The Play's the Thing (The Chronicles of Christoval Alvarez Book 7)

by Ann Swinfen

  But, nay, it was too hot to ponder such arguments. I must think about my future.

  Dr Nuñez had said my earnings from his patients would be barely half my previous salary from St Thomas’s. Could I live on that? Before I gained my licence, I had lived on less, though not as little as half. I still had about two-thirds of the money from the Muscovy Company. I had an adequate supply of clothes, for I had no need to be fashionable, merely clean and professional. I must earn enough to feed Rikki and myself, and buy fuel for my fire when it grew really cold in winter. I could probably share a fire with Simon for part of the time, for the players were often on short rations in the winter when the playhouses were closed, unless they were able to use an inn as a playhouse, as they had done the winter before last.

  My thoughts were straying. My father and I had always lived on tight rations, for we earned little enough. We had to eat, pay our maidservant, and keep warm in winter. Besides, we had carefully put aside money for the future, money which my father had gambled and lost on the Portuguese expedition. That was the fault of Ruy Lopez, fellow Marrano and physician to the Queen, who had persuaded him to invest in that misguided scheme. I knew Sara Lopez would help me, but she had rescued me before and I was loathe to go a-begging again.

  Nay, I would rather eat mouldy cheese, and buy the overripe fruit and vegetables which the stallholders sold cheap at the end of the day. Somehow I would manage. I would have to.

  Chapter Three

  The rest of that week was occupied in being introduced to Dr Nuñez’s patients, who were now to become my responsibility. There were four families who lived in the large merchant houses along Cheapside, three of them goldsmiths, one a mercer. There was another mercer who had done well for himself, served as a Sheriff of the City, and built a house just off the north side of the Strand. Not quite rubbing shoulders with the great aristocratic mansions on the river side of the Strand, but certainly grand enough. There was the minor lord of a small manor out toward Windsor, but we would visit him later. That family was rarely ill, Dr Nuñez told me, which he attributed to the better quality of the air away from London. It would take us an entire day, riding there and back, and I believed he was reluctant to risk his own health while the heat lasted.

  I had often wondered that the prosperous merchants, some of them the most powerful men in London, continued to live in Cheapside. In times past, these houses had held shops at the front, opening on to the street, with perhaps workshops behind, and the family’s living quarters above. With the passing of the years, Cheapside, the street itself, had become one vast market of stalls and ramshackle booths, selling everything from buttons to poultry. Bleeding carcasses were brought here straight from the shambles near Smithfield, to lie amongst the flies and dust until, piece by piece, they were hacked up to be sold. The great merchants of Cheapside, who had prospered under the Queen, as London had prospered, mostly now did their business elsewhere, or through lesser men, and their houses had been enlarged and embellished, but the fact remained that they overlooked the grubby throng that was Cheapside.

  I had never been inside one of these houses until I was taken there by Dr Nuñez, when I discovered that they were not as unpleasant as I had imagined.

  ‘My dear Dr Nuñez,’ Mistress Dolesby said, at the first house we visited, ‘you must take a glass of wine with me in the arbour, you and young Dr Alvarez.’

  She led us out of a grand door at the back of the house, which opened on to a terrace of turf, then down a flight of shallow steps into the garden.

  ‘I am afraid that my poor garden is suffering with this intolerable heat,’ she said, motioning at a maidservant to follow us with her tray. ‘The gardeners do their best, watering twice a day, but it is scarcely enough.’

  Gardeners? I thought. More than one? And as I looked about, I understood why, for the garden was vast. No need to look out toward Cheapside, when you had this refuge at the back of the house. There were large trees established many years, giving grateful shade, an ornamental knot garden planted with herbs (the enclosing low hedges must require constant pruning), a wide lawn laid out for bowls, and an orchard of fruit trees. Beyond the orchard a hedge discreetly concealed what I expected was the kitchen garden. Ruy Lopez had a large garden behind his house, but it was not as elegant as this. The orchard trees here were heavy with fruit, but I did not venture close enough to see whether they had been affected by the drought. Beside the orchard I could see the low brick wall surrounding a private well.

