by Alys Clare
‘Now then,’ said Judyth. ‘Delightful as it is to see you, I sense that there’s something you want?’
‘Celia tells me she came to see you recently,’ I began.
Judyth nodded. ‘She did. She looks well, Gabriel.’
‘Yes. She begins, I think, to put the recent past behind her.’
‘She has courage and determination,’ Judyth said. ‘Both of which will help.’ She studied me. ‘But you’re not here to talk about your sister, are you?’
‘No, not really.’ I took a mouthful of the cordial. ‘She told me you were preparing potions the day she came here.’
‘As indeed I am doing today,’ she agreed. ‘It’s the season, Doctor. Everything in my garden is giving of its best, and I need to capture the essences while I can.’
‘Yes. I think, too, you’ve been working with plants that do not grow in your garden. Mandragora, for example.’
‘I have,’ she said. ‘A consignment of that and other plants arrived from the Mediterranean two weeks ago. I have purchased many items, and with them I am in the process of replenishing supplies of my stock remedies.’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘Do you require a strong soporific?’
‘I do.’
She didn’t speak for a moment or two. Then she said, ‘I know it’s not for me to warn you, and I’m sure you’ve used such a potion before and know its dangers, but the inclusion of mandragora among the ingredients makes powerful medicine, Gabriel.’
‘I understand,’ I replied. ‘I have used mandragora, usually mixed with poppy, and sometimes such substances as henbane, hemlock and even lettuce and ivy when there was nothing else.’
‘How do you use it?’ she asked.
For a moment we were two professionals, discussing our work. It was a deeply gratifying experience. I would like to say I was temporarily unaware of how attractive she was and of how her presence so close beside me was making my heart beat faster, but I’d be lying.
‘I blend the juices of the various plants and then dip in pieces of sponge to soak it up,’ I said. ‘I dry the sponges and store them, then when a soporific is needed, wetting a piece of sponge revives the potency of the juice and the resulting fumes usually succeed in making the patient insensate.’
She was listening intently. ‘You do not fear that unconsciousness will slip into death?’
‘Of course. It’s very difficult to achieve the correct strength, and patients differ in their tolerance of the narcotic.’
‘Yet still you risk it?’
‘I haven’t used it since I left the sea,’ I said quietly. ‘In my previous life, I frequently treated injuries so terrible that men would cry out to me to end their life and their agony. In such cases, worrying about whether my soporific would be a little too powerful wasn’t the first concern.’
‘I see,’ she said. Then, very quietly: ‘I didn’t mean to sound as if I was criticizing you.’
‘No, I know.’
‘So, why, if I may ask, do you now require mandragora?’
I paused. I thought about it, questioned myself, then decided there was no reason not to tell her. ‘It’s for a couple of dogs.’
She started to laugh, and the sudden easing of the tension made me join in.
‘Dogs,’ she repeated.
‘Very big ones.’
‘You plan to perform some surgical procedure?’
Looking at her, seeing the laughter still dancing in her eyes, I was aware she knew full well I wasn’t planning any such thing.
‘No, Judyth. I need to put them to sleep.’
‘And I don’t suppose for a moment that you’re going to tell me why.’
‘I would,’ I said swiftly, ‘but it’s not really my secret.’ And besides, I could have added, I don’t really know.
She smiled, and I knew she understood.
She got to her feet. ‘Come into my still room,’ she said, ‘which, as no doubt you’ve observed, is an elegant name for that little lean-to, and I’ll decant some of my preparation for you.’
The still room was cool and the fragrances and scents within so strong that I felt my head reel. Judyth took a stoneware jar down from a dark shelf high up under the roof and took it to her workbench. As she poured some of the mixture into a small bottle, she told me how much to use.
‘You don’t want to kill these very large dogs, do you?’
‘No, of course not.’
‘Then I’d advise no more than four drops. You’re going to use meat as the carrier?’
‘I thought so, yes.’
