A Bridge in Time

by A Bridge in Time (retail) (epub)

  He would not go far. For the rest of the day he paid hurried visits to the other huts, checking up with Sydney and Dr Robertson about the progress of the disease and always hurrying back to Benjy’s. By afternoon Hannah seemed more peaceful and Tibbie remained wonderfully calm. When night fell, she told him with a smile, ‘She’s managed to feed the bairn. Kate suckled a wee bit so she must be getting better too. They’re both still purging, but not so violently. I’ve rubbed turpentine on their bellies to ease the cramps and it’s helped, I think. What’s happening out there?’

  He shook his head, not really wanting to tell her. ‘It’s bad. The town authorities have sent somebody up and they’ve decided it’s cholera. There’s no doubt any more. Robertson knew this morning but he tried to keep it quiet.’

  She put her hands over her mouth, ‘Oh God, cholera. That’s what killed all those folk in Edinburgh last year, wasn’t it?’

  He didn’t say yes or no but his harried eyes answered for him. ‘Folk can get better from cholera,’ he told her sharply. ‘Robertson doesn’t think Hannah has a bad case and like you said, she’s strong. Those that have died already weren’t as strong as her.’

  ‘How many have died?’ she asked.

  ‘Forty-two.’ His voice was bleak and she knew better than to show the horror that filled her. Cholera was cutting down the people in the camp like a harvester with a sharp scythe in a field of standing corn.

  When the day’s terrible toll was added up it transpired that Major Bob had been the first victim. Naughten and Panhandle followed her into death a short while later. By the time fifteen children of various ages, Squint Mary and Frying Pan and twenty-five others had also died, the Rosewell authorities were in a panic.

  ‘We’ve got to keep this quiet,’ said the Chief Magistrate to the Town Provost when the news was carried down to them in the Provost’s office on the first floor of the Corn Exchange.

  ‘It’ll kill trade in all the shops if it gets out. And there’s two big parties of tourists in town come to visit Sir Walter Scott’s house. If they hear about this, they’ll be out of Rosewell in half an hour and never come back,’ mourned the Provost.

  Dr Stewart, who was sitting in on their meeting, agreed heartily. ‘And we’ve got to make sure that none of our people get it, so we’ll have to seal off that camp.’

  Colonel Anstruther, as a major landowner, had been summoned to the meeting, as were Falconwood and the Duke of Allandale. When they heard the terrible news, the Duke asked, ‘How do you propose to confine the illness to the camp? People are coming and going all the time.’

  The Provost had the answer. ‘We’ll guard the gate. Nobody’ll be allowed out till the danger of infection’s past.’

  The Duke looked at Dr Stewart and asked, ‘How long is that likely to be?’

  The answer was a shrug. ‘In this weather, who knows? It’s always worse in humid conditions. The period of danger of infection could be two weeks, even if there were no more cases after today.’

  Anstruther leaned forward. ‘Two weeks? The men in that camp are building the bridge. They can’t stop working for two weeks.’

  Stewart pondered that one. ‘Well, they can go on working if they’re able, providing they don’t come into the town. They’ll be told to go from the camp to the work-site and back again. We’ll post notices telling other people to keep away from them.’

  ‘But what about provisions for the camp? What about medicines going in? What about the bodies being brought out for burial?’ asked the Duke. ‘The people who haven’t got cholera must eat – and we can’t leave bodies unburied.’

  The Provost had answers for these queries too. ‘We’ll send provision carts up for their truck-shop. There’s a man called Jopp in charge of some of the work and he’s not living in the camp, he’s up at Maddiston. He’s already been here offering to arrange for food to be sent in. He’s got something to do with supplying the truck-shop, apparently.’

  ‘But they don’t all use the truck-shop,’ protested Anstruther, who like the Duke was concerned for the welfare of the people penned up in the camp.

  ‘They’ll have to use it if there’s nothing else,’ said the Provost dismissively.

  ‘And the burials?’ persisted the Duke.

  Dr Stewart had that in hand. ‘A pit’s being dug in the Abbey grounds now. We’ll throw quicklime into it and all the dead will be brought down and put there within two hours of dying. We’ve also forbidden noisy funerals or great fuss. If possible, the bodies will be buried at night. We don’t want the townspeople upset: the less they know about this the better.’