  So the gardeners watered twice a day. I thought of the many London poor who could not even afford small ale and must risk their lives drinking tainted water. How much they would benefit from access to a well of pure water which was being lavished on plants, which would have benefited equally from river water.

  ‘This way,’ Mistress Dolesby said, tripping neatly across the end of the bowling lawn to an arbour the size of a small cottage.

  Like the modest arbour at the Green Dragon, this was smothered in roses, which were flourishing this year, but it was also framed by two apricot trees in large glazed earthenware pots and a host of other flowering plants. Within the shady arbour was a marble table and some beautifully carved oak chairs which could not possibly live permanently outdoors. The servants, I supposed, must carry them in and out every day.

  The maidservant set out delicate Venetian glasses and a jug filled with a golden wine. There were a dozen plates of tiny cakes and biscuits, ornamented with strawberries nestling in their leaves and with some variety of rare early apples carved into the shape of roses. My mouth began to water and I sat on my hands to stop myself reaching for the food. I had not eaten that day.

  I made polite responses when I was addressed, but most of the conversation was between Mistress Dolesby and Dr Nuñez. With the heat and the wine and the food, not to mention a rather dull conversation, I was beginning to find difficulty in keeping my eyes open, until Mistress Dolesby’s three children were brought out into the garden to be inspected. There were two little girls of eight and six, and a sturdy little boy of four. To be quite honest, he was more than sturdy. He was fat.

  After Mistress Dolesby had praised her ‘little angels’ and Dr Nuñez had politely seconded her, I roused myself enough to examine them properly. All three had complexions the colour of uncooked pastry, the girls looked cross, the boy about as lively as a cow chewing the cud.

  I ventured to speak. ‘The children are too warmly dressed for this weather, Mistress,’ I said, determined to be bold and establish my authority here. ‘Have they nothing to wear in lightweight linen? And I suspect that they spend most of their time indoors, do they not?’

  ‘Indeed.’ She smiled complacently. ‘The girls at their needlework, little Jonathan with his tutor.’

  I shook my head firmly. ‘Not in this weather. Their humours will become unbalanced.’

  This woman would possess no knowledge of medicine and health beyond the most simplistic popular theories. I would use that as my reason.

  ‘I must insist, for their health’s sake,’ I continued firmly, ‘that while this intolerable weather continues, they should wear cool garments only and spend most of the daylight hours out of doors in the fresh air, not cooped up indoors like hothouse plants. You have this beautiful garden – let them play out here.’

  She looked at me in astonishment. ‘But my girls will turn quite brown, like peasants!’

  ‘Let them wear straw hats,’ I said. ‘I am sure the girls will have the good sense to stay out of the heat. It is shady here in the arbour, and there, under the trees. Even in the orchard. And they can keep a watch on their little brother. I am sure he needs to run about more.’

  I was being as tactful as possible. I did not point out that the child was already developing a double chin, like a prosperous burgher in his middle years.

  It was clear that I was not to be believed on my own account.

  ‘What do you think, Dr Nuñez?’ she said, casting a dubious look in my direction.

>   ‘My dear Mistress Dolesby,’ he said, taking her hand to emphasise his point, ‘Dr Alvarez is well known as especially gifted in the treatment of children. Perhaps you have not heard? He has just returned from Muscovy where he physicked not only the daughter of the most powerful man in the country, Boris Godunov, but the younger brother of the Tsar and heir to the throne, Prince Dmitri. You will be exceptionally fortunate, and the envy of all your friends, to be able to say that your children are in the care of a royal physician.’

  He made no mention of Dmitri’s murder, nor that I had left Muscovy fleeing for my life. However, this speech clearly impressed the lady and she looked at me with quite a different expression in her eyes.

  ‘Very well,’ she said, ‘if that is Dr Alvarez’s advice. Bet, take the children inside and dress them as the doctor suggests, then bring them out to play in the garden.’