‘Not fresh meat,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘better something that’s on the turn and with a strong smell. But of course you’ll have thought of that.’ She considered, her head on one side, looking down at the bottle in her hand. ‘Maybe five drops, if these dogs really are big.’ She met my eyes. ‘I’d hate to think of one or both of them waking up too soon and taking a chunk out of you.’
‘So would I,’ I muttered.
She handed me the little bottle. She was still looking at me, her expression very serious. ‘I’ve never given this remedy to any other healer, midwife, barber surgeon or physician,’ she said gravely. ‘It is potentially lethal, Gabriel.’
I took it from her. ‘I know, Judyth,’ I said gently. ‘I’ll be very careful, you have my word.’
She went on looking at me for a moment. Then, nodding, she turned away.
Back at Rosewyke, I couldn’t stop thinking that we were in late June, when the days are longest and people tend to stay up late into the night, the urge to sleep postponed by the endless twilight, and that there couldn’t have been a worse time to plan a secret night-time mission. Nevertheless, I took the precaution of slipping into the pantry when Sallie wasn’t looking and removing two big slabs of belly pork from the platter-full that she’d set aside for salting. I put them out on a window ledge in the full sun and let the heat do its work.
Late in the afternoon, however, clouds started to build up in the south-west. At first they were big, white, fluffy and innocent-looking. Blown in off the sea, however, they held moisture. Then the wind veered right round, but still the clouds – turning dark and sinister now – continued their steady progression. They were driving up against the wind, a sure sign that a storm was on its way.
I asked Sallie to serve me an early supper, muttered a remark to Celia about going to discuss something with Jonathan – the truth, if not the whole truth – and, collecting my old black cloak, set off as the first drops were falling. Celia, intent on a complicated and very beautiful piece of embroidery, took little notice but to question my sanity. Sallie was already tucked up in her room. She hates storms and has been known to hide under the big table in the kitchen when thunder rolls over us. Samuel was scurrying towards the yard as I left the house, and I nodded to him and called out, ‘Terrible weather!’
I had decided to walk down to the village. If I wanted to be unobtrusive, it made no sense to ride my big black horse. My boots were of good leather, well greased against the wet, so at least my feet would stay dry.
By the time I was huddling against the old stone wall of Jonathan’s cottage, banging on the low oak door, my feet were about the only part of me that were dry. But the night was warm, and the hard walk, added to the thrill of the mission, had set my heart pounding. I was sweating, and glad that I was wearing only a shirt and breeches under the cloak.
Jonathan opened the door, recognized me with a faintly surprised glance, then quickly ushered me inside and shut the door again. The faint light from within had spilled out for no more than a few moments. Had anyone been watching – and why should they? – they would barely have noticed, and I’m sure they wouldn’t have identified the vicar’s visitor.
We stood in Jonathan’s comfortable little room. ‘I think I know why you’re here,’ he said with a half-smile.
‘It’s a very dark night and there’s a storm,’ I replied. ‘Both factors will make people keep indoors.’
He nodded. ‘Not do
gs, however. Well,’ he amended, ‘a dog with any sense would stay in its kennel this evening, but I don’t imagine Farmer Haydon’s mastiffs are given that option.’
‘Neither do I.’ I reached beneath my cloak and took out a cloth bag. ‘I’ve brought some meat,’ I said. ‘It was sitting on a sunny window ledge for some time earlier today, as no doubt you can detect.’ The smell was, indeed, quite ripe.
‘Irresistible to a pair of large, under-fed dogs,’ Jonathan observed.
‘So I’m hoping.’ I delved inside the purse on my belt and extracted Judyth’s little bottle. ‘And this, I’m also hoping, will lay them out.’
For a moment doubt crossed the vicar’s face, but he banished it. ‘Thank you, Gabriel,’ he said. ‘I have a length of rope.’ He crossed the room to the coat hooks beside the door, taking from one of them a bulky coil of fine rope. He handed it to me, then removed a dark cloak similar to mine, wrapped it round him and picked up a horn lantern, handing a second one to me. Then he met my eyes. ‘I don’t think there’s anything to gain by waiting,’ he said. ‘Shall we go?’