  Colonel Anstruther leaned forward in his chair with a worried frown. ‘I’ve seen cholera in India – I know what it can do. This could be bad. By shutting sick and well people up together, we could be condemning a lot of them to death. And what about doctoring them? Who’s looking after the ones who’re sick? They don’t always die, you know.’

  Dr Stewart looked self-righteous. ‘I’ve my patients in the town to consider. There’s no way I can expose myself to such an infection. What if I brought it back to some innocent nursing mother or little child? Anyway, I’m led to believe that the young doctor who arrived in Maddiston a little while ago has gone into the camp. He’ll manage, I expect. The other practitioners in the district can stand by in case the infection spreads outside. If it does, it’s best that we’re fit and able to cope.’

  Most of the others made agreeing noises. Only the Duke and Anstruther kept silent. ‘That young doctor must be a brave fellow,’ was Anstruther’s eventual contribution.

  ‘Either that or a fool,’ snapped Stewart.

  * * *

  To the intense relief of Tibbie and her son-in-law, Hannah and her baby seemed slightly recovered by nightfall. After a period of squirming and squalling, during which she passed copious watery stools, Kate became very quiet, not even whimpering but lying cuddled in her mother’s arm with her eyes round and amazed as if she was seeing the world for the first time and was wondering about the beautiful things around her.

  Hannah was able to talk a little and Tim held her head up while her mother gave her whey to drink. ‘Ugh,’ she said when she tasted it. ‘You know I hate curds and whey.’

  But Tibbie persisted in pressing the drink on her. ‘It’s an old cure for fever. You must take it,’ she said. She was all the more insistent when her hand on Hannah’s brow told her that her daughter was still burning hot. The fever had not left her.

  At about midnight Dr Robertson and Sydney, both looking ghastly, came in for Tim and took him outside to whisper the latest news. ‘There’s been another ten deaths. It’s rampant. We’re taking the bodies down to the burying-ground now and we need helpers. Can you come?’

  Tim looked through the open door at the lamplit scene within. Tibbie was bending over Hannah who was preparing to sleep. The baby was also quiet. ‘I’ll come,’ he said.

  It was an horrific procession that made its way from the camp to the town that night. Pairs of men carrying makeshift stretchers with shrouded bodies lying on them walked in line down the main path of the camp beneath the light of a pale half-moon that swam in silver strands of drifting cloud. Owls hooted in the hedges which lined the road to the town, and surprised nocturnal animals scurried out of their way, for the men gave little warning of their approach. They were walking in silence and with measured treads.

  When they reached the town square it was deserted. Oil lamps bracketed to the walls cast pools of light into the darkest corners, but not even a cat was out to watch them pass. If there were eyes behind the black panes of glass in the windows, they kept out of sight and gave no sign. The terrible procession crossed the square and headed down the lane to the Abbey. A lamp had been left burning in a bracket above the burying-ground gate, and in the gravedigger’s hut the priest was waiting. When he heard the crunch of the boots of the first bearer-party on the gravel path, he stood up and came out.

  ‘It’s this way,’ he said and walked in
front, his white surplice fluttering round him like the robes of a ghost, leading them to a long, deep pit dug in a straight line beside the graveyard wall. The sharp smell of quicklime mixed with the strange sweetness of decay filled the air. One by one the stretcher-bearers tipped their burdens into the pit, and when all had been deposited, they grabbed the spades that were lying nearby and shovelled earth, mixed with more lime, on top. Then the priest asked the first bearers, ‘Who were they?’ They told him the names and he gabbled off a hurried litany of a series of pseudonyms; for Long Tom, The Music Man, Alfred-From-Hell, Lizzie who was Tom’s wife and their child Little Billy… He prayed to his God to receive their souls in heaven and grant them solace after the misery of their existences on earth. There was no certainty that the people he was sending on their way to God had been Roman Catholics, but at least he was prepared to say prayers over them. The other clergymen of the town stayed well away.

  Tim walked back to the camp after the hurried ceremony with the doctor and Sydney. He knew all of the men whom they had so unceremoniously buried, and also most of the women, and the lack of dignity that attended their end oppressed him. He glared at Sydney with his brows down. ‘Your kind wouldn’t bury their dogs like that,’ he snarled.