  Her tongue stumbled a little over the word ‘play’, as if it were a concept with which she was unfamiliar. However, the two little girls gave me such looks of intense gratitude that I could not forebear smiling back.

  As it proved, our visits to the other households followed much the same pattern. We encountered only one of the husbands. On the afternoon when we visited one of the other goldsmith’s households, Master Eastfield himself received us, his wife being prostrate with the heat. It seemed that word of my royal connections had now gone before me, for gossip flows through London like streams through a meadow.

  ‘Heard you advise that the children should be out in the garden during this summer weather,’ he said briskly. ‘No time for idleness myself, but see no harm in it for the young. Still remember my time as a lad. Used to steal away from my tutor when I could and go fishing in the river, or rabbiting in Finsbury Fields.’

  He laughed and rubbed his hands together. I found I liked him, despite the ostentation of his home and the array of rings on his fingers.

  All this augured well for my acceptance amongst Dr Nuñez’s patients. From my observations, however, they seemed on the whole to be strong and healthy, and so unlikely to provide me with much income, were I to think of them as a replacement for my hospital work. My only requirement as a physician on these first visits was a visit to Mistress Eastfield, laid so low by the heat. As she was tightly laced into a bodice much too small for her buxom form, I prescribed a loose gown and supplied a lotion of witch-hazel to bathe her face and hands.

  ‘No heavy wines while this heat lasts,’ I said. ‘Only small ale. And I will explain to your cook how to make a cooling drink from berries. You will find it refreshing and wholesome.’

  The idea of wholesome fare seemed to puzzle her somewhat, for to these merchant families, rising in importance and sometimes marrying into the gentry, food and drink was a weapon of social prestige. However, when I called on her the following day, she was quite recovered and truly grateful.

  ‘I have suffered with such terrible headaches, Dr Alvarez,’ she said, ‘ever since this heat began. Today is the first time I have been free of them.’

  I provided her with tonic of feverfew, to be taken as soon as she felt the first sign of another such headache. It is but an old wives’ remedy, but very efficacious. I named the fee recommended by Dr Nuñez, which seemed exorbitant to me for so little physicking, but she paid it happily, instructing her steward to remunerate me in coin at once. This was a relief, for I feared I might need to send in a bill and wait a long time for payment. The money would add to my small hoard which I counted over every night, wondering how long it would last.

  When I mentioned to Dr Nuñez that I had been paid at once, he smiled.

  ‘Not all of my patients are so obliging, Kit, but I know you are in no position to wait for payment. I have selected those I know will not be dilatory.’

  ‘But . . . you are keeping for yourself the neglectful?’

  ‘I have a comfortable cushion of coin in my business interests,’ he said. ‘They all pay in the end. I would not continue to physic any who failed to pay their just accounts.’

  ‘Don your best doublet and hose,’ Simon said, catching me on the stairs of our lodgings that afternoon. ‘You are bid to dinner at the Green Dragon.’

  I had been sitting, idle and gloomy, in my room since returning from Dr Nuñez, until Rikki demanded a walk. Now I was plodding back upstairs, wondering how I could occupy myself for the rest of the day.

  ‘Again?’ I said in astonishment. ‘I have recounted all my adventures. There is no more to tell. Master Burbage has no need to pay me for entertainment in kind.’

  ‘It is not Master Burbage who invites you,’ he said, his eyes gleaming. ‘It is the Lord Chamberlain, Lord Hunsdon himself.’

  ‘Do no be foolish, Simon. Lord Hunsdon does not know me, has never heard of me. Why should he invite me to dine?’

  I protested loudly, though one corner of my mind considered that he might have heard of me. My work for Sir Francis was not unknown to some of the high officials of the Court. Besides, he might have interests in the Muscovy Company.

  ‘Well, he has not exactly invited you personally,’ Simon admitted, ‘but he has invited the entire company, and Master Burbage told me to include you.’

