Here There Be Dragonnes

by Mary Brown

  Hot baths, clothes washed, expensive surroundings—I hoped to God my purse would cover the cost! And where were the other guests? True, there was a third place laid at the table: we should have to wait and see. I must discuss terms with the cheerful landlord as soon as possible. I finished my broth and the bowl was whipped away, to be replaced by steaming venison-and-hare pasties, the juice soaking into the bread platter beneath. A pewter goblet of wine appeared at my elbow as I leaned over to cut Gill's pasty and guide his fingers.

  "May I join you?" It was our host, changed into a crimson wool robe and a white undershirt, his feet in rabbit's-wool slippers. He should never wear that shade of red with his color hair, I thought abstractedly, even as I welcomed and thanked him for his excellent hospitality. I had better tackle him straightaway, I thought, even as fruit tarts and cheese were placed on the table. He gave me the opening I needed. "I trust everything is to your satisfaction?"

  "Everything is just fine, sir, and we are most grateful, but I am afraid we cannot afford—"

  He frowned, then smiled. "I had forgot. Perhaps I had better explain. That notice, so helpfully cloaked by the snow, does not read 'Martlet and Swan', but rather 'Matthew Spicer, Merchant.' The inn is two roads away, I'm afraid, but the natural mistake has given me the opportunity to enjoy your company. As my guests, naturally, so no more talk of money, little lady!"

  Chapter Fifteen

  Those weeks we spent in Matthew's house were like another world to me. Not only were we cosseted, fed, warm, entertained and cared for—we were safe. We had only been on the road some seven weeks or so, and yet it seemed to me that I had spent an eternity footsore, usually hungry and cold and always anxious. Not anxious for myself so much as the others. And to have that burden of responsibility taken, however temporarily, from my shoulders was like shucking off a load of wood I had carried, and immediately feeling I could bounce as high as the trees.

  My mother had taught me a trick when I was little; lean hard against a wall, pressing one arm and shoulder as tight as I could. Count to a hundred then stand away from the wall. Your arm rises up of its own accord, like magic! I felt like that released arm.

  Of course on that first evening there was a lot of explaining to do. At first I had felt like grabbing Gill's arm and rushing out into the night, so embarrassed was I at mistaking a rich merchant's house for an inn, but our host soon made us feel at home.

  "A natural mistake, little lady, in all that confusing snow! And what would you have done in my place? Confronted by a damsel in distress, what could any Christian do but take her and her brother in?" He chuckled. "Besides, the servants tell me it is getting thicker by the moment out there. Six inches settled already, and by morning it will be two or three feet. No, it was Providence that brought you to my door, I'm convinced, and Preference will keep you here! But of course," he added hastily, "if after a while you tire of my hospitality, you are perfectly free to go elsewhere."

  "But we cannot impose on you like this! You must allow me to—"

  "Now you're not going to spoil our new acquaintanceship by talking about money, I hope! Money is one thing I don't need. Companionship I do. As a widower without family I find I do not make friends easily, and strangers such as yourselves will give me an interest to take me out of my usual dull routine. So, you will be doing me the favor by staying for a while. . . . Ah, mulled ale! Just what we need."

  It was piping hot, redolent with cloves, cinnamon and ginger. I stretched out towards the fire, dazed with heat and food and drink. I hadn't felt as good as far back as I could remember—in fact since before my mother died, when we had stoked up the fire, told stories and eaten honey cakes, while the wolf wind of winter had howled down the chimney and keened under the door, making the sparks at the back of the chimney glow into patterns among the soot.

  "Perhaps for a day or two, then . . ." I said weakly. He had sounded as though he meant it.

  Gill was seized with a fit of coughing and clenched his fist against his chest with a look of pain. I leaned over and rubbed his back but the merchant went into action at once.

  "Time we got your brother to bed. That cough sounds bad. Tomorrow we shall engage a doctor, snow or no snow."

  He led us up a winding stair to the next floor and pointed to the left. "That is the solar. And here . . ." to the right: "the bedroom."