  Sydney was walking with his head bent and his hands shoved deep in his pockets. ‘I know,’ he agreed. ‘This is terrible – I can’t believe it’s happening.’

  The doctor told them, ‘It’s happening all right and it’s going to go on happening. God knows when this’ll end. I’m not a praying man but sometimes I wish I was. When I see people dying like that and I can’t do anything to help, I feel impotent!’ He stared at his companions from a face that resembled a skull, the eyes sunk deep in dark cavities.

  ‘You’ll have to sleep for a bit,’ said Sydney anxiously. ‘If you crack up we won’t have anyone to help us.’

  ‘Come into my house,’ said Tim. ‘I’ll make a bed for you on the floor. It’ll be quiet there. Hannah was sleeping when I came away.’

  Benjy’s was quiet. Tibbie lay asleep on a folded quilt at the side of Hannah’s bed. The stove glowed red and a soft stream of steam rose slowly from the spout of the kettle that sat on top of it. Tim led the staggering doctor in and whispered, ‘Lie down there by the stove. There’s plenty of blankets.’

  He then walked across to the bed where Hannah and the baby lay. Their eyes were closed and they both looked as if they were carved out of alabaster. ‘They’re going to be all right, aren’t they?’ he asked Robertson, who was laying himself down on the floor.

  ‘There’s a good chance, a good chance,’ was the drowsy reply. In a little while everyone but Tim was asleep. He stayed sitting up in the wooden chair by the window, staring at the sky, waiting for dawn and wondering what new horrors it would bring.

  In spite of his determination to stay awake, he fell asleep at about five in the morning but only slept for a short time before he was awakened by strange noises from the bed. It sounded as if Hannah was weeping and trying to call for help.

  In a panic he jumped from the chair and ran across the floor to her. ‘Hannah, Hannah, what is it?’

  Her eyes were staring and her face deathly pale. ‘It’s the baby, it’s the baby,’ she groaned. Little Kate was silently convulsing, then straightening and convulsing again, drawing her tiny knees up to her chest. Her face was contorted in agony. The clothes she was wearing and the blanket that wrapped her up were soaking wet, and when Tim lifted her he could see that she was excreting water in copious quantities. It did not seem possible that her small body could contain so much.

  The noise wakened Tibbie and Robertson, who ran to the bed as well. Robertson very gently held out his arms for little Kate and Tim placed her in them. When the first light of dawn came striking through the window, it showed him that his child’s face was blue. As he watched, the awful convulsing stopped and the little limbs seemed to go limp. The doctor bent his head and put his face against the baby’s. There were tears on his cheeks when he looked up at Tim and said, very softly, ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry… she’s dead.’

  Tim threw back his head and was about to yell when Tibbie put an urgent hand on his shoulder and hissed, ‘Hannah, Hannah.’

  His wife was lying on her side with her eyes fixed on the tableau in the middle of the floor. He walked across to her and leaned on the bedcovers. Oh God, they were soaking wet as well. Like Kate’s, Hannah’s life seemed to be seeping away. ‘Doctor Robertson’ll take care of Kate for a little while,’ he said. Behind him he heard Robertson going out of the house with the dead child.

  Hannah could not speak, for she too was beginning to writhe in agony – an agony far worse than she had experienced before. It was terrible to watch her. Tim sprawled on the wet bed beside her, trying to hold her down, and stroked the hair off her face as he whispered to her, ‘I love you, Hannah. I loved you from the first moment I saw you. Do you remember? You were standing in the doorway of your mother’s cottage and I rode past with Mr Wylie. Then I saw you at the dance with that French girl and I knew I was going to marry you. I love you. I love you. I love you…’ Over and over again he told her, while she gripped his hand so tight that it hurt.

  ‘Tim, ah Tim,’ was all she could say. Her face looked shrunken and very small. When her struggling grew a little less he felt Robertson’s hand on his shoulder. ‘Let me look at her,’ said the doctor’s voice. It did not take more than a couple of seconds before he was standing up again with a terrible look on his face. ‘These are rice-water stools,’ he said, indicating the mess on the sheets.

  Tim heard Tibbie give a convulsive sob and he stared at the doctor. ‘What do you mean?’ Hannah’s eyes were now closed, and though her limbs were still twitching, it was unlikely that she could hear them any longer.

