually, he neglected his duties so completely that the hospital refused to let him reside in the only house on the grounds. He seems to have no real interest in medicine as a career, except as a well-paid physician for the rich and titled, upon whom he lavishes his medical attention.”

  “How much medical attention can the rich and titled require, I wonder?”

  “Oh, you’ve no idea! He’s told me that their diet is so rich that they often develop obstruction of the bowel. From notable to notable he travels with his little enema device, which he calls a ‘clyster.’ I shouldn’t be surprised if the Queen were to issue him a coat of arms with a clyster as its escutcheon,” Henry jokes. “She’s one of his patients, you know.” He looks down at his foot. “You know, I’m beginning to believe the good doctor knows what he’s doing. My foot barely hurts at all any more.”

  “Why don’t you try walking about a bit?” suggests Noah.

  Up and down the hall they march, and then return to Noah’s room.

  “Much, much better,” says Henry. “I really must write Doctor Lopez a thank-you.”

  Noah is reminded of Henry’s abortive discussion of Lopez’s other life. “You said Lopez is a man of intrigue. When we went to Creechurch for the autopsy, yo
u mentioned something about his participation in the English Armada.”

  Henry explains. “Portugal’s international status is currently in jeopardy. The monarch having died a short time ago, several people now contend for the Portuguese throne. Depending upon who prevails, Portugal will either retain or lose its character as a sovereign country. The question is very serious to the Portuguese, of course. To us English, it may be even more serious.”

  Noah considers the situation. “From what you’ve said, I conclude that one of the competing claimants is the King of Spain, Philip the Second.”

  As ever, Henry seems intrigued by Noah’s intuition. “That’s correct. But what makes you say so?”

  “Really, Henry. That’s easy. If the King of Spain were to become King of Portugal, the result would very likely be unification of the two countries.”

  Henry nods. “Just as England and Spain might have been unified if Philip had been recognized as King of England when he married our late Queen Mary. His father died trying to bring that about. Gives one shivers to think about it.”

  “Amen. Who are the contenders for the Portuguese throne, besides King Philip?”

  “One resides here in England, at the invitation of the Queen under Crown protection. His name is Don Antonio. He’s been living on the grounds at Eton.”

  Something clicks in Noah’s mind. “Wait!” he commands, and lapses deep into thought, his eyes randomly focused on a fixed point on the floor. A few seconds later, he seems to regain awareness of his surroundings. “I do apologize, Henry. I meant no offense speaking to you so presumptuously.”

  “None taken,” Henry assures him.

  “I just realized that certain things I learned from Marie may have a direct bearing on this situation. If I’m right,” begins Noah, “for at least the past several months this Don Antonio has resided in a building at Eton College, and has argued vociferously with his son there. Don Antonio drinks heavily, and corresponds with important people in the Netherlands. In his capacity as ostensible King of Portugal, he employs as his ambassador to Queen Elizabeth … ” Noah furrows his brow incredulously, “Doctor Lopez? Can this be true?”