  It was a lone, commodious chamber, strewn with rushes, hung with tapestries, dominated by a huge bed that would have slept six with ease. A huge fire burned in the hearth; candles were glimmering on a table by the fire and on two blanket chests against the walls. Two heavily carved chairs stood on either side of the fireplace and a series of hooks on one wall provided hanging space for clothes. Between the two shuttered windows was a small prie-dieu. A low archway at the far end was protected by a curtain.

  "For washing and the usual offices," said the merchant, following my gaze. "I shall show your brother. Come, sir," and he led him away.

  I moved over to the bed but let out a stifled gasp as I saw the covers move, and a moment or two afterwards a naked man and woman slipped from beneath the covers and unselfconsciously donned the clothes they had left on the floor. The woman bobbed a curtsy.

  "I believe the chill is off the sheets now, mistress, but a maid will be up in a minute or two to renew the hot bricks. . . ." and with that the pair of them disappeared downstairs, leaving me open-mouthed. What luxury! Was this the way it was done among the rich? Come to think of it, many times at night my mother had insisted I retire first "to warm up the bed for my old bones. . . ." A maid scurried in with hot bricks wrapped with flannel, which she exchanged for those that must have already cooled. The bed looked very inviting, piled high as it was with furs.

  The merchant came back with Gill, now shivering. "Into bed at once. Shall we put him on this side? No, I think it better if he is in the middle, then with you and me on either side he will keep warmer." He helped Gill under the covers and slipped into bed beside him. He nodded at the curtained recess. "Take a candle with you, little lady," and I headed for the garde-robe.

  When I returned another maid was handing Gill a posset; she waited till he drank it then snuffed all the candles but two slow burners, in case we needed to relieve ourselves during the night. She bobbed away, but I hesitated. I knew it was the custom for a host and his lady to share their bed with guests, but even in the ill-assorted places in which Gill and I had slept we had never shared a pallet. In the open we had slept with more intimacy, but the animals had been there too. . . .

  Matthew Spicer propped himself on his elbow. "Something the matter?"

  "Er . . . No. That is . . . I think I'll just stay here by the fire for a while. I—I'm really not tired—"

  "Nonsense, young lady! You've been yawning and blinking for the past two hours!" He scrambled out of bed and came over to me, the long night-shift flapping round his ankles. "It's something I've done, isn't it? Or not done . . . Tell me." For a successful merchant, he had the least self-confidence I had ever seen. But perhaps women made him nervous. Mama had always said that men like that were a pain to begin with but sometimes made the best lovers. Eventually.

  "No, no! You've been kindness itself. It's just that—" I glanced over to the bed: Gill was snoring softly. "You see, even at home I never shared a bed with my brother, and on our travels I slept separately also. I have never shared sleeping space with a man. Perhaps I'm being silly, but—"

  He struck his forehead with the palm of his hand. "Of course, of course! Being a widower I don't have someone to remind me of the niceties. Come to think of it, if we had people staying overnight they were always married couples who shared. Since then all my guests have been men. Do forgive me! I shall have a pallet made up for you immediately. I—Whatever in the world is that?"

  "That" was Growch.

  He must have escaped from the stables and somehow infiltrated into the kitchen, for in his mouth was a large piece of pastry. He was soaking wet and smelled like a midden, but he r
ushed to my side and sat on my feet, growling softly through the pasty, his eyes swiveling from me to the merchant, the servants who were in pursuit, and back again.

  He "spoke" through his full mouth. "Found you! What's goin' on then?"

  "Nothing is 'going on'! You've no right up here! Why couldn't you stay where you were put?" To Master Spicer: "I'm sorry. It's my—our dog. I left him in the stables, but he's been spoiled, I'm afraid, and is not used to being on his own." To Growch I added furiously: "Just get back to the stables right now, and behave yourself!"

  "No way! Needs lookin' after, you does. . . ." He belched, having swallowed the pastry whole. "My place is with you." I could see him eyeing the fire greedily. "Never tell what mischief you'll get into without me. No, here I am, and here I'll stay." He looked up at me through his tangle of hair. "Send me back down there again and I'll howl all night, full strength. Keep yer all awake . . . Promise!"

