The Devil's Breath

by Tessa Harris

  “That is good,” he said. “You look well, despite this wretched fog that afflicts us all.”

  There was an awkward pause as he waited for an invitation into her cottage, but it was not forthcoming. She shifted her legs under the weight of the basket, yet still he did not take his leave.

  Her lips are the color of raspberries, he thought. He stretched his mouth into a smile. How could he tell her that he was the one who was lonely and lost? He was the one who should be dispensing wisdom and charity and God’s love, but his basket was empty, too. Without Margaret he had nothing; was nothing. And all he did now, day after day, was commit people to their graves.

  “I came to see how you fared in the light of Lady Thorndike’s unfortunate fate,” he told her finally.

  “Lady Thorndike?”

  The vicar nodded. “You have not heard?”

  “I heard she had been taken, sir,” she replied. The fog seemed not to care to look at the cut of a man’s clothes before it struck, she thought to herself.

  But the clergyman lifted his eyes heavenward. “So you did not hear they are saying she was murdered?”

  Susannah’s hand flew up to her neck in surprise. She had caught idle snatches of gossip in Brandwick, but had not tarried to talk.

  “Found by the lake, she was. This was her reward for venturing out in the fog,” he told her, adding sagely, “We live in dark and dangerous times. You must keep your door bolted.”

  She noted his warning with a nod. “Indeed I shall, sir,” she replied emphatically. A murderer, she thought to herself. How glad she was of the knife-grinder’s presence in her home. He would see to it that she was safe.

  There was another awkward pause before the vicar waved his cane nonchalantly. “I shall bid you good day, then, Mistress Kidd,” he said finally.

  She nodded. “Good day, sir.”

  He turned and strode purposefully toward the dogcart. Bothered by the flies, the pony was lifting its legs and swishing its tail in a strange dance. He glanced back to see her gazing at him serenely as he mounted the seat. On reflection it was a relief that she had not invited him inside, he told himself. She had not been able to tempt him. He tugged on the reins and his pony moved off, back toward St. Swithin’s and yet another burial.

  Chapter 29

  Thomas and Lydia were in the library, making plans to transport the sick and elderly to the caves. They had outlined their proposal in a letter to Sir John only the day before and he had responded immediately. He had also lost ten men in as many days and was anxious to do everything in his power to save anyone he could.

  Despite the fact that the caves had not been used since Sir Francis Dashwood’s death, they were still safe and the temperature inside was ambient. He could supply blankets, food, and drink. There was much to discuss regarding the organization of patients. Lydia was animated. Thomas had rarely seen her so energized. She had looked at the records of all those living in the tithe cottages on the estate and had drawn up a list of twenty-three. Some Thomas had treated in the past so he was familiar with their medical complications; others, who Lydia assured him were particularly vulnerable, were new to him.

  “You have worked well,” Thomas told her.

  She gave a little shrug and sighed. “I only wish I could do more. These are just the people at Boughton,” she said, waving her hand at the list. Then, as if a kernel of an idea had suddenly planted itself in her mind, she said after a moment: “I will do more.”

  Thomas perched on the desk, facing her. “What do you mean?”

  She looked at him with bright eyes. “I want to look after the patients who go into the caves.”

  At first Thomas thought she was playing with him and smiled, but she returned a serious enough look and he soon realized his mistake.

  “I do not jest,” she told him firmly. Seeing the sudden ardor in her eyes, he did not doubt it. “I want to help nurse them. If I cannot care for my son, at least let me care for others.”

  Thomas understood he had touched a raw nerve. She was still smarting from the disappointment of their London trip. She had said little, but he knew there was a simmering sorrow inside her. He took her hands in his. They were so small and delicate and clean. Those hands had never scrubbed steps, nor laid fires. Then he thought of the caves. They may offer a refuge to those with physical weaknesses, but surely no one would spend their days in the sunless confines there through choice?

  “It will be dark. Cold.”

  Lydia’s look hardened. “But you will need people to help care for the sick, women with commitment and compassion.”

