Dirtnap - The Black Death Pt. 03

Sir John Lovekyn stood at the one window in his office. A neglected report on the number and disposition of ships in London's waters taunted him from where it lay on his desk. He turned his head to gaze out over the waters running below London Bridge. Part of him pined for the days when he was just a successful fishmonger.

Now he was Wardon of London Bridge, Mayor of London, and one of the city's two Aldermanic representatives in the parliament. Not that he hadn't been prepared or willing to take on the responsibilities of these positions. He had simply never quite believed that matters would descend to such a dire state. Nor had he ever imagined that so many catastrophic events might pile up during this most unfortunate time.

Since the devastating quake in Northern Italy back in January, the small folk (and many not-so-small folk) had grown more and more knee-jerk in their superstitious reactions. Every misfortune from drought to hangnail was held up as a sign of God's wrath. And all this with the king away at war in France. John couldn't decide if that absence was another misfortune or a stroke of good luck in disguise. Would the king's presence help, or hinder England's battle with the Mortality?

Of course, these were not ideas he would dream of speaking aloud.

Lovekyn frowned at the sound of footfalls approaching his door. He gazed out over the waters a moment longer. Looking only there, and being upwind of the pyres of the city, one could almost remember when such a day would be enjoyed, or taken for granted. With that thought, he turned and stepped behind his desk.

"Come." he barked, just as the first knock sounded.

There was a pause, then the door opened. One of the guards from downstairs -- he disremembered the man's name -- stepped in. A length of rope trailed from one of the man's fists back through the doorway.

"Lord Mayor..." the guardsman began slowly.

"Yes? Out with it, man. I've a lot of unpleasant business to attend." John replied brusquely.

"Er, it's this one, Lord Mayor." the guardsman gave the rope a tug and stepped further into the office.

Another, less well kempt figure stumbled in, holding his bound wrists before him. The fellow wore an expression of sheepish bewilderment.

"Some people herded him right over to me. Waving brooms and switches and a trowel." the guardsman began.

"A trowel?"

"Aye, well, one of the shops was having some masonry repaired. Seems when the mob gathered nearby, the mason felt oblig- Obligatate- Felt like he ought to pitch in. You'd think 'not much of a weapon, a trowel,; but he was dead accurate with a lump of mortar."

Now that he mentioned it, Lovekyn noticed particles of grainy grey matter still clinging to the man's beard and one shoulder.

"Fine," he allowed grudgingly, "What's he done? Tipped some nadger off the bridge? Stabbed a body for their coin purse?"

"No, m'Lord. They say he busted into the public privy. Threw some old bint out on her arse. Er, bum."

Lovekyn stared.

"She was in quite a state, I can tell you."

Lovekyn tried to remember where he had put his scepter of office. It had a well-anchored brass knob on the end, as he recalled."

"Remind me of your name, lad."

"Barker, m'Lord."

"Does this not belong to a tithing, Barker?" Lovekyn waved, indicating the bound fellow. "Do they no longer hold trials in the city?"

"Ah, well, yes, mostly, m'Lord. But you see, a man from this fellow's tithing was there in the mob. And he said that they're from Cordwainer, so I should just take this feller to stand before you, m'Lord."

Lovekyn slowly leaned forward, placing his fists knuckle down on the desktop. He fixed Barker with a piercing glare. When this failed to set the guardsman on fire, he reluctantly gave conversation another try.

"Barker, I want you to pretend for a moment that I am not you."

"But m'Lord, you're not-"

"And," Lovekyn carried on, ignoring the guardsman, "I want you to pretend that I have many things about which to think. None of them privy related."

He paused. Barker stood, quietly blinking.

"What has this man being from Cordwainer got to do with him being brought to stand before me, Barker, you bipedal side of mutton?" Lovekyn spoke quickly and quietly.

"Oh. Well, they've got Lord Rubbery acting as steward -- judge, you know, down to Cordwainer. But they was doing the trials in his Hall. And now people don't want to gather-"

"Except in mobs for to cause me distraction." Lovekyn grumbled.

"M'Lord?"

"Nevermind. Go on."

"Well, they especially don't want to gather at Rubbery Hall since old Rubbery chinked up every bolthole with sick folk."

"Ah." Lovekyn dropped his gaze to his desktop.

It wasn't as if he could blame them. What the Hell was anyone doing using a public privy at this point, anyway?