  I turned to the merchant apologetically—my exchange with Growch had taken no more than a couple of silent seconds. "I'm sorry if he has been a nuisance. May he stay up here for tonight? I'll—I'll make some other arrangement tomorrow."

  He considered. "I have no objection, though in the morning he might reconsider his decision. I happen to share the house with a rather large cat. . . ." He smiled. "Saffron will sort him out. In the meantime he could do with a bath. While they make up your bed."

  No sooner said than done. Up came a large tub, in went Growch, and by the time his outraged grumbles had subsided, the bed was made up and he was clean and combed—probably for the first time in his short life. In the meanwhile Matthew Spicer sent for more wine and little spiced biscuits and we sat by the fire together. He didn't ask any questions, but I decided I had better tell him our names and our story. Not the real one of course: I used the one I had told everyone so far, but this time I killed off our parents and for some reason didn't mention my "affianced," or the dowry.

  "You have had a hard time, Mistress Somerdai. That is a pretty name, by the way: most unusual. If I may say so, it suits you. . . . I see your bed is made up. We shall talk further in the morning."

  Shyly I knelt before the prie-dieu to give hearty thanks for the temporary haven we had found, then cuddled down in the pallet by the fire. I lay awake for a while, tired though I was, listening to the gentle contrapuntal snores from the bed, and the occasional stifled cough from Gill. There was a soft flumph! from outside as a load of snow slid off the roof to the yard below. The fire crackled pleasantly but there was another, less endearing sound: Growch was scratching his ears, flap-flap-flap, and snorting into his coat as he chased fleas made lively by the heat. It seemed a bath wasn't enough.

  I raised myself on one elbow, my head swimming with the need for sleep. By the light from the night-candle and the fire I could see that my scrawny little black dog was black no longer. He looked half as big again, now his cleaned coat had fluffed out—though nothing could lengthen those diminutive legs—and he was not only black, but tan and brown and grey and ginger and white also.

  He sneezed six times.

  "Can't you stop that?"

  He glared at me from under a fuzzy fringe. "Sneeze or scratch?"

  "Both."

  "Listen 'ere . . . Never mind. All I can say is, if'n you 'ad these little buggers chasin' around, you'd scratch."

  "You wanted to be beside the fire! And don't pretend it was all concern for my welfare, 'cos it wasn't! Anyway, why the sneezing? Caught a chill from the unexpected bath?"

  "Nar . . . Stuff they washed me in: smell like an effin' whore, I do."

  * * *

  In the morning Gill was definitely worse, tossing and turning in a fever, his cough hard and painful. Matthew Spicer shook his head. "He needs treatment right away." He flung open the shutters: snow was still falling. He closed them again, and shook his head. "Don't worry; one of the servants will get through."

  Up and dressed—my clothes returned clean, mended, pressed—I slipped across the cleared yard to the stables. The others were fine; Mistral had been given fresh hay, Basher was still asleep, and I found grain in the bins for Traveler. The Wimperling's nose peeped out from a nest he had made for himself.

  "Everything all right?"

  I told him about Gill, and the merchant sending for treatment.

  "Don't let him bleed the knight; he needs all his blood." I wondered what on earth he knew of doctoring, but let it pass. After all, he had been right before.

  "Are you hungry?"

  "A little grain will do. I've had a nibble of hay already."

  The "apothecary" arrived an hour or so later, in a litter. I don't know what I had expected, but it was certainly not the small, scrunched-up man with the brown skin, hooked nose and black eyes whose candle-lit shadow on the stairs was the first I saw of him. The stooping silhouette with the grotesque reaping-hook nose at first made me cross myself in superstitious fear, but face to face there was nothing to alarm, quite the reverse. The black eyes sparkled with a keen intelligence, the mouth curved easily into a smile and the thin, hunched shoulders and long, clever fingers emphasised everything he said: a shrug of the body, a wave of the hands more expressive than mere words. These he spoke with a heavily accented touch, at first a little difficult to follow.