  “Women like you?”

  Lydia sensed victory. “Until the poisonous clouds lift, those tunnels and caverns are probably safer than anywhere else in the fog’s clutches,” she persisted.

  The doctor shook his head, then smiled in his defeat. “You will make a fine nurse,” he said and he kissed her fingers.

  “Yes,” she said triumphantly. “I will.”

  Thomas walked over to the window. The leaden sky remained unchanged and the tops of the hills were still smudges in the distance. But out of the corner of his eye he could see something moving. He turned his head to the left and adjusted his gaze to the outbuildings a few yards away. A column of gray smoke was rising straight up into the still air. It was too thick and too near to be a bonfire. Rushing over to the spiral staircase that led to the upper floor of the library, he climbed up for a better view.

  “What is it?” urged Lydia, rising from the desk. “What have you seen?”

  Looking out of the top window Thomas surveyed the slate gray rooftops of the granary and the dairy and the game larder. The smoke was darker now. And then he saw the flames.

  “The stables are on fire!” he cried.

  Running down the stairs he called to Lydia. “Raise the alarm. I must hurry.”

  As soon as he opened the back door he could hear the bellowing of the horses. The air smelled different; no longer of rotten eggs but of burning timber and straw. He continued to run. Someone rang the fire bell. He was joined by others—Howard and Hannah Lovelock. People began to shout. He could hear the crackle of the flames now. One of the stable lads was trying to steady a terrified mare as she reared and bucked in the yard.

  Through the haze of smoke, he could make out Will Lovelock, a beater in his hand, frantically pounding away at a flaming hay bale inside the stable. He rushed in and looked around. Jacob Lovelock was struggling with another terrified horse, trying to throw a sack over its head so that he could lead it to safety.

  Flames were licking at the beams overhead. “Get out of there, Lovelock!” screamed Thomas, but still he struggled with the horse until, a second later, he had the sack over its head and tried to drag her out of the door. Thomas grabbed the bridle, pulling frantically, and the mare began to move.

  The heat was starting to sting his hands and face. He heard a loud crack and looked up. Overhead the flames had caught hold of a rafter and a flaming shard of wood broke off and fell two or three feet away. The horse jerked, but Thomas kept a firm hold until a moment later both he and Lovelock were out in the yard.

  By now four or five men had formed a human chain and were passing buckets of water from the yard pump. Soon they managed to get the fire under control. The flames spluttered and hissed like retreating snakes and in less than half an hour only smoking embers remained.

  Thomas drew the back of his hand across his forehead. His face was covered with smuts and his mouth felt as though it was lined with ash. The men gathered around him like soldiers waiting for orders. They, too, were caked in soot and their hair was gray with ash.

  “Is everyone accounted for?” asked Thomas. The men glanced around, their eyes red and streaming. Their looks darted from one to another, each making mental notes. It was Jacob Lovelock who was the first to realize.

  “Mr. Lawson is not here, Dr. Silkstone.”

  “Does anyone know where Mr. Lawson is?” asked Thomas. There were garbled voices and m
uted grunts until Will Lovelock stepped forward.

  “I saw him, sir. He was in there earlier.” The boy pointed a scrawny finger at the blackened building behind him. “But I shouted out as soon as I saw the smoke and I couldn’t see him, sir. There was no one in there, I swear.”

  Thomas sighed with relief. “Thank God for that. And the horses are safe?”

  “Yes, sir,” chorused two of the men.

  “Then we must be grateful,” he said, turning toward the stable door. A beam, as black as coal, had fallen across the threshold and he stepped over it to inspect the damage. The flames had licked at some of the nearest stalls, but as far as he could tell, the furthest ones had escaped relatively unscathed. He looked up at the ceiling. Some of the blackened roof timbers had cracked and splintered and would need replacing, but they seemed sound enough for the time being. He stepped over a pile of charred wood, picking his way toward the far end, inspecting each stall as he went.