"Right," he looked up to glare at the bound privy-crasher, "And what do you have to say for yourself?"

"I was in a bad way, Lord. Do ye know the sweetmeat stall down the way? Run by that cross-eyed blighter?"

Recognition dawned in the Lord Mayor, triggering a shudder.

"Stop. Nevermind." Lovekyn stood and held up a hand to forestall any further explanation. "Barker, take him back and announce for the mob that judgment has been passed. Acquire a strap or switch and give this fellow ten lashes across the buttocks. As reminder never again to-" he failed to formulate an efficient description of the situation, and settled for: "-waste my time."

"Shall I take down his trousers first, m'Lord?" Barker asked dutifully.

Lovekyn's expression curdled.

"You'd be a braver soul than I." he muttered.

"M'Lord?"

"I'll leave the details to you, Barker. Be off now."

"Yes, m'Lord. Let's go you." Barker turned and hustled his captive out, pulling the door closed behind him.

Lovekyn settled into his chair and stared into the middle distance for a time. After a couple of very restful minutes the sounds from below the bridge brought him back to the present. Standing and moving to the window again, he saw that the present was approaching five'o'clock. Almost time for that meeting. Just as well. He was getting nowhere mulling over one hopeless report after another. Perhaps one of the others would have some useful advice.

* * *

Felix winced, bracing for the ear splitting shriek. Then arched an eyebrow. There was a hollow, muted quality to the cry, which turned out to be nowhere near as loud as expected. As the woman rose from the bed, she ceased shrieking and instead launched a rapid fire verbal assault. Felix was distracted by the way the orange-y light from the window seemed to cut through the woman's heavy figure.

As she moved closer, gesticulating and challenging Felix's presence, she cast no shadow. And as she drew close and thrust her hands at his chest, perhaps hoping to bulldoze him back to the front door, it became apparent that her form was about as solid as fog.

The white haired matron seemed not to notice when her hands faded and coalesced again. Felix was intrigued enough to allow her to carry on until she lost steam and her indignant tirade sputtered out. Clearly, she didn't know she was dead. He wondered if there were some sort of circular logic that kept her from questioning the strange inconsistencies of her existence.

"Madame." he said at last, raising his gloved hands in a placating gesture.

When she settled back on her heels to glare suspiciously, Felix reached up and undid the clasps holding his mask in place. Lowering it, he blinked and took a deep breath of stale but blessedly cool air. He hadn't realized how stifling the mask had become. He ran his free hand through his short black hair and attempted a reassuring smile.

"Did you hear a word I just said?" the woman demanded, un-mollified.

Well, he had never been much good at pulling off reassuring. He suppressed the urge to voice any number of satisfying, but probably counterproductive observations.

"Forgive me," he began instead, on the principle that asking forgiveness tends to give others the idea that they have the upper hand. And people tend to be in less of a hurry when they feel they have the upper hand.

"I am a surgeon. My name is Felix Lupino. I arrived in the city only today, and was granted a key to this cottage by Lord Rubbery."

The woman harrumphed impressively, cocking her arms out with hands on hips.

"I'm sure I don't know except that Lord Rubbery is confused. This is our home, Mister Surgeon. We pay our rent."

"Perhaps that is the explanation," Felix agreed amiably. "Perhaps Lord Rubbery is confused. I should be on my way back to ask for a different key."

He began to turn, then stopped.

"But before I go, Madame...?" he prompted.

"Weissberger. Hilda Weissberger. And it's Mrs." she supplied grudgingly.

"Ah. Mrs. Weissberger, have you noticed anything you might call distressing?"

"Compared to what?" she asked.

"A terrible plague claiming hundreds of lives in this very city, for example?"

She eyed him with a new kind of distaste.

"What sort of thing is that to say? Do they not pay a surgeon enough, that you would wish ill on the peoples?" she accused.

"Indeed." he was intrigued again. "Perhaps you would humor me, Mrs. Weissberger. It will only take a moment."

Felix turned and moved alongside Caesar where the latter stood dozing in the middle of the main room. He retrieved a leather tool roll from a saddlebag and unrolled it long enough to pick out a slender copper probe. Holding the handle between his teeth, he quickly tucked the leather roll and his mask into the saddlebag. Taking the probe in hand, he again utilized his teeth -- this time to pull off his glove.