  Matthew Spicer introduced him with pride. "My friend Suleiman, who comes from the East and specializes in many things, including medicine. We have worked together for many years. He has for a long time been my agent in Araby, but now he has been caught by the weather, providentially for us, I might add! I know of his healing powers and salves of old, and he has consented to treat your brother, Mistress Somerdai." He noted my expression of doubt—so did the visitor. "You couldn't do better, I assure you!"

  This was soon evident, at least in Suleiman's meticulous examination of Gill. The Arab first questioned his patient thoroughly, asking for all the symptoms, their duration and severity, before he even touched his body. Then he felt his forehead, looked in his eyes and ears with a little glass, put a spatula in his mouth and peered down his throat, then counted the pulse at his wrist.

  He glanced up at me. "Your brother has a high fever; to bring this down is our first priority, but first we must find the seat of it. I believe it is in the chest, and I shall now listen to this."

  "How?" I was by now too interested for politeness.

  "Watch." From the folds of his capacious red robes he brought forth a metal object shaped like a Madonna lily with a hollow, twisted stem. He held it out to me. "Copied from the horn of a rare antelope in the sands of the desert." He held a silver cup to Gill's mouth and asked him to cough, looking gravely at the sputum. "Too thick . . ." Then he placed the wide end of the metal object on Gill's chest, the thin end in his own ear, and listened intently. Repeating this on various parts of the knight's chest, he asked him to sit up and repeated the process on his back. He then beckoned to me. "Do as I did and listen; make sure the instrument is firmly against his chest."

  At first all I could hear was a shush-beat, shush-beat which I realized must be the heart, then as Gill breathed in there was a gurgling wheezy noise, as he breathed out a whistling bubble. Incredible!

  Master Suleiman took the instrument from me and held it to his own chest. "Listen to the difference. . . ." The steady heartbeat, somewhat slower, but no wheezing, no whistling. "You understand? Your brother has a deep infection in the lungs, hampering his breathing: it is almost as though he drowns in the ill humours that have gathered. So, we can only cure the fever by eradicating its cause: the lung infection. I shall return to my rooms and prepare certain medicines—"

  "You're not going to bleed him, then?" I blurted out, remembering what the Wimperling had said.

  He shot me a sharp glance from under dark brows. "Sounds as though you are no friend to leeches?"

  "A—a friend of mine . . . He says it takes away your strength."

  "Perfectly correct. I sometimes wish we had a method to pump blood in instead of taking it out." He l
ooked over at Gill, manfully trying to stifle another bout of coughing. "We'll soon ease that. . . . Keep my patient warm, no solid food, plenty of drinks. I shall prepare herbs to be steamed over water on a low boil, to soften the air he breathes in here. Please see the fire does not smoke too much. I shall also prepare an expectorant, a potion to reduce the fever and a sleeping draught."

  For once I didn't think of cost: whatever he needed, Gill must have. "Will . . . will he be all right?" I asked, hesitantly, fearfully.

  Suleiman glanced at me sympathetically. "I tell the truth. He is very ill, your brother. I have seen men die in his condition and I have seen them live. His advantages are his youth and strength—and, I hope, my medicines. And a prayer or two wouldn't come amiss."

  For three days my knight seemed to hover between life and death, but gradually the fever abated, his breathing grew easier and the coughing less painful. I did not leave his side save to tend the animals, relieve myself and wash. I even ate my meals by the bedside, though I have no memory of their content.

  Suleiman called twice a day, Master Spicer fussed and cosseted, the maids washed and dried the patient, gave him fresh linen and night clothes daily. I dozed in fits and starts on a stool by the bed, trying always to be ready for the turn of the sand-glass for the regular dosings, to see the fire was kept topped up, to be ready with cooling drinks and a damp sponge to wipe away the sweat.

  On the morning of the sixth day from our arrival Suleiman came in, examined his patient, then crossed the room and flung the shutters wide.