  Quick thinking on the part of Will Lovelock and his father meant that the damage was far less severe than he feared. Metal bars had blistered and buckled and beams and joists needed repairing, but with the help of a joiner and a farrier, the stable could be serviceable again within the week. Yet he wondered how the fire had started. He glanced into the yard at the brazier, a few feet away. It was glowing white; the coals crumbling and flaky. A spark must have flared and ignited the tinder-dry hay. In fact everything was so parched that anything in this intense heat could have sparked the blaze, he told himself.

  Having reached the penultimate stall Thomas was satisfied that the block was empty. He was just about to turn back to the door when he saw what looked like the heel of a leather boot. A wooden crate, blackened but not burned, stood in his way. He kicked it to one side and moved forward. There, lying facedown in the hay, was a man. Reaching down, he felt his neck for a pulse. There was none. It was then that he turned the body over to confirm what he feared. It was Gabriel Lawson.

  They carried the corpse to the game larder and laid it on the slab. Lawson’s coat was dirty with cinders and ash, but mercifully the fire had not touched him. In medieval times in Europe, Thomas had read that friends of condemned heretics used to bribe the executioner to place a sticky brick of poison in among the faggots near the heels. When ignited, deadly fumes were released that killed on inhalation, saving the prisoner the terror of the fire. Thankfully, it seemed that Lawson had been spared the flames. Smoke inhalation must have killed him, thought Thomas. He would have breathed in fumes which would have caused pulmonary irritation and swelling. His suffering would have been short-lived.

  Word would be sent to Sir Theodisius, but he did not anticipate his coming. The Oxfordshire coroner had informed the magistrate of Thomas’s findings on Lady Thorndike. The steward’s death, however, appeared much more straightforward. The fog had indirectly claimed another victim. There was no need for an autopsy. Thomas would simply give the body a cursory examination then release it for burial.

  In the undignified surroundings of the game larder, Thomas stood over Lawson’s corpse. He imagined his trachea and bronchial tubes as black, sooty passages. The lungs, stripped of soothing mucus, would be raw and inflamed. Death would have been relatively quick; there would have been a degree of burning in the nostrils and mouth as Lawson gulped for air. This would have been followed by an intense pain in his chest as he struggled to breathe. However, such agony would have lasted only seconds and unconsciousness, due to asphyxiation and possibly poisoning, would have followed. He recalled an ancient form of execution whereby a criminal was shut in a bathing room with smoldering coals. He had not found Lawson an agreeable character, but he would never have wished this death on his worst enemy.

  So, he would be spared the knife. Thomas would simply give him a superficial examination, beginning with the head. The unkempt curls were full of ash and soot. With his fingers he probed the skull underneath. The ridges of the temporal and parietal lobes seemed in order, but it was when he turned the corpse over, just as he had done with Lady Thorndike, that he found an anomaly. Once more, there was a large swelling on the occipital lobe. Thomas’s heart began to race. He parted the hair. The skin was not broken, but there was a massive contusion. Lawson, it seemed, had been struck a blow to the back of his head.

  Taking out his magnifying glass from its case, Thomas inspected the wound more closely. There they were again: those odd flakes around the wound. He retrieved one of them with his tweezers and looked at it closely under his glass. Could it be part of a desiccated leaf? he asked himself. He sniffed it and, to his amazement, he detected the faint whiff of rosemary.

  Hurrying out into the yard, Thomas marched over to the burned-out stable. Climbing over the beam by the door he edged his way to the farthest stall once more, stepping over a metal pail and a leather nose bag. A number of tools hung on the end wall—hoof picks, rakes, brooms, and a long-handled shovel with a wide, flat blade. Any one of them could have been the murder weapon and now that they were all covered in a thin film of ash, there was no way he could be sure which, if any, was used to execute Lawson.

  From one of the back doorways he heard a noise and looked up to see Lydia standing outside, huddled in her shawl, holding a corner of it over her mouth. She was surveying the devastation. Thomas called to her.

  “You should not be here. ’Tis dangerous.”

  She took no notice and remained rooted to the spot, gazing all around at the blackened beams and charred roof timbers. He made his way back along the cobbles to join her. His eyes were smarting and his throat was dry.