"What in-? Hold on just a moment! I don't care who you are, you can't bring that beast in here!" Weissberger complained, having followed him.

"He've quite wew behafe." Felix turned, glove still held in his teeth. "An' no feev. I shaw chew i' m'shef."

This gave Mrs. Weissberger some pause. Felix took the opportunity to raise his empty hand palm out and jab the tip of the probe into it. He further rubbed the tip of a finger over the end of the probe to illustrate it's harmlessness.

"And now, if you would-"

"Out!" Hilda cut him off, raising the considerable mass (or ghostly impression thereof) of one arm to point the way to the door.

"Good enough." Felix observed, letting the glove drop from his mouth.

Felix struck quickly, whipping the probe down on a trajectory to bisect Mrs. Weissberger's outstretched arm. Which, to her disbelief, it did. The semi-translucent stuff of her being and the probe seemed entirely unaffected by one another. Meeting no perceptible resistance, the probe arced down toward the floor. Felix shifted one foot to keep himself from stumbling forward.

Hilda stood, gaping in shock, while Felix righted himself, cleared his throat, and returned the probe to it's proper place. He made a mental note that he should sterilize all his tools when he was finally unpacked, despite knowing it for the gesture it was. It wasn't as if he might forget. Long years of disciplined practice had left such tasks no less reflexive than dressing himself or eating a meal.

After bending to retrieve his glove, he checked how the late Mrs. Weissberger was faring. She had lowered her arm, but was still regarding it with a pained expression.

"You did see what you think you saw."

Mrs. Weissberger had visible difficulty pulling her attention away from her arm. As she finally succeeded, Felix could see that she was trying very hard to lock a particular door inside her head. Trying to deny her way back to a place where things made sense and she could go back to being self assured and righteously indignant.

"No," Felix continued, "better if I don't have to demonstrate again. Just listen. It would not be boastful to say that I am the most knowledgeable doctor or surgeon in what is left of this city. In that capacity, it is my considered position that you are the unwitting subject of a singular condition."

He paused and judged her reaction. Fear and anger aside, she appeared to be following.

"I'm afraid, Mrs. Weissberger, that you are quite dead. I suspect this has been the case for some time."

Unsurprisingly, the late Mrs. Weissberger was having some trouble with, well, everything. Still, if she was wrestling with it, then she was less securely mired in denial than he had expected. She must have some unfinished business. That would be the key to helping her along to wherever she was bound after leaving the world of the living.

All in due time. Turning back to Caesar, Felix began unpacking. He'd need a long table in case actual surgery was needful. A couple of chairs. Alcohol. Iodine if possible. And... No, a bathtub was probably too much to hope for. He'd have to make due with a half barrel, or pay a carpenter to knock something together.

When he had finished carefully offloading his traveling apothecary cabinet and turned his attention to studying the room, he realized that the ghostly house frau was addressing him again.

"Pardon me?"

Hilda gripped the edges of her apron and glared.

"What are you doing?" she bit off each word.

"Ah. I'm moving in."

"I am-" she began to object.

"A ghost, for want of a better term." Felix interrupted. "And this place suits me. I'm afraid you'll find the law is rather one-sided in favor of the living."

Hilda endeavored to glare harder.

"Of course, you could take it up with Lord Rubbery. Provided you can leave this cottage." he trailed off.

Hilda's eyes flicked to the door. Cold doubt rose in her, and, like a child unable to resist a challenge, she figuratively squared herself and strode purposefully to the threshold. She pulled the door open.

She tried to pull the door open. Still trying not to accept the truth, she tried a second time, watching as her hand failed to interact with the handle. Trying to remember the last time she had gone outside, another unpleasant truth surfaced. Her sense of time and it's passage had become terribly vague and disjointed.

What had happened a week, a month, or a year ago? She could remember dear simple Vetimer, her husband. When had she last seen him? Or cooked his favorite -- cod stew with drippings on toast? Or cooked anything. Or... eaten anything.

Eventually she turned away from the door. Her head was bowed and she worried the fingers of one hand in the other. A hitch in her shoulders was followed by a quiet sob and a world class sniff.

Felix, who had been leaning on Caesar and watching, gave a sigh.

"Don't take it so hard. Happens to everyone, sooner or later. Given, most don't hang about afterward. Come to that, I am surprised Death didn't send someone round to collect you." He had started out sounding sympathetic, but by this point seemed to be thinking aloud.