  ‘That was kind of him,’ I said, a little stiffly.

  I could recognise charity when I saw it. I had only once been a temporary member of the company, when their performance was used as cover for me. It had enabled me to come close to an assassin bent on making an attempt on the Queen’s life, an attempt which Phelippes knew was to take place during the Twelfth Night Revels. Still, it was kind of Master Burbage, to ensure me another good meal. I must make better use of it this time.

  ‘Hurry,’ Simon said impatiently, following me into my room.

  I peeled off my physician’s gown, which became more intolerable every day that the heat continued.

  ‘I am wearing my best doublet and hose,’ I objected. ‘I have been visiting one of my new patients.’

  ‘Very well. Come, then. You need not bring that battered old satchel.’

  I suppose my medicine satchel did look somewhat battered, for I had owned it ever since I had begun working with my father and it had seen some rough usage, especially in the last year.

  ‘I am sorry if it embarrasses you,’ I said with a grim smile, ‘but I go nowhere without it. You know that.’

  ‘Oh, very well. But try to keep it out of sight.’

  ‘What about Rikki?’ I had taken him with me to see Dr Nuñez earlier and since we had returned from his walk he was pushing his empty dish along the floor in a rather pointed manner.

  ‘You will need to leave him behind. He won’t mind staying here.’

  ‘I suppose not.’ I broke up some stale bread into Rikki’s dish and added the last of some meat broth which was to have been my frugal supper. He fell on it eagerly. I feared he was missing the ample meals he enjoyed during my year away, supplied by Tom Read from the hospital kitchens.

  Leaving Rikki in my room, we clattered down the stairs and were soon hurrying across the Bridge, heading north for Bishopsgate Street.

  ‘Why is Lord Hunsdon entertaining the players to dinner?’ I asked. ‘Is he still hoping to persuade Master Burbage to leave the patronage of Lord Strange?’

  Simon shrugged. ‘Who can say? Master Burbage would not wish to offend Lord Strange. Perhaps Lord Hunsdon has not taken his measure yet.’

  When we reached the Green Dragon, we saw that far more sumptuous preparations had been made for this dinner. An awning had been erected in the garden and a large table laid out with starched white table linen. The glasses were as fine as those at Mistress Dolesby’s house, and I wondered whether the inn owned them, bringing them out for very distinguished guests, or whether they had been obliged to borrow them. Instead of benches and stools, cushioned chairs had been arranged around the table. Bowls of scented herbs and rose petals were placed amongst the fine dishes, which included finger bowls of cool water garnished with mint and lemon slices for the guests to rinse gre
asy fingers. I realised that Simon was right. My rubbed and stained satchel was grossly out of place, so I hid it down at the side of the arbour.

  Most of the players were already here, clustered in a nervous group in the garden, although Master Burbage remained at the door of the inn to greet the Lord Chamberlain. I saw the new man, Stoker, lurking furtively at the back of the group. It seemed he was hardly welcome amongst them. As I joined the players I greeted Master Wandesford, who was wiping his face with a large silk handkerchief, looking rather drawn. He staggered and put out a hand against a stunted apple tree to steady himself. I noticed that the pupils of his eyes were much enlarged.

  ‘Are you quite well?’ I said.

  He was having difficulty breathing and seemed to be sweating more even than the heat of the day warranted. He shook his head.

  ‘This heat disagrees with me. My stomach has troubled me all this week past and I am in no mood for a vast meal, but Master Burbage felt we should be here, everyone, to show courtesy to Lord Hunsdon. I have felt dizzy and drowsy too. And my sight has been blurred, so that I have had difficulty copying the players’ parts. I hope I may not disgrace you all by falling asleep at table.’

  His speech was somewhat slurred, unusual in a man who drank little, and he ran his tongue over dry, cracked lips.

  ‘It may be the weather,’ I said sympathetically, ‘or it may be that you have eaten something tainted by the heat. If you wish, I will visit you tomorrow and we will see what can be done to relieve you.’