I nodded.
He set off down a narrow path that led away behind the church and took us on a roundabout route to the track that encircled the bulge of Rogeus Haydon’s land. It would have been half the distance if we’d gone straight through the village, but that would have meant passing several houses and an inn. As it was, we arrived at the stretch of track that passed closest to Foxy Dell without having seen a soul.
Jonathan peered in beneath the trees. ‘Is it worth going straight in and hoping the dogs won’t hear us?’ he asked in a low voice.
I was just about to say I didn’t think so when his question was answered far more emphatically. There was the sound of something large hurtling through undergrowth, a deep-throated growl, one sharp bark, and then the horrifying shape of a wide-eyed, muscular and very large black dog came bursting through the trees some fifty paces away.
I had the meat ready and now, trying to keep my hands steady, I took the stopper from the bottle with my teeth and allowed four drops to fall onto the first piece. Guessing that the fumes from the freshly administered potion might well act on the dogs even before they’d gulped down the meat and ingested the drug, I hadn’t wanted to treat it until the very last moment. Now, with several stone of very angry dog racing towards us, I wished I had done. The bottle was still in my hand, so I added a fifth drop.
Then I flung the piece of meat at the dog.
You could see its dilemma in its eyes. Its purpose in Farmer Haydon’s household was to patrol his boundaries and repel intruders, as savagely as it liked. To this end, I didn’t doubt, the farmer kept it penned up in some filthy kennel when it wasn’t on guard duty and only gave it food when he really had to. Now the dog was out among the sweet and intensified scents and smells of a warm, rainy night, doing what it did best, and, as if that wasn’t enough, someone had just thrown it a big slice of slightly rancid and powerfully pungent meat.
You couldn’t blame the dog. Even as the pork flew through the air towards it, I’m sure it had already decided. It made a very agile, twisting leap – extraordinary in such a large dog – and its jaws closed on the meat before either meat or dog had a chance to hit the ground.
I thought at first, for a few awful moments, that the mandragora potion wasn’t as strong as Judyth had claimed, that she’d made it all wrong, that I hadn’t used enough: in short, that it wasn’t going to work. The dog was slavering and slobbering, gulping at the meat as if it hadn’t eaten in living memory, and already half of it had disappeared down its gaping throat. And, as if that wasn’t cause enough for grave anxiety, now there came the sound of distant barking swiftly becoming louder: the other dog was on his way.
Jonathan grabbed hold of my arm and said, ‘We should go! It’s far too dangerous to stay if—’
But just then, with no warning whatsoever, the first dog collapsed. Just like that. It was as if all strength in its legs had suddenly gone, so that it fell on its knees and then, quite gently, rolled onto its side. Its eyelids drooped, then closed. Its jaws, at first still feebly working, became motionless.
The other dog was almost upon us. I did exactly what I’d done before, and laced the second piece of meat with five drops of Judyth’s potion. The dog had stopped barking and, head down, he was aiming straight for us like a cannonball on a flat trajectory. I had a moment of misgiving – this one’s brighter and he’s not going to be seduced into taking the bait – but I threw the meat anyway. The dog saw it, watched it arch closer.
And came on.
But then some blessed little snake of a scent trail must have reached its flaring nostrils. It turned its head – so quickly that I was surprised it didn’t damage its thick neck – and fell on the pork.
This time, the mandragora worked even more rapidly. The second dog was slightly smaller and, besides, I thought it had inhaled more of the fumes. Just as its companion had done, it subsided into a still, silent heap on the wet grass.
Jonathan had the rope ready. He looped one end through the first dog’s collar, tying it very firmly. I almost offered to check the knot for him since I know a bit about such matters, but decided he wouldn’t have welcomed the interference. Then, swiftly, he wrapped the long tail of the rope round the trunk of the nearest tree, again tying a solid-looking knot. The second dog was closer to the tree, and in no time Jonathan had fastened the rope to its collar. Straightening up, he turned to me. ‘How long will they stay asleep?’