  “Lovelock told me about Mr. Lawson,” she said, her voice catching in the gritty air.

  Thomas climbed over the beam and back out into the yard. “Lovelock does not know the half of it,” he muttered, his gaze directed to the stone cobbles.

  Lydia frowned. “What is it, Thomas? What are you looking for?”

  “This!” he cried, suddenly bending low and picking up a charred branch. What was left of it was about a foot long and was completely blackened at one end. “Now what do you suppose this oak branch was doing lying on the stable floor?” he asked.

  She was growing impatient. “I have no idea,” she snapped. “What is this all about?”

  He lifted his eyes from the piece of wood, but remained holding it, almost triumphantly. “This,” he croaked, “is what was used to start the fire. It was ignited in the brazier over there.”

  Lydia swallowed hard. “You mean to tell me that this fire was no accident? It was started deliberately?”

  Thomas nodded slowly, allowing her to digest what she had just been told. “Then, Mr. Lawson . . .” Her voice trailed off.

  “I am afraid we are dealing with not only an arsonist, but a murderer, too,” said Thomas. “Mr. Lawson was hit from behind. It may not have been a fatal blow, but it rendered him unconscious and led to his death from smoke inhalation.”

  Just then a cart rattled into the yard carrying a pile of sacks. Three men jumped down. One carried an ax, the other two shovels. They headed toward the stable block door. Ned Perkins was among them. He tipped his hat to Lydia.

  “Did Lawson have any enemies among the laborers?” asked Thomas as he watched two of the workers shift the beam that blocked the door. He was recalling the steward’s account of the men’s reluctance to work in the fields while the fog persisted.

  Lydia shook her head. “He was not liked, but . . .” She broke off suddenly, remembering Lawson’s words in the study about the troublemaker. Thomas was already ahead of her. She looked at him with wide eyes. “Joshua Pike,” she said.

  That night the storms began. Thomas had noted earlier in the day that the needle of the barometer had dropped. The air felt even more oppressive. The temperature had risen slightly and there was a moisture in the atmosphere that had not been present for many days.

  The first low growl of thunder was heard shortly after eleven o’clock. It rumbled and rolled in the far distance somewhere toward Oxford and le
ss than an hour later it unleashed its full fury on Boughton. The violence of the sudden crash set the house dogs barking and the cockerels crowing in the barnyard. Those in the household who had retired to their beds were woken and the maids who shared a room huddled close to each other, fearing the roof might cave in.

  Thomas crept into Lydia’s bedchamber, as he did most nights, to find her staring out of the window. She seemed transfixed by the storm, watching the intermittent forks of lightning zigzag across the black sky, illuminating the ground below. The claps of thunder were so loud the glass in the leaded panes rattled. He padded across the floor and put his arms around her waist. She settled her hands on his. Still gazing out she asked, “Could it be that the Day of Judgment is coming?” Her voice was calm.

  Thomas shook his head. “No, of course not. ’Tis just a bad storm. It will pass and the world shall remain.”

  Lydia did not seem entirely reassured. “But the people are afraid,” she replied. “Eliza says they are praying in the streets and some have even asked the Reverend Lightfoot to perform exorcisms. They think the devil is in our midst.”

  Outside the hail began pelting from the sky. Stones the size of musket shot hit the window hard and covered the ground within seconds. And still the thunder crashed overhead, only now it came every few seconds.

  Lydia lifted his hand and pressed it to her cheek. “At least if the world does end,” she whispered, “we shall die together.”

  Not a mile away, in Amos Kidd’s cottage, another young woman was being kept awake by the violent storm. She tossed and turned in her bed for a while, then rose to stand at the window and watch the lightning tear across the heavens. A few seconds later, the bedroom door creaked open.

  “Are you afeared?” a man’s voice asked behind her.

  She did not turn, but remained facing the window. “No,” she replied softly. “ ’Tis a wonderful show. Maybe ’tis like the firework displays in London I heard of.”