  ‘It means she’s dying,’ said Robertson.

  Frantically they tried to help her. They forced liquid in between her parted lips, they chafed her hands and wiped her face but death had too strong a grip on her. An hour later, at seven o’clock in the morning, Hannah Maquire died.

  For several moments Tim stood still and very quiet in the middle of the floor when Robertson told him Hannah was dead. Then he threw back his head and gave a cry of such anguish that everyone in the room felt their blood chill at the sound of it. ‘Aw no, no, no, no,’ he cried. Tibbie held her apron up to her face and wept into it; Robertson dropped his head like a defeated man and turned to leave, but Tim grabbed his shoulder to prevent him going. ‘It’s not true – say she’s not dead! Do something,’ he shouted.

  Robertson did not turn and his voice was bleak and bitter as he spoke. ‘I can’t do anything. She is dead and so’s the baby. I put it in the empty shed where the bodies are being collected. I’ll have to go. There are others…’

  Like a madman, Tim Maquire ran out of the house to the charnel-shed and found little Kate, who was lying on a bench near the door. Holding her in his arms and pushing people out of his way he went running back to Benjy’s and laid the child beside her mother. ‘There’s your baby, my darling,’ he told the body of his wife. ‘Hold on to each other. Oh my God, I can’t believe this. I can’t believe it.’ He sank to his knees by the bedside and buried his face in the foul and tumbled covers. Tibbie, weeping and grief-stricken herself, did not know how to help him. Timidly she laid a hand on his shaking shoulders and knelt beside him and they stayed like that, weeping together, for a long time.

  At last he rose and pulled on his jacket. ‘I’m going to get her a proper coffin. She’s not going to be thrown into a pit wrapped in an old sheet like those poor souls last night,’ he told the sobbing Tibbie.

  At the camp gate, the two men on guard to prevent anyone going out and spreading the infection tried to stop him, but he pushed them each in the chest with his outspread hands and they went reeling away. He did not go to Rosewell but to Camptounfoot, to the man who had provided the coffin for Christopher Wylie. Jo was in his workroom on the first floor when he heard a terribl
e hammering at the lower door and stuck his head out of the window to ask, ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Hannah’s dead. And so’s our baby. I want a coffin for them,’ shouted a man’s voice.

  Jo recognised Hannah Mather’s husband and ran downstairs. There was genuine shock and horror on his face when he opened the door and exclaimed, ‘Hannah’s never dead! Not bonny Hannah!’

  ‘I want a coffin big enough for them both. I want her to be buried with her baby,’ said Tim.

  Jo could see that he was half-mad with grief and hauled him inside. ‘Sit down there a minute,’ he said. ‘I’ve got one that’ll do. Is she in the camp? Have you got a cart to carry it?’

  ‘No.’ Tim ran a hand over his bare head in confusion.

  Jo pushed him in the direction of William’s house. ‘Her uncle’s next door in the smiddy. He’s got a pony and cart and he’ll lend it to you.’

  When William was told about his niece’s death he reeled and put a hand against the smiddy door to support himself. ‘Oh my God, poor Tibbie. That lassie was all she lived for. Of course I’ll give you my cart. I’ll come with you, too. Somebody’ll have to bring Tibbie home.’

  ‘They’ll not let you into the camp because of the cholera,’ said Tim. ‘Just lend me the cart.’

  Everything was done in a great hurry, and in less than an hour Tim was back at the gate, standing up in the cart and driving on the fat pony like a charioteer. Again the men on guard knew better than to try to stop him, for he would run them down beneath the cart-wheels.

  When he entered Benjy’s again Tibbie had washed Hannah and Kate and dressed them in clean clothes. The foul bedding was bundled up in a corner. Hannah and her child looked beautiful and peaceful, all traces of their terrible agonies erased by death. Tibbie had combed out her daughter’s lovely hair and it was tied in a loose knot on the top of her head. Kate, looking as if she were asleep, was cuddled into her mother’s breast. Tibbie turned to Tim and wordlessly pointed at the bed to show what she had done. He stood in the doorway and stared. Then he groaned in renewed agony, ‘Oh Hannah! Oh Hannah, how can you go away and leave me?’