"It would make sense if you had passed recently. With the toll this plague is taking... I wonder if they've ever dealt with such a rapid and widespread turnover. But you were already-"

Another loud sniff interrupted his musings.

"Forgive me. Mrs. Weissberger, please, come. Have a seat."

He dragged over the single chair and dusted the seat off with his hand. As she shuffled over, he watched attentively. She sat. She failed to pass through the chair, as one might have expected.

"Inconsistent overlap with this plane... Or will and expectation effect reality in the Ether?" He began muttering, then caught himself.

Dropping into a squat before the distraught spirit, he affected a soothing tone.

"Don't despair just yet. Doubtless there is some reason for your remaining here. Likewise, I'm sure means exist to see you on your way to Heaven... Or wherever. While I'm here, I shall help you as I can to unravel these mysteries."

Wiping at phantasmal tears, Mrs. Weissberger regarded him with doubt, but also with some measure of hope.

"You?"

"Me. I am more qualified than you know. And in the meantime, you may be of some help to me as well."

* * *

The room over John Lovekyn's fish stall was hardly an ample space for six people. They crowded around a trestle table previously used for processing fish, which John had conscientiously draped with a sheet of old canvas. He sat on an upended barrel of salted herring, having welcomed his guests to all the chairs and stools in the place.

After observing etiquette with a perfunctory toast to God, King Edward, and each other's continued health, the gathered set aside formalities. Though their number included one knight, two Barons, and one Countess, they mostly called each other by name alone.

"I hear another ship has come in. More French." Lady Anne Stockridge observed, apropos nothing. She sniffed disapproval.

"They're being herded into quarantine off the Southern point with the others." This was John Tramwick, sitting far enough back to avoid touching the table in any way. Tall and thin to the point of emaciation, his obssessive fastidiousness was infamous. His presence owed to his family having paid to nullify his conscription. While several elder family members were away at war, he sat as de facto Baron of Epsom. More importantly, he controlled his family's influence and wealth.

Across the table, William Clovis thumped his cup down, empty. He wiped his great red mustache with the back of a sleeve.

"They bring anything of value? And can we... confiscate it? For the safety of all, of course." He spoke very clearly and intelligently, belying the sort of impression his bear like appearance often gave.

Between Clovis and Lovekyn sat Andrew Aubry. The actual Alderman for Cordwainer, he had become distant since his wife had fallen to the plague. He murmured unintelligibly, absently staring into his cup. Lovekyn spared Aubry a glance before speaking.

"Food stuffs would be fine. Small folk carry on crowding in from the countryside. More mouths to feed and less harvest being brought in by the day."

At the foot of the table, across from Lovekyn, Timothy Westmarch peaked over the rim of his cup. He seemed content to hold it up in front of his face as if hiding behind it. None of the others took notice. In fact, they rarely acknowledged his presence unless to suggest he refill their cups or light a new candle. Similar to Tramwick, Timothy's fresh Baronial position came courtesy of losses in his family -- which in turn came courtesy of the war and the Black Death.

It was in Timothy's genes to inherit, but it was not in his genes, among other things*, to Lord. His facial features suggested that many of his forebears had, at some point, been very close in both relation and proximity. He tended to put people in mind of an overwrought chihuahua, bug-eyes and all.

{*These other things included standing in the face of a stiff breeze, speaking more than ten words without tripping over his own teeth, and actually having a chin.}

Lovekyn sometimes good-naturedly encouraged 'Little Timmy,' and it was probably this encouragment which gave him the fleeting confidence to speak up.

"Ehh... C-could not the food shtuffsh be... er... tainted?"

Four pairs of eyes turned on him. Alderman Aubry's gaze remained aimed into his cup.

"To ensure detection of any hint of the Great Mortality is the whole point of quarantine." Tramwick pointed out.

"Hmm," Clovis growled thoughtfully, "I'm for taking what we can -- for the city's sake, but it would be just like those trufflemongers to bring plague with them."

A ponderful silence would have fallen, if not for Clovis sliding his cup down toward the young Lord Westmarch and tapping it upon the tabletop. Timothy poured from a clay jug. Upon offering around, he was waved off by Tramwick and Lovekyn, ignored by the Countess, and went totally unnoticed by Aubry.

At length, Lady Stockridge broke the silence.

"Does it truly require forty days to reveal if there be plague on a ship?"