‘I can’t say precisely,’ I said. I’d once known a large sailor stay unconscious for the best part of three days when I’d given him mandragora, but that had been an extreme case (I’d had to remove a piece of jagged timber blasted off the ship’s deck from the side of his head, relocate his jawbone and sew up quite a lot of his face, and when he finally woke up the pain was so excruciating that he begged me to put him out again). ‘Long enough.’ I hope, I might have added.
Jonathan nodded. ‘Come on, then.’
He slipped in between the trees and into the dell, and I was right behind him.
The deep dell was some twenty paces across, steep-sided, enclosed by deciduous trees in the full glory of their summer foliage, their branches reaching out to join up over our heads. It was safe for Jonathan to strike a flint and put a flame to our lanterns. The soft golden glow illumined the dell and, under any other circumstances, would have made it a place of enchantment. But even under the present circumstances it wasn’t too bad. The storm had moved off, the thunder now grumbling away up over the moors, and, although it was still raining lightly, the trees protected us.
I stared around me. ‘You know, I presume, what you’re looking for?’ I asked. Jonathan nodded briefly. He was clearly preoccupied. ‘Hadn’t you better tell me so I can help in the search?’ I added mildly.
He gave a tsck of irritation, but I knew it was with himself and not me. ‘Sorry,’ he muttered. ‘The lads said they’d found jewels, and—’
‘Jonathan, we’ve already agreed they did no such thing!’ I protested. ‘You surely can’t believe that—’
‘Be quiet and listen!’ Jonathan said in a sort of suppressed shout. ‘We’re looking for something that two unsophisticated village lads might have mistaken for jewels.’ He was already peering at a portion of the steep bank beneath a beech tree, reaching down to investigate a hollow where some animal, fox or badger, had been digging.
There didn’t seem any option but to copy him.
We worked our way slowly around the circumference of the dell. There were many holes and dips, some deeper than others, and it was clear that a variety of wildlife used the spot. Some of the excavations looked recent, some had vegetation growing around the openings and clearly hadn’t been used for years.
Then I came to a place where something had been digging vigorously and, from the sight and the smell of fresh-turned earth, within the last two or three weeks. It looked as if there had been a depression in the side of the
bank – it was very steep just there and a series of hollows undermined a big old beech tree whose roots were exposed – and the soil was soft and easy to dig. Whatever – whoever? – had been digging had apparently enlarged the entrance to the pit, or tunnel, although for what purpose I had no idea.
But it was worth investigating.
I began to shovel earth away with my hand. Almost immediately I felt a sharp pain, as if a thorn had been driven into the soft flesh on the side of my palm. Turning to catch more of the light from the lantern, I tried to see what I’d done. The wound was full of earth, so I bent down and washed it on the wet grass. The cut was bleeding profusely – good, that’ll clean it, I thought – but it was shallow and wouldn’t need stitching. I took off the kerchief I’d tied inside my collar to stop the rain dripping down my neck and wrapped up my hand, tying the fabric tightly.
I noticed that Jonathan was looking at me, his eyes wide, his expression frozen. ‘It’s all right, it’s not serious,’ I said. ‘Not a bad cut, merely a lot of blood.’
He didn’t answer. I noticed then that in fact it wasn’t me and my wounded hand that he was staring at so fixedly.
It was something beyond me, on the slope at the foot of the bank beneath the hole I’d just been enlarging.
And, as I looked down, I saw it too.
The light from the lantern was shining out brightly, catching on what lay there on top of the reddish earth and sparking from it the most beautiful array of colours: red, blue, violet, yellow, green.
Jonathan and I dropped to our knees.
In that entranced moment, it really did look as if a secret hoard of jewels had tumbled out of its hiding place. As if rubies, sapphires, amethysts, citrine and emeralds were spread out, ours for the taking.
Jonathan was first to recover. Straightening up, he proceeded to continue what I and my unknown predecessor, animal or human, had begun, reaching inside the hollow and pushing aside the earth, swiftly and with no care for the possibility of cutting himself as I had done. I was about to issue a warning, but then I saw what he was uncovering.
